Apple's New M6 MacBook Pro Isn't What Fans Were Hoping For

Apple fans have been waiting for a touchscreen MacBook Pro with an OLED display. Instead, Apple released an entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro with its new M6 chip, starting at $1,999. And it's confusing: the newest chip in the lineup is the base model, while the older M5 Pro and M5 Max chips sitting right next to it on Apple's store are still the faster, more capable options for a lot of photo and video work.

The Name Tells You the Generation, Not the Tier

Apple's chip names have two parts, and they mean two different things. The number is the generation: M5, M6. The word after it is the tier: nothing for the base chip, then Pro, then Max. A newer number doesn't beat a higher tier. 

The M6 is a new base chip. Apple debuted it in the Mac mini back in August, and it's Apple's first chip built on a 2nm process. Today is the first time it shows up in a laptop. There is no M6 Pro or M6 Max yet, so the higher-tier MacBook Pros still use the M5 Pro and M5 Max that Apple launched in March. The 16-inch model doesn't offer the M6 at all.

How the Three Chips Compare

Here's the full lineup as Apple lists it today. The numbers that matter most for editing are the GPU cores, the memory bandwidth, and the maximum memory, and on all three the M6 sits at the bottom.

The M5 Max has more than three times the GPU cores of the M6, roughly three to four times the memory bandwidth, and four times the maximum memory. Those are the specs that decide how fast Lightroom's AI Denoise runs, how smoothly you can scrub a multicam 8K timeline, and whether a big local AI model fits in memory at all.

What's Actually New Compared to the M5 Model

The M6 replaces the base M5 14-inch MacBook Pro, and that's the only machine Apple compares it to. Against that model, it's a solid upgrade:

• CPU: 12 cores instead of 10.
• GPU: 12 cores instead of 10, each with its own Neural Accelerator. Apple claims up to 30% faster graphics.
• AI: a new Dual 16-core Neural Engine that Apple says is up to 1.9x faster than M5's, plus up to 25% faster on-device AI workloads.
• Memory: 16GB standard, up to 32GB, with bandwidth rising to 170GB/s on the 24GB and 32GB configurations. The $1,999 16GB model stays at 153GB/s, the same as the M5.
• Storage: 1TB standard, where the original M5 model started at 512GB.
• Wireless: Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 on the base model for the first time.
• Battery: up to 24 hours of video streaming, which Apple calls the longest ever in a Mac.

Apple's own app numbers against the M5 are modest but real: up to 1.2x faster image processing in Affinity, and up to 1.3x faster in Blender ray tracing, Xcode builds, and local LLM prompt processing. What stayed the same: the 14.2-inch Liquid Retina XDR display (1,600 nits peak HDR, with a nano-texture option), the 12MP Center Stage camera, the six-speaker sound system, MagSafe 3, the SDXC card slot, and the Thunderbolt 4 ports.

Is the M6 Better for AI Than the M5 Max?

Apple leans hard on AI in this launch, which makes it fair to ask whether the cheaper M6 beats the far more expensive M5 Max for AI work. For most of what photographers do, it almost certainly doesn't. The M5 Pro and M5 Max already have a Neural Accelerator in every GPU core, just like the M6, and they simply have a lot more of those cores. Apple's own machine learning research on the M5 shows that generating text with a local language model is limited mainly by memory bandwidth, and the Max has several times more of it. The M6's real advantages are its newer Neural Engine and its newer 2nm process, which could help with features built specifically for the Neural Engine, like parts of Apple Intelligence, and with single-core speed. Nobody has independent benchmarks yet, since the M6 MacBook Pro doesn't ship until November 6, so treat that as an educated read of the specs rather than a test result.

Who Should Buy Which One

For photographers who mostly edit stills, travel a lot, and run one or two external monitors, the M6 is a very good laptop at the lowest MacBook Pro price. If you edit a lot of video, batch-process thousands of raw files, or use GPU-heavy AI tools like denoising and upscaling, the M5 Pro is the better buy. And if you want a big multi-monitor desk, pay attention to the display limits: the M6 drives two external displays, the M5 Pro three, and only the M5 Max can run four. Apple says the Max can run all four at up to 6K and 60Hz, so a four-monitor 5K setup is an M5 Max job.

Pricing

Here are the starting prices on Apple's store today. The nano-texture display adds $150 to any configuration.

• 14-inch M6 (12-core CPU, 12-core GPU), 16GB, 1TB: $1,999
• 14-inch M5 Pro (15-core CPU, 16-core GPU), 24GB, 1TB: $2,499
• 14-inch M5 Pro (18-core CPU, 20-core GPU), 24GB, 1TB: $2,699
• 14-inch M5 Max (18-core CPU, 32-core GPU), 36GB, 2TB: $4,099
• 14-inch M5 Max (18-core CPU, 40-core GPU), 48GB, 2TB: $4,699
• 16-inch M5 Pro (18-core CPU, 20-core GPU), 24GB, 1TB: $2,999
• 16-inch M5 Max (18-core CPU, 32-core GPU), 36GB, 2TB: $4,399
• 16-inch M5 Max (18-core CPU, 40-core GPU), 48GB, 2TB: $4,999

The M6 model is $1,899 with education pricing. Some context on that $1,999: when the M5 14-inch launched a year ago, it started at $1,599 with 512GB of storage. It moved to a 1TB base in March, and Apple raised MacBook Pro prices across the board in June because of the memory shortage, so the M6 lands at the same starting price the M5 had. Pre-orders open tomorrow, October 28, and the M6 MacBook Pro arrives in stores Friday, November 6.

What Apple Fans Are Saying

The biggest complaint from Apple users is the price. For years, the entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro started at $1,599, and $1,999 used to get you a MacBook Pro with a Pro chip inside. Now $1,999 gets you the base chip, and a lot of longtime Mac users feel like they're paying more for less. Others have argued that the price increase actually happened back in June because of rising memory costs, not today, and that Apple kept the price the same while adding the new chip, Wi-Fi 7, and 1TB of storage. Some users are also upset that 16GB is still the base memory on a laptop with "Pro" in the name.

Even more people are simply confused. Many assumed the new model would have Thunderbolt 5 (it has Thunderbolt 4), others expected the 16-inch to get an update (it didn't), and plenty can't understand why Apple would release one MacBook Pro today and reportedly another one tomorrow. Some buyers who recently picked up an M5 Max are holding on to their receipts until they see what Apple announces next. On the bright side, a lot of people expect to see big discounts on the M5 models now, and refurbished M5 MacBook Pros are already selling for well under $1,500.

What Might Happen Tomorrow

If you're shopping for a Pro or Max, it may be worth waiting one more day. Apple is holding a "Pro and Tell" event in Los Angeles tomorrow, October 28, at 10 a.m. Pacific, and Bloomberg's Mark Gurman expects the centerpiece to be redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros with touch-enabled OLED displays, the first touchscreen Macs ever, according to MacRumors. Reports point to the same M5 Pro and M5 Max chips inside, with prices possibly up to $500 higher than today's models and an in-store date as early as November 6. None of that is confirmed until Apple announces it. If it happens, it would make the lineup even more confusing: an M6 laptop as the newest chip, and a touchscreen M5 laptop as the newest design.

So which one would you buy: the new M6 at $1,999, an M5 Pro or Max today, or would you wait to see a touchscreen MacBook Pro tomorrow?