AI is forcing me to buy a new MacBook Pro

Ever since I bought it from Apple’s refurbished store, my MacBook Pro with M1 Pro chip has served me well. But these days I’ve been thinking about upgrading it. The upcoming MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips (which could be released soon) are looking mighty tempting, and the rumors are encouraging.

The main aspect is the noticeably improved performance that we should get with the new chips. Rumors suggest that GPU performance could be on par with Nvidia’s RTX 4070 graphics card, and combined with increasing support for high-end games like Cyberpunk 2077, this feels like a strong reason to upgrade.

But there’s another reason that’s compelling me to upgrade sooner rather than later. I can’t help but think that this might be the perfect time to upgrade–and waiting too long could prove to be costly.

Prices are exploding

If you’ve been paying attention to the wider tech world in recent months, you might have noticed that the prices of computing components–particularly memory, but also storage, graphics cards, and more–are going through the roof.

Many RAM sets have doubled in price or more in just a couple of months. PC users are frantically buying up stock before prices rise even further, which they’re expected to do over the course of 2026.

Why the sudden panic? It’s all to do with AI. (What else?) With AI booming and companies either starting up or expanding operations everywhere you look, huge data centers are being constructed to meet the demand for AI compute. All those data centers need computing power, and that means they need memory. RAM manufacturers are switching their production processes towards the kind of high-capacity memory needed for AI and away from consumer kits, pushing prices up for ordinary users as production dwindles.

In other words, AI has caused a massive shortage that isn’t expected to improve for at least a year.

If this all concerns PC components, why should Apple users be worried? Well, Apple needs to buy memory for its laptops and desktops, too. What happens in PC land has a knock-on effect for Apple fans.

Apple has traditionally been very good at insulating its devices against inflation. Look at the Mac mini, for example, which launched in 2005 at a price of $499–over 20 years of inflation later, it costs just $100 more.

But there’s talk that even Apple will have to raise its prices in the wake of this global component shortage. And Apple has shown it’s not afraid to raise prices when global events demand it. Returning to the Mac mini, Apple pushed its price up in the U.K. after Brexit, for example, as it did with every other product it sold at the time.

That means that the upcoming MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips could be the last chance to get a MacBook Pro at a reasonable price for some time. And that’s a risk that’s been seriously playing on my mind.

What about the 20th anniversary MacBook Pro?

The M5 Pro/Max MacBook Pro isn’t the only high-level MacBook we’re expecting this year. Claims have been made that by late 2026 (or possibly early 2027), a new model–the so-called 20th anniversary MacBook Pro–with an OLED display could hit store shelves. That OLED screen could give the device a massive visual boost, and it’s also rumored to come with touchscreen functionality. While I’m not a fan of touchscreen displays (I agree with Steve Jobs’ assertion that they’re “ergonomically terrible”), I’m open to being proved wrong.

The problem, though, is that this edition might come right as price increases start to bite. Throwing an OLED display into a device when memory prices are at their most extortionate seems like a recipe for sky-high costs.

Which brings me back to the M5 Pro and M5 Max and their tantalizing performance. I love gaming, and I have a PC alongside my MacBook Pro for exactly that reason. While I mostly game at home on my PC, I want to be able to carry on while I’m traveling using my MacBook Pro. My M1 Pro chip has fulfilled this role well over the years, but it’s starting to show its age. Considering how well Apple’s modern Pro and Max chips perform when it comes to gaming, I’d love to be able to put them through their paces on the go with a new laptop.

In an ordinary year, new chips like that could be enough to convince me to upgrade. But with the ongoing memory shortage and the threat of out-of-control price rises, that consideration has taken on a new urgency.

If you’ve been considering buying a piece of Apple kit, now is the time to think very seriously about investing. No one can know for sure what will happen, but if any of the uncontrollable price rises on the PC side of the aisle are reflected in Apple’s ecosystem, things could get messy. Apple is a big company with sizeable cash reserves, and it might decide to eat some of the memory cost. But I’d be surprised if prices remained entirely unaffected.

If you weren’t considering an upgrade to your Mac or other Apple kit, there’s no need to rush in and buy something you won’t need in the near future. We don’t know what the situation will look like in another 12 or 15 months. But if you’ve been eyeing an upgrade, this might be the time to make a move before it’s too late. I know I am.