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MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display and Touch

228 points etothet 1 hour ago 358 comments

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2026/10/apple-unveils-groundb...

mixtureoftakes 1 hour ago | parent

M5 chips instead of m6 are SO DISAPPOINTING! looks like a good laptop otherwise though

dkindler 1 hour ago | parent

M5 pro or max which is better than the m6. There is no m6 pro/max

NewsaHackO 1 hour ago | parent

But I assume they are planned/developed at this point, why not release it with the new Pro?

otterley 1 hour ago | parent

Historically speaking, the Pro/Max versions of the chips have become available at around the same time the next-generation base chip does. So, M4 Pro/Max shipped when M5 shipped, M5 Pro/Max shipped when M6 shipped, and so forth.

NewsaHackO 1 hour ago | parent

OK, didn't realize that. Makes sense, I guess. Was holding out on buying a new laptop since May for this, definitely not going to wait another year.

GeekyBear 1 hour ago | parent

The M7 generation is said to be another huge advance on local LLM performance, so Apple is skipping the M6 Pro and M6 Max to bring out the M7 generation early.

tschellenbach 1 hour ago | parent

no point in upgrading from m3 max atm. (it seems)

mattrighetti 1 hour ago | parent

Am I the only one that has never ever felt the need to have a touch screen display on my Mac?

EDIT: I already can’t stand when people touch my display just to point at something, I definitely don’t want my own oily fingerprints smeared all over a screen I spend all day looking at.

egypturnash 1 hour ago | parent

Nope. Never had any desire for one.

dcss_gardener 1 hour ago | parent

You're going to get a ton of affirmatives but remember this is also the forum that considers removable batteries one of the most important smartphone features. Our opinions about consumer tech are outliers.

karpovv-boris 1 hour ago | parent

especially with the same lid angle. Look at the pictures, they didn't even know how people use touchscreen on the laptops, it's funny

jeroenhd 1 hour ago | parent

Touch screens on laptops are a bit like 4k screens or >60Hz screens. You don't expect to get much out of them, but once you're used to them, going back is annoying.

Everything from my watch to my printer has a touch screen, it's kind of strange how long Apple has held out, especially with the ultra expensive market they target with their laptops.

akamaka 1 hour ago | parent

Whenever I had to use a laptop with a touch screen for work, I immediately turned it off. I have no idea what my use case would be as a coder, and it doesn’t seem like Apple has come up with anything new to give me a reason to try it again.

gizajob 1 hour ago | parent

I’ve felt for years that they were holding out until they could make a dual touchscreen MacBook work and be a peak experience. I was expecting an iPhone duo type MacBook. That hasn’t happened.

Who plays a musical keyboard on a vertical surface? Nobody.

jeroenhd 53 minutes ago | parent

Some of their examples are absolutely ridiculous, for sure. The lack of a fold-back design, like the surface, with pencil support is also a surprise to me. I suppose they'd still rather sell you an iPad with an operating system they don't let you control rather than bringing their laptop segment up to par with the competition.

But having had to emulate pinch-zoom in an Android emulator has made me wish I had my touch screen laptop back. Emulated touch events also don't work like real touch events, so web dev can also be a bit annoying sometimes.

lucasoshiro 1 hour ago | parent

My company once gave me a touchscreen laptop and I did know that until I touched the screen by accident. It was fun to play but I never found it useful. I heard many people saying the same, some of them even preferred to disable. I find it uncomfortable to touch a laptop screen... The only thing seems to benefit from that for me is photo editing apps or 3D modelling.

So, I'm curious about how you use it. Do you have a specific use case where touchscreen made you life easier?

jeroenhd 56 minutes ago | parent

It's just small things. I don't have a touch screen laptop anymore, but being able to physically tap things or reaching over to touch things just felt natural.

I have a phone with a QWERTY keyboard that also acts as a trackpad, yet I rarely use mouse mode on it. Seeing kids interact with laptops for the first time and touching the screen expecting them to work like every other device they use is also probably a sign of the times.

I understand why not everyone likes them, though. Some people prefer to disable their trackpads too, or prefer ball mice, or prefer mouse gestures over keyboard gestures. To each their own. I welcome the diversity.

xutopia 1 hour ago | parent

I remember Steve Jobs saying something about how silly it would be.

nomilk 1 hour ago | parent

He said the same of the stylus during the iPhone launch, but it eventually came to life (just in a much more specific setting/use case)

asdff 55 minutes ago | parent

The pencil is bad enough but how it charges itself is even worse. Lets turn my ipad into a brittle stingray. It's up there with the mouse having to charge upside down for apples top own goals.

