Apple is updating the MacBook Pro and introducing some even more powerful chips. Announced this morning via a low-key press release, the 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros are being updated to the M4 line of processors, which now includes the M4 Pro chip that debuted yesterday in the Mac Mini and a new, even higher-end M4 Max. The entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro is also getting a small design upgrade in the form of an extra USB-C / Thunderbolt 4 port on the right-hand side and a space black option to match its more premium brethren.
Like previous models, the M4 Pro-equipped laptops will start at $1,999 for the 14-inch. The 16-inch once again starts at $2,499, but it’s getting an upgrade to 24GB of RAM. The basic 14-inch M4 MacBook Pro still starts at $1,599, but that model now (mercifully) starts with 16GB of RAM instead of 8GB. The new MacBook Pros will be available on November 8th, with preorders available now.
Outside of chip bumps and RAM improvements, the 14- and 16-inch Pros with M4 Pro / Max chips are also the first Mac laptops with Thunderbolt 5 ports. All three MacBook Pros come with new 12-megapixel webcams that feature a desk view, and they can each be configured with a new nano-texture display capable of up to 1,000 nits of SDR brightness and 1,600 nits in HDR.
Those ancillary upgrades are nice, but the big changes are still the chips. Apple claims that the entire M4 generation of chips has “the world’s fastest CPU core” and “the industry’s best single-threaded performance.” Single-core performance has been a strong suit of Apple’s Mac chips since the M1 generation, and the M4 chips are promised to have “dramatically faster multithreaded performance.” The M4 Pro and Max also have faster GPU cores, with a ray-tracing engine that’s twice as fast. The neural engine is also 2x faster than the M3 generation for improved machine learning and AI workloads.
The latest most powerful silicon from Apple should be best equipped for Apple’s big AI push with Apple Intelligence, which just launched this week across supported Macs, iPhones, and iPads. That said, Apple Intelligence runs on Macs going back to the M1 chip from 2020 — the big hurdle for Macs seems to be RAM. Coinciding with today’s MacBook Pro announcements, Apple is also bumping up the base configurations of M2 and M3 MacBook Air models from 8GB of RAM to 16GB, starting at $999 for the M2. So perhaps it’s only a matter of time before older models with lesser specs get left behind on the future features Apple continues to slow-roll via updates.
The M3 generation of MacBook Pros was a mix of continued excellence in the form of the M3 Pro / Max models and an awkward middle child in the non-Pro M3 14-inch. The top-tier Mac laptops with Pro and Max chips have remained great choices for creatives who have performance-intensive workflows with apps like Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro. The entry-level 14-inch M3 model, on the other hand, was a little hard to justify compared to a cheaper MacBook Air or one of its pricier siblings on a sale. The new 14-inch with M4 looks a little more interesting now and a tiny bit more deserving of that “Pro” branding. It’s amazing how an extra USB port can make you feel.