It’s the day after the night before and we still haven’t quite digested the Apple Vision Pro bombshell dropped on stage at WWDC last night. Though, it wasn’t a huge surprise, with it being heavily rumoured beforehand. Plenty else was rumoured and didn’t actually launch. Here’s what didn’t show up.
WWDC 2023 was a long one, with Apple whizzing through numerous hardware launches and countless software updates before landing at its one more thing, the Apple Vision Pro. The rest of the reveals included a new M2 Ultra-powered Mac Pro, a refresh for the Mac Studio, a new 15-inch MacBook Air, WatchOS 10, iOS 17 and MacOS Sonoma.
That’s everything that did launch, and it’s quite the list, but not everything that appeared that was rumoured to come at WWDC 2023. Let’s dive in.
The next-generation M3 chip
As we got closer to Apple’s WWDC event, the chance of the 3nm M3 chip debuting at the event seemed razor-thin. Per Mark Gurman of Bloomberg, you should now expect to see M3-powered Macs arriving by the end of the year, if not early next year.
An M2 Extreme for the Mac Pro
Another Apple Silicon-related release that was missing was an M2 Extreme chip for the Mac Pro. When the original Mac Studio launched, it came with the M1 Ultra and that chip fused together two M1 Max chips. With the Mac Pro inbound, signs pointed towards another step up. The M2 Ultra debuted, to be placed in a refreshed Mac Studio and the Mac Pro.
But, there was no sign of a new M2 Extreme, formed by a combination of two M2 Ultra chips. This wasn’t a huge surprise as this rumour was quashed by Gurman back in December, with Apple reigning in its plans for an Extreme chip.
This one wasn’t necessarily rumoured ahead of the show but, with the Apple Vision Pro being the big announcement, it felt notable that Tim Cook and co were keen to avoid much of the lingo used by rival mixed reality headset makers, like Meta. Not once was the word “metaverse” ushered, and such a vibe was completely avoided. Apple truly put a focus on apps with its VisionOS launch, rather than suggesting you’ll be completely engulfed in a virtual world.
A new iMac
There were rumours of two different flavours of iMac that could launch at WWDC 2023. The most logical seemed like a simple refresh to the current iMac (2021), adding an M2 chip and a larger display option would’ve been nice too. The other could’ve come alongside the Apple M3 launch, as a bigger step forward. But, that chip didn’t come so neither did a next-gen iMac. Expect to see this debut before the end of 2023, or early in 2024 as well.
13-inch MacBook Air refresh
One of the more confusing rumours was a refresh of the 13-inch MacBook Air alongside the new 15-inch model. This was a murky one as it’s unclear how the 13-inch version could be refreshed at this point, with it already sporting an M2 chip. However, a justification came courtesy of Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who posited that a refreshed MacBook Air could feature both an M2 and an M2 Pro option. But that hasn’t come to pass.
This was likely another rumour that gained traction from the chance we saw a new M3 chip debut but, again, that didn’t come. Instead, we just got a larger MacBook Air that changes little compared to its smaller version.
