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The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of
personal computer A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...
s designed and marketed by
Apple Inc Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company ...
. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and software engineers. The current lineup includes the
MacBook Air The MacBook Air is a line of ultrabook computers developed and manufactured by Apple Inc. It consists of a full-size keyboard, a machined aluminum case, and, in the more modern versions, a thin light structure. The Air was originally position ...
and MacBook Pro laptops, as well as the
iMac iMac is a family of all-in-one Mac desktop computers designed and built by Apple Inc. It has been the primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since its debut in August 1998, and has evolved through seven distinct forms. In it ...
,
Mac Mini Mac Mini (stylized as Mac mini) is a small form factor desktop computer developed and marketed by Apple Inc. , it is positioned between the consumer all-in-one iMac and the professional Mac Studio and Mac Pro as one of four current Mac deskto ...
,
Mac Studio Mac Studio is a small-form-factor workstation designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc. It is one of four desktop computers in the Mac lineup, sitting above the consumer-range Mac Mini and iMac, and positioned below the Mac Pro. It is co ...
and Mac Pro desktops. Macs run the
macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...
operating system. The first Mac was released in 1984, and was advertised with the highly-acclaimed "1984" ad. After a period of initial success, the Mac languished in the 1990s, until co-founder Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997. Jobs oversaw the release of many successful products, unveiled the modern
Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and la ...
, completed the 2005-06 Intel transition, and brought features from the iPhone back to the Mac. During Tim Cook's tenure as CEO, the Mac underwent a period of neglect, but was later reinvigorated with the introduction of popular high-end Macs and the ongoing Apple silicon transition, which brought the Mac to the same
ARM In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
architecture as iOS devices.


History


1979–1996: "Macintosh" era

In the late 1970s, the Apple II was one of the most popular computers on the market, especially in education. After IBM introduced the IBM PC in 1981, its sales quickly surpassed the Apple II; in response, Apple introduced the Apple Lisa in 1983. Though the Lisa's
graphical user interface The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inst ...
was partially inspired by the work of
Xerox PARC PARC (Palo Alto Research Center; formerly Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, the company was originally a division of Xero ...
, it also went far beyond PARC's prototypes, and introduced original innovations: the ability to drag-and-drop files, menu bars, and double-clicking. This was to no avail: the Lisa was hampered by its high $9,995 price and lack of available software, and failed in the market. Parallel to the Lisa's development, a skunkworks team at Apple was working on another project. Conceived in 1979 by Jef Raskin, the Macintosh was envisioned as an affordable, easy-to-use computer for the masses, with the Lisa's graphical interface. Raskin named the computer after his favorite type of apple, the McIntosh. The initial team consisted of Raskin, hardware engineer Burrell Smith, and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak; Steve Jobs joined it in 1981 after being removed from the Lisa team, and was able to gradually take control of the project due to Wozniak's temporary absence from the company following an airplane crash earlier that year. Upon its 1984 release, the first Macintosh was described as a "revolution" by the New York Times. Sales initially met projections, but then sputtered as customers were polarized by its groundbreaking interface, and disappointed by the machine's poor performance and initial lack of applications. Most members of the original Macintosh team left Apple, and Jobs became publicly embroiled with CEO
John Sculley John Sculley III (born April 6, 1939) is an American businessman, entrepreneur and investor in high-tech startups. Sculley was vice-president (1970–1977) and president of PepsiCo (1977–1983), until he became chief executive officer (CEO) ...
; Jobs left to found
NeXT Next may refer to: Arts and entertainment Film * ''Next'' (1990 film), an animated short about William Shakespeare * ''Next'' (2007 film), a sci-fi film starring Nicolas Cage * '' Next: A Primer on Urban Painting'', a 2005 documentary film Lit ...
. The first Macintosh nevertheless generated cult enthusiasm from buyers and some developers, who rushed to develop entirely new programs for the platform, including
PageMaker Adobe PageMaker (formerly Aldus) is a discontinued desktop publishing computer program introduced in 1985 by the Aldus Corporation on the Apple Macintosh. The combination of the Macintosh's graphical user interface, PageMaker publishing software, ...
, PowerPoint, and Excel. The Macintosh is credited with popularizing the graphical user interface. It also reflected Jobs' obsession with
typography Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language legible, readable and appealing when displayed. The arrangement of type involves selecting typefaces, point sizes, line lengths, line-spacing ( leading), ...
, and came bundled with a variety of fonts. It was the first
WYSIWYG In computing, WYSIWYG ( ), an acronym for What You See Is What You Get, is a system in which editing software allows content to be edited in a form that resembles its appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product, such as a printed d ...
computer, and due in large part to PageMaker and Apple's
LaserWriter The LaserWriter is a laser printer with built-in PostScript interpreter sold by Apple, Inc. from 1985 to 1988. It was one of the first laser printers available to the mass market. In combination with WYSIWYG publishing software like PageMake ...
printer, it ignited the
desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using page layout software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online ...
revolution, turning the Macintosh from an early let-down into a notable success. In late 1985, Bill Atkinson, one of the few remaining members of the Macintosh team, embarked on a journey to create a
Dynabook The KiddiComp concept, envisioned by Alan Kay in 1968 while a PhD candidate, and later developed and described as the Dynabook in his 1972 proposal "A personal computer for children of all ages", outlines the requirements for a conceptual portabl ...
, Alan Kay's concept for a tablet computer that stores and organizes knowledge. Sculley rebuffed him, so he adapted the idea into a Mac program,
HyperCard HyperCard is a software application and development kit for Apple Macintosh and Apple IIGS computers. It is among the first successful hypermedia systems predating the World Wide Web. HyperCard combines a flat-file database with a graphical, f ...
, whose "cards" could store any information — text, image, audio, video — with the
memex Memex is a hypothetical electromechanical device for interacting with microform documents and described in Vannevar Bush's 1945 article "As We May Think". Bush envisioned the memex as a device in which individuals would compress and store all of ...
-like ability to semantically link cards to each other. HyperCard was released in 1987 and bundled with every Macintosh. In the late 1980s, Jean-Louis Gassée, a Sculley ''protégé'' who had succeeded Jobs as head of the Macintosh division, made the Mac more open and expandable to appeal to tech enthusiasts and make inroads in the enterprise market. This approach led to the successful 1989 release of the Macintosh II, which appealed to power users and gave the lineup momentum. However, this unwillingness to compromise on features foiled Apple's first laptop, the
