Apple's 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M5 Max looks almost exactly like the machines that preceded it, a form that has held for nearly five years and now reads as both mature and stalled. Beneath that unchanged surface, the new chip brings record-setting speed for processing, graphics, and on-device AI, with a Fusion design that may shape Apple's future. It arrives at a higher price, as the world of laptops around it grows more crowded and as the next redesign waits just over the horizon. For those who need that power today, the wait for reinvention becomes a personal judgment about time and mon
Apple's M5 Max MacBook Pro Is the Fastest Laptop Yet, Even as Its Design Stalls
It's so fast it's hard to know quite what to throw at it.
Mark
The headline says fastest laptop yet, but also stalled design. Why does the review hold both?
Mimi
Because nothing visible changed. Same chassis, display, ports, speakers. The upgrade is entirely in the silicon, and the keycap symbols are the only cosmetic change.
Mark
And the silicon is what, exactly?
Mimi
A Fusion architecture, two pieces of silicon stitched together, like the Ultra chips in the Mac Studio. The reviewer says the real payoff isn't visible yet.
Luke
Worth flagging that's his read of the future. Nothing in the review shows the two-die design delivering a benefit today.
Mark
What about the graphics claim, comparable to an RTX 5070 Ti?
Mimi
Cyberpunk 2077 at Ultra ran 62 fps without upscaling, and 88 fps at Medium. Other games held above 60 fps at max settings.
Luke
Those are one reviewer's tests on one unit Apple supplied. The 5070 Ti comparison is his framing, not a head-to-head result in the piece.
Mark
Who should actually buy it?
Mimi
People doing creative or AI work all day. Up to 128 GB of memory on Max configurations, and AI scores up 49 percent on Geekbench AI.
Luke
And the upgrade percentages are against his own M3 Max, not a lab average. He also says owners of M4 or M3 Max probably shouldn't bother.
Mark
What about the charging reports?
Luke
Reports on the 14-inch say the 96-watt charger can't keep up under load. He couldn't verify it. That stays unknown.
Mimi
And the redesign is expected later, though reported features like touchscreen and tandem OLED aren't confirmed.
El Pulso
- The design is nearly identical to a model that has stood for almost five years, and rivals are closing the gap.
- Benchmarks have jumped: the M5 Max leads Apple's laptop lineup in CPU power and rivals an RTX 5070 Ti in graphics.
- Gaming at Ultra settings and on-device AI workloads now run at speeds that were out of reach on earlier MacBook Pros.
- The starting price climbs to $3,899 as the 1 TB option disappears, forcing buyers toward 2 TB storage.
- A redesigned M6 MacBook Pro is expected later this year, so buyers must weigh immediate power against a coming reinvention.
Apple's 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M5 Max looks almost exactly like the machines that preceded it, a form that has held for nearly five years and now reads as both mature and stalled. Beneath that unchanged surface, the new chip brings record-setting speed for processing, graphics, and on-device AI, with a Fusion design that may shape Apple's future. It arrives at a higher price, as the world of laptops around it grows more crowded and as the next redesign waits just over the horizon. For those who need that power today, the wait for reinvention becomes a personal judgment about time and money.
From across the room, Apple's 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M5 Max looks just like the one before it. The reviewer notes that the body has barely changed since the 2021 redesign, with the only visible difference being the keyboard symbols on American models. That stillness has a cost: rivals have been catching up, and reports suggest next year's model will bring a touchscreen, OLED display, and slimmer frame.
The real change lies inside. The M5 Pro and M5 Max adopt a Fusion architecture, joining two pieces of silicon, a design first seen in Mac Studio's Ultra chips. The payoff is already striking. The laptop sets records in standard CPU tests, and its integrated graphics rival an RTX 5070 Ti, running Cyberpunk 2077 at Ultra settings at 62 fps. Only the M3 Ultra Mac Studio outpaces it among Macs. For the reviewer, gaming is a bonus; the machine's real purpose is media creation and on-device AI, with up to 128 GB of unified memory available only on Max configurations.
The cost has risen as well. The 1 TB option is gone, and the 16-inch now starts at $3,899 with 2 TB. The reviewer finds this steep for a typical buyer but reasonable for a machine in this class. His advice is clear: owners of recent Max models can skip this generation, but those coming from M1 or M2 Max will feel a meaningful leap. For anyone who needs this power now, he calls it a great buy.
