Apple Inc.
Please select which sections you would like to print:
Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.
Join Jul 13, 2020. Apple or its trade-in partners reserve the right to refuse or limit any Trade In transaction for any reason. In‑store trade‑in requires presentation of a valid, government-issued photo ID (local law may require saving this information). Sales tax may be assessed on full value of new iPhone. Additional terms from Apple or Apple’s trade-in.
Britannica's Publishing Partner Program and our community of experts to gain a global audience for your work! Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.
Steven LevySenior editor, Newsweek, New York City. Author of Artificial Life: A Report from the Frontier Where Computers Meet Biology and others.
Alternative Titles: Apple Computer, Inc.
Apple Inc., formerly Apple Computer, Inc., American manufacturer of personal computers, computerperipherals, and computer software. It was the first successful personal computer company and the popularizer of the graphical user interface. Headquarters are located in Cupertino, California.
Computers and Technology Quiz
Garage start-up
Apple Inc. had its genesis in the lifelong dream of Stephen G. Wozniak to build his own computer—a dream that was made suddenly feasible with the arrival in 1975 of the first commercially successful microcomputer, the Altair 8800, which came as a kit and used the recently invented microprocessor chip. Encouraged by his friends at the Homebrew Computer Club, a San Francisco Bay area group centred around the Altair, Wozniak quickly came up with a plan for his own microcomputer. In 1976, when the Hewlett-Packard Company, where Wozniak was an engineering intern, expressed no interest in his design, Wozniak, then 26 years old, together with a former high-school classmate, 21-year-old Steve Jobs, moved production operations to the Jobs family garage—and the Silicon Valley garage start-up company legend was born. Jobs and Wozniak named their company Apple. For working capital, Jobs sold his Volkswagen minibus and Wozniak his programmable calculator. Their first model was simply a working circuit board, but at Jobs’s insistence the 1977 version was a stand-alone machine in a custom-molded plastic case, in contrast to the forbidding steel boxes of other early machines. This Apple II also offered a colour display and other features that made Wozniak’s creation the first microcomputer that appealed to the average person.
Commercial success
Though he was a brash business novice whose appearance still bore traces of his hippie past, Jobs understood that in order for the company to grow, it would require professional management and substantial funding. He convinced Regis McKenna, a well-known public relations specialist for the semiconductor industry, to represent the company; he also secured an investment from Michael Markkula, a wealthy veteran of the Intel Corporation who became Apple’s largest shareholder and an influential member of Apple’s board of directors. The company became an instant success, particularly after Wozniak invented a disk controller that allowed the addition of a low-cost floppy disk drive that made information storage and retrieval fast and reliable. With room to store and manipulate data, the Apple II became the computer of choice for legions of amateur programmers. Most notably, in 1979 two Bostonians—Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston—introduced the first personal computer spreadsheet, VisiCalc, creating what would later be known as a “killer app” (application): a software program so useful that it propels hardware sales.
While VisiCalc opened up the small-business and consumer market for the Apple II, another important early market was primary educational institutions. By a combination of aggressive discounts and donations (and an absence of any early competition), Apple established a commanding presence among educational institutions, contributing to its platform’s dominance of primary-school software well into the 1990s.
Get exclusive access to content from our 1768 First Edition with your subscription. Subscribe today
Competition from IBM
Apple’s profits and size grew at a historic rate: by 1980 the company netted over $100 million and had more than 1,000 employees. Its public offering in December was the biggest since 1956, when the Ford Motor Company had gone public. (Indeed, by the end of 1980, Apple’s valuation of nearly $2 billion was greater than Ford’s.) However, Apple would soon face competition from the computer industry’s leading player, International Business Machines Corporation. IBM had waited for the personal computer market to grow before introducing its own line of personal computers, the IBM PC, in 1981. IBM broke with its tradition of using only proprietary hardware components and software and built a machine from readily available components, including the Intel microprocessor, and used DOS (disk operating system) from the Microsoft Corporation. Because other manufacturers could use the same hardware components that IBM used, as well as license DOS from Microsoft, new software developers could count on a wide IBM PC-compatible market for their software. Soon the new system had its own killer app: the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet, which won an instant constituency in the business community—a market that the Apple II had failed to penetrate.
Macintosh and the first affordable GUI
Apple had its own plan to regain leadership: a sophisticated new generation of computers that would be dramatically easier to use. In 1979 Jobs had led a team of engineers to see the innovations created at the Xerox Corporation’s Palo Alto (California) Research Center (PARC). There they were shown the first functional graphical user interface (GUI), featuring on-screen windows, a pointing device known as a mouse, and the use of icons, or pictures, to replace the awkward protocols required by all other computers. Apple immediately incorporated these ideas into two new computers: Lisa, released in 1983, and the lower-cost Macintosh, released in 1984. Jobs himself took over the latter project, insisting that the computer should be not merely great but “insanely great.” The result was a revelation—perfectly in tune with the unconventional, science-fiction-esque television commercial that introduced the Macintosh during the broadcast of the 1984 Super Bowl—a $2,500 computer unlike any that preceded it.