Macintosh Portable Macintosh Portable is a laptop designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from September 1989 to October 1991. It is the first battery-powered Macintosh, which garnered significant excitement from critics, but sales to customers w ...
, which was almost as heavy as the original Macintosh and cost twice as much. The Mac Portable doomed Gassée, who was fired soon after its release. Since the Mac's debut, Sculley had opposed lowering the company's profit margins, and Macintoshes were priced far above entry-level
DOS DOS is shorthand for the MS-DOS and IBM PC DOS family of operating systems. DOS may also refer to: Computing * Data over signalling (DoS), multiplexing data onto a signalling channel * Denial-of-service attack (DoS), an attack on a communicat ...
computers, He also resisted licensing the Mac OS to competing hardware vendors, who could have undercut Apple on pricing and jeopardized its hardware sales, as
IBM PC compatible IBM PC compatible computers are similar to the original IBM Personal Computer, IBM PC, IBM Personal Computer XT, XT, and IBM Personal Computer/AT, AT, all from computer giant IBM, that are able to use the same software and expansion cards. Such ...
s had done to IBM. These early strategic missteps caused the Macintosh to forever lose its chance at becoming the dominant personal computer platform. Though senior management demanded high-margin products, a few employees disobeyed and set out to create a computer that would live up to the original Macintosh's slogan: computer for the rest of us", which the market clamored for. In a pattern typical of Apple's early era, this once-renegade project was endorsed by senior management following market pressures, and in 1990, the effort birthed the
Macintosh LC The Macintosh LC is a personal computer designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from October 1990 to March 1992. Overview The first in the Macintosh LC family, the LC was introduced with the Macintosh Classic (a repackaging o ...
and the affordable
Macintosh Classic The Macintosh Classic is a personal computer designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer from October 1990 to September 1992. It was the first Macintosh to sell for less than US$1,000. Production of the Classic was prompted by the succe ...
, the first model under $1,000. Between 1984 and 1989, Apple had sold one million Macs. It sold 10 million over the following five years. In 1991, the Macintosh Portable was replaced with the smaller and lighter
PowerBook 100 The PowerBook 100 is a portable subnotebook personal computer designed and manufactured by Sony for Apple Computer and introduced on October 21, 1991, at the COMDEX computer expo in Las Vegas, Nevada. Priced at US$2,500 with external flo ...
, the first laptop to place a palm rest and
trackball A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball held by a socket containing sensors to detect a rotation of the ball about two axes—like an upside-down ball mouse with an exposed protruding ball. Users roll the ball to position the o ...
in front of the keyboard. The PowerBook brought a billion dollars of revenue within a year, and became a status symbol. By this point, the Macintosh represented 10% to 15% of the personal computer market. Fearing a decline in market share, Sculley decided to enter in an alliance with IBM and Motorola to create a new standardized computing platform, which led to the creation of the PowerPC processor architecture, and the failed
Taligent Taligent Inc. (a portmanteau of "talent" and "intelligent") was an American software company. Based on the Pink object-oriented operating system conceived by Apple in 1988, Taligent Inc. was incorporated as an Apple/IBM partnership in 1992, and ...
operating system. After 1992, Apple pursued a more aggressive business strategy and flooded the market with Mac models targeting every niche.
Michael Spindler Michael Spindler (22 December 1942 – 2017) was a German businessman who was president and CEO of Apple from 1993 to 1996. Spindler was born in Berlin. Personal life From 1985 until his death in 2017, Spindler lived between Paris, France, and Sa ...
continued this approach when he succeeded Sculley as CEO in 1993. He oversaw the Mac's transition from
Motorola 68K The Motorola 68000 series (also known as 680x0, m68000, m68k, or 68k) is a family of 32-bit complex instruction set computer (CISC) microprocessors. During the 1980s and early 1990s, they were popular in personal computers and workstations and w ...
to PowerPC and the release of Apple's first PowerPC machine, the well-received
Power Macintosh The Power Macintosh, later Power Mac, is a family of personal computers designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer as the core of the Macintosh brand from March 1994 until August 2006. Described by ''MacWorld'' as "the most important te ...
. Many new Macintoshes suffered from inventory and quality control problems. The 1995 PowerBook 5300 was plagued with quality problems; some units even caught fire, and the laptop was the subject of several recalls. Pessimistic about Apple's future, Spindler repeatedly attempted to sell Apple to other companies, including IBM, Kodak, AT&T, Sun, and Philips. In a last-ditch attempt to fend off Windows, Apple yielded and started a
Macintosh clone A Macintosh clone, also known as a Clonintosh (a portmanteau of " Clone" and "Macintosh"), is a computer running the Mac OS operating system that was not produced by Apple Inc. The earliest Mac clones were based on emulators and reverse-engineere ...
program, which allowed other manufacturers to make computers that ran
System 7 System 7, codenamed "Big Bang", and also known as Mac OS 7, is a graphical user interface-based operating system for Macintosh computers and is part of the classic Mac OS series of operating systems. It was introduced on May 13, 1991, by Apple C ...
; however, it only cannibalized the sales of Apple's higher-margin machines. Meanwhile, the far-superior
Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturi ...
was an instant hit with customers. Apple was struggling financially; its attempts to come up with a successor to the obsolete and unstable Mac OS — Taligent, Star Trek and Copland — had all failed, and its hardware was stagnant. The Mac was no longer competitive in the market place, and its sales entered a tailspin. Corporations abandoned the Mac in droves, replacing it with cheaper and more sophisticated
Windows NT Windows NT is a proprietary graphical operating system produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released on July 27, 1993. It is a processor-independent, multiprocessing and multi-user operating system. The first version of Win ...
machines for which far more applications and peripherals existed; even Apple loyalists saw no future for the Macintosh. Once the world's second largest computer vendor after IBM, Apple's market share declined precipitously from 9.4% in 1993 to 3.1% in 1997.
Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...
was ready to abandon
Microsoft Office Microsoft Office, or simply Office, is the former name of a family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. It was first announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at COMDEX in Las Vegas. Initially a marketi ...
for Mac, which would have slashed any remaining business appeal the Mac had; Amelio tried to negotiate a deal with Gates, to no avail. In 1996, Spindler was succeeded by Gil Amelio, who searched for an established operating system to acquire or license, which would form the foundation of a new Apple operating system. He considered BeOS, Solaris, Windows NT, and NeXT's
NeXTSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT Computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its range of propri ...
, eventually choosing the latter. Apple acquired NeXT on December 20, 1996, and with it came its founder, Steve Jobs.


