Mac Studio Delivery Times

Last Thursday (April 28th), Apple held its Q2 earnings call. It reported that demand exceeds supply for Apple products and expects this to affect delivery of Mac Studios. The problem is reduced manpower due to coronavirus lockdown measures in the Shanghai area. China is not only not relaxing measures in Shanghai, it tightened them last week.

In the U.S., Mac Studios with the Max chip and base configuration (10 core CPU, 24 core GPU, 32GB Memory, 512GB Storage) are currently readily available from Apple stores and resellers (Best Buy, Costco). Last week, B&H even had additional configurations that are unavailable except from Apple on a build-to-order basis. The base Max configuration can also be ordered from Apple online with May 10-May 17 delivery.

At stores, supply of Studios with the Ultra chip and base configuration (20 core CPU, 48 core GPU, 64GB Memory, 1TB Storage) has slowed to a trickle. However, these are available from Apple online for June 22-July 7 delivery.

In the last few days, Apple has punted its delivery estimate for most other Max and Ultra configurations to July 27-August 10. I think that it simply doesn't know what production will be over the next three months and is being cautious about delivery commitments.

On the upside, it appears that very few Mac Studios are being delivered later than promised, and that the problem, when it happens, is due to tracking difficulties at UPS or DHL. Indeed, recent posts on the MacRumors Preorder/Order/Delivery thread suggest that a fair number of people with existing orders are receiving their Studio 4 to 6 weeks earlier than promised. The delivery window for the Studio/Max in my signature, ordered April 1st, is June 27 to July 11. However, based on recent posts I think that there's a good chance that I'll receive it by the end of May/early June.

For people ordering "base plus" configurations now, there may be a long wait. During the earnings call, Apple said that it hopes production will return to normal by the end of June.

Ordered the Base Studio on 22 March. Still waiting ( Italy )

Apple has revamped delivery dates for Mac Studios with the M1 Max chip. It appears that it's going to do a production blitz on them.

As of this morning, it says that a new order for a base Max will be delivered May 12-19 and that an order for any other configuration will be delivered June 23-30. This includes the top-specced Max at 32 graphics cores, 64GB memory and 8TB storage. This suggests that Apple is confident about supply of processors, memory and flash storage, and about production line assembly.

Yesterday, Apple also moved up delivery of orders made at the end of March/beginning of April to June 22-29. I suspect that delivery of those orders will happen sooner. This afternoon, a customer in Paris who ordered on April 1st, and was given the new June 22-29 window, was told that his delivery date was being revised again to June 1-8. [EDIT May 5: Apple has told a person in the U.S. who ordered on March 31st that his 64GB memory, 2TB SSD Max will be delivered on May 9th, two months earlier than the original estimate.]

As one of the people that ordered on April 1st, this is all good news given what was said during Apple's Q2 earnings call last week (post #1 above).

Note: May 12-19 and June 23-30 are the delivery dates if one orders today. Obviously these dates will change with time.

I haven't looked into what's happening with Mac Studio/Ultra orders.

Yesterday [May 3rd], Apple also moved up delivery of orders made at the end of March/beginning of April to June 22-29. I suspect that delivery of those orders will happen sooner.

Apple is continuing to deliver Mac Studio (M1 Max) computers weeks ahead of the promised windows. I'm part of the group referred to in the quote above. Five of us who are posting updates on MacRumors ordered Studio/Max computers with 32 graphics cores, 64GB memory and 2TB storage. Our original delivery windows were last week of June to second week of July, which was changed on May 3rd to June 22-29. Three of us (two in the U.S., one in the U.K.) are scheduled to receive our computer this Monday, May 16th. The current order status for the other two, both in the U.S., is "Preparing to Ship". That should change to "Shipped" within 48 hours.

On the other hand, for the last couple of weeks very few U.S. Apple stores have had base Max or Ultra computers in stock. However, delivery time for base Maxes ordered online is fairly short. If one orders one today (May 13), the delivery window is May 23-31. Wait time for a base Ultra is longer, currently July 6-20.