K7PJP 27 minutes ago | parent

He said if the device required a stylus, they failed. The pencil is useful for certain applications, but not required.

sroussey 1 hour ago | parent

Yes, I agree, but I caught myself touching the screen twice this week forgetting it was a Mac...

whalesalad 1 hour ago | parent

when i'm in a supine position like in bed with my knees up... i will unfold my framework pro to 180º and use my thumb to scroll docs etc. only downside is smudge marks on the screen which rly irritate me.

1e1a 1 hour ago | parent

I need a screen which zaps me whenever I touch it, to discouraged me from accidentally leaving fingerprints at the edge.

TuxSH 1 hour ago | parent

You're not alone. Though, I wonder if this means better coating, the coating on the existing MacBooks (but not the M1's) get damaged far too easily when in a bag.

mattrighetti 1 hour ago | parent

> the coating on the existing MacBooks (but not the M1's) get damaged far too easily when in a bag

How so? I have an M2, carry it in a bag daily but my screen is still pristine

jgrahamc 1 hour ago | parent

I use Mac mostly, but I also use a Panasonic Toughbook (https://blog.jgc.org/2025/07/ode-to-anti-mac-panasonic-tough...) and it has a touch screen display and I find it's a useful addition to how I interact with it.

mcv 1 hour ago | parent

I've had a Thinkpad with a touch screen and I loved it. Sometimes touching something on the screen is a lot faster than grabbing the mouse, moving the cursor, and then clicking.

Although it's a lot more useful on laptops that can fold into a tablet, which neither MacBooks nor my Thinkpad can do.

randerson 1 hour ago | parent

If you've ever watched a kid try to use a MacBook, they instinctively touch the screen because they were raised on iPads.

dsego 1 hour ago | parent

Their marketing web page shows someone poking with their fingers at the virtual keyboard and it's so cringe. Who is going to use their laptop that way? For pro workflows? Pros have midi keyboards with pads and those are even not that expensive.

linguae 1 hour ago | parent

I would love a tablet running macOS, which I prefer over Windows and desktop Linux. I have a Microsoft Surface Pro 7. It performed fine under Windows 10, though performance suffered when upgrading to Windows 11. The Surface Pro is a nice piece of hardware, but I wish it had macOS instead of Windows. The iPad Pro definitely has enough processing power to run macOS, but it runs iPadOS, which is too restrictive for me as a developer.

If Apple went through the effort making macOS touchscreen-ready for this new MacBook Pro, then perhaps we’ll see a tablet with macOS one day. I’d buy an iPad Pro with macOS in a heartbeat.

SirMaster 1 hour ago | parent

Even when developing a mobile app and using the simulator, you never wished you could touchscreen the simulator?

causal 1 hour ago | parent

1) Youth expect all screens to be touch. They are learning how to use computers in school on touchscreen Chromebooks. Apple knows they must adapt to user expectation.

2) AI is forcing UI evolution that is hard to anticipate, but I suspect will be served well by having more kinds of inputs available in advance.

Mongoose 1 hour ago | parent

Fully willing to accept that I could be an outlier, but I have never understood how a market exists for laptops with touch screens.

apocalyptic0n3 1 hour ago | parent

I had one for work a while back that could turn around so the screen faced upward while closed, effectively making it a bulky/heavy tablet. It was convenient for walking over to someone desk and discussing a topic. But it wasn't ground breaking enough for me to ever seek something out like it again. I rarely even open my laptop these days unless I'm in a conference room.

causal 1 hour ago | parent

Kids expect all screens to be touch ready. Chromebooks they learn on in schools are touchscreen. It will be a competitive requirement before long, I think.

Louisgaga59 59 minutes ago | parent

I agree with you. When I show things to my kids on my laptop, they instantly try to play with the content by touching the screen.

hirvi74 48 minutes ago | parent

While true, I do not believe kids are the intended market for a laptop in which the entry model starts near $3k USD.

droidjj 1 hour ago | parent

I used to work regularly on a commuter train with a firm-provided touchscreen ThinkPad. The touchscreen was great on the train because it was faster (for many things) than reaching for the trackpad. And when you're in a sort of cramped sitting position, reaching forward feels natural.

I'm a lawyer by trade and am forced to lean on GUIs with little keyboard-control support. When I code (for pleasure), I don't miss the touchscreen, but I often miss it when I'm trying to read PDFs and Word documents on the go.

SirMaster 1 hour ago | parent

I mean it's only $400 more than the LED non-touch screen.

Seems like it would be useful for app development being able to do touchscreen for the iOS and iPadOS simulators.

abujazar 51 minutes ago | parent

I much prefer using an actual device, which is required for a lot of other hardware features anyway.

dstroot 1 hour ago | parent

You’re not an outlier.

nfriedly 44 minutes ago | parent

I look for touchscreens when looking for a cheap windows laptop for someone because they tend to be better quality screens (IPS, decent brightness, etc.) instead of some awful TN panel that's barely visible in a well-lit room.

