Mostly agree, though could be kinda cool for iOS devs to be able to test on a single device.
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Apple's Rumored MacBook Pro Redesign: 6 New Features Anticipated
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Mostly agree, though could be kinda cool for iOS devs to be able to test on a single device.
Why not just dock the iPhone into a Mac shell, or an iPad shell, for that matter, and sell it for just a couple hundred dollars. The phone screen would make a great touchpad. Would work for cars as well. Store everything on the web with storage and battery in the shell. Lose a phone, just download a new one and ready to go.
Ubuntu attempted to do this but got booed out of the room. The first phone company that does this is going to be the next Apple. There are a million schools out there waiting to buy this.
Russia is closest to this. Every student is at least exposed to Linux of one flavor or another.
What is the use case for the touchscreen? That you can’t do with touchpad.
Gorilla arm.
I can assure the universe at large that the overwhelming majority of touch inputs on MacBook Pro screens will be when the user is cleaning the screen.
I can assure the universe at large that the overwhelming majority of touch inputs on MacBook Pro screens will be when the user is cleaning the screen.
It doesn’t make it more expensive for you. Apple wouldn’t change the price unless they were already planning to do so. Apple targets pricepoints and maximizes margins at those pricepoints. They don’t do cost + x%.
Apple potentially saves a some money (multiplied by millions of devices) by excluding a touch enabled display. You don’t save anything.
I'm so torn. I got a macbook air m1 and just bought airpods pro 3
but if the redesigned macbook pro oled comes at the end of 2026...I think I'd better wait for it , and get it with free airpods pro thanks to student discount , no ?
but if the redesigned macbook pro oled comes at the end of 2026...I think I'd better wait for it , and get it with free airpods pro thanks to student discount , no ?
unfortunately that is the main (even sole) reason why I returned it and kept my macbook air m1..I just couldn't use those new macbook pros without being in pain
s
same. it'll likely make it cost much more too. what's the point of a touch-based mac anyway? i truly fail to see the appeal
I have 14” M1 and it’s still the best laptop I have ever used. But the changes I want are always seem to be 2 years from now. Don’t need 5g, touch screen or design change. Don’t care what chip. Just give me and Oled display with punch hole camera in q1 2026
Touchscreen would be a mistake IMO, unless they allow us to turn it off. I hate touchscreens on laptops and desktops. I disable my touchscreen on Windows.
Adding a touchscreen implies they'll re-work the Mac OS user interface into a mess similar to what has become of Windows.
- Widespread inconsistencies between new, legacy, first-party, and third-party apps.
- Bigger buttons.
Would like to have cellular connectivity. Cellular option can also be available with the M5 version. OLED display will also be nice. Overall the changes are exciting. Wish they also have a bright color in addition to silver and black/grey. High time Pro lineup gets some colors.
Touchscreen computers are these worst in every single possible way imaginable.
So sad to see macOS keeps getting dumbed down into an iPad.
So sad to see macOS keeps getting dumbed down into an iPad.
Touchscreens almost always have a negative impact on display quality. Might Apple come up with a solution that doesn’t? Perhaps, but it is unlikely they will be able to completely eliminate all negative impacts.
Also, UI elements for precision inputs vs touch are fundamentally different. If Apple released two versions of macOS - one for technical users and one for finger poking toddlers, then fine. But we all know Apple isn’t going to do that. Spacing and toggle switches on macOS have already gotten pretty ridiculous for precision input.
So in the end, everyone who cares about having a precision computer will suffer, when Apple adds this useless gimmick to their Macs.
(Now an iPad that ran iPadOS when alone, but macOS when docked with a keyboard and monitor or something would be pretty cool. But turning macOS into iPadOS is rather heartbreaking.)
The highest quality display a lot of people have is on their phone, which has touch capability. The OLED MacBook Pro is rumored to use on-cell touch technology, meaning the display layer would be one and the same instead of two layers (which can reduce light transmission a little). That said poor quality PC laptop touch screens generally come from starting with a low quality display, backlight, and plastic screen (instead of glass) to begin with, not the touch layer.
If Apple uses the display tech they are rumored to be using, the touch layer is going to be there regardless of whether Apple enables it or not. Nor does Apple need to adjust any UI in MacOS elements for touch is a secondary input method. Touch screen PC laptops don’t run a different version of windows. I stand by my point that simply adding a touchscreen to a Mac (and doing nothing else) doesn’t have a consumer facing downside, even if you never use it.
My thoughts about where Apple wants to take iPadOS are separate from this, and would have consumer downsides. I do wish iPads running macOS, switching to an iPadOS UI when undocked were on the table.
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The UI does have to be different though. Increased spacing between elements to accommodate larger fingers vs a tiny pointer, decreasing information density per page, replacing small checkboxes with larger toggle switches, etc. Touch and input control have fundamentally different optimization needs.
Regarding Windows, I have no idea how they deal with touch. Last time I used Windows was Windows XP. But if your telling me that you can simply put Windows XP on a computer with touchscreen hardware and everybody is honky dory with absolutely no UI changes, well then I guess I might change my opinion on the issue.
That all said, I am pretty sure macOS has already started transitioning for touch input beginning with macOS Ventura. There has definitely been a deliberate shift to make macOS more touch friendly with every release beginning with Ventura.
