Member-only story
How to choose a new Mac in 2025
The complete guide for all Apple enthusiasts
“I want a new Mac, but I don’t know how not to get lost in the configurations.”
You may already be taking stock of the past few months and wondering what tech innovations you could delight yourself or your loved ones with. Whether Santa brought you an envelope with a decent budget or you’ve saved up your own money, you’re probably like me: you’re yearning for a new Mac.
However, the world of Apple changed dramatically with the arrival of Apple Silicon, which moved from the M1 to the latest M4. Configurations are fixed and can’t be changed in the future like desktop PCs used to be, where you could easily add more RAM or swap out a graphics card. If you decide on a particular model, you have to live with it unchanged until you sell or replace it. On top of all that, the trend of artificial intelligence, which likes to gobble up huge portions of memory and computing power, mixes in, and you can easily find yourself at the edge of what a given Mac can still handle.
If you’re new to the Apple ecosystem, you’ve got a bit of a leg up, because almost any Mac is likely to give you a more nimble and enjoyable experience than you might be used to with Windows or Linux. But if you’ve been working with Macs for a few years, you know that making the…