I don't really expect anyone to use it as a touchscreen, but if they do, at least that will work too.

makeitdouble 22 minutes ago | parent

Getting rid of the fixed keyboard helps a lot (my preferred form factor), but even in the classic laptop form factor is makes a ton of sense IMHO.

There's a lot of small niceties that pile up into a better experience, the sister comments cover a bunch of those, so I'll focus on a macos specific nice point:

iPad and iPhone apps can now get direct touch when running on a laptop, instead of the mouse mode. With this, there is now a perfect platform able to run Mac, iOS and iPad apps outside of the ill-fated Vision Pro.

That's too little to late for me, but I think many will appreciate the benefits.

mschuster91 20 minutes ago | parent

Oh in university it's a godsend having something you can just run PDF Annotator on and draw with a pen directly on your laptop. (Lenovo 20KK user here, got it for 200€ at a hamvention used, even came with a 4G modem)

vehemenz 14 minutes ago | parent

Much like the Touch Bar, I expect that Apple will learn this lesson the hard way.

mrtksn 13 minutes ago | parent

I feel the same but I noticed that the boomers and Gen Z both reach for the screen when I am showing them something and they want to interact with it(i.e. scroll a page or close a window).

Maybe the the intuitive and natural way of interaction is touch and the generations between the boomers and the Gen Z are the only ones who command the skillset to use computers in any other way.

moralestapia 6 minutes ago | parent

5 trillion market cap. That's how much of an outlier (i.e. clueless) you are.

georgel 1 hour ago | parent

Glowing logo is back!

pat2man 1 hour ago | parent

worth the $3k right here

LoganDark 1 hour ago | parent

Oh my god yes!!

whycome 1 hour ago | parent

My god they finally did it. After all the fears of canibalizing iPad sales and gorilla arms. An Apple touchscreen MacBook.

Absurd it took this long when they basically led the field in touchscreen innovation (especially on the UX side of things)

I always thought the Surface Book design by Microsoft was very Apple like and it always seemed like the logical step: let the screen detach but keep the extra horsepower in the base.

mepian 1 hour ago | parent

Does it support the Pencil?

cmckn 1 hour ago | parent

$3400 for the base model 16”, 24GB/1TB. $2900 for the 14”. Quite steep.

djanogo 1 hour ago | parent

$4950 for Max, Nano Texture 36GB/2TB - This is getting ridiculous.

gtm1260 1 hour ago | parent

Seriously. I paid 3400 for my M3 Max 128GB macbook in 2023. Sad times.

KingFelix 54 minutes ago | parent

are you still on the same macbook? Im using the same config and its running solid, note from above is true on the darker colored version, getting some color changes, but its still a beast of a machine.

sunaookami 47 minutes ago | parent

Not the poster but I'm also still using my M1 Max 32 GB RAM Macbook bought at the end of 2022 (yes, just right before the M2 Max...) and see no reason to buy another. Also paid 3400 (euros).

Aurornis 28 minutes ago | parent

> I paid 3400 for my M3 Max 128GB macbook in 2023

A 16" M3 Max with 128GB of RAM and no other upgrades would have been $5000 at launch.

They started shipping at the end of 2023, so you couldn't have bought a refurb.

Either you're remembering the price wrong or you got a crazy deal.

Hamuko 1 hour ago | parent

Really glad I'm not currently shopping for a new computer.

It's also pretty fucking sad how this thing comes with less RAM than my low-end Mac Studio from 2022. I only upgraded from a 512 GB SSD to 1 TB, and I still have 32 GB. And even still, I paid 2599€ for it, where as the OLED MacBook Pro is 4049€.

varispeed 49 minutes ago | parent

Here they offer no finance for over £5k. Crap.

mabunday 1 hour ago | parent

Is there any reason this wouldn't work with an apple pencil too?

CooCooCaCha 1 hour ago | parent

I think if they did support Apple Pencil they’d have used that as a selling point.

CooCooCaCha 1 hour ago | parent

As someone who does coding and art, I’m disappointed that there’s no Apple Pencil support. Makes touch feel more like a gimmick.

allenu 1 hour ago | parent

The touch screen is such a silly idea here. It even looks ridiculous in their own marketing photos. [1] The keyboard and track pad are already a great combo for getting things done.

I don't get why they're doing this other than making another step towards unifying iOS and macOS (and visionOS?).

