Mark Gurman: What Apple has up its sleeve for 2022

“I’m told that Apple is readying the widest array of new hardware products in its history this fall.”

From this week’s Power On, posted Sunday to Bloomberg Technology subscribers:

It’s a shoo-in that you’ll see a new iPhone SE [in March or April], which will probably have a similar design to the current model but a faster processor and 5G support. Given that the iPad Air hasn’t been updated since the end of 2020, I’d say a new version of that product also is possible. Look for that device to get the A15 chip from the iPhone 13, matching the iPad mini from last year.

This spring will mark a year since the last iPad Pro upgrade, and that model launched about a year after the 2020 version. But I don’t expect the new model to arrive that quickly this time around…

But there’s one wrinkle: Earlier this week, Russian regulatory filings were unearthed for three new iPhone models and nine new iPads. The iPhone documents probably relate to the various iterations of the SE, but nine new models would be far too many for a new iPad Air. Either there’s more than just the Air on tap, or Apple filed its launches for this fall fairly early. We’ll see…

But given Apple’s typical strategy, I’d guess that the revamped MacBook Air and Mac Pro aren’t coming until later this year…

To that end, I’m told that Apple is readying the widest array of new hardware products in its history this fall. That makes sense: My back-of-the-envelope list includes four new iPhones, a low-end MacBook Pro, an updated iMac, the new Mac Pro, a revamped MacBook Air, an AirPods Pro upgrade, three Apple Watches, a low-end iPad and iPad Pros.

My take: Kudos for finding that nugget of news in Apple’s Russian regulatory filings.