SSD Benchmark for Mac: What to Use When AS SSD Benchmark Is Windows-Only
Let us start with the honest answer this page exists to give: there is no AS SSD Benchmark for Mac. AS SSD Benchmark is a Windows-only program — its final version, 2.0.7316.34247 from January 2020, runs on Windows, is portable, and has no macOS, Linux or online edition. Any website offering an “AS SSD Benchmark for Mac download” is not offering a real product. The good news is that Mac users are not left without tools: the Mac has its own established disk speed test, and this page explains what it does, how its results relate (and do not relate) to AS SSD scores, and how to think about storage testing on macOS. If you also use a Windows PC, AS SSD itself is on our download page.
The Mac tool: Blackmagic Disk Speed Test
Blackmagic Disk Speed Test, from Blackmagic Design, is the standard free disk benchmark on macOS, available free from the Mac App Store and also bundled with Blackmagic’s Desktop Video software. It comes from the professional video world, and it shows: instead of benchmarking in the abstract, it writes and reads video-sized data and answers the two questions a video user actually asks. Its “Will it Work?” panel lists video formats and frame rates and marks which ones your disk can sustain, and its “How Fast?” panel shows the read and write frame rates behind that verdict. A plain pair of read/write speed figures sits alongside for everyone else.
That video-first design is both its strength and its limit. If you edit video, it translates storage performance into your working language directly — no interpretation needed. If you are diagnosing why a Mac feels slow, it tells you much less: it is oriented to large sequential transfers, because that is what video is, and it does not give you the 4K random results, access times or weighted total score that AS SSD produces on Windows. It is not a Mac version of AS SSD, it is not made by the same author, and the two tools share nothing except the broad job of timing a disk.
Why you cannot convert the results
Because the tools measure different workloads, there is no conversion between a Blackmagic result and an AS SSD score — the same warning that applies between any two benchmarks, stated in detail in AS SSD Benchmark vs CrystalDiskMark, applies with extra force across operating systems. A Mac’s internal SSD showing a large Blackmagic write figure tells you its sequential write speed under that test. It says nothing about what AS SSD would report for 4K random performance, and AS SSD cannot run natively on the Mac to find out. Compare Blackmagic results with other Blackmagic results, on similar settings, and treat any site that publishes an “equivalent AS SSD score” for a Mac as inventing numbers.
Side-by-side comparison
| Dimension | AS SSD Benchmark | Blackmagic Disk Speed Test |
|---|---|---|
| What it measures | Seq, 4K, 4K-64Thrd, access time, Copy and Compression tests on Windows | Disk read/write using video-frame-sized data, reported as speeds plus video format and frame-rate capability panels |
| Score / result form | Per-test MB/s or IOPS and a weighted Total score | Read/write speeds, “Will it Work?” format checklist and “How Fast?” frame-rate table; no total score |
| Platform | Windows only — no Mac version exists | macOS (the Mac-side tool in this comparison) |
| Licence and price | Freeware by Alexej Schepeljanski; free | Free from Blackmagic Design, via the Mac App Store and Desktop Video |
| Maintenance status | Final version 2.0.7316.34247, January 2020 | Distributed and maintained by Blackmagic Design as part of its video software line |
| Best for | Windows users needing a full SSD performance picture and total score | Mac users — especially video editors — checking whether a disk sustains their formats |
Practical advice for Mac owners
Use Blackmagic Disk Speed Test for what it is: a fast check of an internal or external disk’s throughput, and an authoritative answer for video work. Run it against external drives before committing them to a project — a drive that cannot sustain your format will drop frames no matter what its packaging claimed. For health questions (wear, errors, SMART status), remember neither tool family is a health monitor; on Windows that gap is covered in AS SSD Benchmark vs CrystalDiskInfo, and on a Mac you should look for a SMART-reading utility rather than a benchmark. And if a workflow spans both platforms — an external SSD shuttling between a Mac and a Windows PC — benchmark it on each side with that side’s tool and keep both records, rather than forcing one number to speak for both.
One safety note, plainly: do not download anything advertised as AS SSD Benchmark for Mac, macOS or “online”. No such edition exists, so such offers are at best mislabelled other software and at worst a lure. The real AS SSD is a small Windows ZIP from the official site, linked from our download page, with a published SHA-256 hash you can verify.
What about running Windows tools on a Mac?
Technically minded readers sometimes ask whether AS SSD Benchmark can be run inside a Windows virtual machine or compatibility layer on a Mac. Even where such setups launch the program, the result would not be a measurement of the Mac’s internal SSD in any meaningful sense: the virtualisation layer sits between the test and the hardware, the drive the program sees is a virtual device, and the numbers describe that stack rather than the physical disk. The same caution applies to benchmarking an external drive through layers of adapters and virtualisation — each layer changes what is being timed. If you need a figure for your Mac’s storage, measure it natively with the Mac tool described above. If you need an AS SSD score for a specific drive, run AS SSD natively on a Windows PC with the drive attached directly. Shortcuts that blur which hardware produced a number produce numbers that cannot be compared with anything — the one outcome worse than having no benchmark at all.
Verdict by scenario
Mac, video work: Blackmagic Disk Speed Test — it answers in formats and frame rates. Mac, general disk check: Blackmagic for throughput, plus a SMART utility for health. Windows: AS SSD Benchmark, as ever. There is no cross-platform winner because there is no cross-platform contest: each tool is the native answer on its own system.
For the complete map of which tool does which job, see the best SSD benchmark tools overview.