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Price cut: $43 bundle preps you for major cybersecurity certifications

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Woman in front of multiple monitors, with overlay of The Ultimate 2026 Cybersecurity Certification Training courses
Secure lifetime access to six cybersecurity courses at a massive discount.
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

The Ultimate 2026 Cybersecurity Training Bundle preps you for certification exams for CompTIA and Microsoft. It gives you a foolproof way to study for key certifications and build real skills without paying for an expensive bootcamp or short-term courses over and over again.

It’s an affordable, accessible way to jump-start your IT career. And right now, it’s on sale for just $42.50 with code MARCH15 (regularly $199). Note: You also can use the MARCH15 code to save an extra 15% off many other items in the Cult of Mac Deals store through March 29.

Why now is the best time to buy a portable SSD

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SSD prices are on the rise.
SSD price hikes make now the right time to buy.
AI image: ChatGPT/Cult of Mac

Anyone thinking about adding a portable SSD to their Mac or iPad would be wise to make that purchase soon. Prices for the external storage devices are already on the rise.

Why? For the same reason that Apple needed to raise prices for its newest MacBooks.

Apple sets June dates for WWDC26 and its next major software updates

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Apple's WWDC26 logo in white on a black background
The 2026 edition of Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference kicks off June 8 at Apple Park in Cupertino, California.
Image: Apple

The annual Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC26) will take place June 8–12, according to an update Monday on the Apple Developer website — setting the stage for what promises to be one of the company’s most anticipated software events in years. The event will mark the arrival of iOS 27, macOS 27 and more.

Today in Apple history: Macintosh LC II is the Mac mini of its day

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The Macintosh LC II was more powerful and cheaper than its predecessor.
The Macintosh LC II was more powerful and cheaper than its predecessor.
Photo: Jonathan Zufi

March 23: Today in Apple history: Macintosh LC II launch March 23, 1992: The “headless” Macintosh LC II arrives, wooing value-oriented customers with a beguiling mix of updated internals and budget pricing.

Designed to take up minimal space underneath a monitor (sold separately), the Mac LC II is destined to become a hit. In retrospect, the entry-level machine is roughly analogous to today’s Mac mini.

Closeout deal: Get 4 AirTags at their best price ever

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AirTag deal
Keep track off all your stuff with an AirTag or four... at 39% off!
AI image: ChatGPT/Cult of Mac

Apple AirTag deal alert! Now that second-gen AirTags are here, the original model is on close-out. A four-pack of these essential Bluetooth trackers now costs a whopping 39% less than the list price on Amazon right now.

That means you can currently pick up an AirTags four-pack for , or $39 off. That’s $15 apiece — not the usual $29.

iPhone Air gains traction despite getting labeled a ‘flop’

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iPhone Air profile
iPhone Air attracts some buyers with its super-slim design.
Photo:

The iPhone Air accomplished one of the goals Apple surely had for it: It’s reportedly outselling the device it replaced — and by a wide margin. That said, the super-slim iPhone hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm.

Still, it’s far from the flop that some critics labeled it.

Galaxy S26 can now share files with iPhones using AirDrop

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Drop It My Way
AirDrop now works with Samsung's flagship Galaxy phone.
Image: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac

Following in Google’s footsteps, Samsung added AirDrop support to its newest flagship phones: the Galaxy S26 series. This enables iPhone and Galaxy S26 users to transfer files between devices seamlessly.

Top be clear, Google and Samsung enabled AirDrop support in Quick Share without Apple’s help. 

Today in Apple history: PowerCD paves the way toward a lucrative future

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The PowerCD Apple CD player offered a glimpse of the company's post-desktop game plan.
This CD player offered a glimpse of Apple's post-desktop game plan.
Photo: Jonathan Zufi

March 22: Today in Apple history: PowerCD launch March 22, 1993: Apple launches the PowerCD, the first device from the company that doesn’t require a computer to work.

A portable CD player that also works as an external CD drive for Macs, it offers a glimpse of the extremely lucrative path Apple will follow a decade later. However, the PowerCD itself will ultimately fail to take off.

AirPods Max 2 surprise and disappoint, plus OpenClaw! [Cult of Mac podcast No. 12]

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Image of AirPods Max 2, with the words,
Apple's new headphones seem awfully familiar ...
Image: Cult of Mac

This week on the Cult of Mac podcast: The surprise release of AirPods Max 2 gives us plenty to talk about (including all the things Apple didn’t fix about the high-end headphones).

