Apple’s latest iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Pro may look very different on the outside, but they share the same powerful A19 Pro chip, which is the company’s latest A-series chip and an upgrade to the previous A18 lineup. While both of these devices share the same chip name, they are different when it comes to the graphics setup. The A19 Pro chip in the iPhone 17 Pro features a 6-core GPU, while the variant inside the iPhone Air is equipped with a 5-core GPU. This small detail brings us to question if there are any major performance differences between the two.
The iPhone Air’s A19 Pro with 5-core GPU nearly matches the iPhone 17 Pro, but sustained GPU performance shows differences
The iPhone 17 Pro went through a major redesign this year, and other than the highest-end chipset, it also packs a vapor chamber cooling system that enhances the performance for sustained workloads. The iPhone Air, on the flip side, comes with a brand-new ultra-thin design that measures in at just 5.6mm, even slimmer than the company’s iPhone 6.
To judge the performance, we now have our hands on the Geekbench scores of both of these devices. In terms of raw CPU performance, both variants of the A19 Pro chip show almost identical results in single-core tests, with the iPhone 17 Pro posting around 3,895 points, while the iPhone Air just sits under that number with a matching score. This means that everyday tasks like launching apps, scrolling through social media, messaging, or browsing the web would feel equally smooth, no matter which model you choose. Apple’s CPU design continues to lead the industry in single-threaded performance, and the iPhone Air does not compromise in this regard as well.
Multi-core results, however, show a different story, as it leans slightly in favor of the bigger and heftier iPhone 17 Pro. The iPhone 17 Pro’s A19 Pro with a 6-core GPU revved a multi-core score of 9,746, as we have previously covered, while the iPhone Air’s 5-core A19 Pro chip landed at 9,737. The score sits just slightly below the performance level of the iPhone 17 Pro, which roughly shows an 8 to 10 percent decrease in performance.
The difference in performance is modest, and it will slightly reflect in heavy-duty tasks like exporting videos, multitasking, or demanding AI tasks. However, most users would not see or feel the difference between the two. Since the iPhone 17 Pro features a vapor chamber cooling mechanism, the performance would be quite different when the device heats up. The iPhone Air, on the other hand, could throttle due to its design choice, as it does not have a dedicated cooling solution on the inside.
Overall, the A19 Pro chip in the iPhone Air is still a performance beast, offering nearly identical CPU power to the Pro models. If you regularly game or need raw power, then the iPhone 17 Pro is the right choice for you. What are your thoughts on the performance differences between the two devices and their respective chips?
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