Apple’s first M3 Macs could arrive in October

The first batch of Apple’s M3-equipped Macs could arrive as early October, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Writing in his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman reports there “should be another launch” after the company’s annual iPhone event in September, with a new slate of Macs likely the focus of whatever Apple has planned. “October is too early for new high-end MacBook Pros or desktops, so the first beneficiaries of the new chip should be the next iMac, 13-inch MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro,” he notes.

At the start of March, Gurman reported that Apple was at “a late stage” of development on two new iMac models that would feature its next-generation M3 silicon. The new chipset likely won’t feature many more CPU and GPU cores than Apple’s current M2 SoCs, but it is expected to offer significant performance and power efficiency gains thanks to TSMC’s 3nm process. At the time, Gurman predicted the new iMac could arrive as early as the second half of 2023, and that it would feature the same colorful design of the 2021 model. Last week, he wrote that Apple is also working on a new 32-inch iMac, but warned that model won’t arrive until late 2024 at the earliest.

In the past, Apple has typically announced new iPad models alongside its latest Macs, but it sounds like that won’t be the case this time around. “I wouldn’t expect any major upgrades until the M3 iPad Pros with OLED screens arrive next year,” Gurman writes. However, he notes Apple is working on a new iPad Air with refreshed internals. The current model features the company’s aging M1 chipset.