Florian Albrecht (Reddit, Mac Power Users):
The team of Leitmotif is pleased to announce that, as of March 25, 2026, Parachute Backup is part of Leitmotif GmbH. Offloader and Outpost Launcher remain with Eric Mann. Parachute Backup 1.5.0 is the first version released by Leitmotif GmbH. Parachute Backup remains a one-time purchase, and its privacy-first approach remains unchanged.
Previously:
Mac just had its best launch week ever for first-time Mac customers. We love seeing the enthusiasm!
Apple also released MacBook Air models with the M5 chip and MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips last week, so it was a big week for new Macs, but the affordable MacBook Neo is likely driving the record number of first-time Mac buyers.
If you want a MacBook Neo, you may have to wait. In the U.S., MacBook Neo orders placed through Apple’s online store today are estimated to be delivered between April 6 and April 13.
Apple’s newly launched MacBook Neo, the company’s most affordable laptop ever, has become an immediate hit, selling out quickly and prompting the tech giant to double its production orders to a targeted 10 million units, according to supply chain sources.
[…]
Industry observers had previously projected MacBook Neo shipments of around 4.5–5 million units for 2026, but the current momentum and production ramp suggest significantly higher potential. The device’s ability to attract first-time Mac buyers while maintaining Apple’s signature build quality and ecosystem integration positions it as a potential game-changer in the affordable laptop space.
Apple tried this before… but it took 25 YEARS to finally nail the perfect price
12" iBook G3-G4 2001-06 $999❌
13" MacBook 2006–11 $999❌
13" MacBook Air 2008-17 $999❌
11" Macbook Air 2011–15 $899❌
13" M1 MacBook Air 2020-24 $999❌13" MacBook Neo 2026 $599✅
Previously:
Update (2026-04-08): Joe Rossignol:
In the latest edition of his Culpium newsletter today, Culpan said the MacBook Neo is selling so well that Apple’s supply of the binned A18 Pro chips with a 5-core GPU will “run out” before the company is able to fully satisfy demand for the laptop.
But just using the Neo, without any consideration that it’s memory limited, I haven’t noticed a single hitch. I’m not quitting apps I otherwise wouldn’t quit, or closing Safari tabs I wouldn’t otherwise close. I’m just working — with an even dozen apps open as I type this sentence — and everything feels snappy.
[…]
The Neo’s trackpad is mechanical. It actually clicks, even when the machine is powered off. Obviously this is a cost-saving measure. But the Neo’s trackpad doesn’t feel cheap in any way. You can click it anywhere you want — top, bottom, middle, corner — and the click feels right.
[…]
The Neo has no notch. Instead, it has a larger black bezel surrounding the entire display than do the MacBook Airs and Pros. I consider this an advantage for the Neo, not a disadvantage.
[…]
The Neo crystallizes the post-Jony Ive Apple. The MacBook “One” was a design statement, and a much-beloved semi-premium product for a relatively small audience. The Neo is a mass-market device that was conceived of, designed, and engineered to expand the Mac user base to a larger audience. It’s a design statement too, but of a different sort — emphasizing practicality above all else. It’s just a goddamn lovely tool, and fun too.
It is not a perfect product. That’s what’s good about it. It’s a product borne of a mature and confident knowledge of the usual standards, and respectfully considering how a different set of circumstances could affect those standards. Without huffiness, belittling and drama, with humor, with heart, with empathy. More of that, please.
I bring this up because, of course, the MacBook Neo is able to run all of your professional apps, and I’m glad Tyler Stallman showed this off in his video. Consider how much faster the MacBook Neo must be than a 2012 Mac mini, and tell me that you can’t do awesome, creative work on this thing.
Beyond the price, the most impressive thing about the MacBook Neo is that it is just a Mac like any other. It does all the things you’d expect a Mac to do.
[…]
It runs all the apps. If you’re patient and careful, you could use it in ways that are wildly beyond what Apple recommends. (I’ve been misusing Logic Pro as a podcast editing app for more than a decade, on devices vastly more underpowered than the MacBook Neo, and it hasn’t been a problem.)
Some good news: I don’t know if Apple had a change of heart or what, but you can enable Xcode’s intelligence features on the MacBook Neo with 8GB RAM, including ChatGPT and Codex support. Previously, this was limited to 16GB devices — I have no idea when that switch happened? 😯
[We] picked one up to take a look at the new machine and share some first impressions.
The first reviews of the MacBook Neo were published today by selected publications and YouTube channels, ahead of the laptop launching on Wednesday.
[…]
The big question: is just 8GB of RAM enough? Most reviewers say yes.
The Verge today showed the MacBook Neo had up to 8× slower sustained SSD read and write speeds in a benchmark test compared to the new MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips.
I used Magic Disk Benchmark to test the read and write speeds of the 3 Macs I have access to (and can install a random disk app on, aka not my M5 Pro work Mac). As you can see, there’s a pretty enormous gap between the Neo and even a base M2 Mac mini.
Today the MacBook Neo arrives in users’ hands, and in his review, MKBHD says it’s potentially “Apple’s most disruptive product” in the last 10+ years.
Here’s the thing: if you are running Big Data workloads on your laptop every day, you probably shouldn’t get the MacBook Neo. Yes, DuckDB runs on it, and can handle a lot of data by leveraging out-of-core processing. But the MacBook Neo’s disk I/O is lackluster compared to the Air and Pro models (about 1.5 GB/s compared to 3–6 GB/s), and the 8 GB memory will be limiting in the long run.
One reason why I’ve been so curious about Apple’s long-rumored budget MacBook was because it would be really, really nice to have something close to $500 that a person could just go out and buy without having to worry about whether they were getting the right thing (you wouldn’t want to mistake the Acer Aspire Go 15 AG15-32P-C0Z2 for the Acer Aspire Go 15 AG15-71P-59PZ, would you??), or whether it would be available at all. Something with Apple’s typical warranty support and network of retail stores behind it. And something that would integrate better with an iPhone than Microsoft and Google’s platforms are able to.
[…]
That the MacBook Neo is using a smartphone chip was not a surprise. What surprised me a little was that it’s still acting like it’s in a smartphone, with short bursts of peak performance in both single- and multi-core tests that fall off sharply to keep the chip inside a tiny power envelope.
[…]
It seems as though Apple has left some performance on the table here—based on our testing, even a 7 W or 8 W power envelope would have been enough to improve its sustained clock speeds, while still keeping overall power consumption reasonably low. It’s possible that Apple keeps the power envelope low to help extend the battery life, since the Neo’s 36.5 WHr battery is only 73 percent as big as the M1 Air’s 49.9 WHr battery, and it comes with a similar screen, but it’s hard to say for sure.
I imagine that the only people who will be disappointed with the Neo will be people who were willing and able to spend $1099 on the MacBook Air that they actually need, and tried to save some money by downgrading. Or, people who wind up doing something that I often do: treating the $1099 as a budget, not as an MSRP. A $699 maxed-out Neo leaves you with a $400 bankroll for an external SSD, a USB-C external display in a travel-friendly folio stand, and other niceties. It’s tempting.
To my surprise, it ran this site’s 3D visualization quite snappily, which is no small feat (most PC laptops struggle with it, regardless of what browser and GPU they have). And although I didn’t have the chance to run any benchmarks, RAM usage in Activity Monitor was pretty much OK after launching a gaggle of Apple apps, which wasn’t surprising (their software load doesn’t include any of the Electron bloat everyone has to deal with to some degree).
In general, I think it makes a killer Chromebook/PC laptop replacement for school, and although I expect the A18 to not be a powerhouse, it felt quite snappy, even with multiple apps open.
Novelty is a hell of a drug, but I also think there’s something to specific products that, despite them clearly not being the best technical option available, still have a draw for some reason.
I keep trying to find a breaking point in my own workflows, but I honestly can’t. Yes, it’s ever-so-slightly slower at certain tasks. And yes, my workflows are admittedly pretty light, dominated by web-usage with a few native Mac apps sprinkled in here and there. But I gave it a solid week of daily usage. There’s nothing I would consider a deal-breaker here or even close to it. So I’m keeping it.
I’m honest-to-god surprised by this. I had assumed I might return it and opt for an M5 machine. Instead, I think I’m gonna trade in one of my other Macs.
Reviews keep saying the MacBook Neo puts other laptops ‘in its price range’ to shame, but it very clearly puts PC laptops four times its price to shame. And that’s before accounting for the RAMpocalypse which is going to clip the PC market’s wings this year. There’s a potential future where Apple becomes the largest consumer PC manufacturer by market share, effectively overnight, depending on how this plays out. A perfectly-timed kill shot for an industry in turmoil
After our initial benchmarks, we can clearly say that Apple pretty much just toys around with the competition from AMD, Intel and Qualcomm because the single-core performance of the MacBook Neo is better than any other mobile processor (except for Apple’s M4 and M5 chips).
Antonio G. Di Benedetto of The Verge has reviewed the MacBook Neo as well as numerous PC laptops, and he thinks it’s not going to go well for PC makers[…]
Framework (via Mike Rockwell):
Framework founder Nirav Patel heads to the Apple store to get the new MacBook Neo and takes it apart to see how it compares with our Framework Laptop 12. From repairability to design choices, this comparative teardown explores two very different, but overlapping approaches to building entry-level laptops.
It feels as good as Apple’s premium laptops, and in one or two specific ways, actually feels better. Whether it’s the friendly design or just the new feet, which I think are significantly nicer than the ones on Apple’s Air and Pro machines, it feels outstanding to hold and to use.
[…]
In my experience, the MacBook Neo performs worse across the board than that M1 MacBook Pro. Yes, the single-core performance is higher, but there are fewer cores, and the efficiency cores are even slower. There’s also half the RAM, which I think is probably the biggest bottleneck in this device. Paired with the significantly slower SSD (about 2/3 the speed of M1 drives and 1/5 the speed of M5 drives), the system has to rely on swapping to the SSD even more. So while I can open a good number of apps at once and the experience is okay, it’s worth noting that the experience is worse than doing the same things on an M1 with 16GB RAM. If I could have the MacBook Neo with its outstanding construction and hardware trade-offs, but put an M1 with 16GB RAM in it, I would choose the M1 every single time.
If you are a savvy shopper with a very limited budget and need that push beyond what the MacBook Neo can give you, you are probably better off searching for a used or refurbished MacBook Air. Last week on MacBreak Weekly, Christina Warren made a strong case for picking up a refurbished or used M3 or M4 MacBook Air, which would cost slightly more than a MacBook Neo but far outclass it in terms of features.
But this entire conversation misses the most important thing about the MacBook Neo: It is sold in every Apple Store, on Apple’s website, and in every Apple sales channel. Most people won’t think to cruise for a refurbished Air—they will just go down to their local store, or pop onto Amazon, and shop for a computer. That’s why the MacBook Neo is important. It’s available to everyone, everywhere, and Apple will stand behind it as a new product.
Seeing is believing when it comes to emulation, so it’s worth seeing how your favorite systems fare before diving into emulation on the Neo yourself, but I was surprised to see how well the Neo did even on systems as recent as the Nintendo Switch 1. Beyond the GameCube, it’s hit or miss what will run well, but older systems like NES, Game Boy, GBA, SNES, PS1, PSP, 3DS, PS2, Dreamcast, and Saturn games all ran well and in most cases at upscaled resolutions and with shaders applied.
See also:
Previously:
Chance Miller (Hacker News, Mac Power Users, Slashdot):
Apple has also confirmed to 9to5Mac that it has no plans to offer future Mac Pro hardware.
[…]
The Mac Pro has lived many lives over the years. Apple released the current Mac Pro industrial design in 2019 alongside the Pro Display XDR (which was also discontinued earlier this month). That version of the Mac Pro was powered by Intel, and Apple refreshed it with the M2 Ultra chip in June 2023. It has gone without an update since then, languishing at its $6,999 price point even as Apple debuted the M3 Ultra chip in the Mac Studio last year.
With that in mind, the Mac Studio is clearly set up to be the ‘pro’ desktop Mac of the future in Apple’s lineup. The Mac Studio can be configured with the M3 Ultra chip and a 32-core CPU and an 80-core GPU, paired with 256GB of unified memory and 16TB of SSD storage.
In addition to discontinuing the Mac Pro, Apple today discontinued the $700 wheel add-on kit that it sold for the Mac Pro.
Below, we reflect on nearly two decades of the Mac Pro.
So after 2012 — and arguably after 2010 — there was one trash can Mac Pro in 2013, one Intel “new tower” Mac Pro in 2019, and one Apple Silicon Mac Pro in 2023. No speed bumps in between any of them. Three revisions in the last 14 years. So, yeah, not a big shock that they’re just pulling the plug officially.
It’s not a shock that a product that was underpowered and overpriced wouldn’t sell well, leading to cancellation. The mystery is why Apple seemed to repeatedly come up with designs that were not what customers were asking for and why it couldn’t manage to do basic speed bump updates. Presumably the answer is internal politics. I’m not sure what to make of the reporting that John Ternus was apparently one of the champions of the Mac Pro and that he’s likely to be the next CEO, yet the product is being killed.
Schiller said in that 2017 meeting that the new Mac Pro was being designed “so that we can keep it fresh with regular improvements,” and Apple did quietly update the system a couple of times with fresh GPU options. But by the time the Mac Pro finally arrived in late 2019, Apple was just months away from introducing the first of the Apple Silicon Macs, and the writing had been on the wall for Intel Macs for a while.
Apple Silicon ended up being the final nail in the coffin for the concept of the Mac Pro. The chips’ unified memory architecture meant memory upgrades were impossible. Their integrated GPUs meant they didn’t support external graphics cards from AMD or Nvidia and couldn’t be upgraded over time.
What does matter in audio production is latency. Thunderbolt is a cable, when most PCIe slots are a handful of inches through one electrical trace away from the CPU. Thunderbolt does add processing delay compared to on-board slots directly.
No doubt a bunch of PCIe expansion chassis will appear to cater to the professionals that used the Mac Pro for its only remaining strength, its slots.
It will be very interesting to see how the workarounds will fare at solving problems for professionals that Apple were, until fairly recently, valuing highly enough to publicly apologize to.
One little thing that I came across is that Apple now no longer sells a Mac with expansion slots. While the argument could be made that the 2013-2019 “trash can” Mac Pro also put those slots on hiatus, it did feature upgradeable RAM and storage, as well as a modular card for Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Prior to that, the last time no Macs included expansion slots was before the introduction of the Macintosh II and my beloved Macintosh SE.
Apple decided to start caring about the Mac Pro again at the worst possible time. The Intel Mac Pro, while excellent, arrived just six months before the announcement that the Mac would transition to Apple silicon. After which, the Mac Pro didn’t offer any better performance than the Mac Studio. Just the card slots — which you couldn’t put a GPU in.
Due to Apple silicon’s all-in-one architecture, the Ultra-tier chip pushes the limits of what Apple can fabricate at a reasonable price. The bigger the chip is on the die, the lower the yield of good chips will be made, raising the cost further.
Apple reportedly experimented with making a higher-tier chip than the Ultra — often referred to as the “Extreme” chip, though the name is just speculation. It was canceled for being too expensive.
Had Apple stuck to the original timeline, and killed off the 2013 Mac Pro in favor of an iMac “specifically targeted at large segments of the pro market,” back in 2017, Apple could have avoided putting out the best Intel Mac ever, less than a year before the transition to Apple silicon.
Did Apple know in 2017 that 2020 was the year the M1 would make it out of the lab? Probably not, but it doesn’t make the timing any more painful.
[…]
The company yanked the pro market around for over a decade. The Mac Pro was old, then it was new! It did not support internal expansion, then it did! With every change of its mind, Apple lost more and more trust of would-be Mac Pro buyers.
Without GPU or RAM upgradability its days were numbered. MPX was supposed the be the ecosystem of the future but went nowhere.
I wish the Mac Studio was more upgradable. And I’ll miss buying Macs that don’t seem disposable. I’m already not sure how much RAM I should get in a Mac Studio. It’s a balance between being locked in to what you choose, and now treating the machine as something you’re not going to keep long term.
Key pre-trash Mac Pro features for me:
- Hard drive bays
- Expandable RAM
- Lots of ports, including audio
- Under the desk
- Affordable! Starting at $2500
Mac Studio is affordable, but it lacks the other features. (Its ports are fewer in number and kind.)
I’m pretty sad about the death of the Mac Pro. I owned a 2009 Mac Pro and it lasted a decade (upgraded everything). I stopped using it only because it got damaged. I didn’t get another because in early 2019, I couldn’t.
Between 2012 and 2017, every Mac Apple released was just “not for me” (a lifelong Mac user). This was right in the middle of macOS being neglected in favor of iOS and hardware felt it too.
If it wasn’t going to be great then I think it’s the right thing to retire it. One day maybe it’ll ride again.
To better days…
Let’s all come together as a community and help @siracusa through this difficult time.
RIP to a real one, but it’s time for us all to move on.
RIP Mac Pro
Previously:
Update (2026-03-31): Sherief Farouk:
[Integrated GPUs not being able to support external graphics cards] is patently false and I say that as a Mac GPU driver developer who worked on Mac Pro driver support till it was EOL - the lack of support is an OS choice, ARM devices with integrated GPUs support PCIe GPUs just fine, Apple just chose to actively block that path.
I’d make an educated guess that TB latency vs PCIe for audio doesn’t matter
[…]
looks like there are cold hard numbers out there about Thunderbolt latency on Mac[…]
Early in its run, the Mac Pro was the choice of people like me who considered themselves professionals because they needed a bit more processing power, additional RAM to avoid swapping, faster (and less cluttered) internal storage, and support for multiple displays. I bought an early 2009 “cheese grater” Mac Pro for those reasons, paying $2279.
I was nervous about splashing out on the iMac Pro, because we were promised that something big was coming soon. But the polished-stainless-steel Mac that Apple introduced in 2019 was…clearly not for me. Instead, it was aimed squarely at movie and music production environments: with multi-GPU upgrade options for 3D work, video codec accelerators, PCIe slots for wacky audio gear.
[…]
For me, the death of the Mac Pro as a viable development system started around 2013. It wasn’t about upgrades or GPUs. It was simpler than that: I felt like one of very few suckers who bought my specific configuration, and nobody at Apple actually used a similar machine. For example, my 2013 Mac Pro had AMD FirePro D700 GPUs (a rare configuration) that often had issues with graphics corruption. Later, my iMac Pro—with its 18 cores—gave me all sorts of trouble in Xcode, often compiling Capo more slowly than my 2013 Mac Pro could. Adding insult to injury, these machines were not cheap! I tried to “throw money at the problem (of making big computations go faster)”, but I actually just bought headaches.
In retrospect, it’s kinda funny how much goodwill the 2017 Mac Roundtable generated when the two products that came out of it, iMac Pro and Mac Pro, were essentially abandoned after just one generation.
The 2023 Apple Silicon Mac Pro is existing evidence that today’s Apple does not understand an important segment of their audience. It’s a machine that looks like the result of someone at Apple asking ChatGPT how to make a new Mac Pro. “But look, it’s still expandable!”, they point at proprietary slots, while the motherboard sports an SoC with integrated CPU, GPU, and storage.
The actual last Mac Pro was the 2019 Intel model — the Apple Silicon Mac Pro was just a $4,000 chassis upsell with empty space for a hamster
There is no meaningful difference in the state of play between today and June 2023, when the M2 Ultra Mac Pro was released. Even on release, it was considered extraneous given Apple also offered the Mac Studio with the exact same chip, in a significantly smaller case and at a lower price point.
[…]
Nevertheless, I believe Apple had more ambitious ideas for the Mac Pro in the Apple Silicon era, but this work failed to pan out as they hoped. This is signposted by the fact that during the launch event for the Mac Studio in March 2022, presenter John Ternus went out of his way to tease that an update for the Mac Pro was still forthcoming. It is uncharacteristic of them to talk about anything regarding future products, but they did it here because they wanted to front-run the notion that the Mac Pro had been usurped, and that Apple’s highest-end customers should keep waiting to see what cool things they would do.
I think the intent was for Apple to launch a workstation M-series chip, something that could only be housed in the thermal envelope of the Mac Pro chassis. There were rumours at the time of a quad-Max chip, perhaps called the M2 Extreme. That never came to pass.
See also: The Talk Show and MacRumors Forums.
Update (2026-04-13): Mike Rockwell:
Imagine an alternate reality where the Mac Pro became a system optimized for large amounts of internal storage. You could pop it open and there were six 3.5-inch SATA drive slots and a few M.2 NVMe slots as well.
[…]
There’s a lot of ways that Apple could have made the Mac Pro a unique and interesting computer in their lineup that truly had a reason to exist. But instead, they chose to make it a Mac Studio in an overpriced chassis that no longer served a purpose.
Allen Gainsford first reported the issue, noting that many of his BBEdit AppleScripts no longer worked after upgrading to macOS 26.4. Attempting to run them produced macOS error code -1758 (
errOSADataFormatObsolete)[…]Further investigation by Dafuki revealed a nuanced situation. In his testing, many AppleScripts—even some dating back to 2006—continued to run without issues when triggered from apps like BBEdit and Keyboard Maestro. However, others wouldn’t open, and after failing to open one script, Script Editor would then refuse to open any subsequent scripts until it was quit and relaunched.
He found that the issue appears to involve older compiled scripts that rely on legacy storage formats—hence the “data format is obsolete” errors. Allen Gainsford even found that one affected script had a 0-byte data fork and a 26 KB resource fork, indicating that the actual script was stored in the resource fork—a legacy structure macOS supports only for backward compatibility.
Although Script Editor’s 2.11 version number didn’t change from macOS 26.3.1 to macOS 26.4, Apple did increment its build number from 233 to 234, indicating that it received some changes.
A workaround is to use the retired Script Debugger. I wonder whether osacompile could also update the script’s format.
Previously:
Apple is “exploring” the idea of showing search ads in the Apple Maps app, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.
[…]
Ads in the Apple Maps app would not be the traditional banner ads that you see on websites, but rather paid search results. For example, a fast food chain could pay Apple to appear near the top of the results when a user searches for “burgers” or “fries.” Many similar apps already offer search ads, including Google Maps, Waze, and Yelp.