Quick Facts
- 1976 - present
- related people
- Co-founder Ronald Wayne sold his 10% stake in Apple for $800.
- Apple was founded on April Fool's Day in 1976.
- The Apple logo was designed with a bite so that it wouldn't be mistaken for a cherry from afar.
- Apple's market cap is greater than the GDPs of the Netherlands, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, and Norway.
- In 2011, Apple's financial reserves were greater than the U.S. Treasury's operating cash balance.
Your Mac provides several tools to help you identify it. The simplest is About This Mac, available by choosing About This Mac from the Apple () menu in the upper-left corner of your screen. The other is the System Information app. Learn how to use these tools to identify your Mac.
If you don’t have your Mac or it doesn’t start up, use one of these solutions instead:
- Find the serial number printed on the underside of your Mac, near the regulatory markings. It’s also on the original packaging, next to a barcode label. You can then enter that serial number on the Check Coverage page to find your model.
- The original packaging might also show an Apple part number, such as MNYF2xx/A (“xx” is a variable that differs by country or region). You can match the Apple part number to one in the list below to find your model.
This article lists MacBook models only. You can find similar information for MacBook Pro and MacBook Air.
List of MacBook models
MacBook models are organized by the year they were introduced, starting with the most recent. Click the model name for detailed technical specifications.
MacBook models from 2015 and newer can run the latest version of macOS. For models from before 2015, the latest compatible operating system is noted.
Apple Macbook Video
2017
MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, 2017)
Colors: Rose gold, space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook10,1
Part Numbers: MNYF2XX/A, MNYG2XX/A, MNYH2XX/A, MNYJ2XX/A, MNYK2XX/A, MNYL2XX/A, MNYM2XX/A, MNYN2XX/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, 2017)
Colors: Rose gold, space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook10,1
Part Numbers: MNYF2XX/A, MNYG2XX/A, MNYH2XX/A, MNYJ2XX/A, MNYK2XX/A, MNYL2XX/A, MNYM2XX/A, MNYN2XX/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, 2017)
Beginning in 2018, this MacBook model is available in space gray, silver, and the gold color shown here.
Cobook Contacts: Keep your, iPad contacts updated and organised using Cobook Contacts. Things:Things Apps for Mavericks OS allows you to keep a track on things to do easily. Best os x apps. OmiFocus: Stay on top of things that you do in your life.
2016
MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2016)
Colors: Rose gold, space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook9,1
Part Numbers: MLH72xx/A, MLH82xx/A, MLHA2xx/A, MLHC2xx/A, MLHE2xx/A, MLHF2xx/A, MMGL2xx/A, MMGM2xx/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2016)
Colors: Rose gold, space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook9,1
Part Numbers: MLH72xx/A, MLH82xx/A, MLHA2xx/A, MLHC2xx/A, MLHE2xx/A, MLHF2xx/A, MMGL2xx/A, MMGM2xx/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2016)
Mac Laptops 2019
2015
MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2015)
Colors: Space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook8,1
Part Numbers: MF855xx/A, MF865xx/A, MJY32xx/A, MJY42xx/A, MK4M2xx/A, MK4N2xx/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2015)
Colors: Space gray, gold, silver
Model Identifier: MacBook8,1
Part Numbers: MF855xx/A, MF865xx/A, MJY32xx/A, MJY42xx/A, MK4M2xx/A, MK4N2xx/A
Tech Specs: MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2015)
2010
MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2010)
Model Identifier: MacBook7,1
Part Numbers: MC516xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: macOS High Sierra 10.13.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2010)
Model Identifier: MacBook7,1
Part Numbers: MC516xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: macOS High Sierra 10.13.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2010)
2009
Information About Apple Macbook Air
MacBook (13-inch, Late 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook6,1
Part Numbers: MC207xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: macOS High Sierra 10.13.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Late 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook6,1
Part Numbers: MC207xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: macOS High Sierra 10.13.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Late 2009)
MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook5,2
Part Numbers: MC240xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: OS X El Capitan 10.11.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook5,2
Part Numbers: MC240xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: OS X El Capitan 10.11.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2009)
Apple Macbook Pro 2019
MacBook (13-inch, Early 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook5,2
Part Numbers: MB881xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: OS X El Capitan 10.11.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Early 2009)
Model Identifier: MacBook5,2
Part Numbers: MB881xx/A
Newest compatible operating system: OS X El Capitan 10.11.6
Tech Specs: MacBook (13-inch, Early 2009)