Apple unveils new Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra

Apple has unveiled its latest Mac Studio, featuring the powerful M5 Max and M5 Ultra chips. The new lineup is available for pre-order today. The M5 Max, an upgrade from the previous M4 Max model, boasts an 18-core CPU with 6 super cores and 12 performance cores. Its GPU can be configured with up to 40 cores, offering up to 50% faster performance than its predecessor.

The Mac Studio with M5 Max starts at $2,499, including 36GB of unified memory that can be expanded to 128GB. In contrast, the M4 Max Mac Studio launched at $2,499 with options up to 96GB of memory. Meanwhile, the M5 Ultra Mac Studio introduces a 36-core CPU with 12 super cores and 24 performance cores, delivering up to 1.3x higher multithreaded performance compared to the M3 Ultra Mac Studio.

The M5 Ultra packs an impressive up-to-80-core GPU, marking the most powerful Apple silicon GPU to date. This model also adds Neural Accelerators to each GPU core, enhancing AI workloads. The M5 Ultra Mac Studio begins at $5,499 with 96GB of unified memory, expandable to 512GB. Similar to the M3 Ultra Mac Studio, the memory options were reduced due to industry-wide shortages, though they remain unchanged from the M3 Ultra launch.

The M5 Ultra's Memory Engine supports up to 33 simultaneous streams of 8K ProRes video. Pricing for the M5 Ultra Mac Studio starts at $5,499, including 1TB of storage, a $200 price increase from the M3 Ultra configuration. The Mac Studio lineup becomes available for ordering starting today, with shipments set to begin on September 22. Apple also notes that the M5 Ultra Mac Studio with 512GB of memory is expected "in late October."