October 15, 2025 PRESS RELEASE Apple unleashes M5, the next big leap in AI performance for Apple silicon M5 delivers over 4x the peak GPU compute performance for AI compared to M4, featuring a next…
October 15, 2025
PRESS RELEASE
Apple unleashes M5, the next big leap in AI performance for Apple silicon
M5 delivers over 4x the peak GPU compute performance for AI compared to M4, featuring a next-generation GPU with a Neural Accelerator in each core, a more powerful CPU, a faster Neural Engine, and higher unified memory bandwidth
CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA Apple today announced M5, delivering the next big leap in AI performance and advances to nearly every aspect of the chip. Built using third-generation 3-nanometer technology, M5 introduces a next-generation 10-core GPU architecture with a Neural Accelerator in each core, enabling GPU-based AI workloads to run dramatically faster, with over 4x the peak GPU compute performance compared to M4.1 The GPU also offers enhanced graphics capabilities and third-generation ray tracing that combined deliver a graphics performance that is up to 45 percent higher than M4.1 M5 features the world’s fastest performance core, with up to a 10-core CPU made up of six efficiency cores and up to four performance cores.2 Together, they deliver up to 15 percent faster multithreaded performance over M4.1 M5 also features an improved 16-core Neural Engine, a powerful media engine, and a nearly 30 percent increase in unified memory bandwidth to 153GB/s.1 M5 brings its industry-leading power-efficient performance to the new 14-inch MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Apple Vision Pro, allowing each device to excel in its own way. All are available for pre-order today.
“M5 ushers in the next big leap in AI performance for Apple silicon,” said Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of Hardware Technologies. “With the introduction of Neural Accelerators in the GPU, M5 delivers a huge boost to AI workloads. Combined with a big increase in graphics performance, the world’s fastest CPU core, a faster Neural Engine, and even higher unified memory bandwidth, M5 brings far more performance and capabilities to MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Apple Vision Pro.”
A Next-Generation GPU Architecture Optimized for AI and Graphics
With the next-generation GPU architecture in M5, every compute block of the chip is optimized for AI. The 10-core GPU features a dedicated Neural Accelerator in each core, delivering over 4x peak GPU compute compared to M4, and over 6x peak GPU compute for AI performance compared to M1.1 And now with M5, the new 14-inch MacBook Pro and iPad Pro benefit from dramatically accelerated processing for AI-driven workflows, such as running diffusion models in apps like Draw Things, or running large language models locally using platforms like webAI.
The next-generation GPU and enhanced shader cores in M5 also deliver increased graphics performance, achieving up to 30 percent faster performance compared to M4 and up to 2.5x faster performance than M1.1 M5 also includes Apple’s third-generation ray-tracing engine, providing up to a 45 percent graphics uplift in apps using ray tracing.1 Combined with rearchitected second-generation dynamic caching, the GPU provides smoother gameplay, more realistic visuals in 3D applications, and faster rendering times for complex graphics projects and other visually intensive applications. With M5, Apple Vision Pro renders 10 percent more pixels with the micro-OLED displays, and refresh rates increase up to 120Hz, resulting in crisper details, more fluid display performance, and reduced motion blur.
The GPU architecture is engineered for seamless integration with Apple’s software frameworks. Applications using built-in Apple frameworks and APIs — like Core ML, Metal Performance Shaders, and Metal 4 — can automatically see immediate increases in performance. Developers can also build solutions for their apps by directly programming the Neural Accelerators using Tensor APIs in Metal 4.
A Faster Neural Engine to Power Intelligent Features
The faster 16-core Neural Engine delivers powerful AI performance with incredible energy efficiency, complementing the Neural Accelerators in the CPU and GPU to make M5 fully optimized for AI workloads. For example, AI-powered features on Apple Vision Pro — like the ability to transform 2D photos into spatial scenes in the Photos app, or generating a Persona — operate with greater speed and efficiency.
The Neural Engine in M5 also enhances performance for Apple Intelligence.3 On-device AI tools like Image Playground get faster, and the overall performance of Apple Intelligence models are enhanced by the faster Neural Engine and unified memory in M5.4 Also, developers using Apple’s Foundation Models framework will get faster performance.
Enhanced Memory to Do Even More with AI
M5 offers unified memory bandwidth of 153GB/s, providing a nearly 30 percent increase over M4 and more than 2x over M1. The unified memory architecture enables the entire chip to access a large single pool of memory, which allows MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Apple Vision Pro to run larger AI models completely on device. It fuels the faster CPU, GPU, and Neural Engine as well, offering higher multithreaded performance in apps, faster graphics performance in creative apps and games, and faster AI performance running models on the Neural Accelerators in the GPU or the Neural Engine. And with 32GB of memory capacity, M5 also helps users to seamlessly run demanding creative suites like Adobe Photoshop and Final Cut Pro simultaneously, while uploading large files to the cloud in the background.
Apple Silicon and the Environment
Apple 2030 is the company’s ambitious plan to be carbon neutral across its entire footprint by the end of this decade by reducing product emissions from their three biggest sources: materials, electricity, and transportation. The power-efficient performance of M5 helps the new 14-inch MacBook Pro, iPad Pro, and Apple Vision Pro meet Apple’s high standards for energy efficiency, and reduces the total amount of energy consumed over the product’s lifetime.
About Apple Apple revolutionized personal technology with the introduction of the Macintosh in 1984. Today, Apple leads the world in innovation with iPhone, iPad, Mac, AirPods, Apple Watch, and Apple Vision Pro. Apple’s six software platforms — iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, visionOS, and tvOS — provide seamless experiences across all Apple devices and empower people with breakthrough services including the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Pay, iCloud, and Apple TV. Apple’s more than 150,000 employees are dedicated to making the best products on earth and to leaving the world better than we found it.- Testing conducted by Apple in September 2025 using preproduction 14-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M5, 10-core CPU, and 10-core GPU; production 14-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M4, 10-core CPU, and 10-core GPU; and production 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1, 8-core CPU, and 8-core GPU. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.
- Testing conducted by Apple in September 2025 using shipping competitive systems and select industry-standard benchmarks.
- Apple Intelligence is available in beta with support for these languages: English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish, Chinese (simplified), Japanese, and Korean. Some features may not be available in all regions or languages. For feature and language availability and system requirements, see support.apple.com/en-us/121115.
- Genmoji and Image Playground are available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish, and Japanese.
Press Contacts
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Apple
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Apple
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Comments
By mumber_typhoon 2025-10-1513:3743 reply The M5 MacBook Pro still gets the Broadcom WiFi chip but the M5 iPad Pros get the N1 and C1X (Sweet).
All in all, apple is doing some incredible things with hardware.
Software teams at apple really need to get their act together. The M1 itself is so powerful that nobody really needs to upgrade that for most things most people do on their computers. Tahoe however makes my M1 Air feel sluggish doing the exact same tasks ive been last couple of years. I really hope this is not intentional from Apple to make me upgrade. That would be a big let down.
> Tahoe however makes my M1 Air feel sluggish doing the exact same tasks ive been last couple of years.
I have a work provided M2 Pro with 32GB of RAM. After the Tahoe upgrade it feels like one of the sluggish PCs at the house. It is the only one that I can see the mouse teleporting sometimes when I move it fast. This is after disabling transparency in Accessibility settings mind you, it was even worse before.
It's probably due to the Electron bug[1]. A lot of common apps haven't patched up yet.
I also have an M2 Pro with 32GB of memory. When I A/B test with Electron apps running vs without, the lag disappears when all the unpatched Electron apps are closed out.
1. https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/
Here's a script I got from somewhere that shows unpatched Electron apps on your system:
Edit: HN nerfed the script. Found a direct link: https://gist.github.com/tkafka/e3eb63a5ec448e9be6701bfd1f1b1...
> It's probably due to the Electron bug[1]. > When I A/B test with Electron apps running vs without, the lag disappears when all the unpatched Electron apps are closed out.
Look, if userspace apps can break system functionality, to the level that simple mouse cursor is not responsive, it suggests that there is something fundamental broken in the OS.
Yes, everyone should blame and shame Electron, but here the bug is firmly in the OS.
Apparently Electron was using a private API to tweak how window border shadows were rendered.[0] I leave it to you to decide how to assign blame.
Should we not be shaming apple for their recent software releases? Every bit of the os is N times slower than on the previous macOS version. Safari has been unusable. Constant lags and crashes in the shipped browser alone. We are back in Windows Vista times
By happymellon 2025-10-1610:13 Windows Vista broke UX for apps that tried to request admin permissions too often but didn't break the applications thenselves, and for video drivers wasn't that largely due to Intel shipping crap?
My MacOS experience has been first party software is getting worse.
By mocenigo 2025-10-1614:57 This is weird. I have an M3 MBAir and it does not feel slower than under Sequoia at all.
Helpful script, except it prints the same line regardless of the version found.
By geoffpado 2025-10-1518:11 If I’m remembering correctly, the original script he found had different emoji in the two lines (red X vs. green checkmark), but since HN comments strip emoji, pasting it here made them equivalent.
By runjake 2025-10-1518:22 HN nerfed the script. Here you go: https://gist.github.com/tkafka/e3eb63a5ec448e9be6701bfd1f1b1...
hmm there are apps produced by your script that claim to be fixed according to https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/ (Signal, Discord, Notion, etc). And I checked that those apps are updated. Which one’s correct?
By runjake 2025-10-1518:22 HN broke the script. Here's a link: https://gist.github.com/tkafka/e3eb63a5ec448e9be6701bfd1f1b1...
By mikamika83 2025-10-1623:39 the website is correct, you need to update the apps on your mac
unpatched include Asana, Bitwarden, Dropbox… some pretty high-profile apps
By runjake 2025-10-1520:07 Yes, and 1Password up until today!
By speedgoose 2025-10-1514:498 reply Do you have a few electron powered apps that didn’t get updated yet?
Electron used to override a private function that makes the Mac OS sluggish on Tahoe, and apparently no one uses Electron apps while doing testing at Apple.
I keep my applications pretty much up-to-date but I didn't check the release notes for each Electron application that I have to make sure they're updated. I still think this is a failure of macOS, since one misbehaving application shouldn't bring the whole environment to slow to a crawl.
What I can say is that while the situation is much better than at Day 1, the whole Tahoe experience is not as fluid as Sequoia.
Also, it doesn't really matter to me if this was a private function or not, if this was Windows or Gnome/KDE people would blame the developers of the desktop instead.
It shouldn't be the user's responsibility to know what architecture the software uses to then need to go look at upgrading them. Upstream comments blaming Apple for this for "not testing Electron apps internally", but I don't expect Apple to test every single app ever released for regression testing. Apple releases betas, and the software devs are expected to test their app against it. The problem comes from the app devs using a bit of private code where it is suggested to not do that for this very reason. Even if Apple did test and find the result, it would still be the app dev that would need to fix it. Maybe the thought is that an email from Apple to the dev saying fix your code would more compelling???
