[teekert]

But you should compare it to a present day Intel system, and you should then also ask Apple to make the same optimizations...

I know, it's a difficult comparison. But OP stating "I just want ARM" will disappoint for any non Apple ARM (at the moment, I'd say due to software).

[zamalek]

You should be comparing to AMD, at that. There's hope for the upcoming Intel chips - but anything current isn't competitive. Furthermore, M* is good for a specific form-factor, but don't for a second suggest that 4 P-Cores will outdo the 16 hyper threaded cores on a 9950x

[foldr]

The only like for like comparison you can do is comparing an M1 MacBook to one of its Intel Mac contemporaries (which were present day Intel systems at the time).