Washington - Apple said it had hired over 11 000 women globally in the past year - 65% more than the previous year - to boost employee diversity.
"In the first 6 months of this year, nearly 50% of the people we've hired in the US are women, Black, Hispanic, or Native American," CEO Tim Cook said in a message on the company's website.
Cook maintained there was "a lot" more work to be done.
Apple had 92 600 full-time employees as of September 2014.
Diversity reports in the recent past have spurred a national debate about the lack of diversity at Silicon Valley's tech companies and how to improve gender and race ratios.
Google said in June that 21% of tech hires last year were women, boosting overall number of women in technical roles by 1%, as part of efforts to increase diversity.