By speedgoose 2025-10-1515:043 reply Yes I think Apple is to blame there. Electron is so prominent that they should have detected the problem and found a solution well before the general release.
By placatedmayhem 2025-10-1515:021 reply The check script I've been recommending is here:
https://github.com/tkafka/detect-electron-apps-on-mac
About half of the apps I use regularly have been fixed. Some might never be fixed, though...
This is why I stay on previous release until at least 0.2 or 0.3 to let them work out the bugs so I dont' have to deal with them, there was nothing in 26 that felt pressing to me that I would need to update
By abustamam 2025-10-1517:26 Tbh I'm purposely not updating because I'm not in love with the new ~Aero~ glass UI.
By thewebguyd 2025-10-1615:07 > apparently no one uses Electron apps while doing testing at Apple.
You have it the other way around. It should be, apparently no one making Electron bothered to test on the numerous developer and public betas to make sure their hacky override of undocumented APIs (which Apple explicitly says not to use) didn't break.
The OS and stock apps are much slower in Tahoe even. And the UI updates/interactions are also slower. I’m lucky I only upgraded my least used machine, and that’s a well stocked M2.
By astrange 2025-10-1518:00 It should not be slower. File a report in Feedback Assistant.
By pjmlp 2025-10-165:54 WWDC keynote on the state of the nation was quite clear on what Apple thinks about Electron and related stuff like React Native.
Hence I am not surprised that they ignore their existence.
By freehorse 2025-10-1613:51 > apparently no one uses Electron apps while doing testing at Apple
Or also the other way around, nobody who develops electron apps cares to test their app on macos in the beta releases (beta testing for developers was long out afaik).
Except if it was like that JIT JVM bug that caused apps to crash and was not in the beta release.
By nikanj 2025-10-1518:18 Or more likely nobody gives a damn about performance while doing testing.
my tinfoil-hat theory is that on each OS iteration Apple adds a new feature that leverages the latest chips hardware acceleration features and for older chips they do software-only implementations.
they ship-of-thesseus the crap out of their OS but replacing with parts that need these new hardware features that run slow on older chips due to software-only implementations.
I got the first generation iPad Pro, which is e-waste now, but I use it as a screen for my CCTV, it cannot even display the virtual keyboard without stuttering like crazy, it lags switching apps, there's a delay for everything, this thing was smooth as butter on release.
By thewebguyd 2025-10-1515:173 reply I have the 4th gen (2020) iPad Pro with the A12X Bionic, the same chip they put in the Apple Silicon transition dev kits. With iPadOS 26 it's become barely usable, despite still being performant as ever on iPadOS 18. I'm talking huge drop in performance, stutters and slow downs everywhere.
I was considering just replacing the battery and keeping it for several more years but now I feel forced to upgrade which has me considering whether I still want/need an iPad since I'd also have to buy a new magic keyboard since they redesigned it, and they bumped the price ($1299 now vs. $999 when I got the 4th gen) so I'd be looking at $1700. Trying to hold out for an iPad Air with ProMotion.
I may be in the minority here, but I think 5 years is too short of a lifespan for these devices at this point. Early days when things were advancing like crazy, sure. But now? I have 8 year old computers that are still just fine, and with the M-series chips I'd expect at least 10 years of usable life at minimum (battery not withstanding)
By qingcharles 2025-10-1515:283 reply That's weird. I have an 8th Gen iPad, the slowest device that can run iPadOS 26, and everything is fine on that old thing. (except the OS takes up the majority of the storage)
By misiek08 2025-10-1613:34 I have perfectly fine Mini 2 Retina, but because they blocked Safari updates and faked AppStore connectivity issues - I have just perfect display with still good battery than can be used as bread cutting board :(
By cgh 2025-10-162:56 I have a 3rd Gen iPad Pro from 2018 and iPadOS 26 runs fine.
Plus they don't let you downgrade to previous iOS versions on iPhones and iPads (unless you've been smart to save SHSH blobs and all that) so the only option to revert to a smooth version now is to download a sketchy jailbreak.
By 05 2025-10-167:04 > A12 devices and newer
> You cannot restore to any iOS versions other than signed ones. All SHSH blobs are currently useless.
So, anything newer than iPhone X can’t be downgraded
By seec 2025-10-1610:53 Yep, this is pretty much how they operate. Apple has always done that to some extent. Sometimes they are even quite clear about it and use it as a marketing point to push upgrading.
By osn9363739 2025-10-1522:392 reply At some point you have to use the new features available to you. That's not really tinfoil, just progress, and how all tech works no.
By setopt 2025-10-1523:27 They could choose to not offer the new feature to users on old hardware, but still provide those platforms with e.g. security updates and key features like Safari upgrades.
By behnamoh 2025-10-163:07 this couldn't be farther from the truth. people still use vim and it's better than most new tech that was made post 2000s.
By prettyblocks 2025-10-1517:34 I'm on an M2 with 24GB ram and it feels like it flies as fast as ever.
By ExoticPearTree 2025-10-1514:481 reply 26.0.1 fixed the sluggishness. 26.0 was pretty unstable - felt like a game dropping frames.
By kokada 2025-10-1514:51 26.0.1 is better, but I can still get sluggishness in a few specific cases.
I just got one example while passing the mouse quickly through my dock (I still use the magnify animation) and I can clearly see it dropping a few frames. This never happened in macOS 15.
By jen20 2025-10-162:27 > work provided
I too have a work-provided laptop and a personal one bought the same month, with identical specs (the only difference is the US vs UK keyboard layout). The work-provided one is at least an order of magnitude slower to do anything thanks to enterprise crapware.
By Angostura 2025-10-1518:16 I don't get this - I have an M1 iMac - haven't noticed much difference.
By danhau 2025-10-1610:32 With Tahoe my M2 Pro feels snappier than before.
By fersarr 2025-10-1514:44 same here
By tsunamifury 2025-10-1517:091 reply Transparency disabling ads anothe draw layer that is opaque on top making it even worse than when it’s on
By array_key_first 2025-10-1520:391 reply If they developed it in the most naive and stupid way imaginable, sure. If we're assuming Apple isn't filled with 3rd year comp sci students, then no.
By tsunamifury 2025-10-1523:511 reply HAHA this is where HN has become delusional. It quite literally is the implementation, they've checked the render pipeline on reddit. Jesus the arrogance here is so shit.
The fix is to disable Glass. In a terminal: defaults write -g com.apple.SwiftUI.DisableSolarium -bool YES
This gets rid of the slow animations, inconsistent window cornering, and other annoyances.
Then (so menus aren't transparent and unreadable): System Settings > Accessibility > Display > Reduce Transparency
If you do those two things your machine should look and feel normal again. I've been running an M1 Max since 2021 and Tahoe was simply a disaster. Removing the glass layer made everything feel good again.
If for some reason you ever want the bad performance and glass back, you change the YES to NO in the Terminal command. Maybe someday it won't suck.
By zer0zzz 2025-10-177:06 https://tidbits.com/2025/10/09/how-to-turn-liquid-glass-into...
I really don't like what it does to certain transparent drop downs for certain apps as well as the control center.
But It does seem nice to do it on a per app basis (ie "defaults write com.apple.finder com.apple.SwiftUI.DisableSolarium -bool YES")
https://tidbits.com/2025/10/09/how-to-turn-liquid-glass-into...
I think DisableSolarium has no effect anymore. At least I can't see any. I'm in macOS 26.0 (25A354)
By erickhill 2025-10-170:00 Works for me. 26.0.1 (25A362)
By relatall 2025-10-173:24 this helps even iphone
By SkyPuncher 2025-10-1515:316 reply There are so many software related things that drive me absolutely loony with Apple right now.
* My iPhone as a remote for my Apple TV has randomly stopped deciding it can control the volume - despite the "Now Playing" UI offering an audio control that works.
There auth screens drive me crazy:
* Why cannot I not punch in a password while Face ID is working? If I'm skiing, I know Face ID isn't gong to work, stop making me wait.
* Likewise, on Apple TV the parental control input requires me to explicitly choose to enter a Pin Code. Why? Just show me the Pin Code screen. If I can approve from my device, I will.
* Similarly, if I use my phone as a remote, why do I need to manually click out of the remote to get to the parental control approval screen. I'm literally using my phone. Just auto-approve.As someone who jumped in the apple bandwagon at peak apple and hasn’t been through all their ups and downs the way some die hards have been, it’s been super aggravating dealing with apples shit lately - not what I signed up for all those years ago
It seems to have been degrading for a long time, but for me it’s been in this past year where it’s crossed into that threshold android used to live in where using the phone causes a physiological response from how aggravating it can be sometimes
I let my guard down and got too deep into the apple ecosystem- I know better and always avoided getting myself into these situations in the last, but here I am
The phone sucks right now - super buggy and they continue to remove/impose features that should be left as an option to the user By Yes, this has always been the knock on apple, but I typically havent had an issue with their decisions - it’s just so bad now
Lesson (re)learned and I will stay away from ecosystems - luckily the damage here is only for media
The minute I can get blue bubbles reliably on an android, I’ll give the pixel a shot again - if that sucks too then maybe I’ll go back to my teenage years and start rooting devices again
By skinnymuch 2025-10-1517:401 reply How would you ever get blue bubbles reliably on Android? Are you talking about iMessage or something else?
I am fully bought into the Apple ecosystem. Not sure yet if I regret it. It is annoying to be so tied down to one company that isn’t going the way I want it to.
Yeah iMessage - over the years there have been “breakthroughs” - people find nifty workarounds or have even reverse engineered the iMessage protocol, but for whatever reason nothing ever sticks
There are current workarounds, like isn’t your home Mac as a relay, but nothing super elegant that I know of
Having used Whatsapp for the majority of my messaging the last decade or so, every time I'm forced to use iMessage for communicating with family I can't help but think it's absolutely a garbage interface. Buggy, slow, difficult to really get anything done effectively. Threaded messages is a nightmare. I really can't wrap my head around how anyone prefers using this over literally anything else.
By SkyPuncher 2025-10-1517:431 reply So, I still think the experience is generally better and more integrated than when I was on an Android device. I just find they're generally not really paying attention to user details the way they have in the past.
By stavros 2025-10-1710:12 The experience may be better now than when you were on Android, but it's not better than Android now. I switched from Android to iOS around a year ago, I lasted three months before I went back to Android.
There were many papercuts, but the keyboard being a hundred times worse than Android is what aggravated me every time I had to use the phone, and the straw that broke the camel's back.
> * Why cannot I not punch in a password while Face ID is working? If I'm skiing, I know Face ID isn't gong to work, stop making me wait.
