Apple II
computer series by Apple, 1977–1993
The Apple II is a series of microcomputers manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1977 to 1993. The original Apple II model, which gave the series its name, was designed by Steve Wozniak and was first sold on June 10, 1977. Its success led to the Apple II Plus, Apple IIe, Apple IIc, and Apple IIc Plus, with the IIe being the most popular. The name is trademarked with square brackets as apple ][, then beginning with the IIe in 1983 as Apple //.
The Apple II was a major advancement over its predecessor, the Apple I, in terms of ease of use, features, and expandability. It became one of several recognizable and successful computers throughout the 1980s, although this was mainly limited to the United States. It was aggressively marketed through volume discounts and manufacturing arrangements to educational institutions, which made it the first computer in widespread use in American secondary schools, displacing the early leader Commodore PET. The effort to develop educational and business software for the Apple II, including the 1979 release of the VisiCalc spreadsheet, made the computer especially popular with business users and families.
The Apple II computers are based on the 6502 8-bit processor and can display text and two resolutions of color graphics. A software-controlled speaker provides one channel of low-fidelity audio.
The public source identifies “Apple II” as computer series by Apple, 1977–1993. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Apple, computer and series.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q201652. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1977, 1993, 1983 and 1979.
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This entry incorporates text from “Apple II” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.