Apple Launches New MacBook, iPad Pro Models With AI-Friendly Chip

Apple MacBook Pro 14. (Courtesy Apple)

Key Points

• Apple introduced including a new MacBook Pro and iPad Pro, plus an upgraded Vision Pro headset, all of which are powered by the new M5 chip.
• The 14-inch MacBook Pro, starting at $1,500, features the M5 chip for faster AI tasks and up to 24 hours of battery life.
• The new iPad Pro, starting at $999, offers up to 3.5 times the AI performance compared to its M4 chip predecessor.

Apple on Wednesday announced an array of new products, including a new MacBook Pro, that will be powered by its latest chip, as the iPhone maker takes another step towards pushing out goods with artificial intelligence in mind ahead of the holiday shopping season.

The lineup will be powered by the new M5 chip, which is expected to let graphics processing unit-based AI workloads run faster than the previous M4 chip.

“M5 ushers in the next big leap in AI performance for Apple silicon,” Johny Srouji, senior vice president of Hardware Technologies at Apple, said in a news release.

The M5 chip will power the new Apple laptop that was also announced on Wednesday. The 14-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,500 and should be faster than its predecessors, since the M5 chip built into the computer is meant to speed up AI tasks. The new MacBook is also expected to have up to 24 hours of battery life.

Apple on Wednesday also released a new iPad Pro and an upgraded Vision Pro headset, both of which were built with the M5 chip.

The latest iPad Pro should deliver up to 3.5 times the AI performance than the iPad Pro built with the M4 chip does, and starts at $999.

“iPad Pro with M5 unlocks endless possibilities for creativity and productivity — with a huge leap in AI performance and a big boost in graphics,” John Ternus, Apple’s senior vice president of Hardware Engineering, said in a news release.

The company said all of the products announced Wednesday can now be preordered and will be available in stores beginning Oct. 22.

The launches come about one month after Apple’s annual product event, which introduced consumers to the iPhone 17 lineup, the iPhone Air, and the company’s updated Apple Watches and AirPods. All the products Apple announced after launching Apple Intelligence in 2024 have been built to run AI, as consumers look for appealing new software—and investors wait to see if the products are exciting enough to incentivize upgrades.

Write to Angela Palumbo at angela.palumbo@dowjones.com