Funny, a similar thing has been driving me crazy on my Ubuntu 20.04 laptop with fingerprint login. When unlocking, I can either enter a password or use fingerprint. On boot, I am not allowed to enter a password until I fail with fingerprint. If I use fingerprint to log in on boot, I have to enter my password anyways once logged in to unlock my keychain.
I should probably just figure out a way to disable fingerprint on boot and only use it for the lock screen.
By prettymuchnoone 2025-10-1518:131 reply I think this is a GNOME thing...the keychain by default has the same password as the login password, so logging in with the password unlocks it too. fingerprint login doesn't unlock it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38527876, https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/GNOME/Keyring
By strbean 2025-10-1520:04 Yeah, I've resigned myself to that. The part that irks me is that it doesn't present a password prompt (on initial login) until fingerprint attempts are exhausted.
By sample2 2025-10-1517:45 I see the same bug with the remote on my phone, how did they manage to break volume control in the app while keeping it working from the lock screen “now playing”?
I’ve also been unable to get the remote app on my watch to work at all. It’s hard to imagine people working at Apple don’t also run into these issues all the time.
Why can I not use my password manager for my Apple ID but can use it for any other password field? Instead I have to switch to my password manager, copy the password, reopen the App Store, select get app, and paste the password in the Apple ID login pop up in the 10 seconds before my password clears from my clipboard.
By mschuster91 2025-10-1517:481 reply Been ages but I think you can mitigate that annoyance by approving fingerprint purchases.
By sotix 2025-10-1522:00 It requires a password to enable Touch ID whenever you restart your phone. For security reasons, the iPhone automatically restarts every few days. So I run into this issue regularly.
I highly recommend the Apple remote .. then you also don't need to take your phone with you when you are watching TV, which is an added benefit for some.
Of course the thin Apple remote has a way of getting lost, but it has a Find Me feature which locates it pretty well.
By SkyPuncher 2025-10-1517:412 reply Remote is fine, but it's always stuck in a couch cushion.
By K7PJP 2025-10-1519:13 There was a company or two that made cases for the older Apple remotes with the express purpose of making them larger, which I always thought was kind of funny. I would buy one for the current remote if one existed.
Same here.. so we use that Find Remote functionality about once a month! Without it we'd be lost. Business idea: Make a cover for the Apple remote that makes it bigger and harder to lose.
By Tempest1981 2025-10-1621:27 It also feels ice cold, with sharp edges
The volume on iPhone when being used as remote seems to work of you use the hardware buttons. It’s not intuitive at all but it works
By SkyPuncher 2025-10-1615:45 Yes, I'm aware. That feature breaks - despite volume control still working on the "Now Playing" screen.
It's incredible what the hardware teams at Apple have been doing. I imagine they also feel let down by the software that's driving these beasts. It's as if they're 2 completely different companies.
By kenjackson 2025-10-1519:065 reply The latest iPhone OS (iOS 26) is embarrassing. The number of glitches and amount of UI sloppiness is crazy for a company that historically prided itself on the details. It's the first major iOS update I've taken that just seems almost strictly worse than its predecessor.
By paweladamczuk 2025-10-1519:441 reply I remember using my first Apple product years ago, it was an iPod touch 4th gen. The quality of the software on that thing was in a completely different league compared to anything I had used before.
I also installed the iOS 26 update recently. The competitive advantage of software polish that Apple had seems totally gone.
Add to that bugs in iCloud, AirDrop... I don't think I will be buying any more Apple devices for myself.
By mrheosuper 2025-10-172:28 pretty much any ultrabook at the same price range: Dell XPS, Microsoft Surface
By kossTKR 2025-10-1519:55 A small silver lining is if the worlds largest company can ship complete garbage like this don't feel bad about your own small mistakes. I mean i've hotfixed and done my fair share of production reverts - but never, never anything as bad as this.
Disclaimer, i actually like a bit of "bling", but both Tahoe and IOS so filled with glitches and errors, while the UX is bizarrely inconsistent it really is catastrophically bad.
By port11 2025-10-1917:46 We tend to dislike big UI changes. But… I picked up my sister's new iPhone running 26 and got a sudden “ach, Windows Vista” moment. Yuck.
By Andrew_nenakhov 2025-10-165:29 iOS 7 was the first version of iOS that looked good. Its release was far better and stable be than this liquid glass thing.
By whimsicalism 2025-10-1522:43 i've never had such a major downgrade as this one
In the case of Microsoft and Intel, they were. Vertical integration is Apples claim to fame, but apparently, it has its limits.
By pjmlp 2025-10-2214:20 Not really, vertical integration was the way of the computing world, CP/M on 8 bit clones and MS-DOS on IBM PC clones were the exception.
Naturally Apple as the survivor from all that were not IBM-PC, appears to be the one with vertical integration approach.
By discomrobertul8 2025-10-168:123 reply > Software teams at apple really need to get their act together.
WatchOS 26 has rendered my Apple Watch almost useless. It's gone from lasting a whole day including 2 cycling 'workouts' for my commute and the occasional lunch time run (or gym session before work) to now being at 40% battery by the time I make my mid-morning coffee and dead before I get home.
I don't use most of the 'smart' features anyway - I'm mostly using the fitness features - so I'll probably switch to a Garmin at some point.
> I don't use most of the 'smart' features anyway - I'm mostly using the fitness features - so I'll probably switch to a Garmin at some point.
If that's your use case, I can absolutely recommend getting one. I have a Forerunner 745 and it works great for workouts alongside some smart functions like NFC payments, quick-replies to texts, etc. The battery lasts for days as well, which you can't really beat.
> The battery lasts for days as well, which you can't really beat.
The Garmin Instinct 2X's (and 3) battery lasts for 40 days in smartwatch mode, not counting the solar charging.
The Instinct is an "outdoor watch" with a monochrome display, but it has most features the Forerunners have.
By isolli 2025-10-1615:52 For the sake of completeness, I would also mention:
- Suunto (20 to 30 days in smartwatch mode for the Verticals, optional solar charging, flashlight on the Vertical 2)
- Coros (2 to 3 weeks depending on the model), no flashlight
- Withings (30 days, looks like a regular watch)
Coros is good for how long they support their watches, and the fact that they don't restrict features in lesser models. Suunto is great for route planning. Polar is renowned for its training metrics (sleep, recovery etc.) but only fetches a week in smartwatch mode.
Also it has a proper builtin flashlight which is surprisingly useful. Amazing watch, especially if you get a comfortable aftermarket strap e.g. from Hemsut.
By thirdsun 2025-10-208:03 Have you tried restarting your watch? I noticed heavily increased battery drain after the update too, until I restarted the watch and everything turned normal again.
By rstuart4133 2025-10-1623:481 reply If you want to try something cheap, try the Amazfit BIP 6 watch. It costs around 1/4 of Apple watch, has most but not all of the same sensors (can't do ECG). It has far too many configuration options for my taste, but it does mean you can make it look like Apple like with Apple watch like battery life or configure it to last well over 3 weeks on a single charge. TL;DR: software is kinda clunky, but the hardware works well, and it's focus is on fitness.
By nonamenoslogan 2025-10-2020:38 I'll echo this, I've been buying these for my wife since the original Bip, and the battery life alone is more than worth it. She wears hers nearly daily.
Before the whole "batterygate" thing[1], there were forums and discussions on macrumors and similar inquiring about the feasibility of inserting no-op codes deep below the kernel that would kick in under certain conditions. Post-batterygate, you can't find anything NOT about batterygate when searching.
1] Which I still firmly believe WAS indeed a power-supply design failure that would have forced a massive hardware recall had they not done something (slowing down the os). I believe it encompassed everything from inaccurate CPU power estimates to something actually incorrect with the PCB design, causing brown outs - and not merely a battery-aging red herring as is the reported scandalous reason they were "caught". In fact, I think Apple is GLAD that all it amounted to was some philosophical hullabaloo about protecting your poor aging battery.
To clarify, I suspect the "aging battery" merely exposed the real issue - the incorrect PS design - which Apple successfully covered up.
Do you have any links to these discussion posts? This sounds very interesting, and I'm intrigued to learn more about the hardware explanation for this phenomenon.
By nofunsir 2025-10-189:39 Nope. I know a couple were on macrumors forums. And to be clear, there were suspicions of Apple slowing down devices to get you to upgrade far before Batterygate. It used to be painfully obvious, but with apple's protections it wasn't knowable.
I've seen every new OS update leading to M1 Air performance degrade, at this point I'm pretty convinced Apple is doing this intentionally.
Edit: Same experience with iPhone X
Edit2: I still remember the feeling when I got them initially - that Apple is on customer's side, but now I feel totally helpless and i'm being forced to upgrade
I haven’t noticed this to be honest: macOS 26 Tahoe is the first update that significantly hindered the performances of my MacBook Air M1. Even with the Electron _cornerMask fix + disabling auto heuristics at the OS level.
By nonamenoslogan 2025-10-2020:40 I haven't either, though I've purposely kept my M1 on Sonoma for now because the newer OSs have dorked up my Ham Radio software.
By samat 2025-10-1820:09 Same thing, thinking about reinstalling :(
By greg5green 2025-10-1517:374 reply >The M5 MacBook Pro still gets the Broadcom WiFi chip but the M5 iPad Pros get the N1 and C1X (Sweet).
Is that good? Their cellular modems have been terrible. I'll reserve judgement until trying one out.
>The M1 itself is so powerful
I think this is a bit of a fallacy. Apple Silicon is great for the power consumption to power ratio, but something like a Ryzen 9 7945HX can do 3x more work than an M1 Max. And a non-laptop chip, like an Intel Core Ultra 7 265k can do 3.5x.
By wizee 2025-10-1518:01 Those ratios seem way off if you're referring to the M1 Max and not the base M1. If we use Geekbench CPU performance, the Ryzen 9 7945HX (which is from 2023) is around 12% faster single core and 32% faster multicore than the M1 Max (which is from 2021). If you look at the 2024 M4 Max, it's substantially faster than the Ryzen and Intel you mentioned.
https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/amd-ryzen-9-7945hx
https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/intel-core-ultra-7-...
https://browser.geekbench.com/macs/macbook-pro-16-inch-2021-...
https://browser.geekbench.com/macs/macbook-pro-16-inch-2024-...
By n8cpdx 2025-10-1519:00 Source re:modem claims? Performance seems fine in general, modestly slower on very high end networks but using 25% less power.
Performance claims:
https://www.ookla.com/articles/iphone-c1-modem-performance-q...
Energy claims:
https://appleinsider.com/articles/25/02/27/apples-c1-modem-b...
By Avamander 2025-10-1518:56 Having a cellular modem on a MacBook would be really handy even if it's not perfect.
The Broadcom WiFi support 320Mhz while N1 is stuck with 160Mhz. There were report of N1 not supporting 4096 QAM as well but I didn't check.
By ExoticPearTree 2025-10-1514:513 reply > The Broadcom WiFi support 320Mhz while N1 is stuck with 160Mhz.
