In summary:
- Macworld reports that Apple is expected to introduce refreshed color options for the 24-inch iMac later this year, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.
- The update represents a more significant color palette change compared to the subtle tweaks made in 2024, potentially featuring bolder modern colors.
- Apple may also release upgraded Mac Studios and Mac minis alongside the colorful iMacs, continuing the vibrant design approach from the original 2021 M1 model.
Apple unveiled a flurry of new products last week sporting a few new colors, including a pink iPhone 17e and a citrus-flavored MacBook Neo. Those hoping to see a colorful new Mac desktop, however, will have to wait until later in the year. But it looks like iMac fans are in for a treat.
“The 2026 Mac lineup is taking shape,” writes Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman in the latest edition of his Power On newsletter. “Up next are upgraded Mac Studios (I expect these around the middle of the year), and then iMacs and Mac minis. I am told the pending iMac update will include a refreshed color palette.”
This isn’t a trivial matter, given that color has been a major part of the 24-inch iMac’s appeal since it first launched in 2021. The original M1 model came in far more, and far more vibrant, finishes than was customary for Macs of its era, or indeed any desktop computers: blue, green, pink, silver, yellow, orange, and purple. It was a hit, and our review described it as a “beautiful rainbow” and praised it for evoking the whimsy of the G3.
These seven options have remained the same, at least in name, ever since. They stayed exactly the same when the device was updated with the M3 chip in 2023, and in 2024 they were merely tweaked: green got a bit lighter, pink got a bit pinker, yellow got a lot paler, and so on. It’s probably fair to say that the colors no longer feel quite as bold as they did five years ago.
Gurman’s claim is the briefest of throwaway comments in a newsletter that mostly focuses on other areas of Apple’s product roadmap, and offers little further detail. Indeed, it’s possible that we will get only the same “refresh” we got in 2024: the same colors, interpreted slightly differently.
Michael Simon/Foundry
Following the seemingly successful launch of the MacBook Neo, however, there’s reason to hope for more. Apple has really leaned into the Neo’s color palette, which offers fewer options than the iMac but is arguably braver–and more modern–in its choices. Several of these colors have been celebrated in a series of bizarre videos from Apple’s official TikTok channel.
So could we see the iMac in the MacBook Neo’s characterful, if divisive, yellow-green Citrus finish? Perhaps… although we’d imagine that customers are less prone to take aesthetic risks with a device which costs $1,299 than they would with one which costs $599. Either way, we should find out later this year.
Author: David Price, Editor, Macworld
David has been writing about technology for well over two decades, and got on board the Apple hype train when covering the original iPhone launch in 2007. He is an enthusiastic Apple Watch evangelist and feels that the HomePod is misunderstood.