Apple Unveils MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max — Up to 4x AI Performance

The M5 Pro and M5 Max Chips

Apple unveiled new MacBook Pro models in March 2026 featuring its latest M5 Pro and M5 Max chips. Both chips introduce an 18-core CPU with six "super cores" that Apple claims are the world's fastest, alongside 12 performance cores optimized for multithreaded workloads.

Key Specifications

GPU: M5 Pro (up to 20 cores), M5 Max (up to 40 cores) — each GPU core now includes a dedicated Neural Accelerator

AI Performance: Over 4x peak AI compute vs. M4 Pro/Max; up to 8x vs. M1

Memory: M5 Pro up to 64GB at 307GB/s; M5 Max up to 128GB at 614GB/s

Storage: Up to 14.5GB/s read/write (2x faster than M4 generation)

Connectivity: Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6 via Apple's N1 chip; Thunderbolt 5

Battery: Up to 24 hours

AI Implications

The inclusion of Neural Accelerators in every GPU core is particularly significant for on-device AI workloads. Apple claims these enable dramatically faster LLM inference, image generation, and real-time translation compared to previous generations. The r/LocalLLaMA community noted Apple's claim of up to 4x faster LLM prompt processing compared to M4 Pro, making these chips highly relevant for local AI model deployment.

Pricing and Availability

The 14-inch M5 Max starts at $3,599, and the 16-inch at $3,899. The announcement scored 342 on Hacker News, reflecting strong interest from developers and AI practitioners.