I was at a Wi-Fi vendor presentation a while back and they said that 160 Mhz is pretty improbable unless you're leaving alone and no wireless networks around you. And 320 Mhz even less so.
In real life probably the best you can get is 80 Mhz in a really good wireless environment.
For which band? I run 160/160 on 5/6ghz and it’s nice. They are short range enough to work. For 2.4 yeah 20mhz only
By greg5green 2025-10-1517:43 For 5ghz, that's a pretty unusual. You need to be somewhere where DFS isn't an issue to even get 160mhz.
For 6ghz? Yeah, not uncommon.
Indeed, in any relatively dense setting no one should even think about using channels that wide. Think about the original problem with 2.4ghz 802.11b/g: there were only three non-overlapping channels, so you had interference no matter where you went. Why would we want to return to that hell?
By 0x457 2025-10-1520:11 My limited experience:
2.4Ghz is pretty much only used by IoT, you generally don't care about channel width there. When your client device (laptop, phone) downgrades to 2.4Ghz it might as well disconnect because it's unusable.
5Ghz get stopped by a drywall, so unless your walls are just right to bounce off single, you need AP in every room. Ceiling mounting is pretty much required and you're pretty much free to use channels as wide as your device support and local laws allow.
6Ghz get stopped by a piece of paper, so the same as 5Ghz except you won't get 6Ghz unless you have haev direct line of sight to the AP.
I would believe that MLO or similar features could make it a bit more likely that large amounts of bandwidth would be useful, as it allows using discontiguous frequencies.
WiFi does currently get anywhere near the bandwidth that these huge channels advertise in realistic environments.
By HumblyTossed 2025-10-1513:591 reply "stuck".
An infinitely small percentage of people can take advantage of 320Mhz. It's fine.
By londons_explore 2025-10-1514:192 reply Today. But in 3 years time it'll be widespread and your Mac will be the one with the sluggish WiFi connection that jams up the airwaves for all other devices too.
It really won't, and there will be a ton of devices "jamming up" the airwaves. In most places the backhaul isn't fast enough for anyone to get any use for 320MHz channels beyond maybe very large LAN file transfers which are for some reason happening over WiFi?
By shwaj 2025-10-1517:07 How does it “jam up the airwaves” if its operating at a different frequency than the devices you say it will be jamming?
By zdw 2025-10-1516:16 From Apple's support docs:
https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/wi-fi-ethernet-sp...
No devices support 320Mhz bandwidths, and only supports 160Mhz on 6GHz band on MacBooks and iPads. Some iPhones support 160Mhz on 5GHz as well.
Does it? If it’s the same WiFi chip used in other M4 Mac’s then it’s still limited to 160MHz:
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/deployment/dep268652e6...
By ksec 2025-10-162:58 My word I thought the Broadcom ones were better. Thanks for checking.
By Avamander 2025-10-1518:54 Channel width is not the only thing that determines the usability or quality of a chipset though.
Reducing Broadcom's influence over the WiFi ecosystem alone would be a large benefit.
I doubt the number of people in both "has no neighbors" and "owns Apple hardware" camps are significant at all.
By fragmede 2025-10-1519:27 Poe's law?
By MrBuddyCasino 2025-10-1514:43 I don’t think 4096 QAM is realistic anyway, except if your router is 10 cm away from your laptop.
I really wish apple sold the Mx to others like Lenovo.
I would love to se a ThinkPad with an M5 running Linux.
What is the Linux experience on new Mac hardware? I'd be interested also in running a Macbuntu.
Asahi linux is essentially in a holding pattern with only support up to M2. Likely linux will never be supported above M2 and even M2 has a lot of rough edges. When my monitor sleeps on M2 linux it can never reawaken without a reboot.
By tomekf 2025-10-168:12 There are very nice Thinkpads running on Snapdragon now. But no Linux is available…
Yeah I love my M1 iPad Pro. But the "liquid glass" update made it feel slower. Really only the 'unlock' feels slower, once I'm using it it's fine. But it's slightly annoying and does make me want to update this year to the m5.
But it's a glorified Kindle and YouTube box, so I'm hesitating a little bit.
my dad's got a pre AS iPad Pro and it's so bad after updating to 26. My 6th gen iPad on iOS 17 felt faster than this
By baq 2025-10-1520:30 I have a 5th gen? Can’t even remember now it’s so old. Nothing works anymore except Netflix, YouTube and Disney, and that only after a minute or so.
Which is fine, since it’s exclusively used to watch a kids show for a half an hour a day.
…but it’s also super sad to see a once fantastic piece of kit to degrade so much primarily due to software.
By knowitnone3 2025-10-1515:44 "make me want to update this year to the m5." Then Apple software devs did what they were told
By dawnerd 2025-10-1515:12 I’m still daily driving my M1 Max and have no reason to upgrade for a long time. There’s really nothing in my workflow that could be markedly improved performance wise. There’s only thing is maybe more ram as the need for that keeps growing - I’m isn’t just under 30 when running a bunch of containers.
As a UI/UX nerd, it’s a coin flip on intentionality. I’ve been noticing so many rough edges to Apple’s software when it used to astound. iOS Settings search will flash “No Results” as you begin to type which is comically amateurish. The macOS menu bar control panels can’t be keyboard navigated... It’s just silly.
I’ve been debating making a Tumblr-style blog, something like “dumbapple.com,” to catalogue all the dumb crap I notice.
Liquid Glass feels rushed to me. Tons of UI annoyances especially on iPhone - it's suddenly many clicks to get to prior calls for instance, a core way I call people. I'm imagining it will get ironed out over the next two years.
By bombcar 2025-10-1518:47 It really does. It’s a two-year update and hey should have had two teams - one for Liquid Glass working for the next release, and one doing a Snow Leopard-type cleanup for this year. Let the Mac and iPhone be a bit out of sync if needed.
By askonomm 2025-10-1515:25 There already is something like it (though not Apple-exclusive): https://grumpy.website/
By hn111 2025-10-166:48 I’ve been having the same idea for a while. I think it would be a great way to let them prioritize the stability a bit more by publicly displaying how shamefully the UI behaves.
Interested in collaborating on this? Perhaps a simple open-source static blog built with Astro?
"iOS Settings search will flash “No Results” as you begin to type which is comically amateurish."
I'd love to agree that comically amateurish, but apparently there's something about settings dialogs that make them incredibly difficult to search. It takes Android several seconds to search its settings, and the Microsoft start menu is also comically slow if you try to access control panels through it, although it's just comically slow at search in general. Even Brave here visibly chokes for like 200ms if I search in its preferences dialog... which compared to Android or Windows is instant but still strikes me as a bit to the slow side considering the small space of things being searched. Although it looks like it may be more related to layout than actual searching.
Still. I dunno why but a lot of settings searches are mind-bogglingly slow.
(The only thing I can guess at is that the search is done by essentially fully instantiating the widgets for all screens and doing a full layout pass and extracting the text from them and frankly that's still not really accounting for enough time for these things. Maybe the Android search is blocked until the Storage tab is done crawling over the storage to generate the graphs that are not even going to be rendered? That's about what it would take to match the slowdown I see... but then the Storage tab happily renders almost instantly before that crawl is done and updates later... I dunno.)
By robenkleene 2025-10-1517:042 reply The parent isn't commenting about the speed of search, just that saying "No Results", when they really mean "we're still checking for results" is bad UI (which I agree with).
By array_key_first 2025-10-1520:41 The speed is bad too. At least on Android, it does actually take 5-10 seconds sometimes. That's not an exaggeration.
It should be searching, what, a few hundred strings? What is it doing? Is it making a network call? For what?
Anyway, barely related, but it does bring into question the quality of modern software.
By fodkodrasz 2025-10-1518:273 reply It is possibly Null value pattern in action, which is a good thing in my opinion (as in robust), though its display this way is a bit suboptimal.
Funny I'm defending them, but I think this is not even a papercut in my opinion, while they have far bigger issues.
By vizzier 2025-10-1517:15 Might have to be more specific than Android and Windows. Tried them on my devices (S24, windows 11) and they're practically instantaneous.
By SoKamil 2025-10-1517:14 The old System Preferences search was lightning fast compared to current SwiftUI System Settings on macOS.
Please do this. Here are some examples to add to your list, leaving out the 26.0 bugs that I've come to expect running a .0 release.
1. I won't focus on a bunch of Siri items, but one example that always bugs me: I cannot ask Siri to give me directions to my next meeting. The latest OS introduces an answer for the first time, though. It tells me to open the calendar app on my Apple watch, and tap on the meeting, and tap the address. (I don't have an Apple watch.)
2. Mail.app on iOS does not have a "share sheet." This makes it impossible to "do" anything with an email message, like send it to a todo app. (The same problem exists with messages in Messages.app)
3. It is impossible to share a contact card from Messages.app (both iOS and MacOS). You have to leave messages, go to contacts and select the contact to share. Contacts should be one of the apps that shows up in the "+" list like photos, camera, cash, and plenty third party apps.
4. You still have to set the default system mail app in MacOS as a setting in the Mail.app, instead of in system settings. Last I checked, I'm pretty sure you couldn't do this, without first setting up an account in the Mail.app. Infuriating.
By tpmoney 2025-10-1613:22 > Mail.app on iOS does not have a "share sheet." This makes it impossible to "do" anything with an email message, like send it to a todo app.
You can’t directly share the mail message, but you can “share” selected text or you can use the “print” option to generate a PDF of the message and “share” that instead. Not very discoverable but might cover at least some of what you want to do.
Also not sure if it’s new with iOS 26 but for the contacts thing you can at least skip the “leave messages and search for the contact in the contacts app” part. There’s button in the contact info that will take you directly to the contact in the contacts app. It does feel silly that you can’t share direct from the card in messages though.
I had that complaint about Mail too. Then I realized you can begin dragging an email (from the list view), switch apps with your other hand, and drop it into, say, a todo. Of course, this is less discoverable, so I agree a Share button would not go amiss.
By jtbayly 2025-10-161:43 Wow. I didn’t even know it was possible to drag and drop between apps on iOS. TIL. Thanks!
iirc, there's a setting to make the menu bar navigatable. you just need to "alt+tab" to it with some weird button combo, like Ctrl + Cmd + 1 or something.
By lelandfe 2025-10-1514:51 You can turn on "Full Keyboard Access," which paints a hideous rectangle around anything you focus but does allow keyboard access to everything.
But, like, man - why can't I just use the arrow keys to select my WiFi network anymore? I was able to for a decade.
And the answer, of course, is the same for so much of macOS' present rough edges. Apple took some iPadOS interface elements, rammed them into the macOS UI, and still have yet to sand the welds. For how much we complain on HN about Electron, we really need to be pissed about Catalyst/Marzipan.