Apple's 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M5 Max looks, from across the room, exactly like the one it replaces. WIRED's reviewer says the machine has had essentially the same face for almost five years, and that this fifth generation, which traces back to the 2021 redesign, has no discernible physical change from the M4 Max model. That model introduced the Space Black finish and the optional nano-texture screen. The one visible difference is on American keyboards, where Apple has swapped words like Enter, Caps Lock, Tab and Shift for symbols and arrows, matching the version already sold in the UK.
The review's argument is that the design has matured but also stagnated, letting rivals close in. Reports suggest next year's MacBook Pro will be a bigger reinvention, with a touchscreen, a tandem OLED display and a thinner chassis. The reviewer wouldn't blame anyone for waiting. Still, he says the M5 Max is ridiculously powerful and that the 16-inch model remains the most powerful high-end laptop on the market. Display, speakers, webcam and ports are unchanged. The Mini-LED screen peaks at 1,600 nits, and the nano-texture glass is a $150 option he calls worth it. Thunderbolt 5, introduced last generation, is becoming more useful as docks and accessories arrive, though he still wants more Thunderbolt 5 external SSDs.
The change is inside. The M5 Pro and M5 Max build on the base M5, with better single-core performance and a much stronger GPU. They use a new Fusion architecture, previously found in the Ultra chips in the Mac Studio, which joins two pieces of silicon instead of relying on one chip. The reviewer doesn't think the payoff of that shift is visible yet, but expects it to shape Apple's chip direction.
The results are record-setting in standard CPU benchmarks such as Cinebench and Geekbench 6, and High Power mode, which spins up the fans, adds roughly another 7 percent of multicore performance. The integrated graphics are described as comparable to an RTX 5070 Ti. In Cyberpunk 2077 at Ultra settings with no MetalFX upscaling, the laptop managed 62 fps, rising to 88 fps at Medium. Resident Evil Village, Lies of P and Apple Arcade's Oceanhorn 3 all held above 60 fps at max settings without upscaling, and Lies of P ran at 2560 x 1600, though the fans got loud. A Windows gaming laptop like the Lenovo LOQ 15 costs thousands less, but for gaming on a MacBook the reviewer says there is a new king. Only the M3 Ultra Mac Studio is more powerful among Macs. Against his own M3 Max MacBook Pro, the M5 Max scored 35 percent higher in 3DMark Steel Nomad and 43 percent higher on the Cinebench 2024 GPU test.
The reviewer sees gaming as a side benefit. In 2026, he says, this laptop is for media creation and on-device AI. It offers up to 128 GB of unified memory, available only on Max configurations, since the Pro tops out at 64 GB. Apple demonstrated Xcode's new coding assistant and a workflow using DaVinci Resolve and ComfyUI. In LM Studio, a 17-billion-parameter Llama-2 model produced 12.61 tokens per second, 31 percent faster than his M3 Max. Each GPU core now has a neural accelerator, and Geekbench AI scores were 49 percent higher with the same number of GPU cores. Storage averaged about double the M3 Max's read and write speeds, though he never reached Apple's claimed 14.5 Gbps.
The price has gone up. Apple removed the 1 TB option on the 16-inch model, so it now starts at 2 TB for $3,899. Apple raised starting storage and prices across the MacBook line in 2026, down to the 13-inch MacBook Air. The reviewer calls it expensive for a typical MacBook buyer but not for this class of laptop, noting the Asus ProArt P16 sold for upwards of $4,500 when in stock. He also prefers the 14-inch size, since the 16-inch weighs 4.7 pounds. Some reports say the 14-inch model's 96-watt charger can't keep up under heavy load, so the battery drains while plugged in. He couldn't verify that and didn't see it on the 16-inch.
His advice is that owners of an M4 Max or M3 Max shouldn't bother, but those on an M1 Max or M2 Max will see a meaningful jump. A redesigned M6 MacBook Pro is expected later this year, though it may not arrive with the M6 Pro or M6 Max right away. For anyone who needs this performance now, he calls it a great buy.
Citas Notables
The M5 Max is ridiculously powerful, and the 16-inch MacBook Pro remains the most powerful, high-end laptop on the market.— WIRED reviewer
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