Apple announced the launch of the MacBook Pro M4 to round out the presentations of the new personal computers it launched this week with a common element, the Apple M4 SoC, the company’s most advanced proprietary hardware engine and that the iPad Pro tablet was released last spring.

It’s not two without three, and after the all-in-one iMac and the compact Mac mini comes Apple’s stellar laptop, the long-awaited update to the Mac lineup that we told you about last week. As expected, Apple’s promotion is colossal, and Apple’s Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering John Ternus does not hesitate to describe it in his presentation as “world’s best professional laptop”.

MacBook Pro M4: beyond the M4

Apple repeats the basic design of the current M3 with an aluminum chassis, keeping two general versions of the model depending on the screen size: 14 and 16 inches. The panels are the familiar Liquid Retina XDR with a brand new nano-textured screen option that drastically reduces glare and reflections. They can display SDR content with a brightness of up to 1000 nits, as well as HDR content with a maximum brightness of up to 1600 nits, which is ideal for working outdoors in bright light.

Apple M4 SoCs are the laptop’s big news, and we’re talking in the plural, as there are three different versions that can be equipped: Base M4, Pro and Max. Apple promises a leap in performance, efficiency and the ability to accelerate AI processes. Apple says they use “world’s fastest processor cores” and certainly previous tests of the leaked models show very good performance in both single and multi-core work.

Although the approach to the laptop is decidedly professional, the company touts its new hardware-accelerated ray tracing engine, so “games are experienced with amazing realism”. Apple also highlights its advances in AI tasks, as combined with machine learning accelerators in the CPU, advanced GPUs and a faster and more efficient neural engine, “is designed from the ground up to deliver incredible performance for AI”.

Apple also emphasized unified memory faster built-in, with more memory bandwidth and especially increasing its base level to double compared to previous models. The installed capacity of all versions is therefore on 16 GB. Obviously, 8GB was insufficient for current tasks, even on a Mac. Internal storage is covered by SSD disks with a capacity starting at 512 GB.

Other new features to note include a new webcam 12 MP central scene for video calls that automatically keep users focused on the shot as they move. The new camera is Desk View compatible and adds aa studio quality microphones sound system with six speakers compatible with surround sound.

Also new are the connectivity features and the fact that the versions with the M4 Pro and M4 Max chips, Thunderbolt 5 ports debut which double the transfer rate up to 120 Gbps, enabling faster external storage, expansion chassis, docking solutions or other hubs.

All versions have an HDMI port supporting up to 8K resolution, a slot for an SDXC card, a MagSafe 3 port for charging, a headphone jack, as well as support for wireless standards, Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3. Finally, draw attention to 25 hours of autonomy from the whole range, always according to Apple.

Availability and price

The MacBook Pro M4 can now be reserved on Apple’s web portal using availability from November 8. The versions, all with the latest version of macOS Sequoia pre-installed, differ in terms of two screen sizes, three different SoCs, and memory and storage options. We’ll leave you with basic and more advanced configurations, although we’ve already told you that in the middle you can choose everything according to your budget and needs:

• 14-inch M4 MacBook Pro with 10-core M4 CPU, 10-core GPU, 16GB unified memory and 512GB SSD storage: 1,929 euros.
• 16-inch M4 MacBook Pro with 16-core M4 Max CPU, 40-core GPU, 48GB unified memory and 1TB SSD: 4,749 euros.

Apple hasn’t renewed the M4 (for now) with its next line of laptops, the MacBook Air. They are available with M2 or M3 SoCs, but at a much cheaper price: from 1,199 euros. Apple announced this simultaneously with the launch of its older brothers will increase the basic unified Air memory up to 16 GB. And it does it while maintaining the price. As we said, the Cupertino company will set the minimum memory capacity for all its Macs at 16 GB.