In short, the latest rumors about the Mac Pro indicate the computer will be updated with an as-yet-unannounced M4 Ultra chip in the second half of 2025.
Mac Pro: Timing
- When was the current model released? June 2023
- When is a new model expected? The second half of 2025, likely October to December
Mac Pro: What to Know
Apple last updated the Mac Pro with the M2 Ultra chip at WWDC in June 2023, but the desktop tower's overall design remains unchanged since 2019.
A new Mac Pro will launch in the second half of 2025, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. If so, it seems likely that Apple will announce the next Mac Pro at some point from October through December next year. October is a common month for Mac announcements, and the Mac Pro has been updated in December twice since 2013.
Gurman said the new Mac Pro will be equipped with an M4 Ultra chip, which should offer significant CPU performance improvements over the M2 Ultra chip. The Mac Pro would also gain hardware-accelerated ray tracing for improved graphics rendering in games, a technology that was introduced with the M3 series of chips. Plus, Gurman said the next Mac Pro could support up to 512GB of RAM, up from the current limit of 192GB.
No other major upgrades or design changes have been rumored for the next Mac Pro yet.
For several years, it has been rumored that Apple has explored a high-end, so-called "Extreme" chip for the Mac Pro. This chip would effectively be a "quadrupled" version of the Max chip for Macs. For example, a 16-core CPU would become a 64-core CPU. However, Gurman said Apple canceled plans for an "M2 Extreme" chip a few years ago, and The Information recently reported that Apple abandoned plans for another "quadrupled" chip this "past summer." While we reported that this could make an "M4 Extreme" chip unlikely, Daring Fireball's John Gruber made a good point about how there is a long, multi-year gap between Apple designing and shipping new chips, so it is possible the latest chip canceled actually would have been an "M5 Extreme" chip or later if development was only recently ended.
If there ends up being no "Extreme" chip for the next several years, then the Mac Pro might continue to lack major differences compared to the Mac Studio, which is also expected to be updated with the M4 Ultra chip next year. As of now, the Mac Pro is essentially a larger, more expensive version of the Mac Studio with PCIe expansion slots.
If you are currently in the market for a Mac Pro, we certainly recommend waiting for the new model, as the M4 Max chip in the latest 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models is up to 25% faster than the M2 Ultra in the current Mac Pro.
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This article, "New Mac Pro and an 'Extreme' Chip: Here's What the Latest Rumors Say" first appeared on MacRumors.com
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