M5 Pro MacBook Pro, M5 Mac MacBook Pro Update: Why You Might Want to Skip These Apple Laptops?

The next MacBook Pro upgrade cycle looks set to deliver exactly what Apple does best—and what frustrated buyers dread, more speed, less drama.

With a 'special Apple Experience' staged on 4 March in New York, London, and Shanghai, the company is offering just enough theatre to make hesitant upgraders wonder if they should keep their wallets in their pockets a little longer.

Speed, Sure—But Is It Your Speed?

Apple has already planted its flag for this generation with the base 14-inch MacBook Pro powered by M5, pitched as 'the next big leap in AI for the Mac.'

In that announcement, Apple said M5's 10-core CPU delivers up to 20 per cent faster multithreaded performance versus M4, and it framed the gains in plain, workaday terms: compiling code, heavy multitasking, the kind of grind that turns 'Pro' from branding into necessity.​

The more interesting thing, though, was where Apple lavished attention, GPU and on-device AI. Apple said the chip's next-generation GPU includes 'a Neural Accelerator in each core.' and it also highlighted a 'faster 16-core Neural Engine' meant to accelerate AI-driven tasks and the models behind Apple Intelligence. This is Apple, gently but firmly, nudging the MacBook Pro narrative away from raw CPU bragging rights and toward the messy reality of 2026 computing: creators running local models, developers testing toolchains, and businesses that now ask laptops to do a little bit of everything, all at once.​

Apple also made a point of storage performance—rare, because companies usually avoid admitting SSD speed is a headline feature unless they've quietly improved it. In its M5 launch, Apple said the new 14-inch MacBook Pro uses 'the latest storage technology' for faster SSD performance than the previous generation, and even claimed 'up to 2x faster SSD performance' for loading local models and moving big files.​

If Apple follows its usual pattern, the forthcoming M5 Pro and M5 Max machines—assuming they land soon—will aim that same story at people who can actually monetise time saved: editors, 3D artists, developers, engineers, and anyone who measures their week in render queues. That's the audience that pays extra, and it's also the audience Apple is increasingly daring to wait.

Apple's March 4 Tease And The Waiting Game

What makes this moment peculiarly awkward is the way Apple is choosing to communicate. MacRumors reported that Apple has described March 4 simply as a 'special Apple Experience,' with no further information on what it entails—a deliberate vagueness that feels less like secrecy and more like stagecraft. The same report notes the unusual three-city setup—New York, London, and Shanghai—suggesting something smaller than a classic livestreamed keynote, even as expectations build for imminent product announcements.

MacRumors also lists the MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips among the products it believes are imminent. That matters because, for buyers, 'imminent' is not a vibe—it's the difference between buying a machine that holds value and buying one that starts ageing the moment the courier knocks.

If you need a laptop this minute because your current system is breaking your workday, buy what you can justify and move on with your life. Apple's own pitch for M5 leans on practical wins—speed, battery life, faster storage—not fantasy. But if you're upgrading mainly because you want the new one, waiting until Apple actually shows its hand on March 4 could save you from that uniquely modern regret, paying premium money for yesterday's 'pro' before you've even unboxed it.