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Apple’s new Mac mini and Mac Studio are finally available after a month-long wait

The new Mac mini and Mac Studio are pricier, but Apple has several ways to bring the cost down.

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Apple M6 Mac mini
Apple

Apple’s new Mac mini and Mac Studio are officially on sale starting today, September 22. Both desktops are now available through Apple Stores, Apple’s website, the Apple Store app, and authorized resellers.

The Mac mini starts at $899 for the M6 model, while the M5 Pro version starts at $1,699. Mac Studio pricing begins at $2,499 for M5 Max and $5,499 for M5 Ultra.

Apple has a few ways to make the price sting less

Students and educators can save $100 on the Mac mini, bringing the M6 model down to $799 and the M5 Pro version to $1,599. Education pricing on Mac Studio starts at $2,299 for M5 Max and $5,099 for M5 Ultra. Apple Trade In is also available for buyers who want to exchange an existing computer for credit toward a new Mac.

Mac Studio buyers in the U.S. get another option through Apple Upgrade. A 36-month lease starts at $48.99 per month for the M5 Max model and $110.10 per month for M5 Ultra, excluding taxes and trade-in credit. Customers can upgrade, buy the machine outright, or return it at the end of the lease. Configure-to-order options are live as well. The one exception is the Mac Studio with 512GB of unified memory, which will not arrive until late October.

The hardware upgrades are still pretty substantial

The M6 Mac mini gets a 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU, while Apple claims up to four times faster AI performance, twice the graphics performance, and 40 percent faster CPU performance than the M4 version. Memory starts at 16GB and can be configured up to 32GB. Buyers who need more power can move to M5 Pro, which tops out at an 18-core CPU, 20-core GPU, and 64GB of unified memory.

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Mac Studio is the obvious heavy hitter of the two, as it can be configured with an M5 Max chip with up to a 40-core GPU and 128GB of unified memory. It also has an M5 Ultra version that stretches to a 36-core CPU, 80-core GPU, and a massive 512GB of memory with 1.2TB/s of bandwidth. Apple says the M5 Ultra can deliver up to 4.3 times the AI performance of the M3 Ultra.

Sudhanshu Kumar Mangalam
I’ve got about 4 years of experience, mostly covering gaming, PC hardware, and smartphones. In my free time, I like…
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