The M4 MacBook is apparently for sale on Facebook

According to analysts and industry experts like Mark Gurman and Ming-Chi Kuo, Apple is expected to announce an M4 update to the MacBook Pro later this month and most likely before the end of the year. There are no event announcements yet, although Apple has held a Mac event in October in the past. But now an online leak discovered by Wccftech claims that the new model is for sale in a private Facebook group. The claim is backed up by alleged images of retail packaging, but there’s a lot to be suspicious about.

While the images were posted by well-known leaker ShrimpApplePro, the information was sent to him from an unknown source. There are two posts so far, one with an image of the back of the retail packaging – with comments from AppleShrimpPro saying to view it with some skepticism – and one with additional images and the claim that it’s for sale on Facebook.

More photos of it confirmed that it was real. Apparently it’s available in a private Facebook group lmao pic.twitter.com/lxW9rbilSE

— ShrimpApplePro 🍤 ずっと真夜中でいいのに (@VNchocoTaco) September 30, 2024

Interestingly, AppleShrimpPro writes in the second post that “more photos of it confirmed it to be real,” but if anything, it’s the second set of images that makes this leak unconvincing. One of the images shows the front of the box and shows that the M4 MacBook Pro’s wallpaper is… the same as the M3 MacBook Pro’s wallpaper? We all know that Apple doesn’t change the design of its MacBooks with every update, but at least it changes the wallpaper. The likelihood of the company suddenly throwing its new M4 model into a box identical to the M3 is extremely unlikely.

However, we can see some details in the original photo. Of the various barcodes and numbers, only the serial number is partially hidden – and this is the only way to determine whether it is an existing MacBook Pro or a completely new design.

There is also the problem of how someone could get their hands on a packaged and ready-to-sell M4 MacBook Pro. The only really plausible method would be to grab it from an Apple Store’s inventory – but if they’re already in stores, why don’t we have an event announcement yet?

Invitations to the latest iPhone event, which took place on September 9th, were sent out two weeks in advance. It’s hard to believe that Apple would wait several weeks even though everything is ready to go. It’s hard to know exactly when Apple will ship devices to retail stores, but the company probably wants to wait as long as possible – the fewer devices on the market, the less likely there are leaks.

But just because this leak doesn’t seem entirely credible doesn’t mean it didn’t do anything right. We also keep our fingers crossed for at least 16GB of RAM in these new models. It’s not clear if that will happen, but we’ll keep you updated on further leaks and announcements.