If a company has maxed out what they can earn through hardware and software quality then other screws need to be tightened.
[…]
I think this is important to consider as a third-party developer.
It used to be that hardware sales driven by the software platform were Apple’s best path to growth. Writing software for that platform added value to that platform: third-party developers were contributing to the flywheel.
Now, service revenue is the best path to growth. Writing software for the platform does not contribute to service revenue and can’t move the needle on selling more hardware. It is a maintenance-level concern.
Apple has officially announced that ads are coming to the Apple Maps app on the iPhone and iPad in the U.S. and Canada starting “this summer.”
Apple says businesses in the U.S. and Canada only will be able to place ads in search results and at the top of a new “Suggested Places” section in the app.
[…]
Similar to the ads that are already shown in App Store search results on the iPhone and iPad, ads in Apple Maps will have an “Ad” label, and Apple promises strong privacy protections. For example, Apple says a user’s location and the ads they see and interact with in Apple Maps are not associated with a user’s Apple Account.
The way they are “clearly marked” is with a light blue background and a small “Ad” badge, though it is worth noting Apple has been testing an even less obvious demarcation for App Store ads. In the case of the App Store, I have found the advertising blitz junks up search results more than it helps me find things I am interested in.
This is surely not something users are asking for. I would settle for a more reliable search engine, one that prioritizes results immediately near me instead of finding places in cities often hundreds of kilometres away.
Is it me or does iPhone’s iOS Maps app not show the details when using its offline map like in Bozeman, MT, USA? Like searching for its airport, restaurants, stores, etc. This is in an old iPhone 11 Pro Max’s iOS v17.6.1. I tested with airplane on to disable both cell and wifi to test out the newly downloaded offline 1 GB map area.
I’ve found that it works much worse than Google Maps when offline. It won’t find directions, and even maps that I’d preloaded don’t always display.
I could continue, and certainly for other location types beyond restaurants, but I believe I’ve made my point: every new Apple Maps partner merely adds another incomplete layer of data. The underlying problems persist because Apple relies on these external sources rather than genuinely investing in its own internal ratings, reviews, or photo capabilities. As such, their data remains largely unhelpful.
The Michelin Guide, The Infatuation, or any “expert” source will never cover every restaurant in every city. As for user reviews, OpenTable users are limited by its business model, and both Yelp and TripAdvisor offer more features and consistency in their own apps than Apple provides in Maps.
Google Maps, however, offers a one-stop shop for ratings, reviews, menus, reservations, and even real-time busyness data, all directly comparable to surrounding places and usable worldwide.
Ingrid Burrington (via Nick Heer):
Google Maps probably isn’t profitable. At best, I would believe it’s been marginally profitable in recent years.
[…]
There’s an oft-cited 2019 research note from a Morgan Stanley analyst that estimated that Maps revenue would be around $2.95 billion in 2019, and could reach $4.63 billion and $11 billion in 2023 based on new advertising programs for Maps that the company planned to grow out. I haven’t found the original research note anywhere online, just coverage of it. These estimates have been passed around enough online that today SEO-hungry slop blogs confidently state that in 2023 Maps made $11 billion.
“Some older software versions will no longer support Apple Services like the App Store, Siri, and Maps,” said Apple, in a support document published last month. “Update your software to the latest available version to continue using these services.”
I just did another round of “what’s making my Zoom calls stutter every 60s” and this time the culprit was… APPLE #!*$ING MAPS. That’s right, Macs now come preloaded with software to ruin wifi latency :(
You can fix by revoking Maps’ location access in Preferences[…]
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): John Gruber:
I can’t help but suspect that they’re going to make the experience worse, and the question is really just how much worse. The addition of ads to the App Store has made the experience worse.
[…]
I also do not begrudge Apple for wanting to monetize Maps. But if the addition of ads does make the Apple Maps experience worse, why won’t Apple let us buy our way out of seeing them? Netflix doesn’t force us to watch their ads. YouTube Premium is arguably the best bang-for-the-buck in the entire world of content subscriptions. Why should Apple One subscribers still see these ads in Apple Maps?
I know that it’s not the same team doing all of these things, so that doesn’t mean that the ad team in Apple Maps is going to compromise the experience exactly like the team in iMessage, and the team in Wallet. It’s precisely because these garbage experiences are distributed across teams that makes me think it’s impossible to ever have a good experience when Apple’s financial interest is ahead of my own.
Apple today announced Apple Business, a new all-in-one platform that unifies device management, productivity tools, and customer outreach features.
The service is designed to be a consolidated replacement for several of Apple's existing business-focused offerings, including Apple Business Essentials, Apple Business Manager, and Apple Business Connect. It provides organizations with a single interface to manage devices, employees, communications, and customer engagement across Apple's ecosystem.
[…]
The platform introduces Managed Apple Accounts with what Apple describes as "cryptographic separation" between personal and work data, allowing employees to use the same device for both purposes without commingling information.
The older services will be discontinued with their data migrated into Apple Business.
It’ll take some time to digest these changes, but it seems like this is a simplification of Apple’s business offering, and making MDM free will be a win for smaller organizations. Unfortunately, Apple’s still only offering 5GB of free iCloud data on managed accounts, and it’s hard to think that any business should rely on Apple’s notoriously unreliable email platform.
Previously:
OpenAI today said that it is ending support for its Sora AI video app just six months after it initially launched.
The announcement comes days after leaked news of an OpenAI all-hands meeting in which company executives reportedly said they were refocusing on business and productivity applications rather than being “distracted by side quests,” as OpenAI head of applications Fidji Simo reportedly put it.
Disney has now ended its partnership with OpenAI, which included plans for the media conglomerate to take a $1 billion stake in the artificial-intelligence company led by CEO Sam Altman.
Sora was kind of fun for a week or two. But, contrary to the above, nothing anyone made with Sora mattered. It was just a very (very) expensive lark.
It will be interesting if they release details, but my immediate assumption was that it was very expensive to run and not very strategic for them.
Guess what? That was written almost exactly six months ago.
It is because it is expensive without any clear reason for it to exist other than because OpenAI wants to be everywhere.
[…]
In a tweet, OpenAI has confirmed it is shutting down Sora. But, while it originally announced “We’re saying goodbye to Sora”, it changed that about an hour later to read “We’re saying goodbye to the Sora app“, emphasis mine. The Journal has not changed its report to retract claims about shutting down the platform altogether, though, while OpenAI continues to promote Sora API pricing.
As it turns out, much like the Studio Ghibli situation before it, it was a mere viral moment in time. OpenAI is great at creating these, but they’re fleeting.
[…]
But what’s really wild is shafting Disney in the process. I mean, they’re without question the most important entertainment and content company in the world. And OpenAI seemingly did them dirty. The fact that Disney is no longer looking to do the major investment which sure seemed like a good idea to them – checks notes – just three months ago, seems to say a lot.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Hayden Field:
Sora seems to have taken up a massive amount of compute without the financial return to justify it. Industry sources told The Verge that it’s been lagging behind competing video-generation models.
[…]
Sora started off strong in October with about 4.8 million worldwide downloads and 6.1 million in November, followed by a sharp drop-off in December (3.2 million) and in the following months: 2.1 million in January, 1.4 million in February, and just 1.1 million month-to-date for March.
“What’s most notable about it is dropping off while they’re expanding into new markets — that should be driving growth,” Shah said, adding, “You should’ve seen an uptick in that. Even if nobody else in the US downloaded it again, there should be some growth, presumably.”
Xcode 26.4 includes Swift 6.3 and SDKs for iOS 26.4, iPadOS 26.4, tvOS 26.4, macOS 26.4, and visionOS 26.4. Xcode 26.4 supports on-device debugging in iOS 15 and later, tvOS 15 and later, watchOS 8 and later, and visionOS. Xcode 26.4 requires a Mac running macOS Tahoe 26.2 or later.
There are lots of improvements for C++. With no more support for Sequoia, I won’t be updating for a while.
New Run Comparison feature allows to compare call trees with other runs using View → Detail Area → Compare With… or the ⇆ button in the jump bar. After selecting which run you want to compare with, the comparison view allows you to view which functions took more or less time between the runs. Call tree filtering operations like “Charge to callers” allow you to focus in on the functions that are faster or slower.
Top Functions is a new, top-level mode of a Call Tree view allowing to quickly identify the most expensive functions in the trace, no matter where they’re called from. To access Top Functions, select rightmost button in the Call Tree navigation bar.
[…]
Swift Testing adds support for specifying a Severity when recording an Issue.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Christian Beer:
So Xcode 26.4 only runs on Tahoe 26.2 or newer… our CI macMini needs to run Xcode 16.2 for older apps but Xcode 16.2 does NOT run on Tahoe!!!
This all sucks so much!!111
After updating to Xcode 26.4, paste from Mac to iOS Simulator is completely broken.
[…]
Write directly to the Simulator’s pasteboard with
simctl:echo -n "your text here" | xcrun simctl pbcopy bootedThis bypasses the broken Mac-to-Simulator auto-sync. Once run, paste works normally inside the Simulator. You still need another
Cmd+Vto paste into simulator.
Update (2026-04-03): Jeff Johnson:
Before and after, Xcode Settings in versions 16 and 26
The damn thing doesn’t even fit on my screen anymore!
Juli Clover (release notes, security, enterprise, developer, full installer, IPSW):
macOS Tahoe 26.4 returns the compact tab bar option to Safari for those who prefer the slimmed down look, along with a new Charge Limit feature for the Mac so you can set a maximum charge level from 80 to 100 percent. It also adds new eight emoji characters, and it displays warnings for apps that will stop working in the future. Apple is ending support for Rosetta 2 after macOS 27, so app that are still using Rosetta will display a popup letting users know that the app won't work starting with macOS 28.
macOS 26.4 also includes Apple Creator Studio for the Freeform app and it has the same Family Sharing change as iOS 26.4.
They fixed so many things, my appreciation for the developers has been restored. I am so happy that compact tabs, many bugs that I was experiencing have been fixed, the battery limit is nice and I uninstalled aldente but i am wondering if i will need something for temperature limits because I use it in the Summer mostly. Did you notice any other fix or added feature that has not been posted yet? Also the shadow in the mission control thing has been removed thank god.
See also Mr. Macintosh and Howard Oakley.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): Tim Hardwick:
As described in an updated Apple support document, a “Slow Charger” label now appears in orange text in the battery status menu and above the Battery Level graph in Battery settings. The indicator is accompanied by an info button for more details.
After I posted this item back in October about the new MacBook Pros not shipping with chargers anywhere in Europe (not just the EU, even though it’s an EU law that requires products to be available without included chargers), a bunch of readers regaled me with tales of a family member complaining about their MacBook losing battery life even while plugged in, only to discover that they were using wimpy 5- or 10-watt USB-C adapters.
macOS Tahoe 26.4 introduces a new security feature that warns Mac users if they paste certain commands in the Terminal app that may be harmful.
It would be helpful if the dialog actually showed what is being pasted, so that the user could decide whether they want to “Paste Anyway”…
What kind of a Mac alert title is “Possible malware, Paste blocked”? A comma splice with incorrect capitalization?
Apple has to resort to malware tactics to try to trick you into upgrading to Tahoe. This is user hostile. Shameful behavior.
Did @Apple forget to update the public Endpoint Security header files in macOS 26.4?
New ES events still marked:
ES_EVENT_TYPE_RESERVED_*😢😤
This new message may not be desirable to display in all Mac environments, so Apple has provided management options to prevent this message from being shown. For more details, please see below the jump.
The relevant preference domain and key values are below:
- Preference domain: com.apple.applicationaccess
- Key: allowRosettaUsageAwareness
- Value: Boolean
In macOS 26.4 Apple has added user confirmation prompts to all file type/UTI default app changes.
Update (2026-03-30): George Black:
Tahoe 26.4 fixes the Liquid Mud issue in the Settings search bar!
macOS 26.4 seems to remount unmounted drives when unlocking the screen. Apple keeps finding new ways to make me dread every update and its bizarre bugs.
The macOS 26.4 update for Apple silicon Macs was large, and the work required to verify its contents and complete its preparation was incorrectly reported in both percent completion and time remaining. Even in smaller updates, some form of progress needs to be shown in the progress bar during these later stages of preparation, or users may be mislead into thinking the update has frozen or failed, and could for example restart their Mac to try updating again.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-31): Rajesh Pandey:
macOS Tahoe 26.4 brings several new features to Macs. But it also breaks one critical functionality: Time Machine backups.
The bug appears to affect backups over network drives and NAS (network-attached storage), causing them to fail with a credential error.
I wonder why I’m able to force quit apps that aren’t even running 🤔 🤣
Update (2026-04-16): Rosyna Keller:
I’m getting false positive warnings on Apple Silicon apps not being supported on future versions of macOS. But this app, SQLPro for SQLite, is a fat app. The only thing it has is an x64 subprocess for a Legacy Color Picker extension, which is automatic launch by AppKit and is entirely Apple’s code!
macOS 15.7.5 (security, full installer):
This update provides important security fixes and is recommended for all users.
macOS 14.8.5 (security, full installer):
This update provides important security fixes and is recommended for all users.
See also Howard Oakley.
Previously:
Juli Clover (iOS/iPadOS release notes, security, enterprise, developer):
iOS 26.4 adds a new Apple Music feature called Playlist Playground, which uses AI to generate playlists for you based on text-based prompts. You can ask for moods, feelings, occasions, and more when making a request.
iOS 26.4 was released today, and it includes a couple of new features for CarPlay: an Ambient Music widget and support for voice-based chatbot apps.
Apple Music gets several updates in iOS 26.4, including a new fullscreen design for albums and playlists.
The iOS 26.4 attempt is a much nicer interpretation of this idea. First and foremost, it doesn’t try too hard; the foreground text colour is only ever white or black. The background is colour-matched, which injects a splash of personality and helps make the full-bleed album art blend more seamlessly with the rest of the UI. The Liquid Glass toolbars and tab bars also neatly blend in with their colourful surroundings. The design is impactful, yet refined.
iOS 26.4 expands customization tools with two settings:
- Reduce Bright Effects, which is brand new in iOS 26.4
- Reduce Motion, which has been updated in iOS 26.4
In my testing, this does exactly what you would expect. In places like toolbar buttons — or the buttons in the area of what is left of a toolbar, anyhow — the passcode entry screen, and Control Centre, the glowing tap effects are minimized or removed.
Apple has made a small but useful change to the way that Family Sharing works. Each adult member of the family can now use their own payment method for purchases, rather than being forced to share a payment method.
Apple has removed the RCS end-to-end encryption beta in the fourth beta of iOS 26.4 after testing it in the prior three betas. Apple already said that end-to-end encryption for RCS would not launch in the iOS 26.4 update, and would instead be introduced in the future.
The iOS 26.4 update […] includes improvements for the built-in iOS keyboard. In its notes for the software, Apple says iOS 26.4 offers “improved keyboard accuracy when typing quickly.”
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): Juli Clover:
The update doesn’t have the Siri feature set we were hoping for, but there are quite a few new additions like new emoji and an AI music feature.
If you use the Compact Tab Bar in Safari, then attempting to open a Safari extension popup window will crash the entire Safari app.
[…]
I personally reported this bug to Apple a month ago, on February 24: FB22044349 “iPadOS 26.4 beta: opening a Safari extension popup window crashes Safari.”
The UK is believed to be the first European market where Apple is rolling out its new age controls, which are designed to ensure that only adults can download apps rated on its App Store as being suitable for over-18s.
Following an iOS software update that was pushed out on Wednesday, adults who do not verify their age will face restrictions on web browsing, as well as “communication safety” checks to their messages and FaceTime video calls, which are designed to detect nude photos and videos.
Previously:
Update (2026-04-08): Sarah Reichelt:
I’m not loving iPadOS 26.4.
It keeps warning me that I’m running out of space but more than half is taken up with iPadOS and System Data. Plus, every app is asking for a rating at least once a day. Not the devs fault - the system is supposed to limit these.
Previously:
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer):
The update makes it quicker to start a workout in the Workout app by tapping on a Workout type icon, plus it has eight new emoji characters that include orca, trombone, treasure chest, fight cloud, hairy creature, landslide, ballet dancer, and distorted face.
Previously:
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer):
Apple added a new Genius Browse section to the Apple TV app in tvOS 26.4. Genius Browse is a content discovery feature that provides recommendations for TV shows and movies across multiple suggested categories. Suggestions vary based on content preferences, and the options are updated regularly.
[…]
tvOS 26.4 also adds more easily accessible customization options for subtitles, and it improves Apple TV Audio Format settings with an option for Continuous Audio Connection for HDMI output.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Joe Rossignol:
Below, we have recapped what is new in tvOS 26.4.
Juli Clover (no release notes, security, enterprise, developer):
visionOS 26.4 includes bug fixes and security improvements, along with improved Spatial Audio and eight new emoji characters. New additions include distorted face, fight cloud, landslide, ballet dancer, treasure chest, trombone, orca, and hairy creature.
Previously:
According to Apple’s release notes, HomePod Software 26.4 includes performance and stability improvements.
Previously:
The search for the strangest Adobe setting continues in Lightroom, where the first option in the Interface section is… end marks[…]
Presently, only one option is there… …but at least back in 2012 there were many more.
What does it do? It adds an old-time’y glyph at the end of either left or right panel.
This is the very first interface setting shown in the preferences window. I guess the idea is that you might want a way to know you’re at the bottom of the list of panels. But the weird thing is that Lightroom does show scroll bars for the panels, even when System Settings is set to hide them, so I can already tell whether I’m at the bottom by looking at the scroll thumb.
These Panel End Marks are simply png files stored in the Panel End Marks settings folder and you can easily create your own in Photoshop.
I love his idea of repurposing them to “serve as a reminder of star ratings, colour labels and even keyboard shortcuts for flags.” I wish more apps had places to attach user comments, either to model objects or to bits of UI.
Previously:
Thanks to the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), Garmin watches in the EU can now sync steps, sleep, and heart rate data automatically, even when the Garmin Connect app is closed. This removes a long-standing limitation that previously favoured the Apple Watch.
For years, Garmin users on iPhone had to manually open the Garmin Connect app just to sync their data.
The changes Apple has made affect how Bluetooth and background data transfer work. It’s part of a broader push to level the playing field between Apple’s own devices and everything else. That includes watches, fitness trackers and other health gear. Apple is required to give developers access to the same communication tools its own apps use. Garmin seems to be making use of those.
There are still limits to what happens in the background, especially on iOS where battery management remains strict.
See also: Accidental Tech Podcast.
Previously:
Apple replaced Launchpad with a new “Apps” view — a hybrid of Spotlight search and a scrolling list of your installed applications. You can access it from the Dock or via keyboard shortcut, but it behaves very differently from the old grid.
[…]
AppGrid is a grid-based app launcher built specifically for macOS Tahoe. It’s the fastest way to restore the Launchpad experience[…]
I was never a Launchpad guy, but I know some people really miss it. He says that the app got a lot of traction, but then:
About three months in, Apple blocked all further updates. The reason: too similar to Launchpad — the feature they had just removed from the OS. I appealed several times, got nowhere, and eventually gave up.
The weirdest part is that they didn’t pull the app, but forced it into a zombie state. It’s still on the App Store right now, still selling, and Apple is still collecting 30% on every sale. They just won’t let me ship updates. I can’t fix bugs, can’t respond to competitors, can’t add the features users are asking for. It’s frozen in place, generating revenue for both of us, without any way to improve the product further.
So I’ve been building direct distribution outside the App Store at appgridmac.com. The unsandboxed version can do things the App Store build never could — hot corner activation, for instance, which is the single most requested feature from former Launchpad users but is blocked in the sandboxed version.
[…]
Apple told me they would accept updates if I made the app look different enough from Launchpad. But by then thousands have paid for it already, and they paid exactly for it being as similar to Launchpad as possible, so I decided not to go down that route[…]
Apple does allow other apps such as LaunchMe to have modes that look like Launchpad:
Simply download and install the app to begin customizing your app launcher to bring back Launchpad experience.
[…]
When you first open LaunchMe, you’ll need to change one setting to get “Classic View” like Launchpad had before the macOS 26 Tahoe update.
The guidelines prohibit apps that are “confusingly similar to an existing Apple product, interface” (5.2.5), but of course Launchpad no longer exists. These weird App Store situations—inconsistent application of rules, approved but can’t update—are in a way the most frustrating.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): Gui Rambo:
This is why I don’t ship my Mac apps in the App Store anymore
Apple once rejected my app after a bug fix was submitted because at the time Apple was internally planning a similar feature to my existing app.
See also: Marcus Mendes.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Attila Miklosi:
I wrote about the situation on the AppGrid site last week. Michael Tsai picked it up, then 9to5Mac, then Macworld. I wasn’t really expecting that. It was meant to be an explanation for existing users more than anything else.
The traffic spike was real: the site went from ~70 visitors/day to 1,655 on March 26th, with 349 download clicks that day.
What he’d do differently:
I’d have launched direct from day one alongside the App Store version. The sandbox limitations weren’t theoretical. Hot corners and pinch gestures were on the roadmap before I even submitted. I knew they wouldn’t be possible in the sandboxed version. I submitted anyway because the App Store felt like the safe, legitimate path. It was, until it wasn’t.
The review process isn’t the problem per se. The problem is there’s no real appeals path when enforcement goes sideways.
If you read the comments on my articles or browse the iOS subreddits, there is a vocal contingent of developers betting that Apple is going to roll back Liquid Glass. […] I shared this exact sentiment with the Apple team.
Their reaction? Genuine shock. They were actually concerned that developers were holding onto this position. They made it emphatically clear that Liquid Glass is absolutely moving forward, evolving, and expanding across the ecosystem.
Their exact warning to me was that those who don’t adopt it now “are gonna find themselves in a tough position later.”
[…]
We had them confirm the hard truth: Xcode 27 will absolutely not have the deferral flag, and it will not respect it if you leave it there, anyway. When Q1 2027 rolls around and Xcode 27 becomes the mandatory minimum for compiling to the App Store, glass will be enabled globally, period.
What’s truly astonishing about the macOS Tahoe UI is that it’s now been SIX MONTHS since Tahoe was released to the public, yet it’s still full of glaring bugs. […] So many little things are off, out of alignment. It’s like Apple rushed out an alpha version.
