Apple announces the Mac mini M2 and M2 Pro: more powerful and less expensive

Apple announces today its new Mac mini which embeds the M2 and M2 Pro chips, allowing to have even more power than the model sold until now with the M1 chip. And icing on the cake: it is now more expensive than its predecessor.

Launch of Mac mini with the M2 chip

The Mac mini with laM2 chip features an 8-core processor (CPU) with four high-performance cores and four energy-efficient cores, as well as a 10-core graphics chip (GPU). Common tasks, such as launching applications, multitasking or browsing the web, are carried out at blazing speed according to Apple. For users performing more intensive tasks, the new Mac mini with can also handle even more demanding workloads. With up to 24 GB of unified memory and 100 GB/s of bandwidth, activities such as image editing in Adobe Photoshop are up to 50% faster than on the previous generation model.

The M2 chip also equips the Mac mini with the ProRes Accelerator Card, which makes tasks like video editing in Final Cut Pro more than twice as fast. The new computer can also simultaneously play up to two streams of ProRes 422 8K video at 30 frames per second, or up to 12 streams of ProRes 422 4K video at 30 frames per second. On arrival, the new Mac mini is up to 5 times faster than the best-selling Windows desktop computer, according to a claim from Apple. The PC under Windows 11 compared is a model with an Intel Core i5 processor, the graphics chip Intel UHD Graphics 730, there are no further details.

Here are some characteristics shared by Apple. Compared to the Mac mini with Intel Core i7 processor, the Mac mini M2 offers:

• Up to 22x faster performance for machine learning (ML) image upscaling in Pixelmator Pro.
• Render a complex timeline 9.8 times faster in Final Cut Pro.

Compared to the previous generation Mac mini with M11 chip, Mac mini with M2 offers:

• Up to 2.4x faster ProRes transcoding in Final Cut Pro.
• Up to 50% faster performance in Adobe Photoshop for filters and functions.
• Up to 35% smoother gameplay in Resident Evil Village.

Even more powerful M2 Pro chip

There is also the M2 Pro chip, which is more powerful. It features a 12-core CPU, including eight high-performance cores and four energy-efficient cores. For its part, the GPU has 19 cores and offers 200 GB/s of memory bandwidth – twice as much as the M2 – and up to 32 GB of memory. The next-generation Neural Engine is 40% faster than that of the M1 chip, to speed up machine learning tasks such as video analysis and image processing.

Designed to dramatically increase video playback and encoding speeds while consuming low power, the M2 Pro chip features a powerful media engine that accelerates popular video codecs and can simultaneously play up to five streams of ProRes video 422 8K at 30 frames per second, or up to 23 streams of ProRes 422 4K video at 30 frames per second. The model with the M2 Pro chip is up to 14 times faster than the fastest Mac mini with Intel processor according to Apple.

Compared to the 27-inch iMac with an Intel Core i7 processor and Radeon Pro 5500 XT4 graphics, the Mac mini with M2 Pro chip offers:

• Up to 50% faster performance in Adobe Photoshop for filters and functions.
• Up to 5.5x faster image fusion for creating panoramas in Adobe Lightroom Classic.
• Up to 4.4x faster moving object tracking in Final Cut Pro.

Compared to the previous generation Mac mini with M1 chip, Mac mini with M2 Pro chip offers:

• Up to 2.5x faster graphics performance in Affinity Photo.
• Up to 4.2x faster ProRes transcoding in Final Cut Pro.
• Up to 2.8x smoother gameplay in Resident Evil Village.

Price and release date

The first price for the Mac mini M2 is 699€. It’s 100€ less than the old Mac mini M1. Pre-orders start today on the online Apple Store and the first deliveries will take place on January 24.