Shipping times for both online and offline orders of the 16-inch MacBook Pro notebooks from the online Apple store have begun slipping ahead of a rumored Apple event in October.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS:
- Delivery times for new MacBook Pro orders are now slipping
- At many stores, orders are delayed or unavailable for pickup
- Apple is expected to unveil new Macs later in October
MacBook Pro deliveries delayed ahead of Apple’s rumored event
This is happening across both online and brick-and-mortar Apple stores.
The 16-inch MacBook Pro is listed as being unavailable for in-store pickups at many Apple stores in the US. Shipping times for the computer are also slipping across Apple’s international online stores. This is usually a tell-tale indicator of an imminent hardware refresh.
Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman first reported on Twitter that online orders are unavailable.
The 16-inch MacBook Pro (which if you’ve lost track still uses Intel and hasn’t been updated in *2* years) is showing unavailable for pick up at many Apple stores plus shipment delays. pic.twitter.com/vPpTLxXIUz
— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) October 11, 2021
Shipping times for the base 16-inch MacBook Pro are currently 8-10 days.
Apple’s 96W USB-C brick is also in short supply
For the sake of completeness, this could also be a supply chain issue due to the ongoing disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our take: It’s a sign of an upcoming refresh because Apple’s 96W USB-C power adapter for the MacBook Pro was recently listed on the online store with estimated delivery times of up to three months in some cases.
You’re probably aware that Apple is expected to hold another pre-taped product unveiling following its September 2021 virtual event that brought us the new iPhone 13, Apple Watch Series 7, ninth-generation iPad and iPad mini 6. An October event, likely to happen toward the end of the month, should serve as a launchpad for new Apple silicon computers.
The company is expected to unveil a new 14-inch MacBook Pro alongside a refresh for the current 16-incher, and both should run the upcoming Apple M1X chip, an enhanced version of the current M1 chip with ten processing cores, 16 or 32 GPU cores and up to 64GB of RAM.
Apple could also announce a redesigned, thinner Mac mini during the event, plus new AirPods.