Apple heralds ‘next big leap in AI performance’ with M5 chip launch

Macworld

Apple on Wednesday announced the launch of its M5 processor, saying the chip “ushers in the next big leap in AI performance for Apple silicon.” The M5 appears in new editions of the iPad Pro, MacBook Pro, and Vision Pro, all of which are available for U.S. and U.K. customers to pre-order as of today.

‘A faster, more efficient, and more capable chip’

The M5, as you would expect, is a higher-performance chip than its M4 predecessor. Although it’s still built using 3-nanometer technology (albeit 3rd-gen, compared to 2nd-gen on the M4), Apple claims substantial improvements in graphical speed in particular.

According to the announcement, the M5’s 10-core GPU architecture, with a Neural Accelerator in each core, delivers “over 4x the peak GPU compute performance compared to M4” as well as “enhanced graphics capabilities and third-generation ray tracing.” Overall, Apple claims, the new chip is capable of up to 45 percent higher graphics performance than the M4.

On the CPU side, what Apple describes as “the world’s fastest performance core” promises a 15 percent bump in multithreaded performance compared to the M4. And unified memory bandwidth has been improved by almost 30 percent to 153GB/s.

All of which sounds good on paper, but what’s all this theoretical power for? Apple makes this very clear: AI. Unlike the M4 announcement in May 2024, which referenced AI only twice in the first seven paragraphs, the M5’s press release mentions the current tech obsession in the headline, the standfirst, the first subhead, the captions of the first two pictures, twice in the first paragraph, twice in the second paragraph, three times in the third paragraph…

So we can expect lots more discussion of Apple Intelligence in the year to come, then. But for now, we can focus on the first three products to feature the M5 chip.

New iPad Pro

There’s a new iPad Pro for fall 2025, and the M5 is its main, indeed almost its only, significant upgrade. The M5 Pro is the same size, the same design, available in the same colors, and appears to be otherwise virtually identical to the M4 model in every respect except four: it gets the M5 chip, Wi-Fi 6E has been bumped to Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.3 has been bumped to Bluetooth 6, and there’s a new fast-charging capability.

The M5 is clearly the headline change, and Apple claims this means the new device offers “up to 3.5x the AI performance than iPad Pro with M4 and up to 5.6x faster than iPad Pro with M1.” The last addition on my list could be an appealing upgrade, too, however. Apple says the new iPad Pro can be charged to 50 percent in 30 minutes if you’ve got the right adapter.

There’s one other change, but it only affects the cellular models. They get Apple’s C1X modem that was introduced with the iPhone 17.

The M5 iPad Pro starts at $999/£999 for the 11-inch model and $1,299/£1,299 for the 13-inch model. It’s available to preorder starting today and will go on sale on Wednesday, October 22. For more details about this product, check out our iPad Pro news hub.

New MacBook Pro

As was rumored ahead of the announcement, Apple is only announcing new MacBooks with the standard M5 chip; there’s no sign of higher-end models with an M5 Pro or M5 Max. As before, the M5 laptop is only available in a 14-inch size.

As on the iPad Pro, the MacBook Pro’s main upgrade is the M5 chip. Apple says this delivers “up to 3.5x the AI performance and up to 1.6x faster graphics than the previous generation.” But there’s also an upgrade to battery life (an estimated 24 hours, compared to 22 hours on the 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M4 Pro), and faster SSD performance.

The 14-inch MacBook Pro with M5 starts at $1,599/£1,599. It’s available to preorder starting today and will go on sale on Wednesday, October 22. For more details about this product, check out our MacBook Pro M5 news hub.

New Vision Pro

Finally, the M5 makes an appearance on a second iteration of Apple’s Vision Pro mixed-reality headset. The company says this will mean “faster performance, sharper details throughout the system, and even more battery life, setting a new standard for what’s possible in spatial computing.”

Other than the M5 chip, the new Vision Pro features a new cushioned Dual Knit Band to improve comfort. Owners of the M2 Vision Pro can order a new band for $99.

The updated Vision Pro is available to preorder starting today for customers in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, the UAE, the UK, and the U.S, and will go on sale in those countries on Wednesday, October 22. Other countries will follow.