Do mATX boards get hotter than ATX boards?

[liamprice00]

My friend and I were having a discussion about mATX VS ATX and he claimed that mATX boards will always run hotter because they have less surface area to distribute heat. I disagree because mATX isn’t really all that much smaller than ATX and most of the heat coming off the motherboard will be through the VRM heatsink so the quality of the heatsink is the biggest determining factor in how much heat is produced regardless of size. Anyways I’d like to get some other opinions to help settle this, thanks!

 

[SkyNetRising]

It depends more on heatsinks on the motherboard and pc enclosure.
If heatsinks/coolers are the same and you put both boards in same ATX size pc enclosure, then there should be no difference.

Of course - smaller mATX enclosure with constricted airflow will cause higher temperatures.