Why does the iCloud sign in field have me type on the right side of an input? Why does that field have an iPadOS cursor? Why can't I use Esc to close its help sheet? Why aren't that sheet's buttons focusable?
Why does the Stocks app have a Done button appear when I focus its search field? Why does its focus ring lag behind the search field's animated size?
Where in the HIG does it sign off on unfocusable text-only bolded buttons, like Maps uses? https://imgur.com/a/e7PB5jm
...Anyway.
There's also an app, MenuWhere, that enables you to configure different keys to walk the menu bar. It's free (but nagware). https://manytricks.com/menuwhere/
By nixpulvis 2025-10-1523:12 I would be soo excited if apple split out the hardware and software orgs and moved to make hardware more standardized with macos/ios/etc being just one consumer.
Not going to happen, but I can dream.
By thenaturalist 2025-10-1516:061 reply Don't kidd yourself: Planned obsolescence is real.
Apple has a higher duty to their shareholders than to their customers.
Not hating on Apple, just stating the hard economic truth.
By NetMageSCW 2025-10-1521:122 reply Nope, never been real, never will be real. Just conspiracy theories like all the others.
PS The Earth isn’t flat. We did go to the Moon. Vaccines don’t cause autism.
By thenaturalist 2025-10-169:441 reply Yes, it's real and it's plain funny that you discredit simple facts in a case as obvious and with as many data points as Apple.
From the 2005 iPods settlement [0], to the 113 Mio USD Batterygate [1], to Flexgate [2] where Apple only escaped settlement due to plausible deniability.
To quote from Batterygate:
> Apple has agreed to pay millions of dollars to 34 states over its controversial previous practice of deliberately slowing down older iPhones to extend their battery life.
> [...]
> Many believed it was an effort to encourage users to buy new iPhones.
I agree on all your "PS" points, where we seem to differ is that reading is a virtue and not knowing something because you haven't heard of it doesn't constitute a conspiracy theory.
0: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ipod-class-action-suit-settled/
1: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/11/19/tech/apple-battery-settle...
2: https://www.macrumors.com/2021/07/20/flexgate-class-action-l...
By jwhiles 2025-10-1610:52 These obviously are’t planned obsolescence though.
Flexgate is a manufacturing error, that they handled in a consumer hostile way
Batterygate, was an arguably misguided way to support outdated models - prioritising one goal (battery life) over another (speed)
The iPod thing I’ll admit I know nothing about.
It sounds like, for you, planned obsolescence is defined as any instance where a product isn’t manufactured perfectly or degardes over time, regardless of whether it was planned. For me, planned obsolescence should contain at least a hint of planning.
By otikik 2025-10-167:59 Planed obsolescence is not a conspiracy. Apple specifically has been proven to sneakily add "silently slow down the hardware" to their updates. But there's examples of planned obsolescence abound.
By butlike 2025-10-1514:27 I think it's probably a play to get you to upgrade for the new GPU computational power. I _do_ think that what we're seeing (and marketed as AI) will be the future, but I don't think it will look like what we're seeing now. Whatever that future holds will require the upgraded capabilities of these new GPU architectures, and this being a reason for the subtle nudge to upgrade from Apple makes sense to me.
It feels very much like how I imagine someone living in the late 1800's might have felt. The advent of electricity, the advent of cars, but can't predict airplanes, even though they're right around the corner and they'll have likely seen them in their lifetime.
By lawlessone 2025-10-1517:09 >The M1 itself is so powerful that nobody really needs to upgrade that for most things most people do on their computers
a rant on my part, but a computer from 10 years ago would be fine for what most people do on their computer, only for software bloat..
My M1 Air got very sluggish after upgrading to Tahoe but then it started behaving normally after a couple of days. Hopefully, you'll experience the same soon.
By raspasov 2025-10-169:15 Probably building a spotlight index or something of that sort.
By eboynyc32 2025-10-165:17 I think Tahoe is great on my m1 studio. It’s the first os update in a long time that I actually like. The new design feels very futuristic. And I think I’ll get an m5 MacBook Air. There no better computer deal . Even my m1 computer 5 year old still never has any issue with video or render. It’s insane.
Seems like the software teams are there to simply squander the extra processing power that the hardware teams provide, thus ensuring recurring revenue. I see no good reason to upgrade to Tahoe. I’d have to buy a new computer just so I could power transparencies that I don’t want.
By bsimpson 2025-10-1519:50 This feels like it's always been true.
Devices get slower for no perceivable reason, when in reality software at all levels makes higher assumptions about how much power you have, and squanders it more readily.
By hahamaster 2025-10-1621:35 Disable transparencies in Settings then. Simple.
By stingraycharles 2025-10-1611:59 That’s a bit silly though, that implies that the MacBook Pro M5 will not be compatible with Apple’s lossless wireless codec introduced in the iPhone 17 and AirPods Pro 3?
That really is a reason for me to skip this upgrade and wait for the next release.
By attendant3446 2025-10-2319:38 I know this is an old thread, but I wanted to say that I agree with you. I also think that Apple's hardware is fantastic, but it's the software that's holding them back.
By JumpCrisscross 2025-10-1517:121 reply > Tahoe however makes my M1 Air feel sluggish
Counterpoint: my M1 Pro was a turtle for a few weeks and then stopped doing nonsense in the background and is back to its zippy self. (Still buggy. But that would be true on new hardware, too.)
By quadyeast 2025-10-1518:26 mediaanalysisd has been consuming ~140% CPU since upgrading a few weeks ago. I just turned off Apple Intelligence and it dropped to 0%.
By caycep 2025-10-1620:06 I wonder how much is due to just scale vs. a Bertrand Serlet vs Craig Federighi culture/management style
I personally have no idea but I seem to recall the golden age of open source/unix embrace was under Serlet
By RataNova 2025-10-168:32 And it kind of defeats the purpose of having such powerful hardware if the OS isn't keeping up (or worse, actively throttling older devices)
By pantalaimon 2025-10-1513:421 reply Won't that make Linux support even harder :/
By singularfutur 2025-10-1612:59 I tried many times to install linux on my m4 and it's very limited (only Asahi) and not with a great support of features like sleep. It's painful so at the end of the day, I restart with osx
By fx1994 2025-10-167:46 That's why I did not upgrade :) I upgraded VM and when I saw how slow it was, it was a no no for my M2...
By throw0101d 2025-10-160:35 > The M5 MacBook Pro still gets the Broadcom WiFi chip but the M5 iPad Pros get the N1 and C1X (Sweet).
I think many IT departments will be thankful for that as Wifi behaviour can be challenging and hopefully will lower ticket counts.
By dcchambers 2025-10-1613:28 I really want to know why Apple refuses to put a cellular chip in the macbooks.
They are so scared about cannibalizing mac/ipad sales - they really really want people to own both.
By hoppp 2025-10-1617:01 They are known to slow down devices on purpose. For them its simply to bring the most out of their new models but it ends up deprecating the old ones.
By WhitneyLand 2025-10-1514:39 “nobody really needs to upgrade that for most things”
Maybe, but for lots of scenarios even M5 could still benefit from being an order of magnitude faster.
AI, dev, some content scenarios, etc…
By artk42 2025-10-169:22 > I really hope this is not intentional from Apple to make me upgrade. That would be a big let down.
I've got a reference macbook air from 2015, which is almost clean, only zoom, teams and chrome for meets are installed and used for calls. And boy, how do I regret making macOS updates.. I can believe teams and zoom are shitbags of modern software slop, and thus started to fail running simple video calls. But even native macOS apps that are barely updated for years like notes and calendar are freezing now. So I can conclude that these anti-backward compatibility updates are highly intentional, because hardware is absolutely fine for decade, i even used this ultra-tiny air for travel work once back in 2022, it was still capable to do all office things and thin client. But last year it just turned into pumpkin.
My question is - maybe installing linux can help bring it back to life.
By rester324 2025-10-161:03 If Tahoe made M1 slower then I am sure it was intentional. Apple had done this in the past and been fined for hundreds of millions in different courts all over the world. So I am pretty sure they continue slowing software down intentionally on older hardware. You can google "batterygate" and you can see for yourself
By mcculley 2025-10-169:02 Does this mean that the MacBook Pro still has no option for a cellular modem?
By sharts 2025-10-164:52 The reason for better hardware is so software can lag more.
By random3 2025-10-1517:08 This needs benchmarks.
Sad if true. I feel my M1 max sluggish too lately. After bragging that this was the longest lived work machine I had and thinking I'm good to wait for M6. This is not good for business, but IMO you need more than raw power to justify upgrades even for professional use - form factor, screen quality, battery, etc.
I think they bet a lot of hardware money on AI capabilities, but failed to deliver the software, so there was no real reason to upgrade because of AI features in the chip (which is literally what they boast on the first line of the announcement - yet nobody cares about making more cute faces)
It's not 100% their fault. Everyone got onto the LLM bandwagon like it's "the thing" so even if they didn't believe it they sill needed something. Except an OS is not a chat interface, and LLMs do suck at stricter things.
By DSingularity 2025-10-1517:54 Each challenging in their own ways. The real challenge is that we need codesign and that’s the tricky part.
By jbverschoor 2025-10-166:35 >> Tahoe however makes my M1 Air feel sluggish doing the exact same tasks ive been last couple of years
Quit the Dropbox app, it’s electron, and it’s brand spanking new
By phamduongtria 2025-10-1518:12 Even the M4 Max MacBook, I tried in the stores were running like shit on Tahoe
By hexbin010 2025-10-1514:42 [dead]
By mumber_typhoon 2025-10-1513:552 reply What I have seen with iPhones is that the ram has gone from 4gb to 12gb very quickly compared to how it went from 1gb to 3gb.
Apps used to use less ram but over the years apps have become big and more complicated. This is probably why iPhones feel sluggish because new iPhones have more memory and apps snap back faster as newer iPhones which also have faster storage and memory bandwidth to reduce latency of reading more data from the flash.
Batteries are also a problem as maintaining voltage is difficult for a 2-3 year old battery. An official battery swap at apple service for a 3 year old iPhone will make it run much better.
I used to believe (and sometimes I still do) that apple intentionally makes everything heavier to make old phones and devices feel slower but I don't think thats the case.
I think that more things are happening on newer phones and devices and that same task feels slower on older device. This happens are lot faster on iPhones and phones in general (a year or two) as opposed to Macs/computers which can show signs of aging in 4-5 years.
My 2018 intel computer feels very slow in 2025 running Gnome. No one slowed it down. It's just that the 2025 world of software is a lot heavier and 2026 will be even more and so on.
Apple has been proven to intentionally slow down older devices, but it's definitely not to inflate their profits. It's just a way to kindly preserve your old battery for you. And they try to keep it a secret from you so you don't get confused.
… Eh? It was neither. It was due to a design defect in a particular model; if voltage fell into a range that was perfectly possible with an aging but still functional battery, the SoC would shut off. The only viable software fix was to clock it down instead (there was an option to decline that and risk the abrupt shutoffs).