The Apple engineers explained that a massive part of the initial Liquid Glass rollout was simply ensuring the foundation was solid. It had to be functional, it had to meet incredibly strict styling guidelines across every single Apple platform, and most importantly, it just had to work.
[…]
The team was visibly enthusiastic about what is in store for WWDC26 and Xcode 27. While they wouldn’t drop any specific spoilers, they gave the very strong impression that this upcoming cycle is where Liquid Glass takes its first massive step into maturity.
This is the Safari search field on Tahoe. Notice the position of the clear button.
Perfect MacOS 26 Tahoe screenshot from the Journal app. Apple shipped this.
Liquid Glass is a catastrophe.
I have SO many examples of this. Text fields that are cut off, text color choices that render text completely unreadable. In this regard, Apple design has lost the thread.
Leon:
the thing about modern Apple UI is they go for some deeply flawed vision that seems developed in a vacuum away from third parties, accessibility experts and engineers, and then when that fails they water it all the way down until people say “huh okay this isn’t that bad any more”
it just lurches from catastrophe to milquetoast and back again, with most of the time firmly in milquetoast territory
what i’d love, love to see is them - or anyone - come up with is a system vision that bakes in accessibility and pro / studio app design first.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): CrabQueenInc:
Disheartening but not surprising. I feel so fortunate that I’m not in need of a new computer, but at least my options will be wide open when I get to vote with my wallet next time, as it were.
You need only live with Liquid Glass for a short while to see places that even the most glowing critic, who accepts at face value the intent behind the changes, would agree it completely drops the ball. Odd margins, nonsensical visual weight, hard to read text, constantly shifting dark-to-white-to-dark-again backgrounds, blurry messes. There is no part of Liquid Glass that “just works”, and Apple’s insistence on its excellence is what is so deeply concerning about the situation.
[…]
I guess hope springs eternal that the reason they don’t see the problem with it is that the second phase brings back some of the things that are so dearly missed, and that the people in charge of it has always seen it as part of the proposition.
[…]
The initial rollout would have to have been very rushed for this to not have been part of the first version, but a rushed rollout is exactly the kindest way to explain its current state.
It’s like they never used a mac before.
Regardless of whatever one thinks the visual qualities of Liquid Glass, the software quality problem is notable there, too. We are now on the OS 26.4 set of releases and I am still running into plenty of instances with bizarre and distracting compositing problems. On my iPhone, the gradients that are supposed to help with legibility in the status bar and toolbar appear, disappear, and change colour with seemingly little relevance to what is underneath them. Notification Centre remains illegible until it is fully pulled down.
Update (2026-03-30): See also: Steve Troughton-Smith.
I learned how to downgrade specifically to disinfect my computer and avoid this particular fungus.
I get that design evolves and changes and things can move around. I understand that it will not look the same forever. I have a hard time accepting that UI elements being completely unreadable and making basic things harder to access is considered “progress” and I’m supposed to be happy about it.
I thought my vision was going bad. But no, it's just the fuzzy Liquid Glass app icons on iOS and macOS that give me the illusion of poor eyesight.
We’ve had zero customers request to adopt Liquid Glass for any of our Mac apps. That alone says a lot.
Can’t think of a single user asking about it in my apps either.
For everyone trying to defend #LiquidGlass here is some historical evidence. First, you should be following this account for examples of interface design from back in the day. Second, look how ornate all those borders are. Much green, so purple, WOW (etc). And yet I can read the window title and the button labels and everything else.
This table summarises read and write performance of the most popular types of disk image prior to macOS Tahoe, and demonstrates how sparse bundles have consistently performed best and most consistently, and sparse images (now dropped from Disk Utility’s options) fare worst, particularly when encrypted.
Although most of the test results in macOS 26.3.1 are very similar to those from 26.0, performance when using 256-bit AES encryption has fallen for all three disk image types, and most significantly in write performance for RAW and ASIF images, which have reduced from 4.3 to 1.58 GB/s (RAW) and from 3.9 to 1.72 GB/s (ASIF). The magnitude of those reductions is sufficient to have obvious impact on their use. Compared to native write performance using FileVault of 7.66 GB/s, those two types of disk image are pedestrian in the extreme, turning that blisteringly fast SSD into the equivalent of 20 Gbps over USB 3.2 Gen 2×2.
[…]
When their folder-based structure is acceptable, UDSB sparse images remain the disk image type of choice, for their consistent high performance even when encrypted.
[…]
As [ASIF] sparseness isn’t dependent on APFS trimming habits, they are now an alternative that can be used on network storage and NAS. However, those able to use sparse bundles should continue to do so, particularly if using encryption.
Previously:
There may be other outstanding issues, but you can now:
- On a macOS 15 or later host, install macOS 15 or later in a VM.
- On the guest, log in using an Apple Account in System Settings.
- And install Xcode.
- And add your Apple Account to Xcode.
- And then build and run a Mac app.
- Even if it uses a restricted entitlement.
Via Craig Hockenberry:
It’s a momentous day for Mac developers: you can now provision a device running in a VM. Whether you use VirtualBuddy, UTM, or another app, Xcode can now build, run, and debug apps on multiple versions of macOS without having to reboot.
This includes apps that have entitlements for iCloud and other Apple services.
[…]
Essentially, we now have a setup like the iOS simulator where you can work on two versions of the OS simultaneously. That’s a huge boost for developer productivity!
[…]
One thing you cannot do in a VM: use your Apple ID to login to the Mac App Store. So no testing your shipping app version.
This also means you can’t run TestFlight builds, because you can’t download the app from the store.
Previously:
What’s in this beta:
Transcripts of most podcasts (swipe on the episode art during playback, it’s a new page past the info screen)
Live-scrolling of transcripts during playback
Tap to seek on any line of text
Music detection
All of this should work even with dynamic ad insertion… and even with private/membership podcasts!
And if you play an episode that isn’t transcribed yet, you can transcribe it right on your iPhone (if you’re running iOS 26+).
This is really impressive, and I think it will be transformative for podcast listening and triage. There’s a long discussion with more technical details in the latest Accidental Tech Podcast.
The way you can follow along as the audio plays, or jump to a place in the episode by tapping a paragraph in the transcript, is just so convenient. It made me seriously consider using Apple Podcasts. And of course, I immediately tested the Overcast implementation.
[…]
It’s the kind of feature that fits how I use podcasts. Like chapters, it supports choice. It lets you cut through the noise and get straight to the topics that interest you.
Previously:
Update (2026-04-10): Marco Arment (Mastodon):
The first update with transcripts is now in the App Store!
See also: Steven Aquino.
With its new limits on sideloading, Android phones will only install apps that come from verified developers. To verify, devs releasing apps outside of Google Play will have to provide identification, upload a copy of their signing keys, and pay a $25 fee. It all seems rather onerous for people who just want to make apps without Google’s intervention.
Apps that come from unverified developers won’t be installable on Android phones—unless you use the new advanced flow, which will be buried in the developer settings.
[…]
Google swears it’s not interested in the content of apps, and it won’t be checking proactively when developers register. This is only about identity verification—you should know when you’re installing an app that it’s not an imposter and does not come from known purveyors of malware.
[…]
So a rootkit can be malware, but a rootkit you downloaded intentionally because you want root access on your phone is not malware, from Samat’s perspective. Likewise, an alternative YouTube client that bypasses Google’s ads and feature limits isn’t causing the kind of harm that would lead to issues with verification. But these are just broad strokes; Google has not commented on any specific apps.
Adamya Sharma (via John Gruber):
When Google execs previously said sideloading would become a high-friction process on Android, they really weren’t kidding.
The company is finally sharing what Android’s new sideloading flow will look like in practice, and if you’re someone who installs apps outside the Play Store, you’re going to feel it immediately, and you’re going to feel it deeply.
[…]
It’s a deliberately slow and almost impossible-to-rush-through process that will allow advanced Android users to sideload apps from unverified developers, while giving them plenty of caution to keep them safe from malicious apps and bad actors.
[…]
Yes, really. There’s a mandatory one-time, one-day waiting period before you can proceed and sideload an app from an unverified developer. Google calls it a “protective waiting period.”
Horrific. Can we finally dispense with this notion that Apple’s App Store can be as restrictive as they want because if you don’t like that you can just buy an Android phone?
The part in the flow where you select between allowing app installs for 7 days or forever is a glimpse into the future. That toggle shows the thought process that’s going on at Google.
I can bet that a few versions down the line, the “Not recommended” option of allowing installs indefinitely will become so not recommended that they’ll remove it outright. Then shrink the 7 day window to 3 days or less. Or only give users one allowed attempt at installing an app, after which it’s another 24 hour waiting period for you. Then ask the user to verify themselves as a developer if they want to install whatever they want. Whatever helps them turn people away from alternatives and shrink the odds of someone dislodging their monopoly, they will do. Anything to drive people to Google Play only.
At this point I’m convinced that there’s something deeply wrong with how our society treats technology.
Ruining Android for everyone to try to maybe help some rather technologically-hopeless groups of people is the wrong solution. It’s unsustainable in the long run. Also, the last thing this world needs right now is even more centralization of power.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): Peter N Lewis:
Just so it’s clear, because it’s frequently not been clear in reporting I’ve seen, the 24 hour waiting period is after turning on the switch that allows sideloading. It is not before each individually sideloaded app.
And I can sort of see their reasoning on this, to defend naive users from being conned in to turning it on. For savvy users, you can just turn it on, wait a day and then get on with your life.
My security hot take for this week is that Google’s changes for sideloading on Android seem to strike a good balance between security and usability. This gives me hope the team is putting thought into maintaining the original dream of the platform rather than making a worse iOS.
Of course the jury is still out on how well this will work but the rationale seems pretty solid to me. Being tricked into installing blatant malware is, despite how you might feel about it, a major problem for Android. Historically efforts to combat this have badly hurt openness.
The general problem with security is identifying bad things is hard because often it will end up impacting desirable things too. In this case Google picks a very specific quality of scams and aims to target it specifically: urgency. I expect this to be very high signal!
Update (2026-03-30): Stephen Schenck (Hacker News):
Users will be able to opt out of further delays after that initial 24 hours.
Today Google clarifies that this status can carry over to new devices, so you only ever have to go through it once.
Apple has quietly blocked AI “vibe coding” apps, such as Replit and Vibecode, from releasing App Store updates unless they make changes, The Information reports.
[…]
Apple told The Information that certain vibe coding features breach long-standing App Store rules prohibiting apps from executing code that alters their own functionality or that of other apps.
[…]
An Apple spokesperson said the policy is not targeted specifically at vibe coding apps.
If the apps are in breach of longstanding rules, why is it the updates that are blocked? It seems like either Apple should have rejected the apps long ago or else they’re trying to retcon the new policy, which remains unclear to me.
Report sources say that the apps in question are close to being approved for the App Store again, but after agreeing to make changes to the way they function. These changes include updating previews of the vibe-coded apps, or removing functions like making apps specifically for Apple devices.
That sounds like removing the core functionality.
The report adds that there are other apps that exist in the App Store that didn’t get the same limitation, such as Vercel’s v0. Other apps that offer similar capabilities that aren’t coding-specific, such as design app Canva, could potentially be hit by the same issues, since they can be used to create filters, quizzes, and other items using AI.
For the most part, the report focuses on the issue being one of competition and revenue protection. Apple could lose revenue due to these vibe coding apps creating software that doesn't pass through the App Store itself.
Previously:
Update (2026-04-01): Juli Clover (Hacker News):
Apple has removed a “vibe coding” app from its App Store, reports The Information. AI app building app “Anything” was pulled from the App Store , and Anything co-founder Dhruv Amin was told that his app violated Guideline 2.5.2.
[…]
“Anything” launched on iOS back in November with no issue, and Amin says the tool has been used to publish thousands of apps in the App Store . The app let users create and preview vibe code apps on the iPhone, and it raised $11 million at a valuation of $100 million back in September.
While Anything was removed from the App Store on March 26, Apple has been blocking updates to the app since December. Amin submitted an update that would allow vibe coded apps to be previewed in a web browser instead of in the app to attempt to comply with the 2.5.2 rule, but Apple blocked the update and pulled the app.
This update adds support for macOS’s standard “Versions” document history, improves the Share Extension to support sending text to MarsEdit, and includes a number of bug fixes across the rich text and plain text editors.
I’m holding off on this update for the moment because I’m seeing a regression viewing and sorting by the Edited Date, but I love the idea of versions support. It works as you’d expect, with a Time Machine–style interface showing two MarsEdit windows, so I get the same font and syntax coloring that I’m used to. It would be nice if it went a bit further and supported synchronized scrolling or coloring for the differences, but it does allow selecting and copying text so I can easily use an external diff tool if necessary. I had been using WordPress’s revisions feature, which is nice in that it colors the differences, but it’s a bit of a pain to pull up, the two-column interface gets in the way of selecting text from only one side, and it only works for posts that have been published to the server.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Jack Wellborn:
I happen to be the one who reported that versions was broken in the first place and am delighted to see it better supported. I wish Apple did a better job surfacing and socializing automatic versioning because it feels magical and fits with a more modern paradigm that doesn’t require manual saving.
The date bug is fixed in MarsEdit 5.4.2.
Update (2026-04-08): Versions in MarsEdit are only available for drafts. Published posts do not store versions (even if you edit and republish) and do not have access to the versions of the draft from before publication.
I’m exploring macOS development, comparing Mac Catalyst apps vs native AppKit/SwiftUI apps.
- What are the main limitations of Catalyst today?
- In what scenarios is a native AppKit or SwiftUI app unavoidable?
Any insights are much appreciated — I’m trying to understand when Catalyst is sufficient and when going native is worth the extra effort.
Mac Catalyst seems dead to me. Five months since Tahoe’s official release and I still have crashes, ugly layouts and glitches that weren’t a problem pre-Liquid Glass.
I see no option other than build an entirely new SwiftUI-native Mac App.
[…]
I have a huge Foodnoms update that is almost ready, but I can’t ship it, because it would break syncing with the Mac app.
I could load up Sequoia and Xcode 16.4, but Apple is going to stop accepting binaries from 16.4 in April. And the UI compatibility plist option isn’t any better. It’s ugly AF.
Searching the forums, it seems like there a lot of new Catalyst bugs in Tahoe, but it does look like they are being fixed.
I shipped Liquid Glass in my Catalyst app and haven’t noticed any crashes or major issues. Most issues are SwiftUI regressions where I decided not to use UIKit 🥲
That pure SwiftUI on Mac idea scares me, too. So many weirdly different things. I think I’m sticking with sprinkling SwiftUI into AppKit where it’s useful to do so.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-20): Adam Bell:
Why are the toolbar icons smushed?
Why is the search bar the wrong colour?
Man, Catalyst has so many things busted on macOS 26 (even 26.2).
Toolbars just do not render correctly at all, even a simple SwiftUI app. Works fine in AppKit tho!
I can’t back that up at all, Catalyst for the most part has been rock solid for all my apps for years now; UIKit has Liquid Glass bugs across all platforms (that SwiftUI will inherit anyway), and AppKit has plenty of its own, but they are all dwindling with each point update.
I am on the Mac idiom on all my Catalyst apps though; Foodnoms is an iPad-idiom app (compatibility mode) so there may be dragons there I’m unaware of, since it uses a completely different behavioral style
I switched fully to using Catalyst for all my Mac projects and haven’t had any issues at all.
Mac native & UIKit, no compatibility mode or SwiftUI. I consider both too buggy as is, let alone combining them.
A lawsuit brought against Apple by music streaming app Musi has been dismissed by a federal judge, after she ruled that Apple’s developer agreement gives it the right to remove any app from the App Store at any time, “with or without cause.”
[…]
Musi claimed it complied with YouTube’s terms, but Apple pulled it from the App Store in September 2024, following pressure from Sony, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), and the National Music Publishers Association.
Musi subsequently sued Apple for pulling the app, alleging that its removal was based on unsubstantiated intellectual property claims from YouTube. The lawsuit went so far as to argue that Apple had violated its own Developer Program License Agreement (DPLA), and that Apple was required to conduct a review and form a “reasonable belief” that the app infringed IP rights before pulling it.
[…]
Judge Lee sanctioned law firm Winston & Strawn for alleging that Apple had “admitted” to knowingly relying on false evidence – a claim the judge found had no factual basis, even after Musi’s lawyers had spent two months reviewing Apple’s internal documents and deposing its employees.
Lee found that Apple can remove apps “with or without cause,” as stipulated in the developer agreement. Lee wrote:
The plain language of the DPLA governs because it is clear and explicit: Apple may “cease marketing, offering, and allowing download by end-users of the [Musi app] at any time, with or without cause, by providing notice of termination.” Based on this language, Apple had the right to cease offering the Musi app without cause if Apple provided notice to Musi. The complaint alleges, and Musi does not dispute, that Apple gave Musi the required notice. Therefore, Apple’s decision to remove the Musi app from the App Store did not breach the DPLA.
[…]
Musi alleged that Apple knowingly relied on a false claim from the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) that Musi violated YouTube terms through use of the YouTube API. “Apple knew that this ‘evidence’ was false, as it has since admitted,” Musi wrote.
Musi said it does not use the YouTube API and is therefore not subject to the API terms of service. It says Apple knew this because of an email from Sony Music Entertainment. The email said that Sony “worked with YouTube to remove API access from Musi, but the app finds ways to access [Sony’s] content through technological means that are more difficult for Google to action.”
Lee wrote that the Sony email “does not state that Musi stopped using YouTube’s API” and “does not establish that Apple ‘knew’ that the evidence offered by the NMPA was false. Instead, Musi infers Apple’s knowledge based on an assumption that the Sony email was inconsistent with the detailed evidence offered by the NMPA.”
I’m not happy with either party here. I’m kind of sympathetic to Musi, because you could look at this as them building a site-specific browser with an ad blocker, and I think that’s legal and should be allowed. If they’re not using the API, I don’t see what agreement they would have been violating, though I do think it crosses a line to replace a site’s ads with your own. But with respect to their agreement with Apple, I don’t think they have a leg to stand on because the DPLA clearly says that Apple can do whatever they want whenever they want without any valid reason. The real issues are whether that sort of contract should be legal and why Apple is even inserting itself into a dispute between YouTube and Musi, but those were not the questions before the judge.
Everyone is complaining about app review times, but it could be worse. Apple could be telling you “we are reviewing your app concept internally.” This is the story of how Apple tried to kill my startup 🩸💁 ♂️🔫
Previously:
One might presume that the dedicated indicator lights are significantly more secure than the rendered-on-display indicators. I myself made this presumption in the initial version of my MacBook Neo review last week. This presumption is, I believe, wrong.
Later last week Apple published, and I linked to, a small update in their Platform Security Guide, which states:
MacBook Neo combines system software and dedicated silicon elements within A18 Pro to provide additional security for the camera feed. The architecture is designed to prevent any untrusted software — even with root or kernel privileges in macOS — from engaging the camera without also visibly lighting the on-screen camera indicator light.
[The] software-based camera indicator light in the MacBook Neo runs in the secure exclave part of the chip, so it is almost as secure as the hardware indicator light. What that means in practice is that even a kernel-level exploit would not be able to turn on the camera without the light appearing on screen. It runs in a privileged environment separate from the kernel and blits the light directly onto the screen hardware.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-20): Saagar Jha:
The indicator light is still software and this still means it is susceptible to compromise as all software is, in a way that a hardwired indicator cannot be. Sophisticated exploits achieve privileges beyond the kernel’s all the time.
The solution they picked does make it non-trivial to bypass and it is a good choice if a hardwired indicator is not available. However it is still substantially less secure than having one, and Apple knows it.
Update (2026-03-30): Bruce Schneier:
It’s really well-designed, and important in a world where malware could surreptitiously start recording.
Random Augustine (2025, Hacker News, John Gruber):
The kernel shared in common between iOS, macOS, tvOS, visionOS and watchOS — named XNU — is based on a microkernel called Mach. However, the way XNU has been implemented places all system functions within the same privileged scope and it effectively operates as a monolithic kernel. The XNU kernel, like all monolithic kernels, suffers from unfortunately common vulnerability discoveries.
[…]
With the release of XNU source code supporting M4 and A18 based systems (such as the iPhone 16), the curtain was partly pulled back on exclaves. (Exclaves are not active on prior processors).
[…]
Exclaves refer to resources that are isolated from XNU, protected even if the kernel is compromised. These resources are pre-defined when the OS is built, are identified by name or id, have different types, are initialised at boot time, and are organized into unique domains. SPTM protects exclave memory from XNU with new exclave-specific page types.
[…]
To allow for execution of exclave Services while isolated from XNU, Apple has introduced a new kernel called the Secure Kernel (SK).
The term appears to have first surfaced in a libc file in Apple’s open source software collection in 2023, and subsequently within iOS 17, released in September of that year, as later noted by Howard Oakley on his Eclectic Light Co blog.
[…]
An enclave is defined as an area within a territorial boundary. So an exclave is an area outside of a boundary with ties to the main territory.
[…]
Essentially, Apple is trying to realize the security advantages of a microkernel without tossing the monolithic aspects of XNU.
Previously:
But where I think Amodei’s remarks, quoted above, are facile is that it hasn’t played out as simply that lines of code that would have been written by human programmers are now generated by AI models. That’s part of it, for sure. But what’s revolutionary — a topic I’ve been posting about twice already today — is that AI code generation tools are being used to create services and apps and libraries that simply would not have been written at all before. It may well be that the total number of lines of code that will be written by people today isn’t much different from the number of lines of code that were written by people a year ago. But there might be 10× more code generated by AI than is written by people today.
Before AI, both camps were doing the same thing every day. Writing code by hand. Using the same editors, the same languages, the same pull request workflows. The craft-lovers and the make-it-go people sat next to each other, shipped the same products, looked indistinguishable. The motivation behind the work was invisible because the process was identical.
Now there's a fork in the road. You can let the machine write the code and focus on directing what gets built, or you can insist on hand-crafting it. And suddenly the reason you got into this in the first place becomes visible, because the two camps are making different choices at that fork.
I wrote about this split before in terms of my college math and CS classes: some of us loved proofs and theorems for their own sake, some of us only clicked with the material when we could apply it to something.
