The M4, Apple’s next chip, has made its formal debut. This is all the information you require about it.
Apple’s in-house silicon processors have provided top-tier performance for the company’s complete range of computers and gadgets since the release of the M1 back in 2020.
October 2023 saw the initial introduction of the M3, which was later added to the MacBook Air in March 2024. The M3 was originally available on the MacBook Pro and iMac machines. And Apple unveiled the new M4 silicon a scant seven months later.
Apple debuted the iPad Pro with M4 processor at the Let Loose event, but the M4 Macs haven’t arrived yet. In terms of CPU, GPU, and neural engine performance, the new chip is among the finest available for AI-driven devices, according to Apple.
Apple M4 release date
The M4 chip was announced on May 7 during the Apple Let Loose event. The Apple silicon currently only powers the iPad Pro models. We can expect Apple to release the M4 Macs in October 2024. Sources close to Bloomberg claim that Apple is aiming to release the new computers in late 2024 and early 2025, which lines up with the previous M3 release times.
Gurman states there will be updated iMacs, three levels of the MacBook Pro, and a revamped Mac Mini with the M4 chip inside. These are likely to be the first to be updated with the chip, with a MacBook Air update coming several months later.
Here is the order in which Gurman expects the M4 Macs to launch:
| Model | Expected launch timeframe |
| 14-inch MacBook Pro (low-end) | Late 2024 |
| 24-inch iMac | Late 2024 |
| 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros | Late 2024 / Early 2025 |
| Mac mini (M4 and M4 Pro) | Late 2024 / Early 2025 |
| 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Airs | Spring 2025 |
| Mac Studio (high-end M4) | Summer 2025 |
| Mac Pro (M4 Ultra) | Fall / Winter 2025 |
Apple M4: Price
The M4 chip does not have a stand-alone pricing because it is not available individually. Rather, the cost is determined by the gadget it powers. The 11-inch iPad Pro ($999) is presently the least expensive M4-powered gadget on the market. We anticipate seeing the M4 CPU in future iMacs, which usually retail for $1299. M4-equipped MacBook Pros may start at $1599 and their price is probably not going to rise over earlier versions.
Apple M4: Specs and features
The first processor from Apple with an AI focus is the M4. It is constructed using TSMC’s second-generation 3nm technology. A new CPU with up to 10 cores is used by the new chipset. A 10-core GPU expands upon the GPU architecture first seen in the M3. Even on the iPad Pro, the GPU offers capabilities like hardware-accelerated mesh shading, hardware-accelerated ray tracing, and dynamic caching.
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In order to maximize the performance of the iPad Pro’s new Ultra Retina XDR OLED display, the M4 also has a new display engine. You may anticipate that future Macs will also likely use the M4, as there are reports circulating regarding OLED MacBooks, and such laptops will gain from this similar display engine.
AI is the prime focus of the new M4 chip. Apple claims the M4 has its fastest Neural Engine ever, capable of 38 trillion operators per second (TOPS). It’s supposedly 60 times faster than the NPU of Apple’s A11 chip, from 2017, but still falls short of the Snapdragon X Elite’s 45 TOPS.
“The new iPad Pro is an incredibly powerful artificial intelligence device because to the combination of next-generation machine learning (ML) accelerators in the CPU, a high-performance GPU, and higher memory bandwidth,” says Apple.
To compare the speed of the M4 to earlier versions, benchmark ratings are not available. According to Apple, the M4 processor outperforms the M2 in the previous iPad Pro by up to 1.5 times. Additionally, it is stated that the M4 uses half the power of the M2 while providing the same performance. Apple claims the M4 can achieve the same performance with a fifth of the power when compared to the newest PC CPU in a light and thin notebook.
For the time being, Apple has only disclosed the M4 entry-level processor, which goes by the code name “Donan.” There are, however, reports of more potent “Brava” variants as well as a high-end model called Hidra. They will probably be issued under the same naming scheme as their previous incarnations, which is the M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max.
Additionally, it has been stated that Apple is thinking about increasing the RAM capacity of the CPU so that the more expensive Mac Pro and Mac Studio PCs can have up to around 512GB of RAM.
