Apple's M4 Mac mini, including the $599 one, is gradually becoming impossible to buy
Ars Technica • • technology
Key Points:
- Apple’s Mac mini and Mac Studio desktops are experiencing significant availability issues, with many configurations showing long ship times or being marked as “currently unavailable” on Apple’s website.
- The baseline $599 M4 Mac mini recently became unavailable for the first time, and various Mac mini and Studio models now have wait times ranging from 5 to 12 weeks, while some configurations with higher RAM are completely out of stock.
- This shortage is not due to general chip supply problems, as other Apple products like the M4 iMac and MacBook Pros with large RAM and storage are shipping relatively quickly.
- The likely cause is an upcoming hardware refresh for these desktops later this year, combined with increased demand driven by AI workloads that benefit from Apple Silicon’s unified memory architecture.
- Consumers are advised to delay purchasing Mac mini or Mac Studio desktops until new models are released, as stock availability is expected to improve following the hardware updates.
