Apple has a big event coming up in a few days (Tuesday, May 7, to be precise), and the smart money is on it as a showcase for a new line of iPad tablets. However, one specific rumor suggests that this won’t be just any iPad launch, and that might scare a few Mac owners.
According to rumors on the internet, at least one of the new iPads will be powered by Apple’s own M4 chip and come with advanced AI features. It’s nothing new to have these powerful M-series chips – designed primarily for the top MacBooks and Macs – in an iPad Pro; there have been iPad models in the past that have included these chips. However, their inclusion in an iPad usually comes after the chip has already appeared in Apple’s computers and laptops.
If this rumor – which came from notable Apple leaker Mark Gurman – that’s right, it would be the first time that an M-class chip appears in an iPad before a Mac or MacBook. This would represent a major change in Apple’s tactics. Since the company dropped Intel from making the processor (CPU) and integrated graphics card (GPU) for its Macs and MacBooks, it has opted to build its own system on chip (SoC) that powers the CPU, GPU and memory (plus other smart parts), every generation of M-class chip (M1, M2 and M3) has launched alongside new MacBooks.
Could this latest move indicate that the company is shifting its focus from Macs to iPads again? I certainly hope not.
End of the Mac Renaissance
I’m going to be honest: the Macs and MacBooks that Apple released between 2010 and 2020 were pretty uninspired. Aside from a few minor design tweaks, each new Mac, iMac, and MacBook received a small spec boost… and that’s about it. While none of the releases were bad products, they weren’t particularly exciting either. In fact, they were about to become what so many Apple fans hate about Windows laptops: functional yet boring.
Even Apple seemed disinterested, focusing instead on its (relatively) new hit products, the iPhone and iPad.
That all changed in 2020 with the launch of the M1-powered MacBook Air, MacBook Pro 13-inch, and Mac mini. Although at first glance these products looked no different from the previous models, on the inside a revolution had taken place. I remember talking to several people at Apple around the time of that launch, and what stood out was the tension around these new Macs. This wasn’t just an iterative hardware upgrade, it was a whole new game, and it felt like Apple knew a winner was coming.
The new Macs reaffirmed that confidence, delivering impressive performance, excellent battery life and excellent value – something you don’t often associate with Apple. Customers were as impressed as the critics, and Apple was rewarded with the kind of sales that would surely be the envy of most laptop makers.
And so began what I call the Mac Renaissance. More powerful variants of the M1 chips followed (the M1 Pro, M1 Max and an almost ridiculous M1 Ultra), along with a refreshed 16-inch MacBook Pro and an all-new 14-inch MacBook Pro and Mac Studio.
Naturally, Apple didn’t want to lose momentum and soon launched the M2 chip, again alongside a MacBook Air (this time with a radical new design that gave the laptop a much-needed modern look), a 13-inch MacBook Pro and a Mac mini . This was followed by M2 Pro, M2 Max chips and the M2 Ultra.
Apple was apparently starting to get into a bit of a routine. However, in late 2023, the company decided to shake things up – and not everyone was impressed.
At an event in October called “Scary Fast,” Apple surprised just about everyone by announcing not only the anticipated M3, but also the M3 Pro and M3 Max. This broke the cycle of launching the Pro and Max variants about six months after the initial chip launch – and understandably upset those who had only recently purchased M2 Pro and M2 Max MacBooks. The M3 versions were launched just nine months after the M2 versions, leaving some people feeling like the expensive, high-end devices they bought were all too quickly becoming obsolete.
It also raised eyebrows at the M3 ‘Scary Fast’ event that the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros were launched alongside the new chips and a new 24-inch iMac, but for the first time there was no MacBook Air ( or 13-inch MacBook Pro, although that was less missed).
This meant that people hoping for an affordable MacBook with the new M3 chip were left disappointed.
However, the MacBook Air with an M3 chip finally hit the market in March this year (in both 13-inch and 15-inch variants), and they were well worth the wait, with coveted five-star reviews and a place on the list at the top of our best laptop guide.
But I couldn’t help but feel that Apple’s enthusiasm for MacBooks was once again waning. And if the company decides to continue with the iPad Pro as a showcase product for the M4, it could spell the end of the mighty Mac renaissance.
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An iPad Pro with an M4 chip could be seen as a slight to Mac fans. For starters, it would crush any hopes of an M3 Ultra megachip. I can’t imagine Apple would try to sell an ultra-powerful (and expensive) chip built on outdated architecture.
Buyers of the new M3 MacBook Airs may also feel a little disappointed if their new devices are outdone – and by a tablet.
However, if this happens, one thing is for sure: I certainly won’t be trading my beloved MacBooks for an iPad Pro.
To start, you have to accept that your cutting-edge technology will become obsolete at some point. If all you want to do is use the most powerful gadgets money can buy, you’ll burn out a lot of of money. Instead, you need to remember that even if your device is no longer the very best in its class, that doesn’t mean it’s suddenly worthless.
I have a 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M2 Pro chip and I absolutely love it. When the 16-inch MacBook Pro with M3 Pro came out, my M2 Pro model was still an absolute beast of a machine, and will remain so for many years to come. Replacing the MacBook with the newer model would be expensive and largely pointless – especially if an M4 iPad Pro heralds the arrival of an M4 Pro in the near future.
And while I’d be a little gloomy if an iPad showed off the power of the M4 before a Mac, I won’t be trading a laptop for a tablet anytime soon. The iPad Pro is certainly a fine line of tablets – as I discovered when I used an iPad instead of a laptop last year, with a good keyboard attachment you can get a decent experience that comes close to what a laptop offers.
But ‘close’ is not good enough. Unless the M4 iPad comes with macOS instead of iPadOS, so I can use full desktop applications instead of limited versions of mobile apps, I’m not interested.
I use my MacBook Pro primarily for recording and editing music and videos, and I don’t see an M4 iPad Pro that would let me do the same. Of course that’s just my use case, I much prefer typing on a physical keyboard too.
There will be plenty of iPad fans who will love the idea of the M4 chip debuting in an iPad Pro, especially after a few years where they may have felt like Apple has lost interest in the tablet. That’s a feeling that will surely be familiar to Mac fans, so perhaps we can let the iPad line benevolently benefit from a new piece of Apple silicon this time around, knowing that M4 Macs will surely soon follow.
Unless of course Apple pulls the rug out from under us all and launches the M4 alongside a new Vision Pro. When that happens, we rebel.