1997–2011: Steve Jobs era

NeXT had developed the mature
NeXTSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT Computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its range of propri ...
operating system, whose strengths lied in its multimedia and internet capabilities. NextSTEP was also popular among programmers, financial firms and academia for its
object-oriented programming Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of "objects", which can contain data and code. The data is in the form of fields (often known as attributes or ''properties''), and the code is in the form of ...
tools which allowed applications to be written far more rapidly. In an eagerly-anticipated speech at the January 1997 Macworld trade show, Steve Jobs previewed Rhapsody, a merger of NeXTSTEP and Mac OS which would be the foundation of Apple's new operating system strategy. At the time, Jobs only served in an advisory role, but became Apple's ''de-facto'' CEO after Amelio was fired in July 1997. He was formally appointed interim CEO in September, and permanent CEO in January 2000 To turn the company around, Jobs streamlined Apple's operations and began layoffs. He negotiated a deal with
Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...
: Microsoft committed to releasing new versions of Office for Mac for five years, investing $150 million in Apple, and settling an ongoing lawsuit in which Apple alleged that Windows had copied the Mac's interface. In exchange, Apple made
Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated IE or MSIE) is a series of graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft which was used in the Windows line of operating systems ( ...
the default Mac browser. The deal was closed hours before Jobs announced it at the August 1997 Macworld. Jobs brought focus back to Apple. The Mac lineup had been incomprehensible, with dozens of hard-to-distinguish models; he streamlined it into four quadrants, a laptop and a desktop each for consumers and professionals. Apple also discontinued several Mac accessories, including the StyleWriter printer and the Newton PDA. These changes were meant to refocus Apple's engineering, marketing and manufacturing efforts so that more care could be dedicated to each product. Jobs also stopped licensing Mac OS to clone manufacturers, which had cost Apple ten times more in lost sales than what they paid in licensing fees. Jobs made a deal with the largest computer reseller,
CompUSA CompUSA was a retailer and reseller of personal computers, consumer electronics, technology products and computer services. Starting with one brick-and-mortar store in 1986 under the name Soft Warehouse, by the 1990s CompUSA had grown into a nati ...
, to carry a "store within a store" that would better showcase Macs and their software and peripherals; according to Apple, the Mac's share of computer sales in those stores went from 3% to 14%. In November, the online Apple Store launched, which offered built-to-order Mac configurations without a middleman. When
Tim Cook Timothy Donald Cook (born November 1, 1960) is an American business executive who has been the chief executive officer of Apple Inc. since 2011. Cook previously served as the company's chief operating officer under its co-founder Steve Jobs ...
was hired as chief operations officer in March 1998, he shuttered Apple's inefficient factories and outsourced Mac production to Taiwan. Within months, he rolled out a new ERP system and implemented just-in-time manufacturing principles; this practically eliminated Apple's costly unsold inventory, and within a year, Apple had the most efficient inventory turnover in the industry. Jobs' top priority was "to ship a great new product". The first was the
iMac G3 The iMac G3, originally released as the iMac, is a series of Macintosh personal computers sold by Apple Computer from 1998 to 2003. The iMac was the first major new product release for Apple under Steve Jobs, Apple's interim CEO and cofounder ...
, an all-in-one computer which was meant to make the
Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
intuitive and easy to access. While PCs came in functional beige boxes, Jony Ive gave the iMac a radical and futuristic design, meant to make the product less intimidating: it was shaped like an egg, and its case was made of translucent plastic in "
Bondi blue Blue-green is the color that is between green and blue. It belongs to the cyan family of colors. Variations Cyan (aqua) Cyan, also called aqua, is the blue-green color that is between blue and green on a modern RGB color wheel. The ...
" color. Ive also added a handle on the back to make the computer more approachable. Meanwhile, Jobs decided the iMac would be "legacy-free", replacing the ADB and SCSI ports with an infrared port and the cutting-edge
USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...
. He also controversially removed the floppy disk drive and replaced it with a CD drive. The iMac was unveiled in May 1998, and released in August. It was an immediate commercial success, and became the fastest-selling computer in Apple's history, with 800,000 units sold before the year ended. Vindicating Jobs on the Internet's appeal to consumers, 32% of buyers had never used a computer before, and 12% were switching from PCs. The iMac reestablished the Mac's reputation as a trend-setter: for the next few years, translucent plastic became the dominant design trend in numerous consumer products. Apple knew had it lost its chance to compete in the Windows-dominated enterprise market, so it prioritized design and ease of use to make the Mac more appealing to average consumers, and even teens. Apple also instituted a more collaborative product development process for the Mac, the "Apple New Product Process", which implemented concurrent engineering principles. From that point, the Mac would no longer be primarily crafted by engineers, with design as an afterthought. Instead, Ive and Jobs would first define a new product's "soul", before it was jointly developed by the marketing, engineering and operations teams. The engineering team was led by the product design group, and Ive's design studio was the dominant voice throughout the development process. The next product quadrant was the Power Mac G3 (nicknamed "Blue and White") which was well-received by creatives and scientists. It was followed by the
iBook iBook is a line of laptop computers designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer from 1999 to 2006. The line targeted entry-level, consumer and education markets, with lower specifications and prices than the PowerBook, Apple's higher-end ...
, which imitated the iMac's design, with colorful translucent plastic and a handle. The iBook introduced several innovations: it lacked a mechanical latch, instead relying on a strengthened hinge to keep it closed, its ports were located on the sides rather than on the back, and it was the first laptop with built-in
Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wav ...
. It was best selling laptop in the U.S. during the fourth quarter of 1999. Finally came the professional-oriented Titanium PowerBook G4, the lightest and thinnest in its class, and the first laptop with a wide-screen display; it also debuted a magnetic latch that made the lid pop elegantly. The design language of consumer Macs shifted again from colored plastics to white polycarbonate with the introduction of the 2001 Dual USB "Ice" iBook. In order to increase the iBook's durability, it did away with doors and handles, and gained a more minimalistic exterior. Ive attempted to go beyond the quadrant with Power Mac G4 Cube, an attempt to innovate beyond the computer tower and make a professional desktop that was far smaller than the Power Mac. The Cube failed in the market, and was withdrawn from sale after a year; however, Ive considered it beneficial, since it helped Apple gain experience in complex machining and miniaturization. The development of a successor to the old Mac OS was well-underway. Rhapsody had been previewed at
WWDC The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is an information technology conference held annually by Apple Inc. The conference is usually held at Apple Park in California. The event is usually used to showcase new software and technologies in t ...
1997, featuring a Mach kernel and BSD foundations, a virtualization layer for old Mac OS apps (codenamed Blue Box), and an implementation of NeXTSTEP
API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...
s called
OpenStep OpenStep is a defunct object-oriented application programming interface (API) specification for a legacy object-oriented operating system, with the basic goal of offering a NeXTSTEP-like environment on non-NeXTSTEP operating systems. OpenStep wa ...
(codenamed Yellow Box). Apple open-sourced the core of Rhapsody as the Darwin operating system. After several developer previews, Apple also introduced the
Carbon Carbon () is a chemical element with the symbol C and atomic number 6. It is nonmetallic and tetravalent In chemistry, the valence (US spelling) or valency (British spelling) of an element is the measure of its combining capacity with o ...
API, which provided a way for developers to more easily make their apps native to Mac OS X without rewriting them in Yellow Box. Mac OS X was publicly unveiled in January 2000, with the modern
Aqua Aqua is the Latin word for water. It is used in many words which relate to water, such as aquatic life. In English, it may also refer to: Arts * Aqua (color), a greenish-blue color Business * Aqua (skyscraper), an 82-story residential skysc ...
interface, and a far more stable
Unix Unix (; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multiuser computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, and ot ...
foundation, with
memory protection Memory protection is a way to control memory access rights on a computer, and is a part of most modern instruction set architectures and operating systems. The main purpose of memory protection is to prevent a process from accessing memory that ha ...
and
preemptive multitasking In computing, preemption is the act of temporarily interrupting an executing task, with the intention of resuming it at a later time. This interrupt is done by an external scheduler with no assistance or cooperation from the task. This preempt ...
. Blue Box became the
Classic environment This is a list of macOS built-in apps and system components. Applications App Store The Mac App Store is macOS's digital distribution platform for macOS apps, created and maintained by Apple Inc. based on the iOS version, the platform was an ...
, and Yellow Box was renamed
Cocoa Cocoa may refer to: Chocolate * Chocolate * ''Theobroma cacao'', the cocoa tree * Cocoa bean, seed of ''Theobroma cacao'' * Chocolate liquor, or cocoa liquor, pure, liquid chocolate extracted from the cocoa bean, including both cocoa butter and ...
. Following a
public beta A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...
, the first version of Mac OS X, version 10.0 Cheetah, was released in March 2001. Since 1999, Steve Jobs had a new strategy in mind: the Mac would become a "digital hub", the centerpiece of people's "digital livestyle". In 2001, the
iMac DV The iMac G3, originally released as the iMac, is a series of Macintosh personal computers sold by Apple Computer from 1998 to 2003. The iMac was the first major new product release for Apple under Steve Jobs, Apple's interim CEO and cofound ...
gained
FireWire IEEE 1394 is an interface standard for a serial bus for high-speed communications and isochronous real-time data transfer. It was developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s by Apple in cooperation with a number of companies, primarily Sony an ...
, allowing it to connect to camcorders; users could easily create movies with the bundled
iMovie iMovie (known at times as iMovie HD) is a preinstalled video editing application developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, iOS, and iPadOS devices. It was originally released in 1999 as a Mac OS 8 application bundled with the first FireWire-enabled ...
. Apple later gave the iMac the ability to burn CDs, and released
iTunes iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...
, which allowed users to rip CDs, make their own playlists, and burn them to a blank disc. Later still, users could organize their photos with
iPhoto iPhoto is a discontinued digital photograph manipulation software application developed by Apple Inc. It was included with every Macintosh personal computer from 2002 to 2015, when it was replaced with Apple's Photos application. Originally so ...
, and create songs with
GarageBand GarageBand is a line of digital audio workstations developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, iPadOS, and iOS devices that allows users to create music or podcasts. GarageBand is developed by Apple for macOS, and was once part of the iLife software s ...
. More crucially, Jobs' digital hub strategy culminated in Apple's entrance into other markets, with the
iTunes Store The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,00 ...
,
iPod The iPod is a discontinued series of portable media players and multi-purpose mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The first version was released on October 23, 2001, about months after the Macintosh version of iTunes ...
, iPhone, and
iPad The iPad is a brand of iOS and iPadOS-based tablet computers that are developed by Apple Inc. The iPad was conceived before the related iPhone but the iPhone was developed and released first. Speculation about the development, operating s ...
, and Apple's transformation from a Mac-focused company, ''Apple Computer Inc'', into ''Apple Inc'', the world's most valuable company. By January 2007, the iPod came to represent half of Apple's revenues. Apple continued to release new Mac models, such as the white "Sunflower" iMac G4; Ive designed a display that could swivel around and be moved with one) finger, so that it "appear dto defy gravity. In 2003, Apple released the aluminum 12-inch and 17-inch
PowerBook G4 The PowerBook G4 is a series of notebook computers manufactured, marketed, and sold by Apple Computer between 2001 and 2006 as part of its PowerBook line of notebooks. The PowerBook G4 runs on the RISC-based PowerPC G4 processor, designed by the ...
, proclaiming the "Year of the Notebook". With the Microsoft deal expiring, Apple also replaced Internet Explorer with its new browser,
Safari A safari (; ) is an overland journey to observe wild animals, especially in eastern or southern Africa. The so-called "Big Five" game animals of Africa – lion, leopard, rhinoceros, elephant, and Cape buffalo – particularly form an importa ...
. The first
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 positioned between the consumer all-in-one iMac (Intel-based), iMac and the profes ...
was intended to be made in the U.S., but domestic manufacturers were slow and had insufficient quality processes, so Apple chose Tiawanese
Foxconn Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd., trading as Hon Hai Technology Group in China and Taiwan and Foxconn internationally, is a Taiwanese multinational electronics contract manufacturer established in 1974 with headquarters in Tucheng, New T ...
instead. The cheaper, "headless" Mac Mini was introduced at Macworld 2005, alongside the
iWork iWork is an office suite of applications created by Apple Inc. for its macOS and iOS operating systems, and also available cross-platform through the iCloud website. It includes the presentation application Keynote, the word processing and ...
office suite.