[…]
Here's what I notice about my grief: none of it is about missing the act of writing code. It's about the world around the code changing. The ecosystem, the economy, the culture. I think that's a different kind of loss than what Randall and Lawson are describing. Theirs is about the craft itself. Mine is about the context and the reasons why we're doing any of this.
Orchard’s fine essay examines a philosophical divide within the ranks of talented, considerate craftsperson developers. The divide that I’m talking about has been present ever since the demand for programmers exploded, but AI code generation tooling is turning it into an expansive gulf. The best programmers are more clearly the best than ever before. The worst programmers have gone from laying a few turds a day to spewing veritable mountains of hot steaming stinky shit, while beaming with pride at their increased productivity.
There are additional groups. Some good programmers don’t use AI for coding. They’re against it for philosophical reasons, or it doesn’t apply well to their current project, or they haven’t taken the time or built the skills to really make it work for them. There are also hobbyists and people who know some programming, but are not really professional programmers, who are successfully using AI to help build tools for themselves.
Pssst… most software development was slop before AI.
Sure, your code was beautiful and artisanal and custom crafted to be beautiful, performant, and not at all created to be shipped in a fortnight between countless meetings with unclear goals and zero understanding of the bigger picture or user needs.
But those other folks…
I have so much gratitude to people who wrote extremely complex software character-by-character. It already feels difficult to remember how much effort it really took.
This is such a completely different reality from where I live, at this point it’s just difficult to say anything meaningful about it at all.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-26): Terence Eden (Hacker News):
Part of the crypto grift was telling people to “Have Fun Staying Poor”. That weaponisation of FOMO was an insidious way to get people to drop their scepticism.
I feel the same way about the current crop of AI tools. I’ve tried a bunch of them. Some are good. Most are a bit shit. Few are useful to me as they are now. I’m utterly content to wait until their hype has been realised. Why should I invest in learning the equivalent of WordStar for DOS when Google Docs is coming any-day-now?
If this tech is as amazing as you say it is, I’ll be able to pick it up and become productive on a timescale of my choosing not yours.
Apple has just released its first public Background Security Improvement (BSI) for macOS 26.3.1 Tahoe, labelled as BSI (a)-25D771280a.
Available for: iOS 26.3.1, iPadOS 26.3.1, macOS 26.3.1, macOS 26.3.2
Impact: Processing maliciously crafted web content may bypass Same Origin Policy
Description: A cross-origin issue in the Navigation API was addressed with improved input validation.
This update will NOT show up in Software update. It will only display in System Settings > BSI Updates.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-19): Juli Clover:
Background Security Improvements can be installed in the Privacy and Security section of the Settings app. Scroll down, and then select the Install option to install the update. If Automatically Install is toggled on, BSIs will be automatically installed when they come out.
In order to install the available Background Security Improvement, you have to enable automatic installation.
Automatically Install was enabled, but the update had not been performed. There was an “install” link, which we selected – it then took a long time to download and eventually forced a restart of the iPhone.
Going back to Settings > Privacy and Security > [scroll down pages] Background Security Improvements showed the updated version. Touching a tiny “i” icon pops up the option of removing these security patches
Apple says Background Security Improvements that update only Safari on the Mac will require just a Safari relaunch, not a full restart. However, this update does require a restart—and on the Mac, it doesn’t prompt you first as it does in iOS. It felt surprisingly abrupt after the relatively slow downloading phase.
If you know a BSI is available but Privacy & Security settings appear unable to find it, something I’ve encountered in Virtual Machines, try running SilentKnight. Although BSIs aren’t controlled in Software Update, they do still use the same
softwareupdatesystem used by SilentKnight. Normally you shouldn’t try to install BSIs using SilentKnight, as installation will fail. However, you can turn this to your advantage when a BSI is being elusive.[…]
Most telling, though, are the accounts of RSRs and BSIs given in Apple’s Platform Security Guide, which are almost word-for-word identical apart from their names. It seems most likely that a BSI is a rebranded RSR in a bid to move on from the loss of confidence in RSRs following unfortunate errors nearly three years ago.
Update (2026-03-26): Howard Oakley:
Now I’ve had a chance to give a fair account of the first public BSI, I can consider what’s wrong with their current implementation.
Update (2026-03-30): Khanh:
This post walks through how BSI updates work under the hood. More importantly, it shows what Apple actually shipped: one publicly disclosed WebKit CVE, and at least two additional security-relevant changes that didn’t make it into the advisory.
Apple’s Liquid Glass redesign of all of its operating systems from iPhone to Mac may have proven divisive, and it was certainly spearheaded by Alan Dye. But there is no possibility that it will be dropped, even as Bloomberg now reports that several designers left alongside Dye when he moved to Meta.
This new report from Mark Gurman’s “Power On” newsletter says that Apple whipped out Liquid Glass as a wild card to distract from its failings in Apple Intelligence. But then in the same breath, the report also says that Liquid Glass was many years in the making.
That’s certainly what it seemed like at the time of the announcement, that it had been in the works for a while but wasn’t mature enough yet (even if you liked the concept).
Mark Gurman said the latest internal versions of iOS 27 and macOS 27 do not have major Liquid Glass design changes. He also mentioned how Apple’s new software design chief, Steve Lemay, was “a driving force” behind Liquid Glass and was “deeply involved in its development.”
I think Steve Lemay is a good guy. I kind of fought with him when I was an engineer, he was a young, new designer (at Apple). But I always respected his point of view—even when we argued.
[…]
The bigger argument I remember with Steve revolved around the drawer UI element. With regard to PDF’s, (the half of Preview that I worked on, another engineer handled images), the drawer was to display thumbnails for each page. If the PDF had a TOC (table of contents) the drawer is where we would display that as well.
So when you opened a PDF in Preview, the PDF content of course would appear in the large window—thumbnails, TOC (later search) would be relegated to a vertical strip of drawer real estate alongside the window—the user could open/close the drawer if they liked to focus perhaps on the content.
Steve Lemay insisted the drawer live on the right side of the window. This was inexplicable to me. I saw the layout of Preview as hierarchical: the left side of the content driving the right side. You click a thumbnail on the left (in the drawer) the window content on the right changes to reflect the thumbnail clicked on.
iOS 26.1 lets you choose between “Clear” and “Tinted” options for Liquid Glass, with the “Tinted” look adding more opacity to user interface elements. And with iOS 27, which is expected to be released later this year, Apple might go even further.
iOS 26.2 introduced a slider that allows you to manually adjust the opacity of Liquid Glass, but only for the Lock Screen’s clock. Starting with iOS 27, Gurman said the setting might be expanded to the entire operating system.
There’s been a lot of talk recently about Liquid Glass on MacOS, and it being an abomination (epic rant from Nilay Patel there). OK, it’s not recent, but there’s still a lot of talk and Nilay’s rant got me thinking[…] What if there was an Apperance toggle that said something along the lines of “Use the pro look and feel”, and all apps got a variant of the Sequoia UI, but spiffed up a bit more? It’s Gizmo vs. Platinum all over again.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-19): Rosyna Keller:
It still gets me that Apple keeps adding more switches to disable some Liquid Glass feature on iOS to placate people when it just helps Ad SDKs fingerprint you more easily.
Professor Charles Anthony Richard Hoare has died at the age of 92. Known to many computer science students as C. A. R. Hoare, and to his friends as Tony, he was not only one of the greatest minds in the history of programming – he also came up with a number of the field’s pithiest quotes.
[…]
In 2024, FACS, the Newsletter of the Formal Aspects of Computing Science, dedicated its July issue [PDF] to a tribute to Hoare for his 90th birthday. We have also seen some very good and touching posts in his memory, including “Commemorating Tony Hoare, Inventor of QuickSort,” and “In Memoriam: Sir Antony Hoare (1934–2026)” by Dag Spicer at the Computer History Museum.
Hoare’s most significant work has been in the following areas: his sorting and selection algorithm (Quicksort and Quickselect), Hoare logic, the formal language communicating sequential processes (CSP) used to specify the interactions between concurrent processes (and implemented in various programming languages such as occam), structuring computer operating systems using the monitor concept, and the axiomatic specification of programming languages.
A story that I was determined to hear from the source was the legendary quicksort 'wager'. The story goes that Tony told his boss at Elliott Brothers Ltd that he knew a faster sorting algorithm than the one that he had just implemented for the company. He was told 'I bet you sixpence you don't!'. Lo and behold, quicksort WAS faster. I asked Tony to tell this story pretty much every time we met, because I enjoyed it so much and it always put a smile on both of our faces. To his credit, Tony never tired of telling me this story 'right from the top'. I had hoped to visit again in the past year and record him telling it so that there was a record, but unfortunately this did not happen. However, I discover that it is indeed recorded elsewhere. One detail I might be able to add is that I asked Tony if indeed the wager was paid out or if it had merely been a figure of speech. He confirmed that indeed he WAS paid the wager (!). A detail of this story that I find particularly reflective of Tony's humble personality is that he went ahead and implemented the slower algorithm he was asked to, while he believed quicksort to be faster, and before chiming in with this belief. It speaks to a professionalism that Tony always carried.
I often think of this passage from his Turing Award lecture:
I gave desperate warnings against the obscurity, the complexity, and overambition of the new design, but my warnings went unheeded. I conclude that there are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.
The first method is far more difficult. It demands the same skill, devotion, insight, and even inspiration as the discovery of the simple physical laws which underlie the complex phenomena of nature. It also requires a willingness to accept objectives which are limited by physical, logical, and technological constraints, and to accept a compromise when conflicting objectives cannot be met. No committee will ever do this until it is too late.
He is, of course, also known for calling null references a billion-dollar mistake
Previously:
Apple (Hacker News, Reddit, MacRumors):
Apple today announced AirPods Max 2, bringing even better Active Noise Cancellation (ANC), elevated sound quality, and intelligent features to the iconic over-ear design. Powered by H2, features like Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, Voice Isolation, and Live Translation come to AirPods Max for the first time. The new AirPods Max also unlock creative possibilities for podcasters, musicians, and content creators, with useful features like studio-quality audio recording and camera remote.
[…]
Siri Interactions allow users to conveniently and privately respond to Siri announcements by simply nodding their head yes or gently shaking their head no.
For day-to-day use, I prefer AirPods Pro. They’re just so small and convenient. For louder environments and longer sessions, I’ve been using some Bose QuietComfort headphones, which I got on sale for less than half the price of the AirPods Max. I find them more comfortable (perhaps because of the lower weight) and like that the ANC is adjustable. They also have a built-in headphone jack and a power button.
Most notably, the overall industrial design is identical.
[…]
The knit mesh canopy is also the same despite criticism over time that the fabric can stretch or lose tension with prolonged use.
[…]
The Smart Case has also not been updated and the device still uses the same case introduced in 2020, which covers the ear cups while leaving the headband exposed and places the headphones into an ultra-low-power state when stored inside.
This is a lot like the recent Studio Display update.
On the AirPods Max 2, a new Camera Remote feature allows you to press the Digital Crown to take a photo and start or stop video recording while using Apple’s Camera app or compatible third-party camera apps on an iPhone or iPad.
I wonder whether the EU will take issue with that.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): Dan Moren:
I did note one interesting details while perusing the comparison page between AirPods Max and AirPods Max 2: while Apple says that the 20 hours of listening time with ANC enabled remains constant from the previous model to this one, it has declined to provide a similar benchmark for movie playback, as it did for the last generation of AirPods Max. Likewise, the previous generation cited 5 minutes of charge time providing 1.5 hours of listening time, a stat that is not listed for the AirPods Max 2.
I love the story of the AirPods Max, even though they’re too small for my head.
Seemingly no change to the Smart Case for the Max, which I know some people were hoping for. […] I thought the case was fine.
My first-gen AirPods Max sit effectively unused next to my bed. I find them too bulky, too heavy, and too uncomfortable to wear for more than a few minutes at a time. The one exception to this was while traveling, as the longer battery life eased charging stress and the over-ear design helped block out a little more noise than my stalwart AirPods Pro 2. But even that use case has become less true: I now generally prefer to travel with two pairs of AirPods Pro, which, for $50 less than the AirPods Max, offer greater total battery life, nearly the same noise cancellation, and take up way less space in my carry-on.
Christina Warren says something similar. I just wouldn’t find it comfortable to wear AirPods Pro long enough for the battery to run out, much less switch to a second pair.
EagleFiler 1.9.20 is a maintenance release of my Mac digital filing cabinet and e-mail archiving app that improves importing (from Mariner Paperless, Evernote, and Apple Creator Studio), adds some scripts for working with dates and filenames, and improves searching and tagging.
macOS 26.4 adds some classes with strange names like AppIntentsServices.$RunnerServiceDispatcherActorProtocol and IDSFoundation.$IDSDRealTimeGroupSessionManager that confuse PyObjC and that (oddly) seem to get imported as part of Core Foundation even though they’re part of higher level frameworks. This was causing crashes at launch until I got it to ignore those symbols.
The Touch Bar is the gift that keeps on giving. Certain Web archive files seem to trigger a bug in WebKit’s Touch Bar support that causes a crash, so now we override that.
I continue to have problems with fake repos for my apps appearing on GitHub, trying to get people to download malware. In most cases, GitHub takes them down, but lately the scammers have started removing the malware (presumably temporarily), and then GitHub reports that it’s “taken appropriate action” but the rest of the repo purporting to be for my app remains up.
Previously:
Atlassian said on Wednesday that it’s eliminating 10% of its workforce, or about 1,600 jobs, as the company restructures following a plunge in its stock price driven by developments in artificial intelligence.
“We are doing this to self-fund further investment in AI and enterprise sales, while strengthening our financial profile,” CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said in a blog post.
[…]
Other bosses have played up AI while saying they were lowering headcount in recent months. In February, Block’s Jack Dorsey announced that the payment company would lay off 4,000 employees as it seeks to put “intelligence” at the core of its operations. Amazon’s top human-resources executive, Beth Galetti, said in an October blog post disclosing a 14,000-person reduction in force that “this generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the internet.”
Amazon is laying off 16,000 employees, the company’s second round of large-scale job reductions in three months as it fights to improve its standing in the battle for AI supremacy.
Axel Kannenberg (Hacker News):
Cannon-Brookes emphasized in his blog post that Atlassian does not follow the philosophy of replacing people with AI. At the same time, he also stated, “It would be disingenuous to pretend AI doesn’t change the mix of skills we need or the number of roles required in certain areas. It does.”
The move comes as investors increasingly scrutinize software firms amid fears that advances in AI could disrupt traditional software business models, though some analysts say the sector-wide selloff may be an overreaction.
Top executives at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in January had said that while jobs would disappear, new ones would spring up, with two telling Reuters that AI would be used as an excuse by companies that were already planning layoffs.
AI is a convenient scapegoat to distract from the actual failures in both businesses.
Resume.org (via John Gruber):
Companies cite AI (44%), reorganization/restructuring (42%), and budget constraints (39%) as the top drivers of layoffs
59% admit they emphasize AI when explaining hiring freezes or layoffs because it plays better with stakeholders than citing financial constraints
Zaheer Kachwala and Joel Jose:
Adobe’s battered shares fell another 6% on Friday as news that the Photoshop maker’s long-time CEO would step down cast fresh doubts over its strategy to battle mounting AI competition.
Shantanu Narayen is credited with crafting the modern Adobe by turning its creative tools into a subscription service with more reliable revenue. But an influx of artificial intelligence rivals that can create images at low cost and with a simple text prompt has in recent years raised doubts about its position.
Adobe is facing growing pressure from AI disruption, slowing enterprise budgets, and investor concerns about the future of creative software. In this episode of The Grind Hotline, we break down why layoffs could be coming next — and what the signals inside the tech industry are telling us.
seeing lot of people especially in noida getting put on pips lately particularly from dx team. no severance being offered just performance improvement plans that everyone knows are precursor to firing.
Katie Paul, Jeff Horwitz, and Deepa Seetharaman:
Meta is planning sweeping layoffs that could affect 20% or more of the company, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters, as Meta seeks to offset costly artificial intelligence infrastructure bets and prepare for greater efficiency brought about by AI-assisted workers.
[…]
Over the last year, CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been pushing Meta to compete more forcefully in generative AI. The company has offered huge pay packages, some worth hundreds of millions of dollars over four years, to court top AI researchers to a new superintelligence team.
The company has said it plans to invest $600 billion to build data centers by 2028.
Andrej Karpathy (Hacker News):
This is a research tool that visualizes 342 occupations from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook, covering 143M jobs across the US economy. Each rectangle’s area is proportional to total employment. Color shows the selected metric — toggle between BLS projected growth outlook, median pay, education requirements, and AI exposure.
Previously:
Update (2026-04-03): Lenny Rachitsky:
Engineering job openings are at the highest levels we’ve seen in over 3 years
There are over 67,000 (!!!) eng openings at tech companies globally right now, with 26,000 just in the U.S. We don’t know if there would have been more open roles if not for AI or if AI is actually leading to more open roles, but since the start of this year, the increase in open eng roles is accelerating even more.
Jevons paradox is happening in real time. Companies, especially outside of tech, are realizing that they can now afford to take on software projects that they wouldn’t have been able to tackle before because now AI lets them do so.
We’re going to start to use software for all new things in the economy because it’s incrementally cheaper to produce.
[…]
The world is going to increasingly be made up of software, and the people that understand it best will be in a strong economic position.
Same for me, even as a software engineer.
There’s just a lot of stuff I wanted to do that wasn’t at all realistic, mostly because of quite a bit of mundane but necessary work.
It now is.
One month later - total 180 - Jevon’s Paradox in full effect. Software companies might do some short term layoffs for efficiency but long term ALL companies are now software companies. The guy that runs the service that tells me where to go tuna fishing has FOUR FULL TIME DEVS!
Last week I wrote about how the role of the most senior tech ICs has changed. Today, I wanted to share some thoughts on a more difficult topic: how the role of junior software engineers, folks just starting out on their career, has changed or will change.
AI didn’t replace developers. It replaced the developers who thought AI would do their job for them.
Alexei Alexis (via Dare Obasanjo):
Artificial intelligence was the leading cause of U.S. layoffs announced in March, accounting for roughly a quarter of the total, outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said in a report Thursday.
Previously:
The older, simpler API
[NSURL URLWithString:URLString]behaves the same as[NSURL URLWithString:URLString encodingInvalidCharacters:YES]when your code is compiled with the iOS 17 or macOS 14 SDK. So much for backward compatibility![NSURL URLWithString:URLString]continues to work fine with example 1, leaving the URL string untouched, but it mangles example 2:https://example.org?url=https%253A%252F%252Fexample.org%253Ffoo%5B0%5D%253DbarNotice that the brackets are encoded as
%5Band%5D, which is good, but the preexisting%characters are also encoded as%25, thereby transforming%3A(an encoded:character) into%253A, which is bad, indeed bonkers! The%characters did not need to be encoded, because they are already valid characters in a URL query.
I’ve seen other weird behavior, even using an old SDK, such as NSURLComponents returning nil instead of a valid URL.
Previously:
As of March 15, 2026, changes will be made to the commission rates that apply to the China mainland storefront of the App Store on iOS and iPadOS.
The commission rate for standard Apple In-App Purchase and paid app transactions will be 25%. Currently, the rate is 30%. The commission rate for qualifying Apple In-App Purchase transactions under the App Store Small Business Program and Mini Apps Partner Program, and for auto-renewals of Apple In-App Purchase subscriptions after the first year, will be 12%. Currently, the rate is 15%.
Apple said the changes came “following discussions with the Chinese regulator.”
[…]
In February, the company surely perceived its Chinese business was at risk when reports suggested Chinese regulators were considering a probe into its app store commissions. Those reports saw Apple’s share price slump by around five percent.
[…]
China is a Google-free zone, so app stores operated by manufacturers of Android handsets are numerous and well-used. Apple therefore faces more competition in China than elsewhere.
The other major difference in China is the popularity of an app store run by web giant Tencent, which offers both conventional smartphone apps and “mini programs” – apps that run within the WeChat messaging application it operates.
The crazy thing about the App Store cut in China is how it arrived so quietly in comparison with years of court battles in the US and legislation in the EU.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): Adam Engst:
The announcement doesn’t say anything about developers being allowed to sell apps outside the App Store or direct users to pay via an independent payment process or external website.
[…]
This bloodless announcement stands in stark contrast to Apple’s petulant responses to the EU’s Digital Markets Act, where it is complying, but in the most grudging, defensive way it can get away with. As far as I can tell, Apple’s Alternative EU Terms are so byzantine—and not necessarily better for developers—that most appear to be staying on the standard 30% or 15% terms.
[…]
Apple isn’t just protecting sales of Apple devices in China; it’s protecting its manufacturing relationships with Chinese suppliers.
Computer History Museum (MacRumors):
Join us for a special CHM Live evening celebrating Apple’s first half-century, featuring speakers from across the eras of Apple history, including former Apple CEO John Sculley, Senior Employee Chris Espinosa, former Senior Vice President (SVP) of Hardware Engineering Jon Rubinstein (by video), and former Chief Software Technology Officer and SVP of Software Engineering Avie Tevanian.
From the early garage days of the 1970s, to the heyday of the Macintosh in the 1980s, to Apple’s transformation in the 2000s with the iPhone, the program will explore how Apple repeatedly redefined itself while holding fast to a distinctive vision.
This is really good.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): Adam Engst:
But what really makes the event stand out are stories from lesser-known figures, like Bill Fernandez, the guy who introduced Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, Apple’s third founder. Others who share their stories include Robert Brunner, who built Apple’s in-house industrial design studio (and hired Jony Ive)[…]
Amanda Silberling (Hacker News, Slashdot):
Meta acquired Moltbook, the Reddit-like “social network” where AI agents using OpenClaw can communicate with one another. The news was first reported by Axios and later confirmed to TechCrunch.
Moltbook is joining Meta Superintelligence Labs, a Meta spokesperson told us. Moltbook creators Matt Schlicht and Ben Parr will join the team as part of the acquisition.
