Apple’s undeniably cute Mac minis became so popular for on-device AI, we lost any hope of getting one for a low price with base specs. Now, the company is back with a tiny desktop that’s built explicitly for the people who made the last version so hard to come by.
Apple’s new $900 Mac mini (which is $100 more than the last version after recent price hikes) may not seem like a major upgrade, at least judging by a cursory glance. It’s maintaining the same compact shape that first debuted in 2024 with the M4 Mac mini (including the excellent thermal design and awkward downward-facing power button). The new pint-sized desktop also still starts with 256GB of SSD storage and 16GB of unified memory. Things are more interesting when you go The Magic School Bus route and start trawling through its bowels.
The M6 chip is Apple’s first 2nm chip, boasting even better power efficiency than earlier 3nm chips like the M5. The M6 is composed of a larger 12-core CPU broken down into two “Super” cores, four “Performance” cores, and another six “Efficiency” cores. Apple started the “Super” nomenclature with the M5 series, but all you need to know is that they’re supposed to push the system’s single-thread performance—which is what helps your browser pages and apps load faster. The new M6 is running at 170GBps memory bandwidth compared to the M4’s 120GBps.
Otherwise, the M6 is mainly geared for all the AI work that made the Mac mini so popular this past year. Apple promised the M6 CPU is 1.2X faster than the M5 in terms of multi-thread capabilities—how well the computer handles demanding apps. The larger 12-core GPU is the most telling aspect to the new mini’s design. This new design includes neural accelerators built into every GPU core, which is how Apple can claim you’re supposed to get 2x faster graphics than the M4 Mac mini. Apple promised this new desktop will offer strong performance for rendering and gaming (once you find a game on macOS that you actually want to play).
That new GPU is how Apple’s promising 30% better peak GPU power for AI tasks compared to the M5. That’s also thanks to the new “dual 16-core Neural Engine.” As the name suggests, it’s two times the number of Neural Engine cores in M5, and it’s built for running on-device AI like vibecoding in Xcode or running OpenClaw like all those people living that radical “agentic” lifestyle. Of course, the new Mac mini ships with macOS 27 Golden Gate, which packs in the revised AI Siri assistant.
There’s another variant of the Mac mini to consider as well. The version with the M5 Pro should be even more powerful in some of these tasks thanks to its 18-core GPU. Apple promises you’ll get 4.5X rendering performance with path tracing in an app like Blender and 8.5X the speeds of on-device LLM (large language model) processing compared to the previous-gen M4 Pro. The new desktops pack in Wi-Fi 7 support, an upgrade over the previous Wi-Fi 6E, and Bluetooth 6. In addition, the new Mac mini is getting access to speedier 2.5 gigabit Ethernet ports, though you’ll need to pay $90 extra for 10 gigabit ethernet.
However, any would-be AI developers need to consider your I/O options. An M6 MacBook mini packs in three Thunderbolt 4 ports on the rear-facing plate, but the M5 Pro allows for three Thunderbolt 5 ports, all offering even faster data transfer speeds. You’ll need Thunderbolt 5 if you plan to cluster several Mac minis together into a homunculus of an AI processing system.
Apple obviously expects to ship a significant number of new Mac minis. It’s giving potential customers a long runway to preorder starting Tuesday. The new Apple desktops start shipping Sept. 22. While you’ll be pushing and shoving to get in line for a new Mac mini, Apple will likely be ready to announce a whole slate of new iPhone products and—judging by recent leaks and rumors—several more smart home products and maybe even a new Apple TV box.
