Some MacBook Pro users complain about throttling issues

The new MacBook Pro has a thermal issue. YouTuber Dave Lee found out that the top-performing MacBook Pro can’t operate at full speed for a long time because it gets too hot.

According to him, a video export in Adobe Premiere Pro is taking longer on a brand new MacBook Pro with an Intel Core i9 CPU than on a 2017 MacBook Pro with an Intel Core i7 CPU (previous Intel generation).

Sure, if you look at benchmarks, the new MacBook Pro destroys previous models, and even many iMacs. But Apple is throttling the speed of the CPU so that it doesn’t get too hot under heavy load.

Apple Insider tested the performance of the new MacBook Pro with a Core i7 and Core i9 model. In both instances, the clock speed of the CPU started to drop drastically after a while.

For the i9, the CPU dropped from 4.17 GHz to 2.33-2.9 GHz after some tests. The i7 dropped from 3.8 GHz to 2.3-2.6 GHz under load.

Some users on Reddit also got a new laptop and noticed the same issue:

We’ve reached out to Apple for comment and didn’t hear back.

If all those benchmarks are true, the MacBook Pro might have a ventilation problem. You will never get perfect CPU performances on a laptop compared to a desktop computer due to size contraints. But it becomes an issue when you buy a laptop expecting great performances and it doesn’t deliver.