Intel transition and "back to the Mac"

With PowerPC chips falling behind in performance, price, and efficiency, Steve Jobs announced that all Macs would transition from PowerPC to Intel processors, revealing that Mac OS X had been adapted to run on both architectures since 2000. Users could keep running PowerPC apps using
Rosetta Rosetta or Rashid (; ar, رشيد ' ; french: Rosette  ; cop, ϯⲣⲁϣⲓⲧ ''ti-Rashit'', Ancient Greek: Βολβιτίνη ''Bolbitinē'') is a port city of the Nile Delta, east of Alexandria, in Egypt's Beheira governorate. The Ro ...
, and even run Windows natively using Boot Camp. This led to a few years of growth in Mac sales. After the iPhone's 2007 release, Apple began a multi-year effort to bring many iPhone innovations "back to the Mac", including
multi-touch In computing, multi-touch is technology that enables a surface (a touchpad or touchscreen) to recognize the presence of more than one somatosensory system, point of contact with the surface at the same time. The origins of multitouch began at CER ...
gesture support, instant wake from sleep, and fast
flash storage Flash memory is an electronic non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for the NOR and NAND logic gates. Both use ...
. At Macworld 2008, Jobs introduced the first MacBook Air by taking it out of a manila envelope, touting it as the "world's thinnest notebook". The MacBook Air favored wireless technologies over physical ports, and lacked
FireWire IEEE 1394 is an interface standard for a serial bus for high-speed communications and isochronous real-time data transfer. It was developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s by Apple in cooperation with a number of companies, primarily Sony an ...
, an
optical drive In computing, an optical disc drive is a disk drive, disc drive that uses laser light or electromagnetic waves within or near the visible light spectrum as part of the process of reading or writing data to or from optical discs. Some drives ...
, or a replaceable battery. Users could access discs inserted into other computers on their
local network A local area network (LAN) is a computer network that interconnects computers within a limited area such as a residence, school, laboratory, university campus or office building. By contrast, a wide area network (WAN) not only covers a larger ...
through a feature called Remote Disc. A decade after its launch, journalist Tom Warren wrote that the MacBook Air had "immediately changed the future of laptops", starting the
ultrabook Ultrabook is a marketing term, originated and trademarked by Intel, for a category of high-end laptop computers. They were originally marketed as featuring ultra thin form factor and light weight design without compromising battery life or per ...
trend.
OS X Lion OS X Lion, also known as Mac OS X Lion, (version 10.7) is the eighth major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Mac computers. A preview of OS X 10.7 Lion was publicly shown at the "Back to the Mac" Apple Speci ...
gained new features from the iPad, like
FaceTime FaceTime is a Proprietary software, proprietary videotelephony product developed by Apple Inc. FaceTime is available on supported iOS mobile devices running iOS 4 and later and Mac computers that run and later. FaceTime supports any iOS devic ...
, full-screen apps, document autosaving and versioning, and a bundled Mac App Store to replace software install discs with online downloads. Apple devices gained deeper integration, with AirDrop allowing them to send and receive files wirelessly. iPhone-like multi-touch technology was progressively added to all MacBook trackpads, and to desktop Macs through the
Magic Mouse The Magic Mouse is a multi-touch wireless mouse that is manufactured and sold by Apple. The first-generation Magic Mouse was released on October 20, 2009, and introduced multi-touch functionality to a computer mouse. Taking after the iPhone, ...
, and
Magic Trackpad Apple Inc. has designed and manufactured several models of mice, trackpads and other pointing devices, primarily for use with Macintosh computers. Over the years, Apple has maintained a distinct form and function with its mice that reflect the ...
. The second-generation MacBook Air, released in 2010, added an iPad-inspired standby mode, "instant-on" wake from sleep, and
flash memory Flash memory is an electronic non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for the NOR and NAND logic gates. Both us ...
for storage. The MacBook Air also began an increased focus on the environment for the Mac; it was free of toxic chemicals like
mercury Mercury commonly refers to: * Mercury (planet), the nearest planet to the Sun * Mercury (element), a metallic chemical element with the symbol Hg * Mercury (mythology), a Roman god Mercury or The Mercury may also refer to: Companies * Merc ...
,
bromide A bromide ion is the negatively charged form (Br−) of the element bromine, a member of the halogens group on the periodic table. Most bromides are colorless. Bromides have many practical roles, being found in anticonvulsants, flame-retardant ...
and PVC, and came in a smaller packaging. The
iMac iMac is a family of all-in-one Mac desktop computers designed and built by Apple Inc. It has been the primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since its debut in August 1998, and has evolved through seven distinct forms. In it ...
and unibody MacBook Pro gained enclosure redesigns using more recyclable materials like aluminum and glass. On February 24, 2011, the MacBook Pro became the first computer to support Intel's new
Thunderbolt A thunderbolt or lightning bolt is a symbolic representation of lightning when accompanied by a loud thunderclap. In Indo-European mythology, the thunderbolt was identified with the 'Sky Father'; this association is also found in later Hell ...
connector, which had two-way transfer speeds of 10Gbit/s, and was backward-compatible with
Mini DisplayPort The Mini DisplayPort (MiniDP or mDP) is a miniaturized and less common version of the DisplayPort audio-visual digital interface. It was announced by Apple in October 2008, and by early 2013 all new Apple Macintosh computers had Mini DisplayP ...
.


