Best Mac for Adobe Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator is the industry leading graphic design tool that lets you design almost anything, from logos and icons to graphics and illustrations. If you’re looking for guidance on the best Mac to run Adobe Illustrator, or similar apps like Affinity or Sketch, you’re in the right place.

Whenever you’re trying to work out which Mac (or PC) is best suited for an application, you should start with the advised system requirements. Adobe helpfully details minimum and recommended specifications for all of their apps on their website which you can see here. We’ve used Adobe’s information along with user feedback we’ve collected to provide better guidance for you, advising requirements and options for beginner, intermediate and pro users.

At this moment in time Apple’s product line features both Intel and Apple Silicon processors and both can do the job. Hence we’ll include options and considerations for both processor chips.

You’re making logo’s, icons, or simple vector graphics.

• OS: macOS 11 (Big Sur) or newer
• Memory (RAM): 8GB
• Age: 2017 or newer
• Storage: Fusion Drive or SSD

Your projects are larger, have multiple layers and/or include more complex features like different textures, gradients, transparency, or custom lettering. You might also be using a graphics tablet to illustrate and using Photoshop in conjunction.

• OS: macOS 11 (Big Sur) or newer
• Process: Intel quad-core 2GHz or faster / Apple Silicon
• Memory (RAM): 16GB or more for Intel / 8GB or more for Apple Silicon
• GPU: 4GB of GPU memory or an Apple Silicon model
• Age: 2018 or newer
• Storage: Fusion Drive or SSD

You’re creating complex graphics, your project file is large and has lots of layers, you might be experimenting with 3D effects, textures, filters, gradient mesh. You’re moving back and forth between different Adobe apps.

• OS: macOS 11 (Big Sur) or newer
• Process: Intel six-core 2GHz or faster / Apple Silicon
• Memory (RAM): 16GB or more
• GPU: 4GB of GPU memory or an Apple Silicon model with 16GB memory
• Age: 2019 or newer
• Storage: SSD

Yesterday, Apple have released a redesigned iPad and updated the iPad Pro with M2 chips with significant prices increases over previous models.

iPad price increases

The new iPad (64GB) costs £499, up 56% from the 9th Gen predescessor which started from £319. The 9th Gen iPad has also had a price increase, from £319 to £369.

iPad Pro price increases

The new M2 iPad Pro 11-inch starts from £899, up 20% from the M1 model which started from £749. The new M2 iPad Pro 12.9-inch starts from £1249, up 25% from the M1 model which started from £999.

Notably the iPad mini and iPad Air have also had a price hike with the 64GB iPad mini increasing from £479 to £569 (+19%) and 64GB iPad Air increasing from £569 to £669 (+18%), despite no updates to the hardware.

Price jumps are not limited to the UK, Europe and Asia have also seen similar increases. The strong dollar along with the recent jump in inflation is likely the driving factor behind the increase.

We are expecting Apple to make similar increases on the Mac lineup with the expected update announcements in November, assuming a 20% rise this will put the price of the entry level MacBook Air at ~£1200 and entry level 13-inch MacBook Pro at ~£1600.