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MacBook Pro preorders slip to late November, December ahead of release

Potential owners of the new MacBook Pro models will have a long wait for their order, with some default configurations not delivering in the United States until December.

Early preorders of the 14-inch MacBook Pro and 16-inch MacBook Pro saw shipping dates slip within minutes of opening on October 18. Less than a week later, it seems some customers may have to wait until December, even if they preorder before Tuesday's release date.

Apple's online store warns potential buyers of the 14-inch model that deliveries in the United States could arrive between November 16 and November 23 for the default options. For the 16-inch model, the same defaults say deliveries will occur between November 23 and December 1.

For customers seeking a customized MacBook Pro configuration, they will face an even longer wait. Across both varieties, changing from a default to a custom specification extends the delivery estimate to between December 2 and December 9.

An example of how long a MacBook Pro customer will have to wait for their order. An example of how long a MacBook Pro customer will have to wait for their order.

For some configurations, the delivery estimate is even further out, at between December 9 and December 16. This appears to be more the case when customers select both a chip and memory upgrade.

The delays for orders are also affecting other countries, not just the United States. In the UK, the online store says the default configurations for the 14-inch model are deliverable between November 16 and November 23, while the 16-inch stretches from November 23 to November 30.

It is unclear at this time how this will affect store supplies for the new models, but they will most likely be quite limited from the outset.



9 Comments

verne arase 11 Years · 479 comments

Was there when the Apple Store came back and tried to order a 16" MacBook Pro, M1 Max w/32 cores, 32 GB RAM, 2 TB SSD with yearly Applecare+ with Apple Pay on an Apple Card.

The store began to argue that my suburb didn't exist and wouldn't accept the transaction. The suburb name came out of my Apple Pay profile.

Fought with it a while and finally got it to accept my suburb name after retyping it for the second time - I believe there's a flaw in the Apple Pay/Apple Card clearance workflow when stressed under heavy load, and they got a validation link back up.

Any way, by the time it accepted my transaction, shipping had slipped to December 2-9. Later, it popped back to November 17-24 (cancelled duplicate orders?).

Funny thing is, I think the whole process took maybe 15 minutes.

ApplePoor 5 Years · 306 comments

Within 15 seconds of the Apple Store going on line after the presentation, I was entering my order for a custom build 14" MacBook Pro M1 Max, with 64GB Unified memory, 4 TB SSD and 32 GPU core. Despite the lack of shipping information progress on either the Apple Store app or the "Order Status" on the Apple store main web page, my unit began actually it's trek from China on 22 October and will be delivered sometime on the 26th. I also received a 3% credit to my Apple wallet. No invoice showing the pricing details has come to my inbox but the extended warranty certificate is in hand.

tpurdy 15 Years · 40 comments

Still no pickup in store option in my area :(

Hoping to get around the longer wait if I can!! 

davgreg 9 Years · 1050 comments

Ordered mine right at 7 AM on my iPad Pro using the store app that was open even as the website was not on my Mac. It has been shipped and is supposed to arrive tomorrow.

Veterans discount of 10%, Apple Card 3% back and a nice trade in of the Mac mini ($620) I have been using for my desktop makes this a very cheap purchase. The 14” MBP will mostly be a desktop - sitting in a matching 12 South arch and using the Space Gray Apple Full size keyboard and trackpad with a 32” LG 4K display.

I do have an existing breakout connector but will be looking to see what works best for the rest of the stuff- Keyboards, Pioneer Blu-Ray, Focal USB speakers, storage stack, etc.

melgross 20 Years · 33622 comments

I started to order mine in Safari, from Apple’s site. But at one point the progress bar stopped moving. This was at 8:00 est. so I jumped to Apple’s store app, and ordered there. My delivery date was Nov 3 to Nov 5. I’d bet that if I started with the store app as I did with the phone and watch, I would have made the first or second day. But this morning Apple sent me an e-mail saying that my Macbook Pro had shipped and that it would be here Nov 2, which happens to be my birthday, so I’m happy about that.