2012–present: Tim Cook era

Following a period of deteriorating health, Steve Jobs resigned as CEO on August 24, 2011, and
Tim Cook Timothy Donald Cook (born November 1, 1960) is an American business executive who has been the chief executive officer of Apple Inc. since 2011. Cook previously served as the company's chief operating officer under its co-founder Steve Jobs ...
was named as his successor. At WWDC 2012, the MacBook Pro with Retina display was unveiled, featuring a thinner body, faster processor and graphics, a high-resolution Retina display similar to the
iPhone 4 The iPhone 4 is a smartphone that was designed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is the fourth generation of the iPhone lineup, succeeding the iPhone 3GS and preceding the 4S. Following a number of notable leaks, the iPhone 4 was first unvei ...
, the MagSafe 2 charging port, and quieter impeller fans on the 15-inch model. It received largely positive reviews, with Nilay Patel of The Verge calling it "one of the best displays to ever ship on a laptop". In November 2012, the
iMac iMac is a family of all-in-one Mac desktop computers designed and built by Apple Inc. It has been the primary part of Apple's consumer desktop offerings since its debut in August 1998, and has evolved through seven distinct forms. In it ...
was redesigned with thinner edges, faster processor, and the removal of the SuperDrive. At WWDC 2013, the new Mac Pro was introduced, with Phil Schiller exclaiming "Can't innovate anymore, my ass!" in response to critics who said that Apple could no longer innovate without Jobs. This new model featured a miniaturized design with a glossy dark gray cylindrical body and internal components organized around a central cooling system. Tech reviewers praised the 2013 Mac Pro for its power and futuristic design; however, it was poorly received by professional users, who criticized its lack of upgradability and the removal of expansion slots. The iMac was refreshed with a 5K Retina display in 2014, making it the highest-resolution all-in-one desktop computer at the time of its release. The MacBook was
reintroduced Species reintroduction is the deliberate release of a species into the wild, from captivity or other areas where the organism is capable of survival. The goal of species reintroduction is to establish a healthy, genetically diverse, self-sustainin ...
in 2015, with a completely redesigned aluminum unibody chassis, a 12-inch Retina display, a fanless low-power
Intel Core M Intel Core M is a family of ultra low-voltage microprocessors belonging to the Intel Core series and designed specifically for ultra-thin notebooks, 2-in-1 detachables, and other mobile devices. The thermal design power (TDP) of all Core M microp ...
processor, a much smaller logic board, a new Butterfly keyboard, a single
USB-C USB-C (properly known as USB Type-C) is a 24-pin USB connector system with a rotationally symmetrical connector. The designation C refers only to the connector's physical configuration or form factor and should not be confused with the conne ...
port, and a solid-state
Force Touch Force Touch is a haptic technology developed by Apple Inc. that enables trackpads and touchscreens to distinguish between various levels of force being applied to their surfaces. It uses pressure sensors to add another method of input to Apple ...
trackpad with pressure sensitivity. It was praised for its portability, but criticized for its lack of performance, the need to use adapters to use most USB peripherals, and a high starting price of US$1,299. In 2015, Apple started a service program to address a widespread GPU defect in the 15-inch 2011 MacBook Pro, which could cause graphical artifacts or prevent the machine from functioning entirely.


Early neglect of professional users

The Touch Bar MacBook Pro was released in October 2016. It was the thinnest MacBook Pro ever made, replaced all ports with four
Thunderbolt 3 Thunderbolt is the brand name of a hardware interface for the connection of external peripherals to a computer. It has been developed by Intel, in collaboration with Apple. It was initially marketed under the name Light Peak, and first sold as ...
(USB-C) ports, gained a thinner "Butterfly" keyboard, and replaced
function key A function key is a key on a computer or terminal keyboard that can be programmed so as to cause an operating system command interpreter or application program to perform certain actions, a form of soft key. On some keyboards/computers, function ...
s with the Touch Bar. The Touch Bar was criticized for making it harder to use the function keys by feel, as it offered no tactile feedback. Many users were frustrated by the need to buy
dongle A dongle is a small piece of computer hardware that connects to a port on another device to provide it with additional functionality, or enable a pass-through to such a device that adds functionality. In computing, the term was initially synonym ...
s, particularly professional users who relied on traditional USB-A devices,
SD card Secure Digital, officially abbreviated as SD, is a proprietary non-volatile flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA) for use in portable devices. The standard was introduced in August 1999 by joint efforts between SanDis ...
s, and HDMI for video output. A few months after its release, users reported a problem with stuck keys and letters being skipped or repeated. iFixit attributed this to the ingress of dust or food crumbs under the keys, jamming them. Since the Butterfly keyboard was riveted into the laptop's case, it could only be serviced at an
Apple Store The Apple Store is a chain of Retail, retail stores owned and operated by Apple Inc. The stores sell various Apple products, including Macintosh, Mac personal computers, iPhone smartphones, iPad tablet computers, Apple Watch smartwatches, Apple ...
or authorized service center. Apple settled a $50m class-action lawsuit over these keyboards in 2022. These same models were afflicted by "flexgate": when users closed and opened the machine, they would risk progressively damaging the cable responsible for the display
backlight A backlight is a form of illumination used in liquid crystal displays (LCDs). As LCDs do not produce light by themselves—unlike, for example, cathode ray tube (CRT), plasma (PDP) or OLED displays—they need illumination ( ambient light or a ...
, which was too short. The $6 cable was soldered to the screen, requiring a $700 repair. Senior Vice President of Industrial Design Jony Ive continued to guide product designs towards simplicity and minimalism. Critics argued that he had begun to prioritize form over function, and was excessively focused on product thinness. His role in the decisions to switch to fragile Butterfly keyboards, to make the Mac Pro non-expandable, and to remove USB-A, HDMI and the SD card slot from the MacBook Pro were criticized. The long-standing keyboard issue on MacBook Pros, Apple's abandonment of the
Aperture In optics, an aperture is a hole or an opening through which light travels. More specifically, the aperture and focal length of an optical system determine the cone angle of a bundle of rays that come to a focus in the image plane. An opt ...
professional photography app, and the lack of Mac Pro upgrades led to declining sales and a widespread belief that Apple was no longer committed to professional users. After several years without any significant updates to the Mac Pro, Apple executives admitted in 2017 that the 2013 Mac Pro had not met expectations, and that the company had designed themselves into a "thermal corner", preventing them from releasing a planned dual-GPU successor. Apple also unveiled their future product roadmap for professional products, including plans for an
iMac Pro The iMac Pro is a discontinued all-in-one personal computer and workstation designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc. It was released on December 14, 2017. While it was sold, it was one of four desktop computers in the Macintosh lineup, si ...
as a stopgap and a next-generation Mac Pro that would be expandable. The
iMac Pro The iMac Pro is a discontinued all-in-one personal computer and workstation designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc. It was released on December 14, 2017. While it was sold, it was one of four desktop computers in the Macintosh lineup, si ...
was revealed at WWDC 2017, featuring updated Intel Xeon W processors and
Radeon Pro Radeon Pro is AMD's brand of professional oriented GPUs. It replaced AMD's FirePro brand in 2016. Compared to the Radeon brand for mainstream consumer/gamer products, the Radeon Pro brand is intended for use in workstations and the running of ...
Vega graphics. In 2018, Apple released a redesigned MacBook Air with a Retina display, Butterfly keyboard, Force Touch trackpad, and Thunderbolt 3 USB-C ports. The Butterfly keyboard went through three revisions, incorporating silicone gaskets in the key mechanism to prevent keys from being jammed by dust or other particles. However, many users continued to experience reliability issues with these keyboards, leading Apple to launch a program to repair affected keyboards free of charge. Higher-end models of the 15-inch 2018 MacBook Pro faced another issue where the Core i9 processor reached unusually high temperatures, resulting in reduced CPU performance from thermal throttling. Apple issued a patch to address this issue via a macOS supplemental update, blaming a "missing digital key" in the thermal management firmware. The 2019 MacBook Air and 2020 MacBook Pro replaced the unreliable Butterfly keyboard with a redesigned scissor-switch Magic Keyboard. On the MacBook Pros, the Touch Bar and Touch ID were made standard, and the Esc key was detached from the Touch Bar and returned to being a physical key. At WWDC 2019, Apple unveiled a new Mac Pro with a larger case design that allows for hardware expandability, as well as introducing a new expansion module system (MPX), for modules such as an optional Afterburner card for faster video encoding. Almost every part of the new Mac Pro is user-replaceable, with iFixit praising its high user-repairability. It received positive reviews, with reviewers praising its power, modularity, quiet cooling, and Apple's inceased focus on professional workflows.


