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Gustoso

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 25, 2026
2
12
I'm in a bit of a unique situation. I'm buying a M5 Pro MBP as soon as they launch. I've been planning on buying the Pro Apps Bundle for Education as soon as I do. However, with the Pro Apps becoming subscription-based soon, I'm not sure if I should continue as planned or use the subscription service instead. I've never owned a license for any of the software included in the bundle.

Instinctively, I would much rather pay a one-time fee and own the software than be tied to a subscription service. My concerns revolve around what features I would be missing, and whether support would end for the purchased licenses eventually.

Features wise, is it just the AI enhancements that are different? I kinda don't want that anyway. Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro were gonna be just fine for me as they were before the announcement. Unless there's some major feature/quality-of-life change that I'm missing, I'm not sure the added features would be enough to justify going with the subscription.

Regarding the support, I suppose no one can be certain. They announced they'd continue to be supported for now, right? I could definitely see them retiring the licenses in a few years, or maybe make you unable to update past a certain OS until you subscribe. I feel like it's a matter of time until the migration is forced, but if it's a few years away, it may still be worthwhile for now to buy the bundle.

Any thoughts appreciated! Looking forward to getting a new MBP this week 🙂
 
With a perpetual license you won't be missing any of the features, according to the CineD podcast:

“The same features and functionality – Visual Search, Transcript Search, Beat Detection – will be on the one-time purchase version that you have today. It’ll update, and it’ll all just work as you expect it to.”

Bryan O’Neil Hughes
Apple Product Marketing

If you qualify for Apple education pricing, consider the US $29.99 per year subscription. Then you'll get all the features, including AI, plus the iPad apps.

Who knows what Apple will do in the future regarding perpetual licenses. Those that know can't say, and those that say can't know.
 
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