Used-Mac sellers did not blink on announcement day

Update, Sept. 16: The day-one pause did not last. In the larger panel now observed on both sides of the announcement, 101 of 134 asks for the four replaced Mac mini and Mac Studio models had fallen by Sept. 15. The fixed basket declined $45,954, or 11.9%; 24 asks held and nine rose. The full model and source split, and the earlier Sept. 5 reading of the same panel, are in our announcement follow-up, and the daily tracker carries the latest reading.

Original report: Aug. 25

Used Mac asking prices did not fall on announcement day. Of 12 current-generation listings our crawler priced before and after Apple’s M6 and M5 announcement, 10 were unchanged and two fell by 3% and 5%.

Hours after Apple announced the M4 Max Mac Studio’s replacement Tuesday — same $2,499 starting price, shipping Sept. 22 — the used M4 Max Studios on the market were still asking an average of $3,399. That is 136% of the list price of a machine that just became last generation.

Sellers, so far, are not blinking.

Why used Macs were selling above Apple list price

Current-generation Macs have carried a premium over Apple’s own raised list prices since the June repricing — including secondhand. Median asking price as a share of current list, by condition, observed Aug. 21-24:

Config (current list)	Third-party new	Used
Mac mini M4 16/256 ($799)	125%	94%
Mac mini M4 16/512 ($999)	121%	95%
Mac mini M4 24/512 ($1,199)	125%	108%
Mac mini M4 Pro ($1,599)	100%	106%
Mac Studio M4 Max ($2,499)	121%	127%
Mac Studio M3 Ultra ($5,299)	—	111%

Third-party sellers of new units were asking 21-25% over list on most configurations. Used units asked at or above list on everything but the base minis. The premium bought one thing: having the machine now, instead of after Apple’s quoted 37-to-91-day wait.

Did used Mac prices fall after the announcement?

Tuesday’s announcement attacked every input of that trade at once. The new generation restores the withdrawn 64 GB mini and 128 GB Studio memory tiers, which had made the used market the only market. New units ship Sept. 22, which puts a four-week fuse on “available today” as a selling point. And every current-generation machine in service became a soon-to-be-prior-generation machine that morning.

The asks barely moved. Of the 12 current-generation listings our crawler priced both before the announcement and after it Tuesday, 10 were unchanged. Two sellers — both of M4 Pro minis — trimmed: one from $1,749 to $1,699, one from $2,250 to $2,137, cuts of 3% and 5%. Nobody slashed. The M3 Ultra Studios that had been asking around double list still held asks above $5,000.

A 12-listing panel over one afternoon is a first reading, not a verdict. It is also the honest one: the widely felt intuition that resale prices crack the moment a successor is announced is, on day one and in our data, wrong. Repricing seems to wait for shipping trucks, not press releases.

When used Mac prices could fall

The calendar does the work from here. Every day toward Sept. 22 shrinks the value of “in hand today,” and the first delivered M6 and M5-generation machines start the trade-in wave that puts thousands of current-generation Macs on the resale market at once. Sellers holding 127%-of-list asks are betting they find a buyer before that happens.

The same-listing panel grows with every crawl cycle. The update above is the latest larger answer; the next one comes when the new Macs ship Sept. 22.