Apple silicon transition

In April 2018,
Bloomberg Bloomberg may refer to: People * Daniel J. Bloomberg (1905–1984), audio engineer * Georgina Bloomberg (born 1983), professional equestrian * Michael Bloomberg (born 1942), American businessman and founder of Bloomberg L.P.; politician and ma ...
reported that Apple was planning to replace Intel chips with
ARM In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
processors similar to those used in its phones, causing Intel's shares to drop by 9.2%.
The Verge ''The Verge'' is an American technology news website operated by Vox Media, publishing news, feature stories, guidebooks, product reviews, consumer electronics news, and podcasts. The website launched on November 1, 2011, and uses Vox Media' ...
, commenting on the rumors, stated that such a decision made sense, as Intel was failing to make significant improvements to its processors, and could not compete with ARM chips on battery life. At WWDC 2020, Tim Cook announced that the Mac would be transitioning to Apple silicon chips, built upon an
ARM In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
architecture, over a two-year timeline. The
Rosetta 2 Rosetta is a dynamic binary translator developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, an application compatibility layer between different instruction set architectures. It enables a transition to newer hardware, by automatically translating software. The ...
translation layer was also introduced, enabling Apple silicon Macs to run Intel apps. On November 10, 2020, Apple announced their first system-on-a-chip designed for the Mac, the
Apple M1 Apple M1 is a series of ARM architecture, ARM-based system-on-a-chip, systems-on-a-chip (SoCs) Apple silicon, designed by Apple Inc. as a central processing unit (CPU) and graphics processing unit (GPU) for its Mac (computer), Mac desktop compu ...
, and a series of Macs that would ship with the M1: the
MacBook Air The MacBook Air is a line of ultrabook computers developed and manufactured by Apple Inc. It consists of a full-size keyboard, a machined aluminum case, and, in the more modern versions, a thin light structure. The Air was originally position ...
,
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 positioned between the consumer all-in-one iMac (Intel-based), iMac and the profes ...
, and the 13-inch MacBook Pro. These new Macs received highly positive reviews, with reviewers highlighting significant improvements in battery life, performance, and heat management compared to previous generations. The iMac Pro was quietly discontinued on March 6, 2021. On April 20, 2021, a new 24-inch iMac was revealed, featuring the M1 chip, seven new colors, thinner white bezels, and an enclosure made entirely from recycled aluminum. On October 18, 2021, Apple announced new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros featuring a bezel-less mini-LED 120 Hz ProMotion display, and the return of a MagSafe,
HDMI High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is a proprietary audio/video interface for transmitting uncompressed video data and compressed or uncompressed digital audio data from an HDMI-compliant source device, such as a display controller, ...
port, and
SD card Secure Digital, officially abbreviated as SD, is a proprietary non-volatile flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA) for use in portable devices. The standard was introduced in August 1999 by joint efforts between SanDis ...
slot. On March 8, 2022, the
Mac Studio Mac Studio is a small-form-factor workstation designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc. It is one of four desktop computers in the Mac lineup, sitting above the consumer-range Mac Mini and iMac, and positioned below the Mac Pro. It is co ...
was unveiled, featuring more powerful M1 Max and M1 Ultra chips in a similar form factor to the Mac Mini. It drew highly positive reviews for its flexibility and wide range of available ports. Its performance was deemed "impressive", beating the highest-end Mac Pro with a 28-core Intel Xeon chip, while being significantly more power efficient and compact. It was introduced alongside the Studio Display, and was meant to replace the 27-inch iMac, which was discontinued on the same day. At
WWDC 2022 The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is an information technology conference held annually by Apple Inc. The conference is usually held at Apple Park in California. The event is usually used to showcase new software and technologies in th ...
, Apple announced an updated MacBook Air based on a new M2 chip. It incorporates several changes from the 14-inch MacBook Pro, such as a flat, slab-shaped design, full-sized function keys,
MagSafe MagSafe is a series of proprietary magnetically attached power connectors developed by Apple Inc. for Mac laptops. MagSafe was introduced on January 10, 2006, in conjunction with the MacBook Pro, the first Intel-based Mac laptop, at the Ma ...
charging, and a Liquid Retina display, with rounded corners and a notch incorporating a 1080p webcam.


Current lineup


Marketing

The original Macintosh was marketed at
Super Bowl XVIII Super Bowl XVIII was an American football game played on January 22, 1984, at Tampa Stadium between the National Football Conference (NFC) champion and defending Super Bowl XVII champion Washington Redskins and the American Football Conference ( ...
with the highly-acclaimed "1984" ad, directed by
Ridley Scott Sir Ridley Scott (born 30 November 1937) is a British film director and producer. Directing, among others, science fiction films, his work is known for its atmospheric and highly concentrated visual style. Scott has received many accolades thr ...
. The ad alluded to
George Orwell Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950), better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to totalitar ...
's novel ''
Nineteen Eighty-Four ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'' (also stylised as ''1984'') is a dystopian social science fiction novel and cautionary tale written by the English writer George Orwell. It was published on 8 June 1949 by Secker & Warburg as Orwell's ninth and final ...
,'' and symbolized Apple's desire to "rescue" humanity from the conformity of computer industry giant IBM. The ad is now considered a "watershed event" and a "masterpiece." Before the Macintosh, high-tech marketing catered to industry insiders rather than consumers, and as a result, journalists covered technology like the "steel or automobiles" industries, with articles written for a highly technical audience. The Macintosh launch event pioneered event marketing techniques that have since become "widely emulated" in
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo County ...
, by creating a mystique about the product and giving an inside look into its creation. Apple also took a new "multiple exclusives" approach regarding the press, giving "over one hundred interviews to journalists that lasted over six hours apiece", and introduced a new "Test Drive a Macintosh" campaign. Apple's brand, which established a "heartfelt connection with consumers", is cited as one of the keys to the Mac's success. After Steve Jobs's return to the company, he unveiled the
Think different "Think different" is an advertising slogan used from 1997 to 2002 by Apple Computer, Inc., now named Apple Inc. The campaign was created by the Los Angeles office of advertising agency TBWA\Chiat\Day. The slogan has been widely taken as a resp ...
ad campaign, positioning the Mac as the best computer for "creative people who believe that one person can change the world". The campaign featured black-and-white photographs of luminaries like
Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
,
Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (; ; 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948), popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist Quote: "... marks Gandhi as a hybrid cosmopolitan figure who transformed ... anti- ...
, and
Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...
, with Jobs saying: "if they ever used a computer, it would have been a Mac." The ad campaign was critically acclaimed and won several awards, including the a
Primetime Emmy The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the Primetime ...
. In the 2000s, Apple continued to use successful marketing campaigns to promote its Mac line, including the
Switch In electrical engineering, a switch is an electrical component that can disconnect or connect the conducting path in an electrical circuit, interrupting the electric current or diverting it from one conductor to another. The most common type of ...
and
Get a Mac The "Get a Mac" campaign is a television advertising campaign created for Apple Inc. (Apple Computer, Inc. at the start of the campaign) by TBWA\Media Arts Lab, the company's advertising agency, that ran from 2006 to 2009. The advertising camp ...
campaigns. Apple's focus on design and build quality has helped establish the Mac as a high-end, premium brand. The company's emphasis on creating iconic and visually appealing designs for its computers has given them a "human face" and made them stand out in a crowded market. Apple has long made use of
product placement Product placement, also known as embedded marketing, is a marketing technique where references to specific brands or products are incorporated into another work, such as a film or television program, with specific promotional intent. Much of th ...
s in high-profile movies and television shows to showcase Mac computers, like '' Mission: Impossible,
Legally Blonde ''Legally Blonde'' is a 2001 American comedy film directed by Robert Luketic in his List of directorial debuts, feature-length directorial debut, and scripted by Karen McCullah, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith (writer), Kirsten Smith from ...
, and
Sex and the City ''Sex and the City'' is an American romantic comedy, romantic comedy-drama television series created by Darren Star for HBO. An adaptation of Candace Bushnell's Sex and the City (newspaper column), newspaper column and 1996 book anthology of the ...
.'' Apple is known for not allowing producers to show villains using Apple products. Its own shows produced for the
Apple TV+ Apple TV is a digital media player and microconsole developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is a small network appliance hardware that plays received media data such as video and audio to a television set or external display. Since its secon ...
streaming service often feature prominent use of MacBooks. The Mac is known for having a highly loyal customer base. In 2022, the American Customer Satisfaction Index gave the Mac the highest customer satisfaction score of any personal computer, at 82 out of 100. At of that same year, Apple is the fourth largest vendor of personal computers, with a market share of 8.9%.


