There’s been a ton of hype for Apple’s M3 Macbook Air coming later this year, but unfortunately, we’ve been seeing some rumors claiming that it’s actually getting delayed until 2024. So even though I really hope this isn’t true, I want to keep you guys informed on all the leaks. So in this post, I’m gonna give you five reasons why this delay could make sense, as well as my own personal prediction on when it’ll be launched. So let’s get into the first reason, which is the leaker Tech Reeve on Twitter.
MacBook Air M3 Release Date Delayed till 2024
Just over a week ago, Tech Reef claimed that the M3-powered Max was delayed until 2024, which was a huge surprise to me until I found out why. But the crazy thing is that it matches newly updated info from a very reliable leaker, Ming Shaquo, which he posted on Twitter, mentioning that the 15-inch Macbook Air would get the M2 Chip and that the M3 chip would only enter mass production in the second half of 2023, slightly ahead of M3 Pro and M3 Max mass production.
Now that detail is very important because Apple’s chips usually start mass production a while before the launch of the actual product. Getting that chip, for example, Tsmc started three-nanometer chip production at the end of December, which is almost certainly Apple’s A17 Bionic Chip for the Iphone 15 Pro, but that’s only coming in September, so that’s nine months ahead of schedule.
And then in 2021, the M1 Pro and Max chips, which everyone mistakenly thought would be called the M2, entered mass production in April, But it wasn’t until six months later that the chips actually launched in October with the redesigned Macbook Pros. So if makes your quote is right, the M3 chip starts mass production in the second half of this year, which begins in July six months later at a minimum would be January of next year if the M3 sticks to the same timeline as before. So if the M3 somehow does get launched this fall, it would be on an extremely tight schedule with limited chips apply.
And that’s exactly why reason number two is the limited supply of Tsmc’s three-nanometer chips, which is actually the main reason for all of the M3 Macbook Air hype since it should be insanely efficient and fast by my personal estimations based on leaked A17 bionic benchmark scores that were sheared by Tech Reeve.
but it was actually a huge leak from Weibo’s user 937840, who also said that the progression of the M3 would be after the A17 backing up with quo said. But then on March 20th, Tech Reef came back and said that Tsmc is surprisingly struggling with three-nanometer chips, leading to lower goals for the A17, specifically saying that both the yield and performance of three-nanometer are below their target, which means that we might not see benchmark scores as high as the A17 leak as well as my own M3 estimations. He then revealed his reasoning, which was that apparently, Tsmc’s three-nanometer chip yield was less than 50 percent, which is terrible.
And then over a month later, on April 25th, we got reports from other sources that Tsmc is, in fact, struggling to make enough three nanometer chips for Apple’s A17 and M3 chips now having approximately 55 yield, which is still bad. And then three days later, Tech Reef told us how he knew Tsmc was struggling, and it was the fact that N3 should have started production in the Spring if it had proceeded on a normal road map or timeline. But according to minshe quo, it’s only happening in the second half of this year.
So because of that, he revealed that the M3 has been delayed until next year, and even the A17 will face similar yield issues, not in the form of a delay, but instead having reduced performance to compensate for the lower yields. So basically, the main idea is that 55 yields on M3 chip isn’t enough for both the M3 and A17, leading to the delay of M3 Max to 2024, which Tech Reef confirmed again on May 2nd.
Now getting into reason number three: there’s a rumor going around that Apple has a huge stockpile of M2 chips laying around that they’re struggling to sell off, and there’s actually really good evidence for this. The rumor comes from Hachi Tech on Twitter, who basically said that Apple has a severe oversupply of M2 chips, even suggesting that the 24 inch Imac is about to be garbage because originally it was supposed to get the M3 chip, but now they’re gonna give it the M2 just to sell more M2 chips.
The reason for that is of course, because they need to find ways to sell more M2 chips. and apparently that’s another reason why Apple has decided to give the 15-inch Macbook Air the M2, which is expected next month. and this has already been confirmed by many sources, including Minchikuo and Mark German in Tech even said that the Apple Tv gaming console is coming soon potentially also with an M2 Chip. He essentially said that the M2 Max sales numbers are so bad that he wouldn’t be surprised if Apple gave every iPad an M2 Chip just to sell off more of them.
Need proof? That idea is true? Well, Apple reportedly stopped production of their new M2 Chip in January and February because their M2 Max just weren’t selling well enough. and that’s something that hasn’t happened before for a six month old new chip. and then when they eventually resume production, it was only at 50 percent of the rate of previous years. This proves that Apple’s M2 chips were not getting sold fast enough, and they likely have a huge stockpile of them that they don’t want to make even bigger, especially with the M3 chip already on its way.
So basically a big reason to delay the M3 until 2024 is to give the M2 chips time to sell off. And that leads us into reason number four: The rest of the industry is delaying and canceling three nanometer chip products, especially Intel, who recently canceled even more of Tsmc’s three nanometer projects. So the idea here is that Apple can essentially stretch out their M2 line, especially since the competition still hasn’t even caught up to the M2 even though it was a stop Gap release. So instead of rushing to launch M3 products so quickly, they could release more M2 Chip products that are still going to sell very well anyway.
And then when the M3 comes out, everyone who bought M1 or M2 Chip Max will feel like they’re missing out because of the huge performance and efficiency gains, and they’ll be even more likely to upgrade sooner, even if they wait until the M4, which will also be on three nanometer. And because of that, we’re likely getting the M2 15-inch Macbook Air, and we could even end up with more a crappy M2 Chip updates later this year, which will end up being press releases instead of being revealed at events, including probably an M2 Ipad air update later this fall.
And now, finally, for reason number five, we have macro economic factors or essentially the looming recession. The big idea here is that the M3 chip is gonna be a huge deal since it’ll be using the industry’s first three nanometer chips from Tsmc with huge improvements. I’m personally predicting the M3 Macbook Air to have the best battery life in any Macbook. So if Apple has such a great product coming, why risk releasing it during a recession where people simply aren’t buying Max? Anyway, that could even be why Apple recently delayed plans for their 27 inch display with mini Led and promotion technology, as well as maybe even delaying the overdue Mac Pro.
People aren’t really buying Max right now, and we know that for sure because Max sales have dropped 40 percent year over year. even worse than all the other Pc Brands. likely because Mac products are the most expensive. On top of that, many companies are cutting their budgets, including everything from products to advertising, which is why we’re seeing so many layoffs as well as business closures like news media companies. Just look at Google, who is cutting costs by buying fewer staplers, tape, and of course, giving their employees cheap Chromebooks by default instead of other nice laptops like Macbooks.
and I’m sure other companies are doing the same thing to save money. On top of that, Apple’s main iPhone Manufacturing Company, Foxconn just announced a 56 drop in profits compared to last year. So in this environment, companies are doing everything they can to save money because people simply aren’t spending money like they used to. So in the case of the M3 Macbook Air, why release it when we’re in the middle of a recession when they can just keep giving us simple M2 Chip swapped Max until the economy starts recovering again?
hopefully, early next year is great timing for the M3 Macbook Air. And now let me finish off with my personal prediction. I think that even though all of these reasons since I believe Apple will still release the M3 Macbook Air in the Fall simply because it matches up to their 1.5-year update cycle and even if the supply of three nanometer chips is low, I believe they could reveal the M3 Max in November, but with limited Supply so it could sell out very quickly until chip Supply improves later in December or January. So there you guys go. Those were my thoughts.
