Apple launches M6 Mac mini and M5 Ultra Mac Studio for local AI

Apple has started shipping an updated Mac mini and a new Mac Studio topping out at the M5 Ultra chip. Apple says the configuration lets “AI researchers run enormous LLMs entirely on device,” citing up to 512GB of unified memory and 1.2TB/s of memory bandwidth on the top Mac Studio.

The Mac mini starts with a 12-core M6 chip, a 12-core GPU with Neural Accelerators in every core, and a dual 16-core Neural Engine, running 16GB of unified memory at up to 170GB/s of bandwidth. A Mac mini with the M5 Pro chip steps up to an 18-core CPU, a 20-core GPU and up to 64GB of memory at 307GB/s. Apple prices the M6 Mac mini from $899 and the M5 Pro model from $1,699.

The Mac Studio comes in M5 Max and M5 Ultra configurations, with the Max offering an 18-core CPU and up to a 40-core GPU with up to 128GB of unified memory, starting at $2,499. The M5 Ultra model reaches a 36-core CPU, an 80-core GPU and up to 512GB of memory, starting at $5,499. Apple says Thunderbolt 5 with Remote Direct Memory Access lets multiple Mac Studio systems cluster together, giving up to 3x faster performance for distributed AI inference compared with a single system.

The new Mac mini and Mac Studio models became available on September 22, running macOS 27 with Apple Intelligence and Siri AI features. Apple also offers leasing plans starting at $48.99 a month for the M5 Max Mac Studio and $110.10 a month for the M5 Ultra model over 36 months.