M4 Mac Minis sold out globally

Apple’s $599 Mac mini with the M4 chip was unavailable for delivery or in-store pickup on Apple’s U.S. retail site this week. (techcrunch.com) (apple.com) TechCrunch reported on April 24 that the 16 gigabyte memory, 256 gigabyte storage base model had sold out on Apple’s site, and shortages had spread to other base-model memory options. (techcrunch.com) Apple’s current U.S. Mac mini store page still lists the line starting at $599, but the configurator shown this week surfaces other variants while the base machine remains the model cited as unavailable. (apple.com) (techcrunch.com) Higher-storage M4 Mac mini configurations were not gone entirely, but TechCrunch said models with 512 gigabytes of storage and up were only shipping starting in June. (techcrunch.com) That shortage pushed buyers to eBay, where TechCrunch found new or open-box base models listed at $715 to $795, refurbished units as high as $979, and one new listing at $925. (techcrunch.com) (ebay.com) The squeeze is tied to a new use case for the machine: running local artificial intelligence models at home or in small offices instead of renting cloud servers. Apple markets the M4 and M4 Pro Mac mini around “AI workflows,” with a 16-core Neural Engine and up to 64 gigabytes of unified memory. (apple.com 1) (apple.com 2) TechCrunch said the recent OpenClaw boom helped turn the Mac mini into a favored box for on-device models, alongside other local tools from Anthropic, OpenAI, and Perplexity. (techcrunch.com) The appeal is practical: the Mac mini is small, quiet, and power-efficient, which makes it easier to leave running around the clock than many laptops or larger desktop towers. (techcrunch.com) (apple.com) TechCrunch also reported a broader memory crunch and a planned Mac mini refresh were part of the backdrop, though Apple had not responded to its request for comment. (techcrunch.com) The result is a familiar hardware pattern in the artificial intelligence market: a consumer computer that started at $599 is now being treated like scarce infrastructure. (techcrunch.com)