Mac Studio M5 Ultra Delayed to Late 2025 by Memory Chip Shortage

Apple’s decision to skip M6 Pro and M6 Max chips entirely has a quiet but concrete consequence for the Mac Studio lineup: there will be no M6 Ultra, which means the next two Mac Studio generations will be the M5 Ultra arriving later this year and an M7 Ultra expected in 2028. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported the two-model roadmap in his Power On newsletter, framing the 2028 machine as the more meaningful update of the pair.

The skip happens because Apple is canceling its higher-end M6 variants, releasing only a base M6 this year and moving Pro and Max silicon directly into the M7 generation. That generation is expected to focus heavily on on-device AI and GPU-intensive workloads. It marks the first time Apple has launched an M-series cycle without a Pro or Max chip alongside the base model.

For the M5 Ultra Mac Studio, no major exterior redesign is expected. The more interesting engineering work is happening inside the 2028 model, where Apple has been developing a new heat sink architecture aimed at improving thermal performance, suggesting the M7 Ultra’s power envelope may push harder than current cooling allows.

Supply Constraints Complicate the Near-Term Picture

The M5 Ultra model was originally slated to arrive earlier in 2026 but was reportedly pushed back due to memory chip supply issues and rising component costs. Apple has reportedly tested support for up to 768GB of unified memory, though supply constraints may prevent that configuration from actually shipping.

Whether Apple can hit an October launch window is genuinely unclear. The current M3 Ultra Mac Studio already has delivery estimates stretching into October, which suggests inventory pressure has not fully resolved. Two years of waiting for the M7 Ultra is a long runway for a machine that sits at the top of Apple’s desktop lineup below the Mac Pro.