MacBook Pro With OLED Display Likely Still at Least Three Years Away

[zorinlynx]

I'm still confused by this and see way too many contradictory articles... aren't OLEDs susceptible to image retention? Why would we want this on devices with fixed UI elements?

Edited for clarity, thanks @klasma

Indeed. I can say with 100% certainty that I DON'T want OLED on a laptop, unless the burn-in problem is completely solved.

My laptop's screen is on 8-10 hours a day. Plenty of fixed UI elements. Even the best OLED displays at the moment will burn in with that.

 

[cmChimera]

some (rare) laptops

Also most laptops with OLED have pretty dim screens in comparison to the Macbook Pro, so I imagine Apple intends to implement when it can have a screen as bright or brighter than the current Macbook Pros.

 

[contacos]

Isn’t OLED already quite old? Why is it taking so long to bring it from a tv to inbetween sizes since it’s already on phones

 

[crsh1976]

Vision Pro will eliminate all future displays.

Would you like to buy a display for your new Mac? It's only $3,500!

 

[sack_peak]

AMOLED on any Mac or iPad will not accelerate my upgrade cycle but it is a nice to have by 2027.

 

[ikramerica]

And burn in is solved?

Why not just skip to micro-led and be done with it?

 

[Huracan]

No worries. By the time Apple releases a MacBook with OLED display the technology would already be obsolete, and we will be reading rumors about Apple releasing a new MacBook with the next display technology which will take a bunch more years to occur. Gone are the times Apple was at the leading edge of display technology. Saying that. I don't think it makes a big difference. I use MacBooks most of the time plugged to external displays.

 

[sunny5]

Why use OLED when it's a terrible choice for professional uses?

Burn-in is still a main issue and mini-LED is already great enough to use while OLED can't even replace miniLED. Max brightness sucks, burn-in sucks, reliability sucks, longevity sucks, and it just sucks for the computer monitor.
I dont see any advantages over miniLED by sacrificing too much from burn-in.

 

[sack_peak]

Why use OLED when it's a terrible choice for professional uses?

Burn-in is still a main issue and mini-LED is already great enough to use while OLED can't even replace miniLED. Max brightness sucks, burn-in sucks, reliability sucks, longevity sucks, and it just sucks for the computer monitor.
I dont see any advantages over miniLED by sacrificing too much from burn-in.

News of AMOLED gets ad revenue.

If MR had a way to filter out rumors, not news, of AMOLED displays on future refreshes then it would increase my enjoyment of MR.

 

[Tagbert]

Yes, current OLED is not as bright as mini-LED and current OLED does still have some problems with burn-in though there are image shift techniques to reduce it and to be agressive about shutting off the screen (which is done on phones and TVs)

Most of the detailed rumors about OLED on Macs and iPads say that Apple is requiring a dual layer OLED that would give increased overall brightness but also allow each individual layer to run at a lower power level to reduce burn-in (which is directly related to pixel brightness)

Yes, people have talked about OLED on Macs for a decade or so, but the rumors of actual plans for Macs with OLED have only been solid for the last few years. Before that it was wishcasting.

OLEDs are constructed on rigid substrates for panels of TV size. They are usually constructed on flexible substrates for phone sized screens. Laptops and tablets are in between and the flexible substrates at those sizes have a tendency to warp which causes obvious problems with the screens. It has taken a while to develop manufacturing techiques to scale up the flexible substrate panels to be suitable for laptops and tablets without distortions.

Apple has been working on micro-LEDs for a few years now and it sounds like they are close to ready for small panels like the Watch screen but that full production readiness is not certain enough for hard dates. There are a few much larger micro-LED screen but they use a different technique for assembly that doesn’t scale down to Watch/Phone/Laptop. Apple has had to work out new techniques to assemble panels in the sizes that they need.

Ross Young does have good contacts in the display industry and they can tell him what kinds and sizes of panels Apple is looking at and eventually what they are ordering but they don’t always know which devices are the target and exactly when they will ship. Still, his predictions tend to be among the best of the rumor mongers.

