The Mac Studio is a small-form-factor

workstation A workstation is a special computer designed for technical or computational science, scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by a single user, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating syste ...

computer developed and marketed by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...

It is one of four desktop computers in the Mac lineup, sitting above the consumer-range

Mac Mini Mac Mini (stylized as Mac mini) is a small form factor (desktop and motherboard), small form factor desktop computer developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is one of the company's four current Mac (computer), Mac desktop computers, positioned ...

and

iMac The iMac is a series of all-in-one computers from Apple Inc., sold as part of the company's Mac (computer), Mac family of computers. First introduced in 1998, it has remained a primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since and evol ...

, and positioned below the

Mac Pro Mac Pro is a series of workstations and servers for professionals made by Apple Inc. since 2006. The Mac Pro, by some performance benchmarks, is the most powerful computer that Apple offers. It is one of four desktop computers in the current ...

. It is configurable with either the M4 Max or M3 Ultra

system on a chip A system on a chip (SoC) is an integrated circuit that combines most or all key components of a computer or Electronics, electronic system onto a single microchip. Typically, an SoC includes a central processing unit (CPU) with computer memory, ...

Overview

The Mac Studio is a desktop personal computer, designed to sit between the consumer-level

and the professional-targeted

. The Mac Studio has an identical width and depth to the contemporary Mac mini, , but it stands taller at . The Mac Studio was initially offered in two ARM-based SoC: the M1 Max or the M1 Ultra, which combines two M1 Max chips in one package. It has four Thunderbolt 4 ( USB 4) ports, two USB 3.0 Type-A ports,

HDMI High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is a proprietary digital interface used to transmit high-quality video and audio signals between devices. It is commonly used to connect devices such as televisions, computer monitors, projectors, gam ...

(up to 4K @ 60 Hz), 10Gb Ethernet with Lights Out Management and a

headphone jack A phone connector is a family of cylindrically-shaped electrical connectors primarily for analog audio signals. Invented in the late 19th century for tele''phone'' switchboards, the phone connector remains in use for interfacing wired a ...

. The front panel has two

USB-C USB-C, or USB Type-C, is a 24-pin reversible Electrical connector, connector (not a Communication protocol, protocol) that supersedes previous USB hardware#Connectors, USB connectors (also supersedes Mini DisplayPort and Lightning (connector) ...

ports (Thunderbolt 4 in M1 Ultra models) and an

SD card Secure Digital (SD) is a proprietary, non-volatile, flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA). Owing to their compact size, SD cards have been widely adopted in a variety of portable consumer electronics, including dig ...

slot (that supports SDXC cards and

UHS-II Secure Digital (SD) is a proprietary hardware, proprietary, non-volatile memory, non-volatile, flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA). Owing to their compact size, SD cards have been widely adopted in a variety of port ...

bus), making it the first desktop Mac since the 2012

to have I/O on the front. It is cooled by a pair of double-sided blowers and a mesh of holes on the bottom and back of the case, which helps reduce the noise of fans spinning. Nevertheless, there have been reports of excessive fan noise. Mac Studio models with the Ultra SoC are heavier than the Max-equipped models, as they exchange the aluminum

heat sink A heat sink (also commonly spelled heatsink) is a passive heat exchanger that transfers the heat generated by an electronic or a mechanical device to a fluid medium, often air or a liquid coolant, where it is thermal management (electronics), ...

for one composed of copper. Apple says the Mac Studio performs 50 percent faster than a

with a 16-core

Intel Xeon Xeon (; ) is a brand of x86 microprocessors designed, manufactured, and marketed by Intel, targeted at the non-consumer workstation, server, and embedded markets. It was introduced in June 1998. Xeon processors are based on the same archite ...

processor. The Mac Studio was introduced alongside the

Apple Studio Display The Apple Studio Display (marketed as Studio Display) is a 27-inch flat panel computer monitor developed and sold by Apple Inc. It was announced on March 8, 2022, alongside the Mac Studio desktop, and was released on March 18, 2022. It is Ap ...

, a 27-inch 5K monitor with an integrated 12 megapixel camera, six-speaker sound system with spatial audio and

Dolby Atmos Dolby Atmos is a surround sound technology developed by Dolby Laboratories. It expands on existing surround sound systems by adding height channels as well as free-moving sound objects, interpreted as three-dimensional objects with neither horiz ...

support and a height adjustable stand. Customers reported months-long shipping delays for the Mac Studio, attributed to a global chip shortage.

Updates

On June 5, 2023, during WWDC, Apple introduced updated Mac Studio models based on the M2 Max and M2 Ultra chips. Updates include Bluetooth 5.3, Wi-Fi 6E, the capability of running up to six 6K monitors, and support for 8K displays over Thunderbolt and HDMI. On March 5, 2025, updated Mac Studio models were announced with M4 Max and M3 Ultra chips, which began shipping on March 12. Updates include Thunderbolt 5, and memory configurable up to 512 GB and storage configurable up to 16 TB on the M3 Ultra models. Despite the M4 chips being a newer generation than the M3 chips, the M3 Ultra was included in the high-end model due to there being no existing Ultra chips in the M4 line.

Repairability

Mac Studio has two removable flash storage ports, with one or two of them in use, the latter in models with 4 or 8 TB of storage. While it is possible to swap the flash storage card between same size models, with an Apple Configurator restore, upgrading is not supported officially. Some reviewers have criticized this decision as unfriendly for right to repair, while ''

Ars Technica ''Ars Technica'' is a website covering news and opinions in technology, science, politics, and society, created by Ken Fisher and Jon Stokes in 1998. It publishes news, reviews, and guides on issues such as computer hardware and software, sci ...

'' notes this limitation may be due to the design of

Apple silicon Apple silicon is a series of system on a chip (SoC) and system in a package (SiP) processors designed by Apple Inc., mainly using the ARM architecture family, ARM architecture. They are used in nearly all of the company's devices including Mac ...

that implements the SSD controller into the system on a chip rather than the drive itself for encryption purposes. The positioning of components such as the

SSD A solid-state drive (SSD) is a type of solid-state storage device that uses Integrated circuit, integrated circuits to store data persistence (computer science), persistently. It is sometimes called semiconductor storage device, solid-stat ...

beneath an exposed

power supply A power supply is an electrical device that supplies electric power to an electrical load. The main purpose of a power supply is to convert electric current from a source to the correct voltage, electric current, current, and frequency to power ...

has also been criticized.

Reception

Specifications

Software and operating systems

The

macOS macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

operating system has been pre-installed on all Mac Studio computers since release, starting with version macOS Monterey, which is the first release of macOS to ship with the original Mac Studio.

Notes

References

External links

* {{Apple hardware Computer-related introductions in 2022 ARM Macintosh computers Macintosh desktops