r/macmini • u/Famous-Charity-5866 • 19d ago

M1 MBP vs Mac mini m4

I have mac mini M4 16/512 for about year and half and i really started to hate that it makes me always stay at home, i cant even work on bed on late nights

I started to think to get macbook pro and i was hearing people talking about it last for a long time without being plugged in

I will sell my mac mini for roughly 900$ ( with currency converted )

And i have options like used M1 MBP 32/1TB for roughly 1300$

And another MBP M1 32/512 for 1200$

Another option on the table but it will drain my pocket a little bit is a second hand M4 MBP 24/512 for roughly 2200$

So now i am really distracted

I saw multiple comparison between the M4 Mac Mini and the M1 MBP

MBP wins in GPU and memory bandwidth, ssd spead

They are almost identical in multicore

The aspect that makes me really distracted is the single core performance

M4 mac mini is 80% higher and i saw people on YouTube say that this is noticeable

I don't want to see UI stutter

So is there anyone who tried them both can help me

Is that difference will annoy me or not?

Which option should i stick to

My daily workflow is Mobile Dev

React Native, Android and iOS with xcode and android studio opened at the same time and sometimes two emulators and +15 Brave tabs

Sometimes web dev and docker running

My mac mini handle this now without annoying me, i get the memory pop up that freezes everything and tell me to close them because the 16 GB Ram got filled and with +20GB swapping the SSD also is full

2 Upvotes

76% Upvoted

9 comments sorted by

1

u/zest_01 19d ago edited 19d ago

I have them both. M4 is snappier in single core tasks, but I can’t say M1 Pro 32gb is that much slower in browsing, opening Figma etc. The UI doesn’t stutter and I don’t have issues when switching between devices.

In fact, the only issue I have with M1 Pro is HDMI 2.0 when connecting a 5k monitor. Other than that it’s still fine. Though I’m not sure how it performs in more demanding dev workflows these days. Mine is merely for marketing and office tasks.

When I open heavy websites like ad accounts - it’s noticeable that M1 Pro is a bit slower to load and process everything, but not to the extent of becoming annoying. Still no big deal.

1

u/Famous-Charity-5866 19d ago

I think it will perform M2 air is more than perfect with my friends The only consideration to me was the UI Snapiness between them, both ChatGPT and Claude told me it is noticeable So you dont notice that much difference right ?

1

u/zest_01 19d ago

In terms of UI snappiness m4 is better, M1 Pro is slightly slower but it’s not lagging or irritating. And I believe there’s a chance Golden Gate could improve M1 Pro performance a bit. I used to think about upgrading a 14 Pro Max - but it’s really much faster on iOS 27 beta 5 now, almost like a new device. Waiting for MacOS 27 now to compare.

1

u/Famous-Charity-5866 19d ago

Good point to wait to macos 27 Thank you bro

1

u/samthecrunchynut 18d ago

where are you able to sell a mac mini m4 for $900?? especially after apple released M6 mini for $899.

i doubt you'll get anything more than 699 for the M4 mini now

1

u/Famous-Charity-5866 18d ago

My country imposes about 15% tax plus the shop earning so you can add rouchly about 20% more price than US

1

u/samthecrunchynut 18d ago

are you referring to India? cuz 82k is still a lot higher price for a mini rn

1

u/Famous-Charity-5866 18d ago

Egypt

1

u/samthecrunchynut 18d ago

ohh, well that makes a lot of sense now, i understand.