Plus, special guest Christina Warren (developer advocate at GitHub and co-host of the MacBreak Weekly podcast) joins us for a deep dive into one of Leander’s favorite topics — OpenClaw, the open-source AI agent that’s got everyone snapping up Mac minis, and the rise of agentic coding.

Also on the Cult of Mac podcast:

  • More on the MacBook Neo, including why every Mac owner should be thrilled that it comes with just 8GB of unified memory.
  • Griffin reviews the new Studio Display XDR and iPhone 17e.

Listen to this week’s episode of the Cult of Mac podcast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video version, embedded below.

Score a lifetime license to Microsoft Office 2021 for Mac for just $53

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A lifetime license to Microsoft Office 2021 for Mac.
Enjoy lifetime access to Word, Excel, PowerPoint and more.
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

Stuck using an older version of Microsoft Office? This offer gets you a lifetime license to Microsoft Office Home and Business 2021 for Mac for just $52.97 with code MARCH15. With a low one-time payment, you can bid farewell to Microsoft 365’s pesky recurring subscription fees. You’ll never need to pay again for Microsoft’s widely used software for work and school.

And if you need Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows, you can secure a lifetime license for even less: just $35.97 using the same code. (Note: You also can use code MARCH15 to save 15% on almost every item in the Cult of Mac Deals store through March 29.)

Today in Apple history: Apple TV makes its big-screen debut

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20140902_apple-tv_0061-780x520
Apple TV did not become an instant smash hit.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

March 21: Today in Apple history: Apple launches the Apple TV March 21, 2007: Apple launches the Apple TV, a gleaming-white set-top box with a remote control, for bringing iTunes media to the living room.

Unfortunately, the device lacks key features needed to make it a killer entertainment system. It’s something of a missed opportunity for Apple.

How to block ads (and other distracting things) on iPhone for free

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Image showing the Hide Distracting Items feature hiding a banner ad, with a photo of a bunch of billboards, captioned “Remove Ads on iPhone”
Simplify the web, one annoyance at a time.
Image: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac

Safari’s Hide Distracting Items feature lets you remove ads from your iPhone, along with other elements on the page that irritate you. It doesn’t require an ad blocker or a paid extension — Apple built it right into the browser.

Hide Distracting Items is not an ad blocker per se. But if pop-ups and other items that cover the page with no obvious close button pester you (like a cookie banner) Hide Distracting Items can come to the rescue. Here’s how to use it — keep reading or watch our video.

MacBook Neo draws record number of new buyers to macOS

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Tim Cook is excited about MacBook Neo
Tim Cook is excited about MacBook Neo.
Image: Apple/Cult of Mac

CEO Tim Cook says Apple just had its “best launch week ever for first-time Mac customers.” That means the MacBook Neo is doing exactly what it was designed to do: bring in people who have never owned a Mac before.

The first entry-level macOS notebook launched on March 11, and Apple can’t keep up with demand. Orders placed today come with wait times of several weeks.

Today in Apple history: Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh lands with a thud

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Photo of the Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh, which launched on March 20, 1997.
The Twentieth Anniversary Mac offered a glimpse of the future.
Photo: Apple

March 20: Today in Apple history: Twentieth Anniversary Mac lands with a thud March 20, 1997: Apple launches its Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh, a futuristic, special-edition Mac that’s ahead of its time in every way. Not part of any established Mac line, it brings a look (and a price!) unlike anything else available — and Apple delivers them to buyers in a limo!

And yet the Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh promptly bombs. Today, it’s a collector’s piece.

MacBook Neo costs far less than entry-level PCs over time

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MacBook Neo real cost makes 'budget PCs' look overpriced
Think long term, and the MacBook Neo costs far less than you might realize.
AI image: Apple/ChatGPT/Cult of Mac

An analyst’s report shows Apple’s new MacBook Neo is even more affordable than it first appears. The total cost of ownership is about half that of comparable Windows PCs.

It may sound counterintuitive at first — how can a $599 Mac be half the cost of a $599 PC? — but the analyst showed that the typical lifespan of a Mac is so much longer than that of a Windows PC that the Apple model costs much less over time.

All-in-1 brilliance: Top 7 iMac setups

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top 7 iMac setups
This M4 iMac setup packs great audio gear, too.
Photo: [email protected]

The iMac has always occupied a special place in Apple’s lineup — a beautifully integrated all-in-one desktop computer that bundles a 4.5K Retina display, camera, speakers and microphone into a single elegant slab of aluminium with color-matched accessories.