 

[t0rqx]

Just release the M3s and remove the bs notch, because it matches the iPhones. Which is not entirely true cause when this got released the pill came shortly after. So not sure which genius thought about this.

 

[orbital~debris]

Article Link: MacBook Pro With OLED Display Likely Still at Least Three Years Away

…without a time machine!

 

[blazerunner]

That is hilariously embarrassing. So many other manufacturers already have OLED in their laptops..... and the 3 trillion dollar company still doesnt? What excuse is there for this?

 

[Tagbert]

Just release the M3s and remove the bs notch, because it matches the iPhones. Which is not entirely true cause when this got released the pill came shortly after. So not sure which genius thought about this.

The MacBook notch is not there to mimic the phones. Apple was trying to maximize the screen size while keeping the case size as small as possible. The clever solution was to push the screen up into the upper bezel area. This way the menubar can be moved up and the area below it was kept as the same size of screen as before. The result is a gain in screen space. The only downsize is that they needed to make room for the camera, a couple of sensors, and some mounting fixtures so that is where the notch is. As it turns out the notch is in an area of the menu that is rarely used and the OS automatically shifts menus when there are a lot of them. If you use dark mode or if you use one of the dozens of utilities that make the menubar dark, then the notch is nearly invisible. And you still get a larger screen in a smaller case. Genius.

 

[Onelifenofear]

Micro LED is the future. Self emitting single pixels like OLED with any of the downsides... well apart form the cost.

 

[Ivanzz]

good news for me. not a fan of oled.

 

[Tuck_]

No thanks

 

[venom600]

Yes, mini-LED is useless for text in particular.

What? The Macbook Pro has had a MiniLED screen for the past two years and it is highly regarded as one of the best notebook displays on the market.

 

[soyazul]

I am super Ready for the 2024 MacBook Pro 16" M3 Max 64Gb RAM and 2TB (or maybe 4TB) Storage

 

[AlexESP]

Just a friendly reminder that Apple has already announced a product with microOLED displays (where they are definitely needed) and people go through the roof with the price. Of course, it’s not just about the display, but still a relevant part of it.

 

[johnnytravels]

That’s fine, since I won’t be replacing my M1 Air anyway until its successor comes with 1tb base storage and 32GB Ram.

 

[smithrh]

My OLED panel will burn my retinas out if I let it. I like my retinas fine so I don't let it.

Brightness is not a concern.

Again, plenty of burn-in mitigation techniques available. Hell, making the panel quickly replaceable might be one of them...

 

[Darren.h]

Blow off the MacBook Pro. Get a windows laptop.

with a 17 inch screen
touch screen
5G
replaceable ram and SSD
powerful video card.

and more!

 

[smithrh]

What? The Macbook Pro has had a MiniLED screen for the past two years and it is highly regarded as one of the best notebook displays on the market.

I have one as well, and it's pretty poor for how well regarded it is. I was originally pleased with it, but much of the content I wanted to pop in HDR suffered immensely. Once I hooked up my m1 mini to an OLED panel, I saw the future... it's not even comparable.

 

[klasma]

What? The Macbook Pro has had a MiniLED screen for the past two years and it is highly regarded as one of the best notebook displays on the market.

The mini-LED array backlighting provides no benefit for text, compared to the same LCD panel with regular backlighting. That’s because text has much finer detail than the size of the local-dimming zones. For example, the 14” MacBook Pro has 2,010 dimming zones, which translates to almost 3000 pixels per dimming zone, or something like a rectangle of 70x42 pixels, much larger than the details of a text character.

The extra contrast provided by the dimming zones can only benefit features larger than those zones. Hence the blooming you get around small bright details against a dark background. And apart from the dimming zones, mini-LED is just a regular LCD display — even if it’s a good one as in the MacBook. The dimming zones are mostly just useful for images and videos.