It’s officially the end of an era. Apple on Wednesday held the last day of its super week of Mac announcements, this time with the launch of a new generation MacBook Pro with an M4 chip. But the company also did something else: it upgraded all Macs with 16GB of RAM as standard, putting an end to 8GB Macs.
All Macs now start with at least 16GB RAM
Although Macs have gained a lot of RAM upgrade options over the past few years, Apple has never changed anything in the base models since 2016, when the MacBook Air with 4GB of RAM was discontinued and the 8GB version became the standard. Since then, most Macs (except for the Mac Studio and Mac Pro) still came with 8GB RAM.
But things changed suddenly this year. Not only do all new Macs come with 16GB of RAM as standard, but Apple has also updated both the M2 and M3 MacBook Air base models with 16GB of RAM.
The move came as a complete surprise, as the company could at least have waited until the launch of a new MacBook Air next year. Instead, it chose to give customers more RAM right now. Ironically, the upgrades came just months after Apple executives argued in favor of Macs with 8GB of RAM amid criticism from customers.
Mac marketing executive Evan Buyze spoke in favor of Macs equipped with 8GB of RAM. According to Buyze, the 8GB of RAM in entry-level Macs is enough for most of the tasks that most users do with these computers. He used web browsing, media playback, light photo and video editing, and casual gaming as examples.
Apple Intelligence has pushed the need for more RAM
But what exactly has changed since April? The answer is simple: Apple Intelligence. As my colleague Zac Hall said yesterday, the new AI features have certainly played a big role in pushing Apple to upgrade RAM across the entire Mac lineup. That’s because AI features do require a lot of RAM.
Apple has set 8GB of RAM as a minimum requirement to support Apple Intelligence. That’s why the iPhone 15 Pro has Apple Intelligence, but not the regular iPhone 15. Apple has also put the A17 Pro chip with 8GB RAM in the new iPad mini, as the company wants everyone to have access to Apple Intelligence.
But if you think about the future, 8GB of RAM may not be enough for what comes next. I’m pretty sure Apple doesn’t want another iPhone 15 situation where recently released hardware can’t run the latest features. And the fact that even the MacBook Air has been upgraded with more RAM suggests that Apple has big plans for Apple Intelligence next year.
For instance, rumors suggest that iPhone 17 Pro models will be equipped with 12GB of RAM. This could be a sign that some of the features to be introduced next year will require more than just 8GB of RAM. Of course, everyone benefits from having more RAM, even if you don’t use the AI features.
Next, I’d love to see Macs starting with 512GB of storage, but that’s a story for another day.
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