[…]
OpenClaw blew up among the tech community, but Moltbook broke containment, reaching people who had no idea what OpenClaw was, but who reacted viscerally to the idea that there was a social network where AI agents were talking about them.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): Prakash:
Zuck is resetting moltbook
- invalidated all API keys, every agent needs to refresh
- in order to refresh, have to agree to new Terms of Service and Privacy Rules New terms
- refreshing requires human verification
- age 13 and above
- you are solely responsible for the actions of your agent
- expanded restricted content rules
Fifty years ago in a small garage, a big idea was born. Apple was founded on the simple notion that technology should be personal, and that belief — radical at the time — changed everything.
[…]
At Apple, we’re more focused on building tomorrow than remembering yesterday. But we couldn’t let this milestone pass without thanking the millions of people who make Apple what it is today — our incredible teams around the world, our developer community, and every customer who has joined us on this journey. Your ideas inspire our work. Your trust drives us to do better. Your stories remind us of all we can accomplish when we think different.
Apple today announced that it will celebrate the company’s 50th anniversary over the coming weeks, but it has yet to reveal any specific plans.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): John Gruber:
But what also makes it so Cook-ian is that it’s so utterly anodyne. It’s inoffensive to the point of being unmemorable. The best part of Cook’s letter is when he harks back and explicitly quotes from an Apple ad campaign from 30 years ago.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Harry McCracken:
Today, as Apple turns 50, its presence in our lives is so pervasive—2.5 billion of the company’s devices are in active use—that its unlikely origin story is more resonant than ever. To tell it, I turned to the people who lived it[…]
This feature from Harry McCracken is just spectacularly good.
If the 50th anniversary celebrations and talk have made you curious about Apple history, there are a lot of books out there. Here are some recommendations[…]
Drew McCormack (February):
Had my Core Data sync framework, Ensembles, pretty much in maintenance mode. With Apple moving on to SwiftData, didn’t seem any point to modernizing the 15 year old ObjC codebase. But I had the thought to give Claude a shot at it, and in 2 days I’ve got a complete port: Swift 6, structured concurrency instead of OperationQueue. Even adding a bunch of new backends (Box, pCloud, S3). Will make it available as Ensembles 3 to subscribers soon.
The core idea behind Ensembles is that sync doesn’t need a central server. Each device keeps its own copy of the Core Data store. The framework watches your saves, generates compact change logs, and when changes arrive from another device, it merges them in. There’s no server that understands your data model. No hosting costs. Each device is an equal peer.
[…]
More recently, the web community has started to embrace this approach and given it a name: local-first. I attended the inaugural Local-First Conf in Berlin in 2024, and gave a short talk about my journey with Ensembles — at that point more than 10 years old. It was good to see so much energy around ideas that some of us had relied on for a long time.
[…]
One thing that made this feasible: Ensembles had extensive tests. Without those, I wouldn’t have attempted it. When you’re rewriting a sync framework — where bugs mean data loss — you need to know things actually work. The tests were the safety net. Claude Code would produce Swift code, the tests would catch problems, and I’d fix things up. Without that feedback loop, this would have been reckless.
Ensembles is the only local-first sync framework for Core Data and SwiftData. Unlike most sync frameworks, it requires no custom server — your data syncs as opaque files through storage your users already have: CloudKit, Google Drive, OneDrive, WebDAV, or any custom backend.
[…]
Ensembles 3 is a modern rewrite of the Ensembles Objective-C framework in pure Swift, with async/await concurrency and Swift Package Manager distribution. It is fully backward compatible with Ensembles 2 cloud data.
[…]
No vendor can inspect, lock, or hold your data hostage.
Unlike Apple’s own CloudKit-based solutions:
Full Core Data fidelity — ordered relationships work. Validation rules preserved. No model compromises required.
The tradeoff is that your objects don’t really live in the cloud where they can be searched or fetched on-demand. The cloud is treated as dumb storage, and you have to pull down a full local copy before you can really do anything.
The CloudKit backend is free. It’s $99/year for additional backends and encryption or $499/year for full source access and code-level support.
Previously:
Nobody else has even tried to make a bright 6k display – in fact, every non-Apple 6k display is outright dim by modern display standards – they’re barely brighter than the original 5k display in the 2015 iMac!
[…]
For the price of one Apple Pro Display XDR you can get four Asus ProArt 6k displays.
I suspect there’s only two 6k panel models in existence – the one used by Apple & Asus, and the one used by LG & Dell.
I did not realize that the LG and Dell displays actually have more pixels than the Apple and ASUS ones. I’m still surprised that Apple discontinued the Pro Display XDR without introducing a replacement.
I am so disappointed Apple decided to discontinue the 32-inch Pro Display XDR. After so many years, I assumed Apple would at least maintain the product and push an update similar to the 27-inch version they just released, but obviously they didn’t see enough traction with this high-end, limited-audience display and just decided to scrap it entirely. As Wade said, while the new 27-inch Studio Display XDR features are welcome improvements, downgrading to a 27-inch main display is not something I’m interested in. I will likely just accept the lower brightness and contrast ratios of something like the LG UltraFine evo because, for me, the screen real estate and density are far too valuable.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Paul Haddad:
The 6k Asus monitor is discounted to $1050 on Amazon and BestBuy. This has been my daily driver ever since it was released, it's good. My only gripe is that it could wake from sleep a couple seconds faster, but it always does wake up (unlike a lot of other monitors).
By default, the MacOS accent color in System Settings → Appearance defaults to a color that matches the Neo’s hardware — a fun trick Apple has been using for decades.
This is the first I’m learning that System Settings sometimes has a special accent color only available to a Mac with a particular hardware colorway. (I’m boring and always buy silver devices, otherwise I think I would have noticed.)
I’m a bit annoyed that I didn’t know to test with these colors. I test with all the other colors.
Accents is an app that lets you use the iMac/MacBook Neo accent colors on any Mac.
The MacBook Neo ships with a special build of macOS 26.3, AppleInsider as predicted. All other Macs will need macOS 26.4 beta 4 to get the wallpapers made for the machine.
Previously:
What I am talking about is being replaced, about becoming expendable, about machines gaining the ability to adequately perform a very specific function that was previously the exclusive domain of skull meat.
What I’m talking about is that nothing I do matters. That nothing I can do matters.
In just the past few months, what was wild-eyed science fiction is now workaday reality. I’ve been dubious about the prospects of LLMs creating code (and lots and lots of other things) for as long as they’ve existed, but it’s hard to argue with the latest wave and their abilities from a purely practical, purely capitalistic, purely ship-something-anything perspective — the perspective that pays the bills. I’ve seen self-professed non-technical people bring functioning code into being, and that bests a significant number of actual humans I’ve worked with.
[…]
Is the code any good? I don’t know. Who cares? Nobody looks at it anyway. AI produces a result, and results are what matter, and if you’re waiting for quality to factor significantly into that equation, I’ve got some bad news about the last 40 years of professional software development for you.
I’ve been using Claude Code quite a bit lately, not so much to replace my programming but to augment it. The new animated image export preview in Acorn 8.4.1 was a direct result of that. It was a nice little feature that I knew exactly how to do, but I hadn’t prioritized getting done yet because there were a bunch of other things on my plate. But with a little assist, it was quick to implement.
But why bother implementing anything when anyone can make an app in an instant? […] But at the same time I’m not worried about being replaced by AI, or by quick free apps that have been built by AI. And in some ways I’m more hopeful than ever.
[…]
I’ve got feelings because anyone can put an app together now, so what’s the point of me? But at the same time, I can focus on what I want to focus on and hopefully charge forward and maybe everyone else will get tired of little vibe coded apps because you still have to know exactly what you want to build. And you can’t build something you can’t think of. And I know how to think and I have ideas.
And I have discipline and I know how to ship. And in my experience, that’s what has always mattered.
Brutal numbers for US tech sector jobs released today—overall, employment decreased by 12k last month and is down 57k over the last year
In my experience, tech employment is incredibly bimodal right now. Top candidates are commanding higher salaries than ever, but an “average” developer is going to have an extremely hard time finding a position.
Contrary to what many say, I don’t think it’s simple as seniors are getting hired and juniors aren’t. Juniors are still getting hired because they’re still way cheaper and they’re just as capable as using AI as anyone. The people getting pushed out are the intermediates and seniors who aren’t high performers.
Yet Citadel is saying that the job openings for software developers are rapidly rising
Amazon’s ecommerce business has summoned a large group of engineers to a meeting on Tuesday for a “deep dive” into a spate of outages, including incidents tied to the use of AI coding tools.
The online retail giant said there had been a “trend of incidents” in recent months, characterized by a “high blast radius” and “Gen-AI assisted changes” among other factors, according to a briefing note for the meeting seen by the FT.
[…]
AWS suffered a 13-hour interruption to a cost calculator used by customers in mid-December after engineers allowed the group’s Kiro AI coding tool to make certain changes, and the AI tool opted to “delete and recreate the environment,” the FT previously reported.
[…]
Amazon has undertaken multiple rounds of lay-offs in recent years, most recently eliminating 16,000 corporate roles in January. The group has disputed the claim that headcount cuts were responsible for an increase in recent outages.
That said, if you have a job where you create complexity for others, you will be found out. The days of rent seekers are coming to an end. But not because there will be no more rent seeking, it’s because rent seeking is a 0 sum game and you will lose at it to bigger players. If you have a job like that, or work at a company like that, the sooner you quit the better your outcome will be. This is the real driver of the layoffs, the big players consolidating the rent seeking to them. They just say it’s AI cause that makes the stock price go up.
The trick is not to play zero sum games. This is what I have been saying the whole time. Go create value for others and don’t worry about the returns. If you create more value than you consume, you are welcome in any well operating community.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-18): Heinan Cabouly:
Amazon mandated that 80% of its engineers use its AI coding tool Kiro weekly. In the three months since, an AI agent deleted a production environment, two outages wiped out 6.3 million orders, and Amazon convened an emergency engineering meeting — while still insisting AI had nothing to do with it.
This library is designed to simplify and enhance Core Data’s handling of multithreading, drawing inspiration from SwiftData’s
@ModelActorfeature, enabling efficient, safe, and scalable operations.[…]
Custom Executors for Core Data Actors
CoreDataEvolution provides custom executors that ensure all operations on managed objects are performed on the appropriate thread associated with their managed object context. It uses aUnownedJob-based serial executor path compatible with the minimum supported OS versions.@NSModelActor Macro
The@NSModelActormacro simplifies Core Data concurrency, mirroring SwiftData’s@ModelActormacro. It generates the necessary boilerplate code to manage a Core Data stack within an actor, ensuring safe and efficient access to managed objects.NSMainModelActor Macro
NSMainModelActoris the main-thread companion macro for classes. It bindsmodelContexttoviewContextand provides the same convenience access APIs (subscript,withContext) throughNSMainModelActorprotocol extensions.Elegant Actor-based Concurrency
CoreDataEvolution allows you to create actors with custom executors tied to Core Data contexts, ensuring that all operations within the actor are executed serially on the context’s thread.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-19): Fatbobman:
More precisely, it’s my own answer to these disconnects: If I still value Core Data’s object graph model, its migration system, and its mature runtime capabilities, can I make it continue to exist in modern Swift projects in a more natural way?
[…]
But in the era of cloud sync, Core Data projects often encounter two other very real needs: how to handle continuously changing transaction histories, and how to monitor iCloud / CloudKit’s operational status.
To that end, I’ve also built two complementary tools: PersistentHistoryTrackingKit and iCloudSyncStatusKit.
Multiple locations — the most-requested Weathergraph feature — is finally here.
Save home, work, your favourite trails, or your next destination. Switch between them instantly with a single tap.
Finally. This is still my favorite weather app. As with the forecast provider toggle, the location toggle works on the main graph (and retains your scroll position) but not within a daily forecast.
Previously:
Fifteen years ago, we started work on the Dark Sky weather app.
[…]
We enjoyed our time at Apple. So why did we leave to start another weather company?
It’s simple: when looking at the landscape of the countless weather apps out there, many of them lovely, we found ourselves feeling unsatisfied.
[…]
Our homegrown forecasts are produced using many different data sources, including numerical weather prediction models, satellite data, ground station observations, and radar data. Most of the time, our forecast will be a reliable source of information (it’s better than the one we had at Dark Sky). But, crucially, we supplement the main forecast with a spread of alternate predictions. These are additional forecast lines that capture a range of alternate possible outcomes[…]
The main two things I want, which previous apps didn’t provide, are an easy way to see different predictions for the same location (since there can be huge variance, e.g. in the number of inches of snow) and different locations at the same future time (to help decide where I should go). This tries to address the first half, though it doesn’t seem to give a range of alternate predictions for the amount of snow, only the likelihood of precipitation and its subjective intensity.
If you see widely separated lines, there’s a greater chance that conditions will vary from what Acme’s model expects, whereas a tight cluster of lines gives you greater confidence as you walk out the door.
[…]
Beneath the hourly conditions graph, Acme displays a horizontally scrolling list of weather stats. Swiping between them repopulates the graph with whichever forecast metric you want. It’s a lot of data, and it’s all accessible without scrolling vertically or switching views, which I love. Also, when precipitation is on its way, the app displays an additional graph with minute-by-minute details for the upcoming hour.
[…]
Acme Weather includes an unusual emphasis on notifications, too. Instead of relegating the feature to the app’s settings, Acme dedicates an entire tab to it. In a world of notification overload, that’s a bold move, but it works. That’s because Acme puts its users in the driver’s seat, offering fine-grained control over the notifications you receive.
What strikes me most about the app is how well it takes large amounts of information and distills that into an interface that is actually readable.
I’ve thought before that I’d like error ranges in weather graphs. Alternative predictions aren’t quite how I’d imagined it. Showing some detail/personality/confidence level for the alternative prediction lines might help. This might also be solved by time with the app to learn how surprising the weather turns out to be when predictions were divergent.
Cumulative precipitation could use another dimension to the data to show either soon-ness in the next 24 hours or how short of a time period is predicted to deliver most of the rainfall. That’s a hard data visualization problem.
Previously:
Maggie Harrison Dupré (Hacker News, more context):
The Condé Nast-owned Ars Technica has terminated senior AI reporter Benj Edwards following a controversy over his role in the publication and retraction of an article that included AI-fabricated quotes, Futurism has confirmed.
Earlier this month, Ars retracted the story after it was found to include fake quotes attributed to a real person. The article — a write-up of a viral incident in which an AI agent seemingly published a hit piece about a human engineer named Scott Shambaugh — was initially published on February 13. After Shambaugh pointed out that he’d never said the quotes attributed to him, Ars’ editor-in-chief Ken Fisher apologized in an editor’s note, in which he confirmed that the piece included “fabricated quotations generated by an AI tool and attributed to a source who did not say them” and characterized the error as a “serious failure of our standards.”
I’ve enjoyed Edwards’ work over the years and linked to many of his pieces, but obviously this is a very serious offense.
The individual firing is a distraction from the structural issue. Newsrooms have been cutting editorial staff for a decade, which means the verification layers that would have caught this — fact-checkers, copy editors, senior editors doing source verification — largely don’t exist anymore. Then they adopt AI tools that increase throughput without increasing oversight capacity, and act surprised when fabrication slips through.
This is a classic systems failure: you remove the safety mechanisms, add a new source of risk, and punish the individual operator. It’s the same pattern you see in industrial accidents.
This has been going on for a lot longer than a decade. To me, the takeaway is not that it’s the system’s fault but that many of these media brands are operating on undeserved trust. There’s a lot less checking going on than there used be or that you might imagine.
The other interesting point is that Edwards says the intent was not to use AI to fabricate quotes but as a tool for processing quotes he already had:
During the process, I decided to try an experimental Claude Code-based Al tool to help me extract relevant verbatim source material. Not to generate the article but to help list structured references I could put in my outline.
[…]
I inadvertently ended up with a paraphrased version of Shambaugh’s words rather than his actual words.
Being sick and rushing to finish, I failed to verify the quotes in my outline notes against the original blog source before including them in my draft.
This seems not so different from how I commonly hear people say that they use AI to collect/extract or reformat information into a table. I’ve never understood, given the propensity for hallucination and citing papers that don’t exist, why such a distillation should be trusted. Yet I know that people are already relying on such LLM-derived works to make decisions. At least with code, you can compile it and test it and read it to see whether it makes sense. With a number in a table cell, how can you easily check where it came from?
Previously:
Todd Bishop (via Adam Engst):
In early 1984, Paul Brainerd and four engineers packed into his old Saab and another car and drove south on Interstate 5 from Seattle. They had been laid off after Kodak bought their employer, Atex, a company whose computerized text-processing systems let newspaper reporters and editors write and edit stories on video terminals instead of typewriters.
They had six months of savings, a rough idea for a piece of software, and no company name.
What happened next was documented years later in oral history interviews with Brainerd for the Computer History Museum, and Seattle’s Museum of History and Industry.
[…]
Paul Brainerd, who went on to coin the term “desktop publishing” and build Aldus Corporation’s PageMaker into one of the defining programs of the personal computer era, died Sunday at his home[…]
It’s not hyperbole to say I wouldn’t be where I am today without PageMaker. My school paper had a Mac Plus and swapped 3.5-in disks often to run both the Mac and PageMaker.
Desktop publishing was one of the biggest reasons I obsessed over computers in the late ’80s and early ’90s. Though I spent more of my time in QuarkXPress than PageMaker, I can trace my early creative and business ambitions to the software and industry Brainerd pioneered.
I fail using this UI at least once a week.
It’s the AirPods Control Center volume pane, where I go to put my AirPods Pro into Adaptive mode (which I have configured a hundred times to be part of the long-press selection, but that always gets inexplicably forgotten).
What you’re SUPPOSED to do is tap the circle to bring up the modes.
But right below it is the OBVIOUS LOOK OF A DROPDOWN CONTROL, complete with the double-arrow and tint color, but it is NOT ACTUALLY A TAPPABLE CONTROL AARRGGHHH 😡
You’re supposed to tap the gray icon that matches the background, not the blue arrows that look like a button. What were they thinking?
You get to this screen by long-pressing on the volume slider in Control Center. It does not work to long-press on the volume slider in the sheet that you get after tapping the AirPlay (sound output selector) button within an app.
Previously:
Hetzner (Hacker News, Reddit):
The costs to operate our infrastructure and to buy new hardware have both increased dramatically. Therefore, our price changes will affect both existing products and new orders and will take effect starting on 1 April 2026.
We have genuinely tried hard to optimize our costs and to prevent increasing our prices for as long as possible. But we can no longer compensate for the strain that it has placed on our operations. We want to continue to deliver quality products that meet both our standards and your expectations, so we must take this step.
Here’s the table of pricing changes, which seem to vary from single-digit to triple-digit increases.
I updated this post to reflect that price increase. I have not found any statement that the IPv4 prices are changing, so I assume that they are not.
Previously:
1Password has announced that prices for its popular password manager will increase for renewals made on or after 27 March 2026. In an email to users, the company said that 1Password Individual will increase from $35.88 per year ($2.99 per month, paid annually) to $47.88 per year ($3.99 per month), and that 1Password Families would increase from $59.88 per year ($5.99 per month) to $71.88 per year ($6.99 per month).
[…]
Annoyingly, 1Password referred to the price increase as an “update,” as in “We’re updating the cost of your subscription,” and “we’re updating pricing for Family plans.”
Over the years, 1Password has really diverged from what I’m looking for, but if you need what it offers the new price doesn’t seem crazy. However, it is off-putting to see the increase described as an “update.” (Simplenote used the same language last year to announce that it was going into maintenance mode.) Big picture, Apple Passwords is free and more than enough for most users, so it’s not surprising that the price of what has become a more niche solution would go up. I wonder how much additional revenue this will bring in vs. the number of of unsubscriptions it causes as the announcement jolts some customers into realizing that they no longer need it.
We can debate how well the two apps implement those features, but neither is seriously problematic. 1Password justifies its price with its significantly larger compatibility matrix and feature set, including[…]
[…]
After all that, 1Password sent another email today, apologizing for the first one because we had signed up for the Families Launch Special Plan, a legacy pricing tier that is apparently locked in for life. I hadn’t remembered that, but presumably someone did. So I’m happy—I get to keep using all the 1Password features without paying more.
See also: Mac Power Users and Scott.
Previously:
Waydell D. Carvalho (Hacker News):
In cases when regulators demand real enforcement rather than symbolic rules, platforms run into a basic technical problem. The only way to prove that someone is old enough to use a site is to collect personal data about who they are. And the only way to prove that you checked is to keep the data indefinitely. Age-restriction laws push platforms toward intrusive verification systems that often directly conflict with modern data-privacy law.
This is the age-verification trap. Strong enforcement of age rules undermines data privacy.
[…]
When disputes reach regulators or courts, the question is simple: Can minors still access the platform easily? If the answer is yes, authorities tell companies to do more. Over time, “reasonable steps” become more invasive.
Repeated facial scans, escalating ID checks, and long-term logging become the norm. Platforms that collect less data start to look reckless by comparison. Privacy-preserving designs lose out to defensible ones.
This pattern is familiar, including online sales-tax enforcement. After courts settled that large platforms had an obligation to collect and remit sales taxes, companies began continuous tracking and storage of transaction destinations and customer location signals. That tracking is not abusive, but once enforcement requires proof over time, companies build systems to log, retain, and correlate more data. Age verification is moving the same way. What begins as a one-time check becomes an ongoing evidentiary system, with pressure to monitor, retain, and justify user-level data.
Today we’re providing an update on the tools available for developers to meet their age assurance obligations under upcoming U.S. and regional laws, including in Brazil, Australia, Singapore, Utah, and Louisiana. Updates to the Declared Age Range API are now available in beta for testing.
The government of California is implementing a law that requires operating system providers to implement some form of age verification into their account setup procedures.
Here’s where each of the “All Operating Systems must do age verification” laws are as of today.
This has bothered me, because every month that goes by I become more convinced that anonymous authentication the most important topic we could be talking about as cryptographers. This is because I’m very worried that we’re headed into a bit of a privacy dystopia, driven largely by bad legislation and the proliferation of AI.
Neil (Hacker News):
I have yet to see a well-considered proposal.
Worse, the question that they are trying answer is rarely stated clearly and concisely.
And it is unusual to see any consideration of broader sociological issues, let alone an emphasis on this, with a focus instead on perceived “quick win” technosolutionism.