Not really sure what else they could have done there.
By HumblyTossed 2025-10-1514:02 Apps are heavier because a lot of them do not use native code. It's all cross platform BS. And they include a lot of A/B code as well. Really wish Apple would nip that all in the bud.
By the_other 2025-10-1514:23 My iPhone X worked fine for 7 years, even without a battery replacement. It still works just fine. I wanted a larger screen and better zoom lens, so I upgraded earlier this year but I absolutely didn't have to and didn't feel any pressure from Apple to do so.
n=1.
I've been using an iPhone 11 for 4 years now (also, reminder: the 11 was launched 2 years prior to when I bought mine). I replaced the battery earlier this year as it wouldn't last to the end of the day any more but besides that it's showing no slowdowns or any other issues.
Do you have iOS 26 on it? That pigdog is making my 15 Pro Max sweat and cry.
I have an iPhone 13 and haven't upgraded yet. Sounds like I should hold off.
By alimbada 2025-10-1513:52 I only just upgraded to iOS 18 recently. I'm unlikely to go to 26 unless there's a good reason to do so.
By rsynnott 2025-10-1514:33 Never, ever, upgrade to any Apple OS until at least .1. .0 is _always_ broken.
By chasd00 2025-10-1514:32 i don't see what the big deal is with iOS 26. it looks a little bit different, everything now seems to have some degree of transparency but everything works the same.
By tempoponet 2025-10-1514:311 reply They support their phones for years longer than any vendor. This has been widely understood for probably 10+ years at this point.
There's plenty of room for criticism without a blanket conspiracy that doesn't match what most can observe.
By imcritic 2025-10-1613:03 Support means that the manufacturer just still releases OS updates. But it says absolutely nothing about the quality of those updates: what if those updates simply degrade the situation? Every iPhone user I know says the same without conspiring with each other: it's better to stop updating to newer major OS releases for older iPhones.
By endemic 2025-10-1514:26 No more than any other company.
By wartywhoa23 2025-10-1518:381 reply > ...The <thing I own right now> is so powerful that nobody really needs to upgrade...
I keep hearing this since the Intel 486DX times, and
> Nobody will ever need more than 640K of RAM!
By bombcar 2025-10-1518:43 This is the first time I’ve gone four+ years without even a real desire to upgrade, I have a hard time figuring out even what would be faster.
Amusingly enough, adding more ports could do it.
By DecentShoes 2025-10-1520:232 reply They always release a slowdown update to destroy their older hardware. I don't know why you're even questioning it
I agree with your feeling that about Apple devices eventually getting updates to the point they becomes sluggish. I have just reached that point with iOS 26 and my iPhone 13 mini.
I am undecided in my thoughts about how malicious this is. Do people think that it is something like wanting to cram more features into the operating systems, and they are careless how it affects the earliest supported models? Or do most people think it is planned obsolescence?
Apple generally offer updates longer than Android, so is it more pronounced on iPhones than Android phones? I remember seeing similar slow-downs on Android phones in the past.
Apple generally offer updates for iOS for less time than Windows. I don't really have a feel for the difference between the two in terms of how much new versions slow down older hardware.
Obviously separating feature updates and security updates would be a way to address, and it's not possible that no one at Apple has considered that idea. They are a business and selling new products is unfortunately a disincentive pushing them away from doing that.
Apple was fined all over the world for intentional malicious software slowdown by different courts in many countries. Just google "batterygate". At this point this a proven fact that apple had been doing this. I am pretty sure they continue to do so. Why would they stop?
The slowdown occurs on systems that can't hold sufficient charge to reliably power the CPU to full anymore. If the battery can't supply the expected voltage, then the system simply shuts off. That is much worse than slowing down. This feature inarguably increased longevity—hardly what I'd expect from a "planned obsolescence" scheme.
They did make a mistake, though: they should have been up-front about it. They should have advertised it rather than hiding it away.
By 0xWTF 2025-10-163:53 Meanwhile Ubuntu is still snappy on my original 2012 rMBP. It got a new screen, two new batteries, still has the last supported version of macOS installed if I want it. Still sparks joy. If only my fingers could keep the Ubuntu cmd and ctrl key functions properly mapped.
Base models only:
- M1 | 5 nm | 8 (4P+4E) | GPU 7–8 | 16-core Neural | Memory Bandwidth: 68.25 GB/s | Unified Memory: 16 GB | Geekbench6 ~2346 / 8346
- M2 | 5 nm (G2) | 8 (4P+4E) | GPU 8–10 | 16-core Neural | Memory Bandwidth: 100 GB/s | Unified Memory: 24 GB | Geekbench6 ~2586 / 9672
- M3 | 3 nm (first-gen) | 8 (4P+4E) | GPU 8–10 | 16-core Neural | Memory Bandwidth: 100 GB/s | Unified Memory: 24 GB | Geekbench6 ~2965 / 11565
- M4 | 3 nm (second-gen) | 10 (4P+6E) | GPU 8–10 | 16-core Neural | Memory Bandwidth: 120 GB/s | Unified Memory: 32 GB | Geekbench6 ~3822 / 15031
- M5 | 3 nm (third-gen) | 10 (4P+6E) | GPU 10 | 16-core Neural | Memory Bandwidth: 153 GB/s | Unified Memory: up to 32 GB | Geekbench6 ~4133 / 15,437 (9-core sample)
Let's see if I can turn this into an ASCII table and have it survive HN's reformatting.
+------+------------------+--------------+----------+----------------+-------------------+-------------------+---------------------------+ | Chip | Process | CPU Cores | GPU | Neural Engine | Memory Bandwidth | Unified Memory | Geekbench6 (Single/Multi) | +------+------------------+--------------+----------+----------------+-------------------+-------------------+---------------------------+ | M1 | 5 nm | 8 (4P+4E) | 7–8 | 16-core Neural | 68.25 GB/s | 16 GB | ~2346 / 8346 | | M2 | 5 nm (G2) | 8 (4P+4E) | 8–10 | 16-core Neural | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | ~2586 / 9672 | | M3 | 3 nm (first-gen) | 8 (4P+4E) | 8–10 | 16-core Neural | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | ~2965 / 11565 | | M4 | 3 nm (second-gen)| 10 (4P+6E) | 8–10 | 16-core Neural | 120 GB/s | 32 GB | ~3822 / 15031 | | M5 | 3 nm (third-gen) | 10 (4P+6E) | 10 | 16-core Neural | 153 GB/s | up to 32 GB | ~4133 / 15437 (9-core) | +------+------------------+--------------+----------+----------------+-------------------+-------------------+---------------------------+Or to fit in a narrower window:
Chip | Process | CPU | GPU | Neural | Memory | Unified | Geekbench6 | | Cores | | Engine | Bandwidth | Memory | Single / Multi -----|---------|-----------|------|---------|-------------|---------|---------------------- M1 | 5 nm G1 | 8: 4P+4E | 7–8 | 16-core | 68.25 GB/s | 16 GB | 2346 / 8346 M2 | 5 nm G2 | 8: 4P+4E | 8–10 | 16-core | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | 2586 / 9672 M3 | 3 nm G1 | 8: 4P+4E | 8–10 | 16-core | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | 2965 / 11565 M4 | 3 nm G2 | 10: 4P+6E | 8–10 | 16-core | 120 GB/s | 32 GB | 3822 / 15031 M5 | 3 nm G3 | 10: 4P+6E | 10 | 16-core | 153 GB/s | ≤32 GB | 4133 / 15437 (9 core)By hedgehog 2025-10-1615:23 Adding the other CPU options currently available in the 14 Pro:
Chip | Process | CPU | GPU | Neural | Memory | Unified | Geekbench6 | | Cores | | Engine | Bandwidth | Memory | Single / Multi ---------|----------|-------------|---------|---------|------------|---------|---------------------- M1 | 5 nm G1 | 8: 4P+4E | 7–8 | 16-core | 68.25 GB/s | 16 GB | 2346 / 8346 M2 | 5 nm G2 | 8: 4P+4E | 8–10 | 16-core | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | 2586 / 9672 M3 | 3 nm G1 | 8: 4P+4E | 8–10 | 16-core | 100 GB/s | 24 GB | 2965 / 11565 M4 | 3 nm G2 | 10: 4P+6E | 8–10 | 16-core | 120 GB/s | 32 GB | 3822 / 15031 M5 | 3 nm G3 | 10: 4P+6E | 10 | 16-core | 153 GB/s | ≤32 GB | 4133 / 15437 (9 core) M4 Pro | 3 nm G2 | 14: 10P+4E | 16–20 | 16-core | 273 GB/s | 64 GB | 3925 / 22669 M4 Max | 3 nm G2 | 16: 12P+4E | 32–40 | 16-core | 546 GB/s | 128 GB | 4060 / 26675By thenberlin 2025-10-162:301 reply This is somehow the most Hacker News thread I've ever seen and I love it.
the narrow window view is appreciated given the increased indent level of your comment
By aidenn0 2025-10-163:14 You can go to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45598632 to have zero indent level.
By momojo 2025-10-160:06 doing the lords work
By geuis 2025-10-162:33 Needs to be even more narrow. (iPhone 16pro landscape Safari).
By ksec 2025-10-1715:04 Updated to 10 Core Version, ST 4,263 / MT 17,862
For Context:
M1 Ultra (Mac Studio): 18,405
M3 Pro (14-inch MacBook Pro): 15,257
By someothherguyy 2025-10-163:511 reply to make it more narrow, place the redundant units in the header
By vietvu 2025-10-164:00 and replace first, second... with 1st, 2nd...
By tpowell 2025-10-163:00 Can I get YoY % improvements to the geekbench scores in another column I double-dog dare you
By PeterCorless 2025-10-1521:09 You've done yeoman's work, lad.
By kjkjadksj 2025-10-162:29 Looks brutal on mobile
By hereme888 2025-10-1523:24 Good idea!
The step down from 32GB to 24GB of unified memory is interesting. Theories? Perhaps they decided M4 allowed too much memory in the standard chip and they want to create a larger differential with Pro/Max chips?
Update: I am thinking the 24GB for M5 is a typo. I see on Apple's site the 14 inch MBP can be configured optionally with 32GB of RAM.
That seems like a typo or incorrect info, the M5 MBP definitely can be configured up to 32 GB, and the Apple page mentions 32 GB explicitly as well.
I had the same question, but I can only speculate at the moment. The cynical part of me thinks in a similar line: create an artificial differentiation and push people to upgrade.
If anyone has any real clues that they can share pseudonymously, that would be great. Not sure which department drove that change.