Hardware

Apple outsources the production of its hardware to Asian manufacturers like
Foxconn Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd., trading as Hon Hai Technology Group in China and Taiwan and Foxconn internationally, is a Taiwanese multinational electronics contract manufacturer established in 1974 with headquarters in Tucheng, New T ...
and
Pegatron Pegatron Corporation () is a Taiwanese electronics manufacturing company that mainly develops computing, communications and consumer electronics for branded vendors. It also develops, designs and manufactures computer peripherals and components. ...
, maintaining a high degree of control over the end-product. As a highly vertically integrated company, Apple produces its own operating system and designs its own chips, allowing for tight control over all aspects of its products and deeper integration between hardware and software. All current Macs use
ARM In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
-based
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. It is the basis of most new Mac computers as well as iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Apple TV, a ...
processors, except the Mac Pro. Apple silicon Macs have been praised for their performance and power efficiency. They can run Intel apps through the
Rosetta 2 Rosetta is a dynamic binary translator developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, an application compatibility layer between different instruction set architectures. It enables a transition to newer hardware, by automatically translating software. The ...
translation layer, as well as
iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...
and
iPadOS iPadOS is a mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc. for its iPad line of tablet computers. It is a rebranded variant of iOS, the operating system used by Apple's iPhones, renamed to reflect the diverging features of the two product l ...
apps distributed via the
App Store An App Store (or app marketplace) is a type of digital distribution platform for computer software called applications, often in a mobile context. Apps provide a specific set of functions which, by definition, do not include the running of the co ...
. All current Mac models come equipped with high-speed
Thunderbolt 4 Thunderbolt is the brand name of a hardware interface for the connection of external peripherals to a computer. It has been developed by Intel, in collaboration with Apple. It was initially marketed under the name Light Peak, and first sold as ...
or
USB 4 USB4 (aka: USB 4.0) is a specification by the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), which was released in version 1.0 on 29 August 2019. The USB4 protocol is based on the Thunderbolt 3 protocol; the Thunderbolt 3 specification was donated to the USB- ...
connectivity, with speeds up to 40Gbit/s. Current Apple silicon Macs have custom
integrated graphics A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed to manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display device. GPUs are used in embedded systems, mobi ...
rather than graphics cards. MacBooks are recharged with either USB-C or
MagSafe MagSafe is a series of proprietary magnetically attached power connectors developed by Apple Inc. for Mac laptops. MagSafe was introduced on January 10, 2006, in conjunction with the MacBook Pro, the first Intel-based Mac laptop, at the Ma ...
connectors, depending on the model. Apple offers a range of accessories for the Mac, including the Studio Display and
Pro Display XDR The Pro Display XDR is a 32-inch flat panel computer monitor created by Apple, based on an LG supplied display, and released on December 10, 2019. It was announced at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference on June 3, 2019 along with the thir ...
external monitors, the
AirPods AirPods are wireless Bluetooth earbuds designed by Apple Inc. They were first announced on September 7, 2016, alongside the iPhone 7. Within two years, they became Apple's most popular accessory. The most recent model, AirPods (3rd generation ...
line of wireless headphones, and
keyboards Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...
and
mice A mouse ( : mice) is a small rodent. Characteristically, mice are known to have a pointed snout, small rounded ears, a body-length scaly tail, and a high breeding rate. The best known mouse species is the common house mouse (''Mus musculus' ...
such as the Magic Keyboard,
Magic Trackpad Apple Inc. has designed and manufactured several models of mice, trackpads and other pointing devices, primarily for use with Macintosh computers. Over the years, Apple has maintained a distinct form and function with its mice that reflect the ...
and
Magic Mouse The Magic Mouse is a multi-touch wireless mouse that is manufactured and sold by Apple. The first-generation Magic Mouse was released on October 20, 2009, and introduced multi-touch functionality to a computer mouse. Taking after the iPhone, ...
.


