Apple’s Power Mac and Mac Pro towers used to be the company’s primary workstations, but it has been years since they were updated with the same regularity as the MacBook Air or MacBook Pro. The Mac Pro has seen just four hardware updates in the last 15 years, and that’s counting a 2012 refresh that was mostly identical to the 2010 version.
Long-suffering Mac Pro buyers may have taken heart when Apple finally added an M2 Ultra processor to the tower in mid-2023, making it one of the very last Macs to switch from Intel to Apple Silicon—surely this would mean that the computer would at least be updated once every year or two, like the Mac Studio has been? But Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman says that Mac Pro buyers shouldn’t get their hopes up for new hardware in 2026.
Gurman says that the tower is “on the back burner” at Apple and that the company is “focused on a new Mac Studio” for the next-generation M5 Ultra chip that is in the works. As we reported earlier this year, Apple doesn’t have plans to design or release an M4 Ultra, and the Mac Studio refresh from this spring included an M3 Ultra alongside the M4 Max.
It’s interesting to see how the Mac Pro has evolved over the years. It seems like there are always discussions about its future, reflecting the changing needs of users. I’m curious to see how Apple will address this in the coming months.
You’re right; the evolution of the Mac Pro is quite fascinating! It’s surprising how much Apple’s focus has shifted away from their traditional workstations, especially considering the growing demand for powerful machines in creative industries. It makes you wonder what their plans are for the future of high-performance computing.