New chips deliver major AI gains as pre-orders open today for September shipping.
Apple dropped a quiet but significant hardware update on Today. The company refreshed its compact Mac mini and high-end Mac Studio with new silicon that prioritizes on-device AI performance.
The Mac mini now comes with the all-new M6 chip or the existing M5 Pro. The Mac Studio steps up to M5 Max or the brand-new M5 Ultra, which Apple calls its most powerful chip ever. Both systems can be pre-ordered immediately and ship starting September 22.
M6 Marks Apple’s First 2nm Chip
M6 is Apple’s first processor built on a 2-nanometer process. It features a 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU with Neural Accelerators in every GPU core, plus a dual 16-core Neural Engine. Apple claims up to 4x faster AI performance, 2x faster graphics, and 40 percent faster CPU performance than the previous M4 Mac mini.
The base M6 Mac mini starts at $899 with 16GB of unified memory and 256GB of storage. The M5 Pro version begins at $1,699 and supports up to 64GB of memory. Both add Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and faster 2.5Gb Ethernet (with a 10Gb option).
Johny Srouji, Apple’s chief hardware officer, called the Mac mini “the little Mac that can do it all,” whether used for home productivity, professional work, or always-on AI agents.
Mac Studio Targets Extreme Workloads
The Mac Studio with M5 Max starts at $2,499. The M5 Ultra model opens at $5,499 and can scale to 512GB of unified memory and an 80-core GPU. Apple says the M5 Ultra delivers up to 4.3x the peak AI compute of the previous Ultra chip. Configurations with the full 512GB of memory arrive in late October.
Thunderbolt 5 ports allow users to cluster multiple Mac Studios for distributed AI inference. The systems also gain Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 for the first time.
Why It Matters for Everyday Users and Pros
Demand for the Mac mini surged earlier this year as developers and enthusiasts used it to run local AI models. Apple is leaning into that use case. The new chips include dedicated Neural Accelerators and higher memory bandwidth specifically to speed up on-device large language models and generative tasks without sending data to the cloud.
macOS 27 Golden Gate, arriving this fall, will further leverage the hardware with Siri AI and expanded Apple Intelligence features.
Apple also quietly updated its Magic Keyboards with symbol-based key labels to match recent MacBooks and lowered the price of its Polishing Cloth from $19 to $9.
Tim Cook posted about the Mac mini on X, noting its ability to handle everything from everyday tasks to AI. With Cook set to step down as CEO on September 1, this low-key announcement may mark one of his final product unveilings in that role.
The new Mac mini is here. Small in size. Big on performance. From everyday productivity to all things AI, it can help you do it all. pic.twitter.com/GopxcHM5od
— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) August 25, 2026
Pre-orders are live now on Apple’s website. Availability begins September 22.
AI Disclosure: This article was created with the assistance of artificial intelligence tools and was reviewed and edited by the Glowls News editorial team before publication.