Software

Macs run the macOS operating system, which is the second most widely used desktop OS, after
Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
and ahead of
ChromeOS ChromeOS, sometimes stylized as chromeOS and formerly styled as Chrome OS, is a Linux-based operating system designed by Google. It is derived from the open-source ChromiumOS and uses the Google Chrome web browser as its principal user interfac ...
. macOS is the successor of the
classic Mac OS Mac OS (originally System Software; retronym: Classic Mac OS) is the series of operating systems developed for the Macintosh family of personal computers by Apple Computer from 1984 to 2001, starting with System 1 and ending with Mac OS 9. The ...
, which saw nine releases between 1984 and 1999. The latest version of Classic Mac OS,
Mac OS 9 Mac OS 9 is the ninth major release of Apple Inc., Apple's classic Mac OS operating system which was succeeded by macOS, Mac OS X (renamed to OS X in 2011 and macOS in 2016) in 2001. Introduced on October 23, 1999, it was promoted by Apple as "T ...
, was introduced in 1999, and still evokes nostalgia for some users, part of a trend known as
retrocomputing Retrocomputing is the use of older computer hardware and software in modern times. Retrocomputing is usually classed as a hobby and recreation rather than a practical application of technology; enthusiasts often collect rare and valuable hardw ...
. Mac OS 9 was succeeded by
Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...
in 2001. Over the years, Mac OS X was rebranded to OS X, and is now known as macOS. macOS is a derivative of NextSTEP and
FreeBSD FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...
. It uses the XNU kernel, and the core of macOS has been open-sourced as the Darwin operating system. macOS features the
Aqua Aqua is the Latin word for water. It is used in many words which relate to water, such as aquatic life. In English, it may also refer to: Arts * Aqua (color), a greenish-blue color Business * Aqua (skyscraper), an 82-story residential skysc ...
user interface, the
Cocoa Cocoa may refer to: Chocolate * Chocolate * ''Theobroma cacao'', the cocoa tree * Cocoa bean, seed of ''Theobroma cacao'' * Chocolate liquor, or cocoa liquor, pure, liquid chocolate extracted from the cocoa bean, including both cocoa butter and ...
set of frameworks, and the
Objective-C Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language. Originally developed by Brad Cox and Tom Love in the early 1980s, it was selected by NeXT for its NeXTS ...
and
Swift Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to: * SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks ** SWIFT code * Swift (programming language) * Swift (bird), a family of birds It may also refer to: Organizations * SWIFT, ...
programming languages. Macs are deeply integrated with other Apple devices, including the iPhone and iPad, through Continuity features like
Handoff In cellular telecommunications, handover, or handoff, is the process of transferring an ongoing call or data session from one channel connected to the core network to another channel. In satellite communications it is the process of transf ...
,
Sidecar A sidecar is a one-wheeled device attached to the side of a motorcycle, scooter, or bicycle, making the whole a three-wheeled vehicle. A motorcycle with a sidecar is sometimes called a ''combination'', an ''outfit'', a ''rig'' or a ''hack''. ...
, Universal Control, and Universal Clipboard. The first version of Mac OS X, version
Mac OS X Cheetah Mac OS X 10.0 (code named Cheetah) is the first major release of macOS, Mac OS X, Apple Computer, Apple's desktop and server operating system. It was released on March 24, 2001 for a price of $129 after a Mac OS X Public Beta, public beta. Mac ...
, was released in March 2001. Major releases include
Mac OS X Tiger Mac OS X Tiger (version 10.4) is the 5th major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Mac computers. Tiger was released to the public on April 29, 2005 for US$129.95 as the successor to Mac OS X 10.3 Panther. Some ...
, which added
Spotlight Spotlight or spot light may refer to: Lighting * Spot lights, automotive auxiliary lamps * Spotlight (theatre lighting) * Spotlight, a searchlight * Stage lighting instrument, stage lighting instruments, of several types Art, entertainment, an ...
search,
Mac OS X Snow Leopard Mac OS X Snow Leopard (version 10.6) is the seventh major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Snow Leopard was publicly unveiled on June 8, 2009 at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference. ...
, which brought refinements, stability, and full
64-bit In computer architecture, 64-bit Integer (computer science), integers, memory addresses, or other Data (computing), data units are those that are 64 bits wide. Also, 64-bit central processing unit, CPUs and arithmetic logic unit, ALUs are those ...
support,
OS X Lion OS X Lion, also known as Mac OS X Lion, (version 10.7) is the eighth major release of macOS, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Mac computers. A preview of OS X 10.7 Lion was publicly shown at the "Back to the Mac" Apple Speci ...
, which took many features from the iPad,
OS X Yosemite OS X Yosemite ( ; version 10.10) is the eleventh major release of macOS, Apple Inc.'s desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. OS X Yosemite was announced and released to developers on June 2, 2014, at WWDC 2014 and rel ...
, which removed
skeuomorph A skeuomorph (also spelled skiamorph, ) is a derivative object that retains ornamental design cues (attributes) from structures that were necessary in the original. Skeuomorphs are typically used to make something new feel familiar in an effort t ...
ic interface elements, macOS Sierra, which added
Apple File System Apple File System (APFS) is a proprietary file system developed and deployed by Apple Inc. for macOS Sierra (10.12.4) and later, iOS 10.3 and later, tvOS 10.2 and later, watchOS 3.2 and later, and all versions of iPadOS. It aims to fix c ...
(APFS) support,
macOS Mojave macOS Mojave ( ; version 10.14) is the fifteenth software versioning, major release of macOS, Apple Inc.'s desktop operating system for Macintosh computers. Mojave was announced at Apple's Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, Worldwide Devel ...
, which added a dark mode for applications, and
macOS Big Sur macOS Big Sur (version 11) is the seventeenth major release of macOS, Apple Inc.'s operating system for Macintosh computers. It was announced at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) on June 22, 2020, and was released to the public ...
, which introduced an iOS-inspired redesign of the user interface. The Mac has a wide variety of apps available, including cross-platform apps like
Google Chrome Google Chrome is a cross-platform web browser developed by Google. It was first released in 2008 for Microsoft Windows, built with free software components from Apple WebKit and Mozilla Firefox. Versions were later released for Linux, macOS ...
,
Microsoft Office Microsoft Office, or simply Office, is the former name of a family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. It was first announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at COMDEX in Las Vegas. Initially a marketi ...
,
Adobe Creative Cloud Adobe Creative Cloud is a set of applications and services from Adobe Inc. that gives subscribers access to a collection of software used for graphic design, video editing, web development, photography, along with a set of mobile applications an ...
,
Mathematica Wolfram Mathematica is a software system with built-in libraries for several areas of technical computing that allow machine learning, statistics, symbolic computation, data manipulation, network analysis, time series analysis, NLP, optimizat ...
,
Visual Studio Code Visual Studio Code, also commonly referred to as VS Code, is a source-code editor made by Microsoft with the Electron Framework, for Windows, Linux and macOS. Features include support for debugging, syntax highlighting, intelligent code complet ...
,
Ableton Live Ableton Live is a digital audio workstation for macOS and Windows developed by the German company Ableton. In contrast to many other software sequencers, Ableton Live is designed to be an instrument for live performances as well as a tool f ...
, and
Cinema 4D Cinema 4D is a 3D software suite developed by the German company Maxon. Overview As of R21, only one version of Cinema 4D is available. It replaces all previous variants, including BodyPaint 3D, and includes all features of the past 'Studio' ...
. Apple has also developed several apps for the Mac, including
Final Cut Pro Final Cut Pro is a series of non-linear editing, non-linear video editing software programs first developed by Macromedia, Macromedia Inc. and later Apple Inc. The most recent version, Final Cut Pro 10.6.4, runs on Macintosh, Mac computers power ...
,
Logic Pro Logic Pro is a digital audio workstation (DAW) and MIDI music sequencer, sequencer software application for the macOS platform. It was originally created in the early 1990s as Notator Logic, or Logic, by German software developer C-Lab which ...
,
iWork iWork is an office suite of applications created by Apple Inc. for its macOS and iOS operating systems, and also available cross-platform through the iCloud website. It includes the presentation application Keynote, the word processing and ...
,
GarageBand GarageBand is a line of digital audio workstations developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, iPadOS, and iOS devices that allows users to create music or podcasts. GarageBand is developed by Apple for macOS, and was once part of the iLife software s ...
, and
iMovie iMovie (known at times as iMovie HD) is a preinstalled video editing application developed by Apple Inc. for macOS, iOS, and iPadOS devices. It was originally released in 1999 as a Mac OS 8 application bundled with the first FireWire-enabled ...
. A large amount of
open-source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Op ...
applications run natively on macOS, like
LibreOffice LibreOffice () is a free and open-source productivity software, office productivity software suite, a project of The Document Foundation (TDF). It was fork (software development), forked in 2010 from OpenOffice.org, an open-sourced version of t ...
,
GIMP GIMP ( ; GNU Image Manipulation Program) is a free and open-source raster graphics editor used for image manipulation (retouching) and image editing, free-form drawing, transcoding between different image file formats, and more specialized task ...
, and VLC, as well as command-line programs, which can be installed through Homebrew. Many applications written for
Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...
or BSD also run on macOS, often using
X11 The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X provides the basic framework for a GUI environment: drawing and moving windows on the display device and interacting wi ...
. Apple's official integrated development environment ( IDE) is
Xcode Xcode is Apple's integrated development environment (IDE) for macOS, used to develop software for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, and tvOS. It was initially released in late 2003; the latest stable release is version 14.2, released on December 13, ...
, allowing developers to create apps for the Mac and other Apple platforms. The current release of macOS is
macOS Ventura macOS Ventura (version 13) is the nineteenth and current major release of macOS, Apple's desktop operating system for Mac computers. The successor to macOS Monterey, it was announced at WWDC 2022 on June 6, 2022, and launched on October 24, 2 ...
, which launched on October 24, 2022.


Timeline


Notes


References


Books

* * * * * * * *


Print

*


Further reading

* This is an interview about the introduction of the Macintosh. * * * * * * * * * * * *


External links

* {{Authority control Macintosh computer Computer-related introductions in 1984 Apple computers Steve Jobs