Apple ships Mac mini with M6 chip, bringing local AI compute to the 6,999-yuan tier
The purchase fact is real, but the AI performance multiples are Apple's own claims; independent local-inference benchmarks are still pending.
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The 2026 Mac mini goes on sale September 22, with the M6 model starting at 6,999 yuan and the M5 Pro model at 12,999 yuan.
The M6 integrates a 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU, and for the first time on a Mac mini equips every GPU core with a neural accelerator, with 16GB of unified memory standard and up to 170GB/s of memory bandwidth. The M5 Pro model offers up to an 18-core CPU, 64GB of unified memory and 307GB/s of bandwidth.
Figures such as up to 4x AI performance and 2x faster graphics are Apple's official claims, not independently tested; Geekbench has already flagged purported M6 Pro benchmark leaks as questionable.