The most powerful Mac goes on sale. It almost beat Nvidia's best card in Blender

  • Mac Studio with the M5 Ultra chip appeared in the Blender Open Data database with a score of 15,350 points
  • It beats the RTX 5080 by approximately 69%, and trails the most powerful RTX 5090 by about 4%
  • In the Czech Republic, the configuration with 80-core graphics costs 193,990 CZK

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Jakub Kárník
Jakub Kárník
23. 9. 2026 10:30
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The new Apple Mac Studio officially goes on sale today, and the first benchmark numbers are already out. In the Blender Open Data database, which measures performance in rendering 3D scenes, the version with the M5 Ultra chip and 80-core graphics scored 15,350 points. This result in this test is close to the most powerful gaming card available today.

Double its predecessor

Compared to the previous Mac Studio with M3 Ultra, which achieves around 7,234 points in Blender, this is more than a twofold leap. The M5 Ultra is actually a pair of M5 Max chips connected into one. The result reflects this: the M5 Max alone scores roughly 8,112 points, so doubling the graphics brought almost double the performance. This is not a given when combining chips.

Nvidia still leads

The GeForce RTX 5080 card averages around 9,100 points in Blender, making the M5 Ultra roughly 69% faster. The flagship RTX 5090, with approximately 16,000 points, remains ahead, by only about 4%. The context is important: Blender primarily tests rendering, and Apple runs it via the Metal interface, while Nvidia uses CUDA and OptiX. In games or when training AI models, the difference could be entirely different. Apple, on the other hand, has an ace up its sleeve in terms of memory: Mac Studio offers up to 512 GB of unified memory, which the graphics can fully utilize, whereas the RTX 5090 has 32 GB.

What’s the price of admission

The Mac Studio with M5 Ultra starts in the Czech Republic at 154,990 CZK for the version with a 30-core processor, 64-core graphics, and 96 GB of memory. The tested configuration with a 36-core processor and 80-core graphics costs 193,990 CZK. This is not cheap, but an adequate setup with an RTX 5090 doesn’t come out much cheaper today due to expensive graphics cards and memory. Additionally, the Mac Studio occupies a cube on the desk with sides less than 20 centimeters.

Would you trade a gaming PC with an RTX 5090 for a Mac Studio?

Source: Notebookcheck, Blender Open Data, Applemagazin, Macworld

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Jakub Kárník

Jakub is known for his endless curiosity and passion for the latest technologies. His love for mobile phones started with an iPhone 3G, but nowadays… More about the author

Jakub Kárník
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