You can put a touchscreen on anything if you want. Nothing about the UI "needs" to be different. Obviously a device designed around touch "should" be different, but I specifically called it a secondary input option for a Macbook, not the primary. You need to design for the primary and accommodate the secondary, that's it. People that use the touchscreens on PC laptops don't use touch for everything, just the random scroll or touch on an element that is large enough to be touched. The trackpad still exists, and it's still the primary way the computers are used. My point has been that simply giving people the option to do this isn't a negative. It may not be much of a positive either, but it's not negative, and especially not a negative proportionate to the opposition it can see here; which has a bias toward painting things Apple isn't doing as negatives, only to see the opinion flip once they do.
You are right that Apple has been making changes to better accommodate touch in MacOS for quite some time now though. I think it pre-dates Ventura. They boosted things like maximum icon size before that anyway. I think it's something they've considered for a long time, specially because adding a touch enabled display isn't a major undertaking. The biggest challenge Apple faces with touchscreen capable macs is deflecting attention away from a perceived foot in mouth moment.
Built in 5G modem, touch screen display, good keyboard.... All these have been available in Windoze Pee Cees for years. If Apple fails to deliver much longer, maybe my next laptop should run Windows?
Apple in October 2024 overhauled its 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models, adding M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max chips, Thunderbolt 5 ports on higher-end models, display changes, and more. That's quite a lot of updates in one go, but if you think this means a further major refresh for the MacBook Pro is now several years away, think again.
Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has said he expects only a small performance boost for the next MacBook Pro refresh when new models with M5 chips arrive likely early next year, while the "true overhaul" for the laptop will come further down the line – either in late 2026 or early 2027. So if you are planning to skip the M5 MacBook Pro, or you're just plain curious about what's two generations away, here are the biggest changes rumored to be coming to Apple's premium laptop line.
OLED Display
Goodbye, mini-LED
Several rumors have indicated that Apple is developing MacBook Pro models with OLED displays. Research firm Omdia in May 2024 claimed Apple is "highly likely" to introduce new MacBook Pros featuring OLED displays next year, while display analyst Ross Young in September 2024 said that Apple's supply chain is expected to have sufficient notebook-optimized OLED display production capacity in 2026 to bring the technology to MacBook Pro. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has said he expects the MacBook Pro to gain an OLED display "between the end of 2026 and early 2027." Compared to current MacBook Pro models that use mini-LED screens, the benefits of OLED technology would include increased brightness, higher contrast ratio with deeper blacks, improved power efficiency for longer battery life, and more.
Thinner, Lighter Laptop
Major Redesign
The switch to OLED displays could allow future MacBook Pro models to have a thinner design, and rumors suggest that is indeed what Apple intends. When the M4 iPad Pro was unveiled in May 2024, Apple touted it as the company's thinnest product ever. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman subsequently called the iPad Pro the "beginning of a new class of Apple devices," and said Apple was working to make the MacBook Pro thinner over the "next couple of years." Apple is reportedly focusing on delivering the thinnest possible device without compromising on battery life or major new features.
Notably, the MacBook Pro got thicker and heavier with its most recent redesign in 2021. A major highlight was the reintroduction of several ports that were removed in previous iterations in favor of chassis thinness. How Apple will make its redesigned MacBook Pro thinner without removing the functionality it reintroduced fairly recently is the big question.
Punch-Hole Camera
No More Notch
If you are fed up of the notch intruding on your Mac display, here's some good news. Apple plans to remove the notch from the redesigned MacBook Pro, according to a roadmap shared by research firm Omdia. The roadmap indicates that redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models will have a hole-punch camera at the top of the display, rather than the notch we've become accustomed to. A MacBook Pro without a notch would offer additional visible pixels on the screen, creating a more uninterrupted and cohesive display design.
Such a move would mirror Apple's iPhone evolution, since the iPhone's notch became the current Dynamic Island starting with the iPhone 14 Pro models in 2022. It's unclear whether the MacBook Pro would include Dynamic Island functionality or simply adopt the visual design, but the change would at least address long-standing user complaints about the notch, which physically ingresses into the macOS menu bar.
5G Modem
Cellular Connectivity
Earlier this year, Apple introduced the C1, its custom-built 5G modem chip which debuted in the entry-level iPhone 16e. More recently, Apple debuted the iPhone Air equipped with a new C1X chip, which is up to 2x faster than the C1. According to Apple, the C1X is the most power-efficient modem in an iPhone. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is considering bringing cellular connectivity to the Mac lineup for the first time. The company is said to be "investigating" the possibility of adding a second-generation C2 modem chip to a future Mac as soon as 2026, teasing the potential for a cellular MacBook Pro in the same year. The C1 and C1X modem chips are limited to sub-6GHz 5G speeds, but the second-generation version will support faster mmWave technology, according to Gurman.
M6 Series Chip
2nm Process
Before the MacBook Pro's major redesign, Apple plans to update the lineup with M5 series chips, likely in early 2026. The chips will be manufactured with TSMC's third-generation 3nm process, known as N3P, resulting in typical year-over-year performance and power efficiency improvements compared to the M4 seri... Click here to read rest of article
Article Link: Apple's Rumored MacBook Pro Redesign: 6 New Features Anticipated
I wish they'd get back to a 15" MBP at some point. Maybe as a mid-tier model between the Air and top end MBP.
I'd be fine with an M5 Pro (or M6 Pro) level chip with OLED screen but a thinner profile and less weight if that's possible.
I'd be fine with an M5 Pro (or M6 Pro) level chip with OLED screen but a thinner profile and less weight if that's possible.
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