They definitely do that. You could get 64gb ram without going up to the top spec of the Max tier of CPU in the M1 and M2 generations, but with the M4 Pro you can only do 24 or 48gb, while on the lower spec M4 Max you can only do 36gb and nothing else, only the absolute best CPU can do 64, therefore if you were otherwise going to get the 48gb m4 pro, you'd have to spend another ~$1200 USD to get another 16gb of ram if all you cared about was ram.
There may be a technical explanation for it, but incentives are incentives.
you can get 64GB on the mini with M4-Pro so that lays credence to no technical reason, but at the same time if the business reason was strong, why allow it on the mini but not in a macbook? I think this is equally likely to be due to reducing SKUs or something. E.g they found that most people buying 64GB ram do also buy the upgraded processor.
I could be wrong about this but, if I had a guess, I'd say the 24GB M5 chips/systems exist due to binning.
Apple is designing and manufacturing a chip/chipset/system with 32GB with integrated memory. During QA, parts that have one non-conformant 8GB internal module out of the four are reused in a cheaper (but still functional) 24GB product line rather than thrown away.
Market segmentation also has its hand in how the final products are priced and sold, but my strong guess is that, if Apple could produce 32GB systems with perfect yield, they would, and the 24GB system would not exist.
By angoragoats 2025-10-164:571 reply The memory is not on-die, it’s separate (completely standard) memory chips, either DDR4 or DDR5 depending on which M-series CPU you’re looking at. So binning doesn’t really apply.
Seems like there's a misunderstanding on my part here. <reads more>
Ah, the memory is integrated in the same package (the "chip" that gets soldered onto the motherboard) as the integrated CPU/GPU, and I had understood that correctly. However, I had incorrectly surmised that it was built into the same silicon die.
Thanks for the correction!
Lesson: TIL about the difference between System-In-a-Package (SIP) and System-On-a-Chip, and how I had misunderstood the Apple Silicon M series processors to be SoCs when they're SiPs.
By christkv 2025-10-1518:38 the still have an option for 32GB
By umanwizard 2025-10-1520:421 reply M1 MBPs are still great laptops. In fact there are even Intel models from 2019 that are still officially supported. Apple is pretty much the last company it makes sense to accuse of planning obsolescence.
By mschuster91 2025-10-1520:546 reply Yup, but only on the hardware side. On the software side, you are entirely at their mercy - unlike Windows which goes to utterly ridiculous length to keep software dating back to the Windows 95 era running on top notch Windows 11 systems, Mac developers are all too used of having to constantly keep up with whatever crap Apple has changed and moved around this time.
By darkteflon 2025-10-1622:01 I see this criticism of Apple all the time and it’s completely at odds with my experience.
Our family iPad Pro is older than my 8-year old son, and still gets security patches. My wife’s phone is an XS Max, launched in 2018; iOS 26 is the first release that doesn’t support it - it will continue to receive security patches for the foreseeable future. My son’s school laptop is my old 8gb 2020 M1 Air, which continues to have stellar performance and battery life and could run Tahoe if I was crazy enough to want to upgrade it. My work machine is a 2021 M1 Pro that runs just as great as the day I bought it (thanks, Al Dente!). My 3 Apple TV 4Ks are I-have-no-idea-how-old but they are still being updated and just get out of the way like a TV box should.
I have no particular love for Apple (or any other company), but they’ve always treated me well as a customer. I can’t really think of another tech co that seems to make people as irrationally angry. Is it their marketing? I hate their marketing too. But their products and support are great.
Amazing. My M3Max is going to look like a paper-weight very soon. And that's fine by me. When I get an M6 or M7Max to replace it it'll be amazing.
I’m trying to find any reason I can that my M1 Max needs replacement; it’s hard. How do you justify it?
By djtriptych 2025-10-1518:596 reply Same. I have an M1 Max Studio and it's just laughing at the little workloads I throw at it (pro photo editing, music production, software dev, generally all at the same time).
It just never sweats AT ALL - it feels like a decade from obsolescence based on what I'm doing now.
It would have to be an order of magnitude faster for me to even notice at this point.
By zahirbmirza 2025-10-1519:143 reply Obsolescence for Macs comes when Apple decides not to allow your mac update the OS to the latest one.
You're clearly running low-intensity tasks (pro photo editing, music production, software dev, generally all at the same time) instead of highly-demanding ones (1 jira tab)
By j45 2025-10-163:53 So many articles I’ve read about the Mac Studio is how it very easily could be a 10year computer effortlessly.
The additional cooling in them seems quite helpful to their performance compared to the same chip in a laptop.
By kinnth 2025-10-1522:09 yup I'm an M1 max laptop, i actually went upto an m4 pro and went back the m1 max, it could handle more trading screens!
Obsolescence comes when Apple conveniently "optimizes" a new architecture in the OS for a new chip... that conveniently, ironically, somehow severely de-optimizes things for the old chips... and suddenly that shiny new OS feels slow and sluggish and clunky and "damn I need to upgrade my computer!." They'll whitewash it not as planned obsolescence but optimization for new products. Doesn't have to be that way, shouldn't be that way, but its incredibly profitable.
You should wait until next Fall if you don't really need to replace your M1 Max. Rumors say that Apple's going to redesign the Macbook Pros next year with an OLED screen.
I would rather buy the last refresh of the old design. Waiting for a redesign is risky, as some redesings are just bad (like the touchbar MBP). And Apple is opinionated enough that it often refuses to admit its mistakes and sticks to them for years.
For the love of god remove the notch, that's the only idiotic branding vestige left.
By montebicyclelo 2025-10-1519:143 reply On the contrary; now might be a good time to get an M1 Max laptop. A second hand one, ex-corporate, in good condition, with 64Gb RAM, is pretty good value, compared to new laptops at the same price. It's still a fantastic CPU.
By ozarkerD 2025-10-1520:19 That's what I did, bought a used one with 64GB and a dent in the back for ~$1k a year back or so. Some of the best money i've ever spent.
By andrei_says_ 2025-10-1521:241 reply Where would one look for ex-corporate MacBook pros?
By simondotau 2025-10-1521:001 reply Honestly the only Apple Silicon e-waste has been their 8GB models. And even those are still perfectly good for most people so long as they use Safari rather than Chrome.
By alexeldeib 2025-10-1518:45 By dgacmu 2025-10-1521:30 I finally replaced my m1 mini because of memory capacity (16GB doesn't cut it for me and jumping to 64 was worth it), but I'm having the same feeling about my M1 pro MBP with 32GB. It just still works so well for nearly everything I do.
I'm guessing the m5 pro may support 64GB but...
By throw0101d 2025-10-160:331 reply > How do you justify it?
* I want it.
* I have met all my other financial obligations.
* I do not have to go into debt for it.
* QED
By SchemaLoad 2025-10-163:511 reply You'd also want to evaluate what it lets you do which improves your life rather than just "I want it"
By croemer 2025-10-167:27 Personal workloads that benefit from upgrade: Running a Python script that's CPU limited, aligning genomes in parallel on all cores. It's common that I need to wait 2min for those tasks to complete. Shaving off 30s for faster iteration loop. is meaningful.
By nu11ptr 2025-10-1518:54 I am in the same boat as my Rust compile times are solid. I'm good for now, but with the M4 max twice as fast, upgrading to the M5 max next year could be a tempting upgrade.
By varispeed 2025-10-1521:56 I have M1 Max 32GB and I think I'll go with M5 Max simply because I need more RAM. I am constantly swapping about 16GB. I don't feel it that much, but it bothers me.
By gigatexal 2025-10-1520:56 I do a lot with VMs, and other memory intensive things so I went with 128GB of ram. I'm hoping for a laptop with 256GB+ in a few generations and one with more or less double the oomph would be nice. Everything can be faster, bring it on!
By burnt-resistor 2025-10-169:56 Did a M1 Max (32 GiB, 1 TB -> 64 GiB, 4 TB - Z14X000HR) upgrade in early 2024 for ~$1800 USD with ~20 battery cycles and 99% battery health. Avoiding *os 28 because I refuse unusable, battery-wasting bling.
By dzhiurgis 2025-10-1523:53 Weird timing but my m1 started lag out recently. Must be just in my head.
By zer0zzz 2025-10-1522:28 I have an easy one: asahi Linux only runs on m1 and m2 at the moment
By winstonp 2025-10-160:22 Rumor has it M6 Pro will be a total redesign. Whether that's a good or bad thing depends on how much you trust Apple to nail a next gen design first try again
By timcobb 2025-10-160:41 Compilation times?
By nine_k 2025-10-162:00 Running AI inference faster, of course!
By seanmcdirmid 2025-10-163:491 reply > How do you justify it?
Local LLMs.
By grishka 2025-10-1522:39 My M1 Max works just fine. Everything is as snappy as it was the day I bought it. I don't see any reason it might need a replacement any time soon. (The fact that I don't install major system updates unless absolutely necessary probably helps too)
By rootusrootus 2025-10-1519:301 reply I was thinking similar thoughts about my M2 Max MBP. I look at the newer chips and wonder at what point will (or has it happened already) will the base M chip outperform my M2 Max? I'll probably hold onto it a while anyway -- I think it will be a while before I find 96GB limiting or the CPU slow enough for my purposes, but I'd still like to know how things are progressing.
By lagadu 2025-10-168:56 Base M4 was already slightly outperforming the M2 Max in CPU. GPU-wise it's nowhere near close.
By jay_kyburz 2025-10-1519:344 reply Serious questions. How is Asahi these days? Is it ready as a daily driver? Is it getting support from Apple or are they hostile to it? Are there missing features? And can I run KDE on it?
> How is Asahi these days?
Much less active than it used to be when it was run by Hector Martin. The core development is a lot slower. Although the graphics stack, for instance, has reached a very mature state recently.
> Is it ready as a daily driver?
It depends. Only M1 and M2 devices are reasonably well-supported. There is no support for power-efficient sleep, Display Port, Thunderbolt, video decoding or encoding, touch ID. The speakers overheat and turn off momentarily when playing loud for a longer period of time. The audio stack in general had to be built from ground up and it seems to me like there are bits and pieces still missing or configured sub-optimally.
> Is it getting support from Apple?
Not that I am aware of.
> are they (Apple) hostile to it?
Not to my knowledge.
> Are there missing features?
Plenty, as described above. There has been some work done recently on Thunderbolt / Display Port. Quite a few other features are listed as WIP on their feature support page.
> Can I run KDE on it?
Of course. KDE Plasma on Fedora is Asahi Linux's "flagship" desktop environment.
Good and fair comment. Just adding some nuance:
> There is no support for power-efficient sleep
"power-efficient sleep" refers to discharging 1-2% battery over night rather than 10-20%. I.e. there's room for improvement, but the device can still be used without worrying much about battery life regardless (especially given how far a full charge gets you even without sleep).
> Display Port, Thunderbolt
Big item indeed, but it's actively worked on and getting there (as you mentioned).
> video decoding or encoding
Hurts battery performance, but otherwise I never noticed any other effect. YMMV for 4K content.
