M5 Now or Wait for M6? A Resale-Timing Guide for MacBook Pro Owners

Every MacBook Pro owner eventually faces the same question: buy the M5 machine that is here now, or wait for whatever comes next? In 2026 that question is unusually tangled, because the "next" MacBook Pro is not a simple M6 upgrade — and getting the resale timing right depends on understanding what Apple is actually planning. This is a resale-timing guide for MacBook Pro owners weighing an M5 now against holding out for the next big change.

The short answer is that the roadmap rewards decisiveness in both directions: buy the M5 and keep it a full cycle, or sell what you have before the redesign lands. The expensive middle ground is buying late in a generation or selling right after a launch. Here is how the pieces fit.

There is no straightforward "M6" MacBook Pro to wait for

The instinct to "wait for M6" assumes Apple will do to the Pro what it does to the Air — bump the chip a number and move on. That is not the plan. MacRumors' roadmap reporting states plainly that "Apple isn't going to release M6 Pro and M6 Max chips." Instead, the high-end 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro moves to M5 Pro and M5 Max silicon inside a redesigned, thinner body with an OLED touchscreen, arriving late 2026 or early 2027.

9to5Mac's account adds the entry-level picture: the base MacBook Pro is set to jump to an M7 chip with a redesign of its own in early 2027, while the premium touchscreen models run M5 Pro/Max. So the real choices are not "M5 or M6." They are: the current M5-class Pro that ships today, the OLED M5 Pro/Max redesign coming shortly, and an M7 entry-level redesign a bit further out.

How chip-number waiting hurts resale timing

Waiting purely for a higher chip number is usually the worst resale play, for a reason that is easy to miss. Used MacBook prices step down around launches, and a machine loses the most value in its first year — on the order of 20–30%, per AppleInsider, then 10–15% a year after that. If you buy a Pro late in its generation, you pay a near-current price for a machine that is about to take its first big depreciation step when the successor ships.

The same logic runs in reverse for selling. Holding your current Pro until the redesign is already on shelves means selling into the dip — after buyer attention has moved to the new look. Because this next change is a full redesign rather than a chip bump, that step-down is likely to be sharper than usual: a new shape, OLED, and touch all at once make the outgoing design read as last era's at a glance.

A simple framework for MacBook Pro owners

Match your move to your situation rather than to the calendar:

• You need a Pro now and will keep it 3–4 years: buy the M5-class machine and stop watching rumors. Over a full ownership cycle, the redesign timing barely matters, and Apple Silicon stays fast and supported for years.
• You want the newest design and upgrade often: wait for the OLED M5 Pro/Max redesign rather than buying an outgoing model at a near-current price weeks before it drops.
• You already own a recent Pro and plan to sell: list before the redesign ships. Selling into peak demand for the current design beats selling into the post-launch step-down.
• You are on the base MacBook Pro and can wait: the entry-level M7 redesign in early 2027 is the relevant milestone for you, not the high-end OLED models.

Why holding your current Pro is rarely a mistake

None of this means a current MacBook Pro is a bad machine to own through the transition. An M-series Pro remains a genuinely fast, well-supported computer, and Apple's practice of skipping M6 Pro/Max means the performance gap between what you have and what is coming is narrower than a generational leap would suggest — the redesign's story is the body and the display, not raw speed. If your Pro does everything you need, the strongest financial move is often to simply keep using it rather than chase a number.

Where timing does pay off is at the moment you decide to move it. Values around a redesign shift week to week, so the figure in your head from last year is almost certainly stale. The only number that matters is the one tied to your exact model, memory, storage, and condition today — and an instant offer takes about thirty seconds to surface it. The offer is the offer, so it holds once the machine arrives.

The bottom line

For MacBook Pro owners, "M5 now or wait for M6" is the wrong frame, because there is no M6 Pro or M6 Max — the next real Pro is an OLED redesign on M5 Pro/Max silicon, with an M7 entry-level model behind it. Buy the M5 and keep it a full cycle, or sell your current Pro before the redesign ships. Both are good calls. The costly one is drifting in the middle: buying an outgoing model at a near-new price, or selling into the dip after the new design lands.