Apple's Decision to Kill the Mac Pro Actually Began in 2022

The Mac Pro had been on a slow path toward discontinuation. Apple has now made that outcome official. According to a report from Mark Gurman, the shift effectively began in 2022, when the company scrapped plans for a high-end chip that would have featured roughly double the processing cores of its Ultra components. Without that top-tier option, the Mac Pro lost much of its differentiation, especially as the Mac Studio — smaller, cheaper, quieter and more practical — already covered similar ground.



Still, Apple had committed to bringing the Mac Pro into the era of in-house silicon, so it introduced an M2 Ultra version in 2023 alongside a Mac Studio with similar specifications. Apple emphasized that every Mac Pro shipped with an M2 Ultra, though that carried less weight given the Mac Studio offered the same chip at a lower price.


The Mac Pro was a difficult sell in other ways as well. It was roughly three times larger in volume than the Mac Studio and cost $3,000 more, starting at $6,999. Its approach to expansion also reflected an earlier era. The chassis included PCIe slots for networking and audio cards, but didn't support upgrades to memory or graphics — areas that are increasingly central to modern workflows.

By last year, those limitations had become more apparent. The Mac Studio with M3 Ultra pulled further ahead, offering improved performance, greater memory capacity and higher storage ceilings. The Mac Pro, meanwhile, was not updated.

Apple also appeared to be laying the groundwork for the transition. The company recently announced that the Mac mini will be assembled in Houston. Because the Mac Pro had been Apple's only domestically assembled computer, the shift helps maintain a U.S. manufacturing presence while avoiding headlines around ending its sole made-in-America Mac — a move that likely would have drawn political attention.

Even before these developments, the Mac Pro had a complex history. The 2013 redesign introduced a thermally constrained form factor that limited its evolution and led Apple to publicly acknowledge missteps in 2017. The 2019 model addressed many of those concerns and was positioned as a fresh start with the expectation of regular updates. The transition to Apple silicon, however, ultimately proved difficult to reconcile with the traditional expandable workstation design.