> touch ID
Annoying indeed, and no one has worked on this AFAIK.
> The speakers overheat and turn off momentarily when playing loud for a longer period of time. The audio stack in general had to be built from ground up and it seems to me like there are bits and pieces still missing or configured sub-optimally.
Sad to hear since I thought the audio heat model was robust enough to handle all supported devices. On my M1 Air I've never seen anything like this, but perhaps devices with more powerful speakers are more prone to it?
> On my M1 Air I've never seen anything like this
My experience is also based on a M1 Macbook Air. I have repeatedly experienced sudden muting of the speakers for a second or two while playing conversations on a high volume.
I only assume it is caused by thermal management of the speakers but I did not actually verify it.
By SchemaLoad 2025-10-163:531 reply Am I misrepresenting the situation or did the whole project seemingly fall apart over an argument between Hector and Linus Torvalds in the mailing list about getting some driver merged?
By pbasista 2025-10-1613:51 I would consider that to be a misinterpretation. The whole project did not fall apart because Hector Martin left. But as with any project where the leaders depart, it definitely got slower.
The argument was originally about merging some Rust code into some parts of the Linux kernel if I remember correctly. It did not involve Linus Torvalds directly. Rather, the respective maintainers of those specific parts were unwilling to merge some Rust code, mostly because they did not know Rust well and they did not want to acquire the responsibility to maintain such code.
By jay_kyburz 2025-10-1519:362 reply nevermind. Found this. Still a ways to go. https://asahilinux.org/docs/platform/feature-support/m4/#tab...
Asahi will probably only ever be feasible for years-old hardware. macOS is a total non-starter for me, so maybe one day I’ll end up with one of these, but only as some kind of tertiary / retro machine.
By filmgirlcw 2025-10-1520:341 reply Yeah, given all the people with passion/ability for low-level reverse engineering have left the project, I don’t think we should ever expect to get greater than M2 support from Asahi. Maybe one day another project will pick up the ideas, but for anyone not wanting to use years old hardware, the dream of Linux almost natively existing on modern Apple silicon remains just that: a dream.
By SXX 2025-10-1520:06 On macbook air M1 Asahi is pretty usable when it comes to hardware support. And been usable for at least 1 year.
Though either Fedora itself, how it built with Asahi or just running it with little disk space end up with freeze on boot after random updates. Twice, once without even rpmfusion enabled. Either some weird btrfs issue or I dont know what.
Like I'm Linux dude for two decades and dont do anything fancy, so this is weird. Switched to Asahi Ubuntu on ext4 and it working great so far.
By strogonoff 2025-10-1522:23 It is a shame Asahi supports only up to around M2 or so, because I really wanted to use it.
By rick_dalton 2025-10-1519:00 The multi-core geekbench score for the M5 is the 9 core version iirc. The 10 core score isn't out yet as far as I know.
Did TSMC 2nm slip to next year, or was it always planned to be 2026?
By hooch 2025-10-1521:35 Always been one more iteration of 3nm in the plan
By LordDragonfang 2025-10-1520:032 reply Interesting to see that over 5 years (M1 was 2020), the benchmark performance has not quite doubled. Is this an indictment of Moore's law, or just Apple over-speccing the M1 and slowly decreasing that over time?
By imoverclocked 2025-10-1520:35 Moore's law has never been an absolute and it's also about the number of transistors per mm/^2 ... not speed. Sometimes progress is a little faster and sometimes it's a little slower.
By hinkley 2025-10-1522:42 More than double the memory bandwidth. Processors can't do much while they're stalled waiting for data to load.
By ElijahLynn 2025-10-1518:41 Thank you! Since this is the top rated comment, can you also add M1 and M2 as well?
By mrheosuper 2025-10-172:351 reply yup, but your 13900 is likely attached to an oversize heatsink
By LarsDu88 2025-10-177:09 Glow in the dark water cooled heating, yes
By zer0zzz 2025-10-164:02 Easily yes
By B1FF_PSUVM 2025-10-1518:321 reply Thank you. Looking at replacing an Intel MacBook Air, I hope there are price drops on the "outdated" M4s (although an M2 phased out early this year would do well enough...)
By testing22321 2025-10-1523:041 reply I replaced an intel MacBook Pro with a used m1 air. By far the fastest computer I have ever used. Massive, massive leap.
By stefanfisk 2025-10-164:10 Yeah, going from Intel to M1 is IMHO somewhat comparable to going from HDD to SSD.
By hinkley 2025-10-1522:38 That's a lot of memory bandwidth. Kinda surprised geekbench doesn't benefit more from the fatter pipe.
By morshu9001 2025-10-1519:021 reply And the fastest M4 max was already fastest single and multicore CPU by a decent margin, while the fastest non-Apple CPU was only specialized for single or multi.
By AnthonyMouse 2025-10-1520:092 reply The single thread performance for modern high performance CPUs are all very close to each other. Apple's latest usually has a small advantage because they're the first to use TSMC's latest nodes, which is good for something like 15-20%.
The fastest multicore CPUs are the ones with a lot of cores, e.g. 64+ core Threadrippers. These have approximately the same single-core performance as everything else from the same generation because single-core performance isn't affected much by number of cores or TDP, and they use the same cores.
Everyone also uses Geekbench to compare things to Apple CPUs but the latest Geekbench multi-core is trash: https://dev.to/dkechag/how-geekbench-6-multicore-is-broken-b...
By musictubes 2025-10-162:071 reply That article points out that GB5 and GB6 test multi-core differently. The author notes that GB6 is supposed to approach performance the way most consumer programs actually work. GB5 is better suited for testing things like servers where every core is running independent tasks.
The only “evidence” they give that GB6 is “trash” is that it doesn’t show increasing performance with more and more cores with certain tests. The obvious rejoinder is that GB6 is working perfectly well in testing that use case and those high core processors do not provide any benefit in that scenario.
If you’re going to use synthetic benchmarks it’s important to use the one that reflects your actual use case. Sounds like GB6 is a good general purpose benchmark for most people. It doesn’t make any sense for server use, maybe it also isn’t useful for other use cases but GB6 isn’t trash.
By AnthonyMouse 2025-10-164:581 reply > The only “evidence” they give that GB6 is “trash” is that it doesn’t show increasing performance with more and more cores with certain tests. The obvious rejoinder is that GB6 is working perfectly well in testing that use case and those high core processors do not provide any benefit in that scenario.
The problem with this rejoinder is, of course, that you are then testing applications that don't use more cores while calling it a "multi-core" test. That's the purpose of the single core test.
Meanwhile "most consumer programs" do use multiple cores, especially the ones you'd actually be waiting on. 7zip, encryption, Blender, video and photo editing, code compiles, etc. all use many cores. Even the demon scourge JavaScript has had thread pools for a while now and on top of that browsers give each tab its own process.
It also ignores how people actually use computers. You're listening to music with 30 browser tabs open while playing a video game and the OS is doing updates in the background. Even if the game would only use 6 cores by itself, that's not what's happening.
By morshu9001 2025-10-1520:271 reply I was going by Geekbench. If it's broken then yeah.
It's not trash - it's quite nice for its niche. It's just not very scalable with cores, so it's best interpreted as a benchmark of lightly threaded workloads - like lots of typical consumer workloads are (gaming, web browsing, light office work). Then again, it's not hard to find workloads that scale much better, and geekbench 6 doesn't really have a benchmark for those.
For the first 8 threads or so, it's fine. Once you hit 20 or so it's questionable, or at least that's my impression.
By rldjbpin 2025-10-1614:10 just looking at this, this is yet another tock phase, breaking the two-year cyclic pattern.
the boost seems mainly due to higher memory bandwidth and slightly different architecture.
They're going to have a hard time selling the M5 when compared to the M4 Pro. Geekbench for that chip is 3843/22332, which is slightly slower for single core but better for multi, but also has thunderbolt 5 instead of 4.
The numbers for M5 Geekbench are for the binned iPad Pro version with one performance core disabled.
It's the only M5 device that leaked to the public early.
By jjcm 2025-10-1620:31 Thank you, I didn't realize this.
By NetMageSCW 2025-10-1520:53 Fortunately they will be selling the M5 Pro against the M4 Pro (and more likely, their expectation is no one with the current Pro is going to upgrade for one generation) so it will be easier.
So how many hardware systems does Apple silicon have for doing matrix multiplies now?
1. CPU, via SIMD/NEON instructions (just dot products)
2. CPU, via AMX coprocessor (entire matrix multiplies, M1-M3)
3. CPU, via SME (M4)
4. GPU, via Metal (compute shaders + simdgroup-matrix + mps matrix kernels)
4. Neural Engine via CoreML (advisory)
Apple also appears to be adding a “Neural Accelerator” to each core on the M5?
By throwaway31131 2025-10-1519:131 reply Doesn’t that make sense though as each manipulates a different layer in the memory hierarchy allowing the programmer to control the latency and throughput implications. I see it as a good thing.
By gcr 2025-10-1911:43 Oh I’m not complaining, I appreciate having so many knobs to tweak performance
By twoodfin 2025-10-1517:43 Is this really strange? Matmul is just a specialized kind of primitive compute, one that is seeing an explosion in practical uses.
A Mac Quadra in 1994 probably had floating point compute all over the place, despite the 1984 Mac having none.
Thankfully I think libraries like Pytorch abstract this stuff away. But it seems very convoluted if you're building something from the ground up.
Does PyTorch support other acceleration? I thought they just support Metal.
By joshuabaker2 2025-10-1521:59 You can convert a PyTorch model to an ONNX model that can use CoreML (or in some cases just convert it to a CoreML model directly)
By jmrm 2025-10-1518:01 I wonder if some Apple-made software, like Final Cut, make use of all of those "duplicated" instructions at the same time for getting a better performance...
I know how just the multitasking nature of the OS probably make this situation happens across different programs, but nonetheless would be pretty cool!
Would it be possible to use all of them at the same time? Not necessarily in a practical way, but just for fun? Could different ways of doing this on CPU be done in some extent by one core at the same time, given it's superscalar?
By staticfloat 2025-10-1517:09 This is a very old answer about the M1, but yes what you’re saying is possible: https://stackoverflow.com/a/67590869/230778
By RataNova 2025-10-168:42 Apple's clearly betting big on on-device AI workflows becoming the norm
By llm_nerd 2025-10-1520:39 >Apple also appears to be adding a “Neural Accelerator” to each core on the M5?
The "neural accelerator" is per GPU core, and is matmul. e.g. "Tensor cores".
By HeckFeck 2025-10-1518:48 Adding CPUs and GPUs on top of your CPUs and GPUs... Sounds like we've the spiritual successor of the Sega Saturn.
By hannesfur 2025-10-1514:23 I inferred that they meant the neural engine cores by neural accelerators or it could be a bigger/different AMX (which really should become a standard btw)