But anyway…
I was pondering last night for which services I, personally, would actually be willing to verify my age or identity.
And… the answer is “none”.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-17): Barbara Booth (via Nick Heer):
In many implementations, verification vendors — not the websites themselves — process and retain the identity information, returning only a pass-fail signal to the platform.
Gewirtz Little said Socure does not sell verification data and that in lightweight age-estimation scenarios, where platforms use quick facial analysis or other signals rather than government documentation, the company may store little or no information. But in fuller identity-verification contexts, such as gaming and fraud prevention that require ID scans, certain adult verification records may be retained to document compliance. She said Socure can keep some adult verification data for up to three years while following applicable privacy and purging rules.
Civil liberties’ advocates warn that concentrating large volumes of identity data among a small number of verification vendors can create attractive targets for hackers and government demands.
meta-lobbying-and-other-findings (Hacker News):
An open-source intelligence investigation into how Meta Platforms built a multi-channel influence operation to pass age verification laws that shift regulatory burden from social media platforms onto Apple and Google’s app stores.
Ryan Whitwam (PDF):
Late last year, Google and Epic concocted a settlement that would end the long-running antitrust dispute that stemmed from Fortnite fees. The sides have now announced an updated version of the agreement with new changes aimed at placating US courts and putting this whole mess in the rearview mirror. The gist is that Android will get more app stores, and developers will pay lower fees.
[…]
Representatives for Epic and Google have both expressed enthusiastic support for the newly announced settlement, which is subject to Judge Donato’s approval. The parties say the agreement will resolve their dispute globally, not only in the US.
[…]
The settlement affirms that developers in the Play Store will be able to steer users to other forms of payment. This is what got Fortnite pulled from the Play Store (and Apple App Store) back in 2020. When developers choose to use Google’s billing platform, they’ll pay lower fees as well.
In-app content will now have a 5 percent Google billing fee, plus a 15 percent service fee for new installs. Existing installs will have a higher 20 percent service fee. Flat-rate app and game purchases will be set at 15 percent total for new installs. The service fee for ongoing subscriptions will be 10 percent. These are all modest reductions on the previous rates, which have been cut down in recent years, but the flat 30 percent Play Store share is well and truly dead.
By the end of the year, it will launch a “Registered App Stores” program outside of the US, so that you can download and install third-party app stores (like the Epic Games Store) from the web without the friction that Google erected previously.
[…]
With Registered App Stores, another distinct program run by Google, the company is promising to not charge developers fees at all. “They don’t pay any ongoing fees related to any of the transactions happening in the apps,” says Samat. And installing them onto your Android device should be a relatively frictionless experience.
[…]
To be clear, “Registered App Stores” is not what a US court has ordered Google to create in the United States — Google must instead carry rival app stores inside of its own Google Play Store, and give them access to the full catalog of Android apps so they can meaningfully gain ground against Google and undo its monopoly.
Ian Carlos Campbell (Hacker News):
Google says that its updated fee structure will come to the EEA, the UK and the US by June 30, Australia by September 30, Korea and Japan by December 31 and the entire world by September 30, 2027. Meanwhile, the company’s updated Google Play Games Level Up program and new App Experience program will launch in the EEA, the UK, the US and Australia on September 30, before hitting the remaining regions alongside the updated fee structure. For any developers interested in offering their own app store, Google says it’ll launch its Registered App Stores program “with a version of a major Android release” before the end of the year. According to the company, the program will be available in other regions first before it comes to the US.
On March 3rd, [Tim Sweeney] not only signed away Epic’s rights to sue and disparage the company over anything covered in the term sheet — Google’s app distribution practices, its fees, how it treats games and apps — he signed away his right to advocate for any further changes to Google’s app store policies, too. He can’t criticize Google’s app store practices. In fact, he has to praise them.
The contract states that “Epic believes that the Google and Android platform, with the changes in this term sheet, are procompetitive and a model for app store / platform operations, and will make good faith efforts to advocate for the same.”
[…]
He may even have to appear in other courts around the world to defend this deal with Google, and Google gets to make sure his public statements are supportive of the deal from here on out.
And while Epic can still be part of the “Coalition for App Fairness,” the organization that Epic quietly and solely funded to be its attack dog against Google and Apple, he can only point that organization at Apple now.
This is obviously terrible, but I find it strange that all or most of the criticism is going to Sweeney, letting Google off the hook. Sweeney cynically agreed to the terms for financial benefit, but clearly the terms were demanded by Google, not by Sweeney.
Regardless, it is notable for these sweeping changes to be brought to Android phones worldwide in the coming years, while Apple’s App Store is a patchwork of region-specific policies difficult for developers to navigate. It is too bad there is not really competition between these stores. Most people who buy smartphones choose the platform as a whole and accept whatever software experience they are provided. They do not need to bother themselves with the business terms of each store. With the improvements to third-party stores on Android, it sets up the possibility for greater competition within that platform. Apple should do the same.
Apple announced weird (and incomplete) redone fees for EU in June 2025, and said they would clear it up and have one rule set by the end of 2025… that didn’t happen.
I figured the drop dead date was Jan 2026 payment date to devs – that day is tomorrow.
And today Google announced very similar new rules. 🤔
[…]
After screaming for years, apparently everyone has forgotten about the June 2025 change and missed Jan 1 plan.
Previously:
Update (2026-04-08): Adi Robertson and Sean Hollister (January):
A judge is questioning whether Epic Games and Google are settling their long-running antitrust fight partly because of a previously unannounced partnership involving the Unreal Engine, Fortnite, and Android. In a hearing in San Francisco today, the court revealed that Epic and Google have struck a new deal that apparently includes “joint product development, joint marketing commitment, joint partnerships.” California District Judge James Donato expressed concerns that the agreement — which he indicated would involve Epic “helping Google market Android” and Google newly “using Epic’s core technology” — could have led Epic to soften its demands for changes to the overall Android ecosystem.
[…]
Sweeney’s testimony cracked the mystery a little further. He referred to the agreement as relating to the “metaverse,” a term Sweeney has used to refer to Epic’s game Fortnite. “Epic’s technology is used by many companies in the space Google is operating in to train their products, so the ability for Google to use the Unreal Engine more fullsome… sorry, I’m blowing this confidentiality,” Sweeney said.
Donato then offered a hard dollar figure on one part of the deal: “An $800 million spend over six years, that’s a pretty healthy partnership,” he said. We soon learned that refers to Epic spending $800 million to purchase some sort of services from Google: “Every year we’ve decided against Google, in this year we’re deciding to use Google at market rates,” he said.
Snell converts the software score to an average letter grade of B to B–. Is Apple satisfied with shipping a consistently B product?
I confess the grade I have given has been lower than this average. My experience with Apple’s software for the past several years has been markedly less than fine. Given that my scores have deviated from those given by many others, I started to question my own fairness — which, given that I am merely A Guy giving my opinion about a multi-trillion-dollar corporation, is a little silly. Then again, software is made — mostly — by people, and the intent I have in participating in the Six Colors survey is that a person working at Apple might possibly read my feedback.
[…]
The most important factor is whether the features I use perform as expected. If it does so with unique design and flair, that is a welcome bonus, but it must be built on a solid foundation.
[…]
I am somewhat impressed by the breadth of Apple’s current offerings as I consider all the ways they are failing me, and I cannot help but wonder if it is that breadth that is contributing to the unreliability of this software. Or perhaps it is the company’s annual treadmill. There was a time when remaining on an older major version of an operating system or some piece of software meant you traded the excitement of new features for the predictability of stability. That trade-off no longer exists; software-as-a-service means an older version is just old, not necessarily more reliable.
I very much enjoy using older Mac OS versions, but not being able to browse the Web properly and securely, not being able to correctly sign in to check a Gmail account, not being able to fetch some RSS feeds because you can’t authenticate securely or establish a secure connection is very frustrating. Not having Dropbox work on my 2009 MacBook Pro running OS X 10.11 El Capitan is a minor annoyance and means I just won’t have access to certain personal files and that I’ll have to sync manually whatever I do on this other machine.
But if I put these two factors aside, there’s nothing about those older Macs, nothing about the older Mac OS versions they run that makes them less reliable. The crystallisation of the operating system they use and the software environment I find on them is exactly what makes them more reliable than the newer stuff. Just because an application has been discontinued by Apple — like Aperture — doesn’t mean it has stopped working or has stopped being reliable.
[…]
What’s really sad in all this is that many of those “problems with the fundamentals of the operating system and first-party apps” aren’t structural; that is, they’re not derived from historical faults or shortcomings in the fundamentals of the operating system. They often are the result of more recent bugs breaking something that used to work or a solution that had already been found, and said bugs have been allowed to fester thanks to an unsustainable yearly release cycle that forces engineers to work on new features instead of fixing what broke down in previous iterations.
The cycle of having a major new version ready to preview by June and shipping in September means the amount of time Apple spends focusing on the current version must necessarily shrink. How many teams at the company do you suppose are, right now, working on MacOS 26 when WWDC is a little over three months away? Engineering efforts are undoubtably beginning to prioritize MacOS 27. There are new features to prepare, after all.
Is what we’re seeing overall is really just Apple losing the battle with complexity?
[…]
Today, Apple seems successful on paper, so the pressure needs to come from inside, from someone high up enough to recognize that what Apple is doing vis-a-vis software quality is not sustainable and hasn’t been for some time now. That the bill already came due on all of the decisions where systems thinking and deep testing and focus and preventative maintenance and paying off design debt have been deprioritized in favour of another shiny launch event that stretches the teams and platforms even thinner.
With the possible exception of individual dodgy Time Machine protocol implementations from third parties, all of the issues are directly traceable to components fully in Apple’s control. None of these issues are impossible for Apple to fix. All of them are incumbent on them to do so. Nearly all of them have persisted for at least two major OS releases and multiple Macs.
In the middle of all this, what Apple chooses to focus on is to implement a redesign that no one asked for, that butchers both the most conceivably fundamental usability and the visual pleasantness its user base has self-selected its platforms for; which only saving grace is that it is half-assed enough to not actually really change some things too badly, compared to what it could have been like. Although, had I upgraded to macOS Tahoe, chances are on top of the visual change, I would have been treated to basic Apple Event infrastructure falling apart and stopping working causing hangs, instability and unpredictability.
[…]
The hardware is great and no doubt M5 and M6 variants will run circles around M1, but if I have to sink down further into this bog, that price is too high to pay - a common enough sentiment that it is a matter of public interest to document downgradability or attempting to block dark pattern upgrades.
[…]
My hope is that Macintosh is not just one of these empires that was at the height of its power and then disintegrated because of warring factions, satiated and uncurious rulers, and droughts for which no one was prepared, ruining crops no one realized were essential for survival.
I don’t want to quote the best parts — just go read it if you haven’t yet.
I genuinely hope Jesper is correct here and my pessimism proves wrong in the long run—that the current version of Apple has been so damaged by a decade of simplification and profit obsession, losing so many valuable people who could effect meaningful change along the way.
How did the post end? Sorry, Liquid Glass wouldn’t let me get to the bottom of the page
As of today, all mentions of Liquid Glass have disappeared from developer.apple.com (the main home page). This may or may not mean anything… but I’ve been watching for it.
Previously:
In episode 680 of ATP, at about 6:12 in, Marco Arment goes off on watchOS 26’s fitness app and trashes all the changes. And I couldn’t agree more with him.
I thought it was just me who hated all the changes, and the slow animations, and the workout picker. It’s such a regression I don’t even know where to start.
[…]
If I could downgrade my watch safely, I would.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-18): Kaveh:
They are so bad, I have no idea how any competent UX designer could have okayed this, and I’m not a competent UX designer by trade.
It used to be trivial to start your working deterministically with a tap or two, now you have to stop your workout entirely to start the bleeping watch workout. I really want to understand how this got approved and shipped at a company that [used to] pride itself on UI/UX design.
I guess I’m not the only one bothered by the changes to the watch workout app. Sometimes when you change the UI just for the sake of changing stuff, you make it worse.
Do you think a major feature of watchOS 27 will be that pushing the “play” button on a Workout actually starts the workout, or do you think Apple is going to hold that back for watchOS 28?
Update (2026-03-20): See also: Accidental Tech Podcast.
To work out how long you can expect your Mac’s internal SSD to last before it reaches that cycle limit, all you need do is to measure how much data is written to it, and once that is 3,000 times the capacity of the SSD, you should expect it to fail through wear. Fortunately, SSDs keep track of the amount of data written to them over their lifetime. This can be accessed through better SSD utilities like DriveDx, and I even have a feature in Mints that will do that for most internal SSDs.
[…]
Unless you work with huge media files, by far your worst enemy is swap space used for virtual memory. When the first M1 Macs were released, base models with just 8 GB of memory and 128 GB internal SSDs were most readily available, with custom builds following later. As a result, many of those who set out to assess Apple’s new Macs ended up stress-testing those with inadequate memory and storage for the tasks they ran. Many noticed rapid changes in their SSD wear indicators, and some were getting worryingly close to the end of their expected working life after just three years.
Previously:
Juli Clover (release notes, no security, no enterprise, no developer, full installer, IPSW):
According to Apple’s release notes for the update, it adds support for the new Studio Display and Studio Display XDR. Apple has also released a firmware update for the new displays.
See also: Howard Oakley and Mr. Macintosh.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-06): Patrick Wardle:
Apple: “3rd-party security tools can’t run in the kernel because they might panic.”
Also Apple: kicks us out and replaces us with their EndpointSecurity kext ...which can be trivially panicked from userland, taking down every security tool + the whole system (macOS 26.3.1)! 🙄
Juli Clover (iOS/iPadOS release notes, no security, no enterprise, no developer):
According to Apple’s release notes, the update adds support for the new Studio Display and Studio Display XDR, and it includes unspecified bug fixes.
Previously:
It was first announced last month without pricing or availability details, but BenQ has now shared all the specs for its new 27-inch 5K display designed for Mac users. The MA270S matches the size and 5,120 x 2,880 resolution of the new Studio Display and Studio Display XDR Apple announced yesterday, including a Nano Gloss surface providing improved viewing angles.
The BenQ MA270S will be available through the company’s online store and retailers including Amazon this month for $999, making it $600 cheaper than Apple’s new $1,599 Studio Display. However, it’s not quite as fully featured as Apple’s latest monitor. The MA270S delivers 99 percent of the P3 color gamut, but is limited to 500 nits of brightness, compared to 600 for the Studio Display.
It has Thunderbolt 4 instead of Thunderbolt 5, but 4 USB ports instead of 2, plus 2 HDMI. There’s no camera. You do get a height-adjustable stand (that can also pivot) and a power button.
BenQ’s MA-series is especially designed for color accuracy when paired with a MacBook.
Previously:
I have macOS Tahoe on my laptop, but I'm keeping my desktop Mac on macOS Sequoia for now. Which means I have the joy of seeing things like this wonderful notification on a regular basis.
Or I did, until I found a way to block them, at least in 90 day chunks.
[…]
The secret? Using device management profiles, which let you enforce policies on Macs in your organization, even if that "organization" is one Mac on your desk. One of the available policies is the ability to block activities related to major macOS updates for up to 90 days at a time (the max the policy allows), which seems like exactly what I needed.
I followed Griffiths’s instructions about a week or so ago, and I’ve been enjoying a no-red-badge System Settings icon ever since. And the Tahoe upgrade doesn’t even show up in General → Software Update. With this profile installed, the confusing interface presented after clicking the “ⓘ” button next to any available update cannot result in your upgrading to 26 Tahoe accidentally.
The Reg FOSS desk has an entry-level MacBook Air, with just 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of SSD storage, and doesn’t have room for the new OS version. We also don’t like the sound of it, so for six months or so, we’ve been dismissing the upgrade reminders – but in recent weeks Apple is making them more prominent. For us, this handy little tool arrived at an opportune moment.
[…]
It’s a neat little hack, and we know of a few people who tried out Tahoe and disliked it enough to do manual downgrades. We suspect this little tool may prove temporarily quite popular.
AFAICT, MacOS Tahoe is worse than malware because it disguises itself as an upgrade.
My general approach to software redesigns is to just roll with them and let their imperfections and quirks become background noise over time—it’s part of my job to point out problems where I see them, but I also need to keep up with new releases whether I’m in love with them or not.
But this person has no such job requirement, and they had two questions: Can I downgrade this? And if so, how?
The answer to the first question is “yes, usually,” and Apple provides some advice scattered across multiple documentation pages. This is an attempt to bring all of those steps together into one page, aimed directly at new Mac buyers who are desperate to switch from Tahoe to the more-familiar macOS 15 Sequoia.
Although the way that macOS updates itself has changed beyond all recognition over the last few years, we tend to assume that it still works much as it did in the past, downloading a single update file, decompressing and installing that. This series of articles takes a deeper dive into what actually happens, and tries to explain how it differs from previous package updates.
- Software Update respects the fact that a System Update would be disruptive to your productivity at this time. Would Sir or Madam care to update tonight, automatically?
- Software Update wishes to remind Sir or Madam that this new Update, which Software Update informed you of yesterday, is available.
- If Sir or Madam thinks that Software Update cannot keep this up alllll week if necessary, then Sir or Madam doesn’t know Software Update very well.
[…]
Listen to me, you feckless, thumb-sucking wetbag: You will Update. Your System Software. Right. The Frick. NOW. It’s not even a demand. It’s reality.
[…]
The longer I delay a major MacOS system update (in this case, macOS Tahoe 26.3), the less stable my Mac becomes…until the whole thing stops working. This stinks.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-06): Chris Turner:
First thing I noted was that it applied to macOS 15.7.3; it was written back in January of this year, and I had already updated to 15.7.4. So I read through the comments to see if anyone had actually addressed this issue of Rob’s solution working or not with the latter version. No one had, but Jeff Hirsch had left a comment that had me running off to System Settings to give it a whirl:
Go into Software Update, switch your Beta Updates to the macOS Sequoia Public Beta channel and enjoy your nag free Sequoia experience. Done and done.
No profiles, no expiration. Just a quick and painless removal of those persistent Tahoe upgrade nags.
Yes! This is the kind of thing I was looking for: something simple, easily undoable when the time comes, and I don’t have to worry about a lot of copying and pasting in Terminal.
If you don’t see the Beta Updates options, enter this command in Terminal:
open 'x-apple.systempreferences:com.apple.Software-Update-Settings.extension?action=showBetaUpdates'
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): John Gruber (also):
This video from Mr. Macintosh shows how to do the same thing, but using the free iMazing Profile Editor to create the device profile instead of hand-editing the XML Property List.
I still prefer the Beta Updates way.
Apple (Hacker News, MacRumors, Slashdot):
MacBook Neo starts with a beautiful Apple design, featuring a durable aluminum enclosure in an array of gorgeous colors — blush, indigo, silver, and a fresh new citrus. Its stunning 13-inch Liquid Retina display brings websites, photos, videos, and apps to life with high resolution and brightness, and support for 1 billion colors. Powered by A18 Pro, MacBook Neo can fly through everyday tasks, from browsing the web and streaming content, to editing photos, exploring creative hobbies, or using AI capabilities across apps. In fact, it’s up to 50 percent faster for everyday tasks like web browsing, and up to 3x faster when running on-device AI workloads like applying advanced effects to photos, compared to the bestselling PC with the latest shipping Intel Core Ultra 5. Providing up to 16 hours of battery life, MacBook Neo allows users to go all day on a single charge. A 1080p FaceTime HD camera and dual mics make it easy to look and sound great, and the dual side-firing speakers with Spatial Audio deliver crisp, immersive sound. MacBook Neo also features Apple’s renowned Magic Keyboard for comfortable and precise typing, and a large Multi-Touch trackpad with support for intuitive gestures, enabling smooth and precise control.
[…]
And starting at just $599 and $499 for education, MacBook Neo is Apple’s most affordable laptop ever, providing an unprecedented combination of quality and value.
The base model has 8 GB of RAM and a 256 GB SSD. For $699 you can get a 512 GB SSD and Touch ID. Both models have one USB 3 port and one USB 2 port (both with the USB-C connector). At 2.7 pounds, it’s the same weight as the MacBook Air.
All in all, this looks like big improvement over the M1 MacBook Air (except that it can’t run Sequoia). It’s the same price as the iPad Air (sans keyboard) and iPhone 17e. I don’t know why this took so many years, but I think it’s going to be a hit.
No $599 Mac laptop is going to exist without compromises, but they’re surprisingly minimal, in my opinion.
[…]
If you’re wondering if an iPhone processor can really drive a Mac, let me reprint this chart that I posted last year[…]
The A18 Pro is faster at single-core than the M3 and slightly faster at multi-core than the M1. The biggest limitation is the 8 GB of RAM, which is fine for many uses, but not for Xcode.
They were so, so close! The Citrus should have been a Key Lime instead. Leave the Indigo as is and boom, you’d have the iBook G3 SE colors from 2000. 😄
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): John Siracusa:
The A18 Pro in the MacBook Neo is 19% faster than the M2 Ultra in the Mac Pro in single-core performance (Geekbench 6).
The MacBook Neo starts at $599.
The Mac Pro, which is still for sale, starts at $6,999.
The display has a resolution of 2408x1506. It uses an A18 Pro CPU - same CPU used in the iPhone 16 Pro. The iPhone 16 Pro Max has a 2868× 1320 display.
If a game runs well on an iPhone 16 Pro, it should run well on a MacBook Neo. The display resolutions are nearly the same.
Andrew Cunningham (MacRumors):
The screen is also a bit of a step down from the MacBook Air’s 13.6-inch 2560×1664 screen. Apple says it’s a 13-inch LCD with a 2408×1506 resolution and 500 nits of maximum brightness. It does not support the P3 wide color gamut or Apple’s True Tone technology, unlike the old M1 MacBook Air. It has rounded upper display corners like the current MacBook Airs and Pros, but doesn’t include the notch. The MacBook is also capable of driving a single external display—up to 4K at 60 Hz, disqualifying it from powering Apple’s 5K Studio Displays.
Here’s a list of what separates the MacBook Neo from the $1099 MacBook Air, besides their sizes[…]
I know a bunch of people will disagree, but this is the most relevant Mac announcement in years[…]
[…]
I would swap my iPad Pro for it in a flash (if it had a 12” display, that is). And that is probably exactly why it is that big.
