New MacBook Pro Release Date Confirmed In Latest Apple Report

The new MacBook Pro has long been expected to launch in October. That event is now being reported as happening in the last week of the month—possibly as late as Halloween to tie in with the horrible holiday—ahead of a retail release on November 1st.

The launch of three major models of the MacBook Pro (alongside new versions of the Mac Mini and iPad Mini) has been reported by the ever-reliable Mark Gurman. Writing for the Power On newsletter, he states that the MacBook Pro models will include a 14-inch variant running the low-end M4 Apple Silicon chipset, and 14-inch and 16-inch variants running the M4 Pro or and M4 Max chipsets.

Missing from that list is any sign of a consumer-focused MacBook Air; the M4 MacBook Pro stands as the lowest-priced laptop in this round of updates. Previously the M4 MacBook Pro has been a bit of a shell game as it is built around the MacBook Air internals, but adding a fan to increase the power on tap from the M4 chipset. The Air is expected to launch late in Q1 2025 (around the same time as the next-generation iPhone SE).

The Apple Silicon M4 was launched in May 2024. For the first time, Apple’s new M series debuted not in a Mac but in an iPad, the seventh generation of the iPad Pro. Mac fans will have been waiting nearly six months for an M4 MacBook when the laptops hit the shelves in November.

No doubt Apple will be leaning heavily ito generative AI on the new MacBooks. The awkwardly backronymed Apple Intelligence was the prime selling point at the iPhone 16 launch—even if Apple is still to release the software. With Microsoft’s focus on generative AI in Windows 11, macOS will need to implement Apple Intelligence quickly if it does not want to be left further behind.

Two generative AI features being tested—and likely to be found in macOS Sequoia when it launches with the new MacBooks—are Writing Tools, which helps summarise and rewrite text in a select number of apps, and improvements Sri, which allows for more natural language requests to be made to the existing voice-based assistant.

Given the rapid explosion of generative AI tools in the last twelve months, this feels more like a taster of AI rather than Apple being at the top of its game, ready to change the landscape by arriving late with a full toolbox.

Still, with generative AI features delayed on the iPhone, arriving late on the MacBook feels on brand for Apple Intelligence.

Now read more about the disappointment of the iPhone 16 Pro…