Apple today announced a new MacBook Pro lineup featuring the all-new family of M3 chips: M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max. With a next-generation GPU architecture and a faster CPU, the M3 family brings even more performance and remarkable new capabilities to MacBook Pro.
Although unveiling a new processor may not sound sexy, it will serve as the backbone to Apple’s latest products, enabling faster speeds and more capabilities than ever. For example, Apple said the M3 speeds are now up to 2.5x faster than on the M1 family of chips, and its core processing performance is up to 50% faster. The chips are built with 3 nanometer technology, which can support advanced graphics and artificial intelligence.
“It will bring a whole new level of graphics to the Mac,” an Apple executive said during the event. “They are the most advanced chips ever built for a personal computer.”
The new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro laptops will sport the M3 Pro and M3 Pro Max chips. Although the models look the same as their predecessors, they will come in a new “space black” color, replacing space gray. The MacBook Pro option with the M3 Pro Max processor comes with up to 8 TB of storage, 128 GB of memory and is about 11 times faster than the fastest Intel-based MacBook Pro line, according to Apple.
The models also promise 22 hours of battery life and a display that’s 25% brighter than its previous version.
In the U.S., the 14-inch MacBook Pro laptop will start at US$1,599 and a 16-inch version starts at US$2,499. The new iMac desktop with the M3 family of chips starts at US$1,299. Some will be available next week, while others will not ship until later in November.
Apple has seen a revitalization in its Mac business, roughly doubling its market share to nearly 11% since 2020 when it parted ways with Intel and started using its own custom-designed chips as the brains of the machines, according to preliminary data from IDC.