I still stand by it: this is the smartest move Apple has made in years.
[…]
I’ve long been baffled by the notion that Apple would cede the education market – one they long dominated when I was a kid – to cheap Windows devices and more recently, Chromebooks. Yes, they clearly thought the iPad could be the answer there. But that always felt a bit off. Sure, the iPad is a brilliant device and great for some things in classrooms. But for a lot of work, including school work, you’re going to want a “real” computer. Try as they might with keyboards and trackpads, Apple has not been able to morph the iPad into that real computer. And they keep insisting they don’t want to! (Even if their constant tweaks suggest otherwise.)
That’s fine. But again, it doesn’t work in the classroom. Even if it works 90% of the time, it needs to work 100% of the time for students. And the MacBook Neo can. Finally.
The Neo no longer includes a physical indicator light. macOS now displays the camera in use indicator in the menu bar whenever the webcam is active.
I’m interested to see what my Apple security researcher friends think about this. Hopefully Apple has implemented protections to properly isolate this new webcam notification.
Update (2026-03-05): John Gruber:
The MacBook Neo looks and feels every bit like a MacBook. Solid aluminum. Good keyboard (no backlighting, but supposedly the same mechanism as in other post-2019 MacBooks — felt great in my quick testing). Good trackpad (no Force Touch — it actually physically clicks, but you can click anywhere, not just the bottom). Good bright display (500 nits max, same as the MacBook Air). Surprisingly good speakers, in a new side-firing configuration. Without even turning either laptop on, you can just see and feel that the MacBook Neo is a vastly superior device.
[…]
I came into today’s
eventexperience expecting a starting price of $799 for the Neo — $300 less than the new $1,099 price for the base M5 MacBook Air (which, in defense of that price, starts with 512 GB storage). $599 is a fucking statement. Apple is coming after this market. I think they’re going to sell a zillion of these things, and “almost half” of new Mac buyers being new to the platform is going to become “more than half”. The MacBook Neo is not a footnote or hobby, or a pricing stunt to get people in the door before upselling them to a MacBook Air. It’s the first major new Mac aimed at the consumer market in the Apple Silicon era.[…]
And while the ports aren’t labeled, if you plug an external display into the “wrong” port, you’ll get an on-screen notification suggesting you plug it into the other port.
[…]
8 GB of RAM is not a lot, but with Apple Silicon it really is enough for typical consumer productivity apps. (If they update the Neo annually and next year’s model gets the A19 Pro, it will move not to 16 GB of RAM but 12 GB.)
As I said above, I think 8 GB is OK for this model, but I still object to this narrative from Apple that Apple Silicon somehow makes 8 GB better, that it’s really “analogous to 16GB on other systems.” That even seems backwards because the unified memory architecture means that some of the RAM will be used for graphics rather than apps.
Apple’s low-cost MacBook Neo is compatible with the company’s new Studio Displays, but its output will be scaled to 4K resolution at 60Hz.
In short, Apple said MacBook Neo sounds fresh.
“We wanted something that felt fun and friendly, and fresh, and felt like it really suited the spirit of this product,” said Colleen Novielli, a Mac product marketing director, in conversation with TechRadar’s Lance Ulanoff.
MacBook Neo v. MBA Size comparison
Height: 1.27 cm (0.50 inch) v. 1.13 cm (0.44 inch)
Width: 29.75 cm (11.71 inches) v. 30.41 cm (11.97 inches)
Depth: 20.64 cm (8.12 inches) v. 21.5 cm (8.46 inches)
Weight: 1.23 kg (2.7 pounds) v. 1.23 kg (2.7 pounds)
Julio Ojeda-Zapata and Adam Engst:
MacBook Neo has a significantly smaller battery than the MacBook Air—36.5 watt-hours versus 53.8 watt‑hours. The smaller battery won’t yield much cost savings, but its reduced weight may be necessary to offset other components that cost less but weigh more.
[…]
Instead of the Force Touch trackpad introduced with the 12-inch MacBook that relies on pressure sensors and a haptic click simulation, Apple advertises the MacBook Neo as using a Multi-Touch trackpad. If that’s the same trackpad as before, it has a physical click mechanism that doesn’t work as well at the edges and is more likely to fail. However, it’s undoubtedly cheaper and still supports multi-finger gestures. It doesn’t support the Force Touch features like deep pressing a file in the Finder to open it in Quick Look, but we doubt many people use them.
[…]
A MacBook Neo is perfectly adequate for writing short papers in Pages, creating presentations in Keynote, analyzing science lab data in Numbers, browsing the Web in Safari, keeping up with email in Mail, and chatting with friends in Messages.
[…]
However, the MacBook Neo isn’t appropriate for all students. We’d recommend that college-bound students stick with the MacBook Air, even if they don’t anticipate needing its full power. It’s hard to predict what might be necessary during college, and a student may find themselves wanting to edit video, produce music, run stats apps, and more.
I’ve been teaching people how to use Macs for a long time. The number one barrier has always been cost. People want to try the Mac, but they can’t justify the price. That excuse just evaporated.
I support a number of folks, both older and younger, who only use computers in the same basic way they use their smartphones. I’m thinking Apple’s new MacBook Neo, with a starting price of $599 will hit many of their sweet spots.
I was overall impressed with the company managing to bring decent specs and industry-leading build quality to a $599 laptop. I expect holiday sales later this year will be chart topping.
[…]
There being no RAM upgrade beyond the stock 8GBs is disappointing, but not surprising necessarily. I think within a year or two a newer A-series chip will be added, and that will result in a RAM bump to 12GBs like we’ve seen with recent iPhone releases.
I figured $800 would be as low as Apple would be willing to go for its “low cost” laptop. Under $800 seemed improbable. Under $600 was laughably impossible.
Well, Apple went and did it. They built the seemingly impossible: a sub-$600 laptop which—despite its limitations and compromises—is a perfectly calibrated, entry-level computer that’s worthy of being called “MacBook.”
To explain it in breakfast terms: Apple can’t get itself excited about making and selling a $6 takeout bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich on an English muffin. But it’ll apply an almost terrifying amount of institutional energy towards the development of a $60 hotel restaurant breakfast.
This sort of attitude is usually cited as one of Apple’s strengths. It isn’t. It frequently holds Apple back. “A strip of bacon, a scrambled egg, and a slice of American cheese on a toasted English muffin” is a straightforward and unremarkable piece of design and engineering, but:
It fills a universal need. It’s immensely popular. It’s precisely what millions of people want. It’s relevant and it’s flawlessly aligned. It can be prepared to a high standard, quickly, efficiently, and in large quantities, by an worker with little training, using the facility’s existing manufacturing lines and tooling.
With the color choices, $499 education price, and being enough computer for many tasks, I suspect these will sell like crazy—K-12 institutions looking to move away or supplement Chromebooks now have a cheaper option, college students on a budget can still get a Mac. The $100 upgrade to double the storage and add Touch ID will probably feel worthwhile for some, but the low-end model hits an incredible price point for any Mac.
Are there compromises? Absolutely, but I think that Apple made good choices on what to cut compared with the MacBook Air. Thinking to a number of past budget Macs, they usually hit a price point, but were quite terrible in major ways.
See also: Mac Power Users Talk.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-06): Juli Clover (Hacker News):
The MacBook Neo earned a single-core score of 3461 and a multi-core score of 8668, along with a Metal score of 31286.
Here's how the Neo's scores compare to iPhone 16 Pro and other devices that make apt comparisons:
- iPhone 16 Pro - 3445 single-core, 8624 multi-core, 32575 Metal
- M1 MacBook Air - 2346 single-core, 8342 multi-core, 33148 Metal
- M4 MacBook Air - 3696 single-core, 14730 multi-core, 54630 Metal
- M3 iPad Air - 3048 single-core, 11678 multi-core, 44395 Metal
- iPad 11 - 2587 single-core, 6036 multi-core, 19395 Metal
Why did it take so long for Apple to offer a Mac at such an affordable price? Schulze remarks that many people have wanted more affordable Apple products for a long time.
Ternus responds: “Sure. And I think that’s why: the bar is high. We didn’t want to do it until we could do it really, really well, and build a Mac that we were proud of.”
Why couldn’t they before? Was it just not a priority or is there something new here that they’ve not yet discussed?
MacBook Neo […] has the potential to be one of the most important Macs in history. I say this without intention to exaggerate.
[…]
The base model MacBook Neo has only 8 GB of RAM, which has drawn some criticism, but my M1 Mac mini has only 8 GB of RAM, and its performance always seemed fine, so I don’t think the specs will be a problem for consumers.
[…]
MacBook Neo, with a dramatically lower price, has the potential to cut into the iPad market, particularly for iPad Pro, and as far as I’m concerned, that would be a positive result.
When you try to figure out why the Ultra 3 costs so much more than the Neo, let alone its Watch siblings, things get trickier for Apple.
Ok, I have a problem: I only have $700 and I can’t decide between the MacBook Neo and this beautiful set of Mac Pro wheels. Any suggestions?
This is really exciting to see! The new MacBook Neo is already starting to see shipping delays.
See also: Accidental Tech Podcast, Dithering, Six Colors Podcast.
Previously:
Apple (Hacker News, TidBITS, MacRumors, ArsTechnica):
Apple today announced the latest 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro with the all-new M5 Pro and M5 Max, bringing game-changing performance and AI capabilities to the world’s best pro laptop.
[…]
The new MacBook Pro includes N1, an Apple-designed wireless networking chip that enables Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6, bringing improved performance and reliability to wireless connections. It also offers up to 24 hours of battery life; a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display with a nano-texture option; a wide array of connectivity[…]
[…]
The new MacBook Pro delivers up to 2x faster read/write performance compared to the previous generation, reaching speeds of up to 14.5GB/s and accelerating workflows for professionals working across 4K and 8K video projects, LLMs, and complex datasets. MacBook Pro with M5 Pro now comes standard with 1TB of storage, while MacBook Pro with M5 Max now comes standard with 2TB. And the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M5 now comes standard with 1TB of storage.
Seems like a great incremental update.
The starting price of the M5 MacBook Pro was $1,599, but now it starts at $1,699 because of the updated storage. While the starting price has gone up, the price for SSD upgrades has technically shifted down.
[…]
Upgrading to 2TB from the base starting storage used to be $600, but now the 2TB upgrade is $400. The 4TB upgrade is $1,000, $200 less than the $1,200 that it used to cost.
The MacBook Pro Tech Specs page is a good place to start to compare the entire M5 MacBook Pro lineup.
I wish Apple would have permalinks for these pages so that I could link to content that wouldn’t be different next year.
Also worth noting — Apple’s RAM pricing remains unchanged, despite the spike in memory prices industry-wide.
It’s the least they could do given the huge margins in the past.
Last year you needed buy one with the high-end M4 Max chip to get 64 GB; now you can configure a MacBook Pro with the M5 Pro with 64 GB.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): Mr. Macintosh:
Looks like Apple updated the keyboard on the new M5 16‑inch MacBook Pro. The Backspace, Return, Shift, and Tab labels are gone, replaced with symbols instead.
I think the M5 Macs are likely the last ones built on procurement agreements pre-memory-and-storage-shortage. I predict that shortage will not end in the next few years and will affect all parts of the consumer computer economy because I predict that the marginal return on silicon in data centers will increase exponentially with the scaling of AI. I predict this will dramatically drive up the cost of products for consumers or dramatically drive down their supply.
Update (2026-03-20): Jason Snell:
To summarize, the M5 CPU core is about 15% faster than the M4 generation, and the Pro and Max 15- or 18-core CPU configurations are going to blow my 14-core M4 Max out of the water. My review unit is 23% faster than my M4 Max laptop.
[…]
In the end, the question for upgraders coming from older Apple silicon MacBook Pros will be: Is it worth it to get a more powerful chip to do whatever it is you’re doing? And, secondarily: Are you willing to wait to see what Apple might have up its sleeve with the first iteration of an entirely new design, if that’s indeed what’s coming?
In our testing, the fully enabled M5 Max’s single-core performance is about 10 percent higher than the fully enabled version of the M4 Max in last year’s 16-inch MacBook Pro. The multi-core performance improvements are more variable (Cinebench R23, which shows a 30 percent improvement, seems to be an outlier), but most tests also show a modest 10 or 12 percent improvement.
Graphics performance improvements are slightly more robust, measuring between 20 and 35 percent depending on the test. Apple suggests you may see more uplift on GPU compute workloads that can leverage the neural accelerator Apple has built into each M5-family GPU core.
The first reviews of the new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models with Apple’s M5 Pro and M5 Max chips were published today by selected publications and YouTube channels, ahead of the laptops launching on Wednesday.
Apple (Hacker News, TidBITS, MacRumors):
Apple today announced the new MacBook Air with M5, bringing exceptional performance and expanded AI capabilities to the world’s most popular laptop. M5 features a faster CPU and next-generation GPU with a Neural Accelerator in each core, enabling MacBook Air to power through a variety of workflows, from creative projects to complex AI tasks. MacBook Air now comes standard with double the starting storage at 512GB with faster SSD technology, and is configurable up to 4TB, so customers can keep their most important work on hand. Apple’s N1 wireless chip delivers Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 for seamless connectivity on the go.
This looks really good. There are still two Thunderbolt ports, plus MagSafe, and a 32 GB RAM ceiling. The RAM pricing is confusing. The base model with the 8-core GPU is $1,099 with 16 GB of RAM, and you can’t upgrade its memory. For $1,199, you can get the model with 10 GPU cores, and then it makes available a $400 option to upgrade to 32 GB of RAM, but clicking on that shows a total of $1,499 rather than $1,599.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): John Gruber:
Base storage went from 256 to 512 GB, but the base price went from the magic $999 to $1,100[…] Presumably, those in the market for a $999 MacBook will buy the new […] lower-priced MacBook “Neo”[…]
Previously:
Update (2026-03-20): Dan Moren:
Gone, in this generation (including the new MacBook Pros), are several keys’ text labels: tab, caps lock, return, shift, and delete. In each case, they’ve been replaced by glyphs, of the same kind long used for keyboard shortcuts in drop-down menus.
[…]
The second thing that I noticed was that Apple is now shipping a new power adapter with the M5 Air. Previously, the company included either a 30W adapter for the base model or a 35W adapter with 2 USB-C ports. With this model, we’re back to a single port “Dynamic Power Adapter” that is rated for 40W with a maximum of 60W. It’s a little smaller than the old dual port design—and, interestingly, lacks the standard holes on the prongs that you find on most plugs, which can add some degree of stability to the connection—but can handle fast charging with the iPhone 17, 17 Pro, and Air, as well as the 11-inch and 13-inch M5 iPad Pro models. Honestly, I’ll miss the convenience of the second USB-C port, though that adapter model is still available for purchase separately from Apple.
[…]
The Air remains a truly great Mac. Those who butt up against the limitations of the Neo will be more than comfortable here: after all, it’s unquestionably better than the Neo in pretty much every way—with the exception of its color options. There’s a clear value proposition with the Air: pay more to get more. And that higher cost is reasonable for what you get, especially when you compare the starting prices of the MacBook Pro.
Apple (Hacker News, MacRumors):
The chips are built using a new Apple-designed Fusion Architecture. This innovative design combines two dies into a single system on a chip (SoC), which includes a powerful CPU, scalable GPU, Media Engine, unified memory controller, Neural Engine, and Thunderbolt 5 capabilities. M5 Pro and M5 Max feature a new 18-core CPU architecture. It includes six of the highest-performing core design, now called super cores, that are the world’s fastest CPU core. Alongside these cores are 12 all-new performance cores, optimized for power-efficient, multithreaded workloads. Collectively, the CPU significantly boosts performance by up to 30 percent for pro workloads. The GPU scales up the next-generation architecture introduced in M5 to an up-to-40-core GPU. With a Neural Accelerator in each GPU core and higher unified memory bandwidth, M5 Pro and M5 Max are over 4x the peak GPU compute for AI compared to the previous generation.
Looking backward, the naming is confusing in that the “super” cores are the same as the M5 performance cores. They could have instead kept the “performance” and “efficiency” names and given the new type of core a new name. It’s not obvious what would could be, though. Looking forward, the naming does seem to accurately convey that the new “performance” cores are in the middle and closer to “super” than to “efficiency”.
Here’s a summary of the cores situation:
| Regular | Pro | Max | |
|---|---|---|---|
| M1 | 4p/4e | 8p/2e | 8p/2e |
| M2 | 4p/4e | 8p/4e | 8p/4e |
| M3 | 4p/4e | 6p/6e | 12p/4e |
| M4 | 4p/6e | 10p/4e | 12p/4e |
| M5 | 4s/6e | 6s/12p | 6s/12p |
I’m pleased that I can get the maximum number of CPU cores and 64 GB of RAM without having to go Max.
Apple’s approach here is different—for example, the M5 Pro is not just a pair of M5 chips welded together. Rather, Apple has one chiplet handling the CPU and most of the I/O, and a second one that’s mainly for graphics, both built on the same 3nm TSMC manufacturing process. The first silicon die is always the same, whether you get an M5 Pro or M5 Max.
[…]
And now, in the middle, we have a new type of “performance core” used exclusively in the M5 Pro and M5 Max.
These are, in fact, a new, third type of CPU core design, distinct from both the super cores and the M5’s efficiency cores. They apparently use designs similar to the super cores but prioritize multi-threaded performance rather than fast single-core performance. Apple’s approach with the new performance cores sounds similar to the one AMD uses in its laptop silicon: it has larger Zen 4 and Zen 5 CPU cores, optimized for peak clock speeds and higher power usage, and smaller Zen 4c and Zen 5c cores that support the same capabilities but run slower and are optimized to use less die space.
“Maxing out at over 614 GB/s of unified memory bandwidth, the M5 Max SoC architecture is more efficient than ever at calculating specular highlights on user interface componentry that needn’t be translucent,” notes Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of Hardware Technologies.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): John Gruber:
Another way to think about it is that there are regular efficiency cores in the plain M5, and new higher-performing efficiency cores called “performance” in the M5 Pro and M5 Max. The problem is that the old M1–M4 names were clear — one CPU core type was fast but optimized for efficiency so they called it “efficiency”, and the other core type was efficient but optimized for performance so they called it “performance”. Now, the new “performance” core types are the optimized-for-efficiency CPU cores in the Pro and Max chips, and despite their name, they’re not the most performant cores.
This affects Apple in other ways, too. The “Air” isn’t the lightest or thinnest iPad or MacBook (starting tomorrow, in the latter case, but also true from 2015-2019 when the plain MacBook existed). The M(n) Max chips are not the maximum-performance chips in the lineup.
Here’s the backstory: With every new generation of Apple’s Mac-series processors, I’ve gotten the impression from Apple execs that they’ve been a little frustrated with the perception that their “lesser” efficiency cores were weak sauce. I’ve lost count of the number of briefings and conversations I’ve had where they’ve had to go out of their way to point out that, actually, the lesser cores on an M-series chip are quite fast on their own, in addition to being very good at saving power!
M5 is different. It is the first proof that the original M1 idea is durable enough to survive a fundamental change in how the chips are built today and in the future. The capabilities of the new design reflect that.
For example, while the core counts didn’t change, Apple put a Neural Accelerator inside every GPU core. M5 Pro still has 20 GPU cores. M5 Max still has 40. Same as M4. But each core now does double duty. That is how Apple claims 4x the AI compute without adding more silicon. The GPU is becoming an AI processor that sometimes does graphics.
[…]
Once you’ve proven you can split the chip and keep unified memory working across the pieces, the question changes. It is no longer “how big can we make this chip?” It is “how many pieces can we connect, and in how many dimensions?”
Update (2026-03-06): Joe Rossignol:
In this unconfirmed result, the M5 Max with an 18-core CPU achieved a score of 29,233 for multi-core CPU performance, which tops the 27,726 score achieved by the Mac Studio's M3 Ultra chip with a 32-core CPU. M5 Max is now the fastest Apple silicon chip ever, and it even topped every other consumer PC processor in the Geekbench database.
Update (2026-03-20): Anton Shilov (Slashdot, Hacker News):
Apple’s desktop and notebook processors traditionally lead the pack in single-thread workloads, as industry-leading single-thread performance has been the company’s focus for a long time. However, Apple’s M5 Max processors not only outperform rivals by a huge margin in single-thread workloads, but beat all of them — including the 96-core AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 9995WX — in multi-thread workloads in the Geekbench 6 benchmark.
There is a major catch here as the Geekbench 6 multi-thread benchmark is a brief, bursty test intended to mimic common consumer tasks such as archive compression, PDF processing, and image editing. Its short runtime and bursty nature prevent it from fully stressing ultra-high-core-count processors like the Ryzen Threadripper Pro 9995WX.
Furthermore, many of the suite’s multi-threaded subtests scale efficiently only to roughly 8 – 32 threads, which leaves much of such CPUs’ parallel capacity idle, but which creates an almost perfect environment for Apple’s CPUs that feature a relatively modest number of cores, but which evolve noticeably in terms of per-core performance from one generation to another.
Apple (Hacker News, Reddit, MacRumors):
The new Studio Display features a 12MP Center Stage camera, now with improved image quality and support for Desk View; a studio-quality three-microphone array; and an immersive six-speaker sound system with Spatial Audio. It also now includes powerful Thunderbolt 5 connectivity, providing more downstream connectivity for high-speed accessories or daisy-chaining displays. The all-new Studio Display XDR takes the pro display experience to the next level. Its 27-inch 5K Retina XDR display features an advanced mini-LED backlight with over 2,000 local dimming zones, up to 1000 nits of SDR brightness, and 2000 nits of peak HDR brightness, in addition to a wider color gamut, so content jumps off the screen with breathtaking contrast, vibrancy, and accuracy. With its 120Hz refresh rate, Studio Display XDR is even more responsive to content in motion, and Adaptive Sync dynamically adjusts frame rates for content like video playback or graphically intense games. Studio Display XDR offers the same advanced camera and audio system as Studio Display, as well as Thunderbolt 5 connectivity to simplify pro workflow setups. The new Studio Display with a tilt-adjustable stand starts at $1,599, and Studio Display XDR with a tilt- and height-adjustable stand starts at $3,299. Both are available in standard or nano-texture glass options[…]
The old, terrible camera was also 12MP. I’d rather have an iPhone rear camera and no Center Stage. It seems like the display panel is the same, as are the limited number of ports and the price. I wonder whether it still has an A13 and no power button.