Yet despite the machine’s considerable visual appeal, iMac setups are a surprisingly rare sight in Cult of Mac‘s long-running Setups section. I noted in March 2025 that, out of 616 Setups articles written over more than four years at that time, only 11 featured an iMac as the centrepiece. That’s partly due to the fact that Apple desktop sales. They made up just 14% of Mac sales in 2024, while MacBooks accounted for a whopping 86%.

5 old problems that still plague AirPods Max 2

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A photo of Apple's space gray AirPods Max headphones sitting on a leather mat
New model number, same old drawbacks.
Photo: Jason Zhang/Unsplash License

Apple had years to refine its high-end headphones, the AirPods Max. But with the just-announced AirPods Max 2, the company played it safe.

An upgrade to Apple’s H2 chip brings some notable new features to AirPods Max 2. However, with many of the original model’s shortcomings still present, the revamp feels like a missed opportunity.

Google preps a Gemini Mac app with smarter features

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Gemini could soon get a dedicated Mac app.
Gemini could soon get a dedicated Mac app.
AI image: ChatGPT

Google has begun internally testing a dedicated Gemini app for macOS. While the company continues to improve its AI tool almost every other week, the lack of a native Mac app limits its full potential.

A dedicated app will make Gemini more accessible and better integrated into everyday workflows on macOS.

Apple finally fixes frustrating iPhone typing problem

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An iPhone typing problem frustrates iPhone users.
An iPhone typing bug that frustrates users gets a fix.
AI image: Apple/ChatGPT/Cult of Mac

Apple’s iOS 26.4 update includes a small line in its release notes that is drawing outsized attention. It promises “improved keyboard accuracy when typing quickly.”

While that might sound like a routine tweak, it appears to address a typing problem that has frustrated iPhone users for months.

Today in Apple history: The ultra-fast Macintosh IIfx speeds into stores

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Mac IIfx
The IIfx was the fastest Mac of its day.
Photo: Old Computr

March 19: Today in Apple history: The ultra-fast Macintosh IIfx speeds into stores March 19, 1990: The ultra-fast Macintosh IIfx makes its debut, sporting a hefty price tag appropriate for such a speedy machine.

The fastest Macintosh of its day, it boasts a CPU running at a “wicked fast” 40 MHz. It gains an additional speed bump from a pair of Apple-designed, application-specific integrated circuits. Prices start at $9,870 and run up to $12,000 — the equivalent of $24,561 to $29,862 in 2026 money!

Dev runs data-center AI model on MacBook — and it changes everything

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data-center AI model on MacBook
A developer did with a MacBook Pro what usually requires a whole rack of specialized, powerful gear.
AI image: Grok/Cult of Mac

Over the past few years, the artificial intelligence race looked like a story about infrastructure. Which company can build the biggest, most power-hungry data center, stock it with the most Nvidia GPUs and spend the most money? OpenAI, Amazon, Google, xAI — they’re all in a competition to build industrial-scale computing factories just to run the most powerful AI models. But it looks like developer Dan Woods just upended that story by running a data-center AI model on MacBook.

And that could mean Apple wins the AI race after all.

This travel adapter replaces every charger in your bag [Review] ★★★★

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The Tessan Voyager 205W travel adapter is one-of-a-kind.★★★★
The Tessan Voyager 205W travel adapter is one-of-a-kind.
Photo: Rajesh Pandey/Cult of Mac

The Tessan Voyager 205 Universal Travel Adapter combines a global plug adapter with a powerful 205W GaN charger with seven ports. It’s bigger and heavier than your usual travel adapter — but also far more capable.

Does the Voyager deserve a spot in your travel bag? Find out in our review.

Why Apple TV 4K can’t — and won’t — become a Mac

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Dream on: an Apple TV 4K can't be made into a Mac
Dream on: an Apple TV 4K can't be made into a useful Mac.
Image: Apple/Cult of mac

The MacBook Neo runs macOS on an Apple A-series processor with excellent performance, which has caused people to suggest that the Apple TV 4K could be hacked to run macOS and create a full-featured desktop computer for $129.

Or they propose Apple itself port macOS onto the video streamer and release it as a desktop that costs $200 or less.

Neither one is likely at all. Here’s why.