3DMark vs Ax Performance Test
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
3DMark
Benchmark your iOS device to measure and compare its graphics performance. Test the latest iPhones and iPads with various demanding game-like scenes, including ray tracing, to understand real-world gaming capabilities and track performance changes over time.
- GPU performance testing
- Ray tracing benchmarks
- Gaming workload simulations
- Cross-platform comparisons
- Stress testing for sustained performance
- Device performance rankings
- Performance change tracking
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Test and compare the performance of the latest iPhones and iPads with this free and easy-to-use benchmarking app. 3DMark Solar Bay Extreme is a ray-traced gaming benchmark, designed to test the graphics performance of high-end iPhones and iPads. 3DMark Steel Nomad Light is our heaviest non-raytracing benchmark for iOS. Steel Nomad Light lets you compare the performance of the latest iPhones and iPads in heavy gaming workloads. Run 3DMark Solar Bay to compare the latest iOS devices that support gaming with real-time ray tracing. Ray tracing is a new technology in games that is used to produce far more realistic lighting. It has three sections with increasingly higher ray tracing workloads, helping you understand how enabling ray tracing will affect your device’s gaming performance. 3DMark Wild Life is a cross-platform benchmarking app for comparing the performance of the latest smartphones and tablets. Use 3DMark Wild Life Extreme to test and compare the latest iPhones and iPads as well as Apple Mac computers with the M1 chip. Or run the original Wild Life benchmark to test older iPhone and iPad models. 3DMark Steel Nomad Light, Solar Bay, Wild Life, and Wild Life Extreme offer two ways to test your device: a quick benchmark that tests instant performance and a longer stress test that shows how your device performs under longer periods of heavy load. 3DMark benchmarks measure GPU performance by rendering a demanding game-like scene in real-time. The faster the scene runs, the higher your benchmark score. With its charts, lists and rankings, 3DMark gives you unique insights into the performance of your device. - Measure the GPU performance of your iPhone and iPad. - Compare your score with others from the same model. - See how your device compares with the latest models. - See how performance changes with each iOS update. - Search, filter and sort the in-app rankings to compare popular devices. 3DMark is a free app. There are no ads or in-app purchases. Download it today and join millions of people who choose 3DMark for accurate and impartial benchmark results. This app is for non-commercial use only. - Business users, contact UL.BenchmarkSales@ul.com for licensing. - Members of the press, please contact UL.BenchmarkPress@ul.com.
Ax Performance Test
This app measures your device's CPU and GPU performance by dropping cubes until a target frame rate is reached. It calculates a total score based on cube count and polygons rendered per second, displaying detailed performance metrics.
- CPU performance measurement
- GPU performance measurement
- Rigid body physics simulation
- Visible polygons per second display
- Total performance score calculation
- GPU chip leaderboards
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Simple non-deterministic cube performance test. Measures CPU and GPU performance. Drops cubes until the frame rate averages less than 60. Cubes stack and tumble following rigid body physics properties. CPU performance is measured via physics performance and GPU is measured via the number of cubes your device can render. Displays visible polygons per second. A total score is calculated based on the number of cubes times the polygons per second. Leaderboards for each individual GPU chip.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Ax Performance Test at 5.0 against 3DMark's 4.1. Ax Performance Test also leads on update cadence (every 3 weeks vs every 2 months) and iOS requirement (11.0 vs 15.0). 3DMark's advantage is ratings volume (73 vs 4). On price, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Ax Performance Test holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.1. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: 3DMark has 73 ratings behind it against 4, so its average is the more settled of the two.
3DMark ships an update every 2 months, Ax Performance Test every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 9, 2026 and September 25, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | 3DMark | Ax Performance Test |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.1 (73 ratings) | 5.0 (4 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 52.7% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 73 — better | 4 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 3 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 | 11.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 2.0 GB | 28 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Underwriters Laboratories Inc. | Les Bird |
Customer experience
3DMark
Ax Performance Test
In-app purchases
3DMark
No in-app purchases
Ax Performance Test
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is 3DMark free?
Is Ax Performance Test free?
Which has better reviews, 3DMark or Ax Performance Test?
Do 3DMark or Ax Performance Test have ads?
Which is updated more often, 3DMark or Ax Performance Test?
Other comparisons