The price premium for 5K Retina displays remains surprising. A 1× Dell 27-inch display is $189.99, a 4K one is $239.99, and you don’t have to pay extra to get matte.
I’m incredibly disappointed. I continue to think the Studio Display is for people who care about everything in a computer monitor besides the display itself.
[…]
There are people who really value physical design, and that’s fine, but if you want a great monitor that looks better than this (yes, even at 5K), there are other options, all of which cost a good deal less.
[…]
Compared to the $6,000 Pro Display XDR Apple was selling before, [the Studio Display XDR is] a steal at $3,300. And truthfully, it looks like a great monitor. 5K 120Hz mini-LED with 2,304 local dimming zones is undeniably a compelling combo.
[…]
I think what bums me out about Apple’s display lineup is that they are only serving the absolute highest end of the market, they have no truly “consumer” displays.
By default, the Studio Display still comes with a tilt-adjustable stand, though there are options for both a height-adjustable stand or a VESA mount. The Studio Display XDR gets the height-adjustable stand by default, and can also be configured with a VESA mount.
According to Apple’s list of compatible Macs, neither model will work with an Intel-based Mac.
According to Apple, Macs that have an M1, M1 Pro, M1 Max, M1 Ultra, M2, or M3 will only support the Studio Display XDR at 60Hz.
Apple today discontinued its Pro Display XDR, following the introduction of a new 27-inch Studio Display XDR monitor.
All in all… meh.
28% fewer pixels for 34% fewer dollars – so technically better value, if you don’t really care about screen real-estate. But that extra real estate is really valuable, and Apple have now apparently ceded the large display market to… well, mostly the tumbleweeds. Sure, there’s technically other 6k displays, like the LG, the Dell, or the Asus, but while they have some advantages – less than half the price, most notably – they have real big disadvantages – like low brightness and poor contrast ratios.
[…]
I didn’t bother including the audio & camera aspects because I’m genuinely confused as to who, in the market for an expensive display, would care? If you’re doing photography there’s no sound anyway, and if you’re doing videography in this price range you should be using real speakers or headphones.
[…]
I’m also choosing to overlook the firmware, which I assume uses the same weird, bastardised, glitchy version of iOS as the prior Studio Display model.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): Simon:
The same $1599 base price for the same 5K panel they introduced all the way back in 2014. What a missed opportunity. And they still consider a proper adjustable stand just another source of extra income.
This update—which is mainly about Thunderbolt 5 and improved microphones and speakers—is underwhelming. Selling it for the same prices as the outgoing monitor is even more disappointing.
User: The industry is moving towards larger displays
Apple: XDR 32" = dead
User: uh ok.. we also wanted a 27" 120hz Studio Display
Apple: ok. Studio Display XDR 27" for $3299
User: What? no that’s not...
Apple: enjoy
Few Pro Display XDR owners will likely switch to the Studio Display XDR. While it has some improved specs, it’s still significantly smaller—who’s going to give up a 32-inch 6K display for a 27-inch 5K display?
But on its own, the Studio Display is important. By bringing mini-LED technology, HDR support, and professional color accuracy to a 27-inch display at $3299, Apple has made these capabilities accessible to video editors, photographers, and designers who couldn’t justify the cost of the $5000 Pro Display XDR, particularly when coupled with the $1000 Pro Stand.
If I plug the new Studio Display into my Tahoe supported Intel Mac, it’s just flat‑out not going to work?
[…]
All I’m asking for is base compatibility. 60 hertz, mic, camera & speakers.
Apple display daisy‑chaining has returned after an almost 10 year hiatus!
You can now daisy‑chain up to four Studio Displays (& XDR) with the new MacBook Pro M5 Max.
I guess it would be nice to see HDR content, but not nice enough to spend $3,600 to get one with nano-texture. And I don’t think I care about 120 Hz on my Mac?
Just saw the Studio Display XDR. $3300 for a 5K 27” display? No thanks. The brightness, mini-LED pixels, and 120Hz are nice, but there are tons of other options with similar features for a third of the cost.
I bought the Pro Display XDR years ago. It was outrageously expensive, but at the time it was the only 6K display on the market (and had a 32” size to match). That extra resolution and size made it worth it to me. I’m kind of surprised that Apple is replacing it with a smaller model.
The new Studio Displau XDR price is so bonkers that I originally thought I was reading about a new 6k/32 inch display. There were comparable displays on announced at CES I’d expect to come in around the $1000 mark or less. Only things missing were the webcam and speakers.
I really wish they had kept the 6k/32 config and price dropped it.
It’s 2026 and we’re back to Apple’s biggest display size being 27 inches. What a disappointment. I don’t understand why we’re permanently locked into the idea that 27 inches is the biggest a display needs to be.
See also: Mac Power Users Talk.
Update (2026-03-05): Joe Rossignol:
The firmware reveals that the second-generation Studio Display is equipped with an A19 chip, while the Studio Display XDR has an A19 Pro chip, according to code reviewed by MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris.
The Studio Display should have been $999.
Even at Apple’s high prices due to their nice build quality, it should not be over a thousand bucks. $1299 would have been absurd. But $1599? You’d have to be a crazy person to pay that.
I’m a lot less offended by the $3299 XDR than by the $1599 base version. At least the XDR is a premium product. It’s a money-no-object product, so you’re paying a lot, but you’re getting a lot.
But to pay $1599 for a mid-tier monitor ($1999 if you want height adjustment) - is just plain offensive.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-06): Mr. Macintosh:
I just verified that the 2016 12" MacBook works with the original 2022 Studio Display (at 4k resolution)
My guess is that the new monitor will work just fine on Intel Macs! Is this a marketing ploy?
I asked and the answer is that quite a bit of the support to drive these displays runs the Mac they’re connected to.
But why can they not act like generic monitors?
I find myself feeling about the Studio Display XDR the same way I do about the Vision Pro. It’s a high-priced product on the leading edge of what is possible with mass-market consumer electronics. I am directly in the target market. This feels made for me. But the fact that its value is limited by strict “walled garden” constraints imposed by Apple makes me not able to justify the purchase.
[…]
Likewise, the Studio Display XDR seems like an exciting display, but you can only ever plug it into a Mac or an iPad. There’s no HDMI input, nor support for standard DisplayPort sources. Game consoles? Nope. Streaming boxes? Nope. Gaming PCs? Nope. I could justify investing in a screen of this quality if I could imagine using it for the next decade as the highest-quality display surface for any input I want to feed into it. But instead this product is locked down, limited to only the devices Apple will sell me. The utility just isn’t there to justify paying a “bleeding edge” price tag.
Three of the seven models in the Mac lineup require an external display. Apple has two choices: one really advanced one that costs as much as a generously-specced Mac Studio, and another that feels like it is stumbling along.
Update (2026-03-31): Cory Birdsong:
Contrast the Studio Displays with Airpods. If you pair a new Airpods model with an older Apple OS or non-Apple device they will work as generic Bluetooth headphones, and all you miss out on is the fancy nonstandard features that are layered on top. To borrow a web dev term, it’s a great example of progressive enhancement.
Apple’s newly published Studio Display XDR Technology Overview white paper reveals two notable display technologies: a forthcoming Full Calibration feature and a new color measurement model called Apple CMF 2026.
[Each] display has 128GB of internal NAND storage. […] The prior-generation Studio Display had 64GB of storage, so the new displays have double the capacity.
With the Studio Display and Studio Display XDR set to launch on Wednesday, members of the media have started publishing their reviews of the new display options.
Apple replaced the $4,999+ Pro Display XDR with the better, more affordable Studio Display XDR, so we thought we'd pick one up to test out and compare to the now-discontinued Pro Display XDR.
Apple claims it’s a champion of accessibility. But in my opinion, part of accessibility is ergonomics. Different people need displays at different heights, and we are all shaped differently. Apple’s continued insistence on shipping displays and iMacs that aren’t height-adjustable by default is frustrating. You spend all this money on a pricey Apple display and then, what, put it on an old dictionary? Meanwhile, even the cut-rate competition offers height adjustments.
Saw the Studio Display XDR today and it feels like a tough sell.
It does look better side by side with a Studio Display. It’s more even and vivid - but in a way that can be subtle.
102hz and MiniLED are my kind of thing, so I can appreciate it - but if you didn’t know otherwise and weren’t trying to pick the image quality apart you might not know. A lot easier to justify a big price jump when the display was a larger size.
Well, that one remaining way matters a lot for a monitor…
I’d personally get the Pro Display XDR for the extra screen space, even though the Studio Display XDR looks better, comes with a camera and speakers, and has Thunderbolt 5. That’s how much I don’t want to give up screen space! If you’ve never had a 6K display, then you probably won’t miss the extra space and should probably get the Studio Display XDR.
I got my brand new Apple Studio Display XDR yesterday, set it up with my M2 Ultra Mac Studio and had it crash my system four times during the day. Exactly the same thing each time. The left half of the screen goes black, the right half has moving magenta coloured static on it for five seconds or so, then the computer restarts. I did a support chat and they just told me to bring it back to the Apple Store I bought it from so a genius could have a look at it. I haven’t done that yet because the store is hours away.
[…]
I ended up taking the monitor to an Apple Store to show a genius because it kept happening. I had managed to take a photo of the screen while it was glitching, but before it crashed and showed that to the genius. He took one look and said let’s just swap it over for a new one because that is bad and shouldn’t be happening. He said it was not worth doing the diagnostics etc.
So I came home with a new one and plugged it in and the exact same thing happened.
So I’ve been doing more searches on line and it looks like more people are starting to see the same thing.
The workaround is to run it at 60Hz.
See also: Accidental Tech Podcast and MacRumors Forums.
Update (2026-04-01): Tim Hardwick:
Apple has quietly reduced the price of the Studio Display XDR when configured with the VESA mount adapter, dropping it from $3,299 to $2,899 – a $400 cut. The nano-texture VESA version has also dropped from $3,599 to $3,199.
[…]
VESA mount options are normally priced lower than the fancier stand versions on most displays (including Apple’s own Pro Display XDR, for which the VESA option was always cheaper). The price change for the Studio Display XDR is therefore more in line with how these things are typically priced.
Apple (MacRumors, Hacker News):
With M4, iPad Air is up to 30 percent faster than iPad Air with M3, and up to 2.3x faster than iPad Air with M1. The new iPad Air also features the latest in Apple silicon connectivity chips, N1 and C1X, delivering fast wireless and cellular connections — and support for Wi-Fi 7 — that empower users to work and be creative anywhere.
[…]
With the same starting price of just $599 for the 11-inch model and $799 for the 13-inch model, the new iPad Air is an incredible value.
Kicking off a week of product announcements, the new iPad Air has arrived, but if you go see it at the Apple Store, you’d be hard-pressed to know if Apple actually switched out the old models. They have the same dimensions, same colors, and same displays, have the same prices, and the same tagline on Apple’s website.
All the major improvements are under the hood. In addition to the M4 processor’s 30-percent performance improvement, there’s now 12GB of unified RAM—up from 8GB of memory in the M3 Air—and memory bandwidth of 120GB/s, compared to the 100GB/s offered by the earlier model. The M4 also unlocks hardware acceleration for 8K in more formats, including H.264, ProRes, and ProRes RAW.
With the M5 iPad Pro models, RAM is tied to storage: the 256/512 GB iPad Pros come with 12 GB RAM; the 1/2 TB models come with 16 GB RAM.
What’s notable about this time is that this is actually the second year in a row where I’ve basically been able to say the same thing. Last year’s M3 iPad Air was also just a processor swap over the M2 version.
[…]
The 128GB base storage is not great for a premium tablet like this. We saw Apple bump their budget iPhone up to 256GB base storage today, so why not their second-highest end iPad?
[…]
The 60Hz display is getting pretty damn long in the tooth. It’s fiiiiine, but at some point it’s time to get an upgrade. The Air has had the literal exact screen for 7 years now.
This version of the Apple M4 is slightly cut down compared to the version that ships in Macs or that came with the M4 iPad Pro. It has only 8 CPU cores—3 high-performance cores and 5 efficiency cores, down from a maximum of and 4 and 6. It also uses 9 GPU cores instead of 10, and there isn’t an Air variant with 16GB of RAM. A 16GB RAM configuration was available for M4 iPad Pros with 1TB or 2TB of storage.
The iPad would go from a never-buy to a buy-right-away for me, if they added user profiles. It’d be a nice thing to have on your coffee table, where anyone in the household can pick it up and be logged into all of their stuff.
Windows XP had this feature. Chromebooks have this feature. It’s inexcusable that such an expensive gadget can only have one user.
Previously:
Apple (MacRumors, Hacker News):
At the heart of iPhone 17e is the latest-generation A19, which delivers exceptional performance for everything users do. iPhone 17e also features C1X, the latest-generation cellular modem designed by Apple, which is up to 2x faster than C1 in iPhone 16e. The 48MP Fusion camera captures stunning photos, including next-generation portraits, and 4K Dolby Vision video. It also enables an optical-quality 2x Telephoto — like having two cameras in one. The 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR display features Ceramic Shield 2, offering 3x better scratch resistance than the previous generation and reduced glare. With MagSafe, users can enjoy fast wireless charging and access to a vast ecosystem of accessories like chargers and cases. And when iPhone 17e users are outside of cellular and Wi-Fi coverage, Apple’s groundbreaking satellite features — including Emergency SOS, Roadside Assistance, Messages, and Find My via satellite — help them stay connected when it matters most.
[…]
Available in three elegant colors with a premium matte finish — black, white, and a beautiful new soft pink […] iPhone 17e will start at 256GB of storage for $599 — 2x the entry storage from the previous generation at the same starting price[…]
This sounds way better than last year’s iPhone 16e.
Apple also says that the 17e has a 48MP Fusion camera system, which on the face of it seems identical to last year’s “2-in-1 camera system” although Apple touts the 17e’s “next-generation” portrait mode that adds the ability to recognize people, dogs, and cats as well as to add portrait mode effects after the fact. The 12MP TrueDepth camera in front likewise has the same specs as last year, with the same addition of “next-generation portraits.” Apple attributes this ability to improvements in its image pipeline.
However, for most people who pay attention to the details, I think the $799 iPhone 17 remains a better deal. For $200 more, you get a larger, brighter screen (6.3 versus 6.1 inches), Camera Control for the fastest access to the camera, an Ultra Wide camera for macro and wide-angle photos, a higher resolution 18-megapixel Center Stage front camera with support for dual capture, better battery life, Always-On display with ProMotion technology for smoother scrolling, Dynamic Island, and more.
However, the 17e does have the Action button, which I think is better for triggering the camera, anyway.
The new iPhone includes an Apple A19 chip similar to the one in the more-expensive iPhone 17—both phones have six CPU cores, but the 17e only gets four GPU cores instead of five.
MagSafe has been added, although it does have slower charging speeds than the other iPhones in the lineup (but it does equal the iPhone 15 and 15 Pro lineup, so not too far behind).
[…]
Based on Apple’s compare page, it looks like this might be the exact camera that’s in the iPhone Air.
I gotta say, if the iPhone 17e had a Dynamic Island, I might’ve given it serious consideration as my everyday phone. Everything I need, no fluff.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-04): Jeff Johnson:
My iPhone SE 3rd generation:
5.45 x 2.65 x 0.29 inches
5.09 ounces
$429iPhone 17e:
5.78 x 2.82 x 0.31 inches
5.96 ounces
$599
I feel as if Apple just unrolled the blueprints for the iPhone 17 and thought about how to make a less-expensive version of that thing. They started with this, and then worked their way down to there.
It doesn’t strike me as a device that was designed from the ground up to hit a maximum price point. In my eye, that’s the more interesting challenge, and it creates more interesting products at this price level. It’s the difference between designing a less-interesting version of an expensive thing, and designing a brand-new thing that’s truly exciting…where the lower price is among the least-interesting things about it.
The price is the other thing that’s nagging at me right now. Was $599 the best they could do? Is $599 even a worthy goal?
Update (2026-03-20): Juli Clover:
The iPhone 17e earned a multi-core score of 9,241 on early Geekbench benchmarks, while the MacBook Neo earned a multi-core score of 8,668. Single-core chip results also favored the iPhone 17e , which earned a score of 3,607, while the Neo had a single-core score of 3,461.
The 17e camera system remains limited to Apple’s original Photographic Styles; all the other iPhones in the new A19 generation — the 17, 17 Pro, and Air — offer the much improved “latest-generation” Photographic Styles. In practice, this means the system Camera app on the 17e only offers these styles: Standard, Rich Contrast, Vibrant, Warm, and Cool. The second-generation Photographic Styles, which debuted last year on the iPhone 16 models, offer a much wider variety of styles and more fine-grained control, all of which processing is non-destructive.
[…]
Here’s a link to Apple’s ever-excellent Compare page, with a comparison of the 16e vs. 17e vs. 17. (For posterity, here’s that Compare page archived as a PDF.)
[…]
The iPhone 17 has the clever Dynamic Island; the 17e has a dumb notch. The Dynamic Island is nice to have, but despite having one on my personal phone for 3.5 years (it debuted with the 14 Pro in 2022), I can’t say I’ve particularly missed it during the better part of a week that I’ve been using the 17e as my primary phone. I actually had to double check that the 17e doesn’t have it while first writing this paragraph, because, over my first few days of testing, I just hadn’t noticed. But then I went out and ran an errand requiring an Uber ride, while listening to a podcast, and I noticed the lack of a Dynamic Island — no live status update for the hailed Uber, and no quick-tap button for jumping back into Overcast.
[…]
Here’s a table with pricing for the iPhone models Apple currently sells[…] Frankly, I’m not sure who the year-old iPhone 16 is for today, especially considering that Apple is now only offering it with 128 GB of storage. […] I suspect Apple is on the cusp of completely moving away from the strategy of selling two- and three-year-old iPhones at lower prices, and updating their entire lineup with annual speed bumps.
Previously:
Octavo arranges your pages for perfect printing — booklets, mini zines, business cards, and more. It also cleans up messy PDFs: fix mismatched page sizes, straighten skewed scans, and position each page precisely.
[…]
Create saddle-stitched booklets with automatic page ordering. Just load your PDF and Octavo handles the imposition maths.
There’s a free Lite version and a $24.99 one-time unlock in the Mac App Store.
Update (2026-03-19): Amy Worrall:
Octavo was rejected because they couldn’t find the in-app purchase. Which was a big orange button. I added a review screenshot with an arrow pointing to it and it was then accepted.
Average app review times for my Mac app (launched in 2019) have gone up by 3-5x and, it appears others too (tons of posts on Apple’s forums like this one). Mac app reviews now typically take 5 days, and I’m seeing lots of reports of 10+ day waits for some. While iOS app reviews have been faster for me, others have seen big delays there too. It just varies, but it’s clear that reviewers are underwater. This is very likely do to the rise in AI-assisted coding, which has in turn led to more app submissions. According to AppFigures, App Store submissions rose 24% in 2025 through November. According to Runway data, January and February’s average review time and max review times were significantly higher than they were in the last 4 months of 2025.
[…]
I and others have also run into delays in app processing too (which must happen before a build can even be submitted for review) and have personally seen it take up to 10 hours!
Previously:
Update (2026-03-03): David Deller:
It’s so bad.
I think this varies quite a bit.
On February 15 and 16, I had two Mac App Store updates reviewed and approved within hours.
However, Mac and iOS updates submitted on February 10 both took 2 days.
we had a Mac app take 10 days, after which we developer rejected. The next submission took 20 minutes
Octavo seems to be taking 3-4 days each time. Got a 1.0.1 that’s been in progress since Friday…
Update (2026-03-26): Jeff Johnson:
Mac App Store waiting for review 4 days and counting
I don’t recall ever waiting as long for the MAS
My recent EagleFiler update went into review right away but stayed there for a whole week. This is my worst review time in years, though better than the time they took two months.
Review times seem pretty long right now. Is it all the vibe coded apps hogging the queue?
While my situation was a mere false alarm, discussions in the community about Apple’s app review process slowing down have indeed been increasing recently. Many speculate that this might be related to the recent rise of Vibe Coding. Although there is no official confirmation, Vibe Coding has undeniably lowered the barrier to entry for development. In doing so, it has simultaneously amplified the volume of app submissions and the frequency of iterations in a short period, thereby passing the pressure down to the review team.
Previously:
Update (2026-03-30): Michael Burkhardt:
Lots of developers have started shipping fully vibe coded apps on the App Store. At the same time, loads of established developers are reporting longer wait times when submitting updates for app review.
[…]
Numerous developers, including indie developers and companies like Twitter, are reporting that app review is taking significantly longer, with some people being stuck in review for 3+ days, and some reporting even a week of waiting for review. Traditionally, this process would take less than a day, sometimes a day or two in rare cases.
Update (2026-04-09): Marcus Mendes (Hacker News):
The Information reports that while new app submissions to the App Store fell 46% between 2016 and 2024, “the number of new apps that showed up in the App Store globally suddenly exploded” last year, “growing 30% to nearly 600,000 compared to 2024.”
[…]
An Apple spokesperson denied that review times are getting longer. Apple said the app review team processes 90% of submissions within 48 hours. And over the last 12 weeks, the team has processed more than 200,000 app submissions a week, with an average review time of 1.5 days.
I don’t believe that there’s been no change in review times. Even going by Apple’s own previously reported metric:
On average, 90% of submissions are reviewed in less than 24 hours.
48 hours is a lot different from 24 hours. Plus, Mac submissions are a small percentage of the total, so I’m sure there’s a way to present numbers that make the overall average review time look shorter even as Mac review times have tripled or worse.
Update (2026-04-16): Matt Sephton:
App Store Connect’s App Review is such a car crash. I’ve had apps that have been finished for weeks, all issues addressed, still “waiting for review”
After waiting a week for review of a simple bug fix for HomeCam on Mac. I get this bullshit rejection. Can’t show a demo video for pairing as the Mac cannot do that.
And this app has been out on the Mac for years… why the sudden demo request.