[1] https://mastodon.social/@allenu/117519656286195439

ajay-b 1 hour ago | parent

I could see it with tablet but reaching out to touch my laptop, or worse desktop, screen would get very tiring, very quickly.

allenu 1 hour ago | parent

I agree. The ergonomics of using a touch screen on a laptop screen aren't great. It only really works if you convert it to a tablet so that the screen is closer to you and angled up a bit for comfort, but it's no longer a laptop, so why bother?

nomel 1 hour ago | parent

If the screen could fold all the way back, old school convertible style, I would see the point.

SirMaster 1 hour ago | parent

I mean it seems like a good idea to me for mobile app development, being able to touchscreen the simulator.

giwook 1 hour ago | parent

That seems like a great use case for it.

How many Macbook Pro owners are mobile app developers though?

SirMaster 1 hour ago | parent

Not sure, but I bet most mobile app developers are MacBook users haha.

I mean it's a $400 up-charge over the same model without touchscreen. Not that unreasonable if you are a heavy app developer IMO.

whynotminot 50 minutes ago | parent

They sell other equally capable MacBook pros if this isn’t your use case?

giwook 43 minutes ago | parent

But without the new screen, which is genuinely impressive and a noticeable upgrade.

whynotminot 26 minutes ago | parent

And nicer new screens cost more money!

You don’t have to touch it?

Kwpolska 47 minutes ago | parent

Is it really that useful if you need to test on real hardware anyway?

hirvi74 45 minutes ago | parent

Simulation is already great, and one can (and should) test their app on device.

qingcharles 49 minutes ago | parent

Here's the official launch video, where it looks silly to me, but I know very casual users who love their touchscreen laptops:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnZI5uUSdEo

hbn 21 minutes ago | parent

Casual users should not be buying the most expensive MacBook Pro unless they have so much money that $3000 (or more) means little to them.

aaomidi 1 hour ago | parent

Cellular?

codys 1 hour ago | parent

Apparently no Apple Pencil support (not mentioned in their press release or on the sale page)

minimaxir 1 hour ago | parent

This bullet point is funny:

> Draw. Sketch and annotate directly onscreen.

asdff 52 minutes ago | parent

I always wanted to fingerpaint my notes

chrisfosterelli 1 hour ago | parent

I have never wanted to touch my laptop screen or felt any sort of desire to do so. In fact I try really hard not to touch it so that I don't get smudges on it.

The laptop touch screen always felt like an awkward use case to me because the ideal UX for touch and KBM are so different. If you're designing for use on laptop/desktop you need to design for KBM-first -- since the majority of devices will be -- and therefore the touch experience suffers, and users with a touchscreen just use the KBM.

I don't think the average consumer cares that much about this either. I've noticed my grandparents often buy laptops with touchscreens accidentally and then proceed to mostly interact with it by accident.

Part of me wants to believe that a company like apple must/would do this right if they were going to do it but on the other hand there's the whole touch bar debacle and it doesn't seem like their foldable phone is starting off with the best reviews either.

mattrighetti 1 hour ago | parent

> In fact I try really hard not to touch it so that I don't get smudges on it.

Glad I'm not alone. Unfortunately every week I have to clean it from dust and also smudges that gets passed from the keyboard when you close the lid.

jonah 1 hour ago | parent

Get a custom-made cloth or use a thin microfiber like a lens cleaning cloth and put it between the keyboard and screen. Whenever you close the computer. Keeps the smudges off and prevents key shaped wear marks in your display.

mason55 1 hour ago | parent

> The laptop touch screen always felt like an awkward use case to me because the ideal UX for touch and KBM are so different

Which is why I think it makes sense for certain things where you can update the experience to be enhanced for touch but not, like, daily email & web browsing. But those things that will do well with touch do seem to align with the creative side of Apple's market - things like manipulating 3D objects, moving audio tracks around, that kind of stuff, if the interface is re-thought for a touch experience then I think there's a lot there.

Certainly there are times, even just basic things like looking at pictures, where I wish I could touch my monitor like it was a tablet.

I don't want to try to tap a link on a desktop rendered website, a mouse is more precise for that kind of thing, but I can imagine a lot of use cases that will improve if you assume that a large subset of your users has some kind of touch device.

chrisfosterelli 46 minutes ago | parent

I agree, there's definitely places where I could see it being useful. I just wonder if it's too marginal to justify it. I felt the same way about the touch bar.

phoghed 1 hour ago | parent

I liked the Touch Bar for custom app actions, but I didn’t like that it replaced the physical keys. Not that I use any of them much besides volume.

chrisfosterelli 45 minutes ago | parent

The touch bar's specific advantages grew on me and I liked the slider for volume/brightness. But I definitely haven't missed it either.

jayd16 1 hour ago | parent

You act like you don't use a touch screen every day. Its not some crazy impossible technology to have an oleophobic display.

chrisfosterelli 49 minutes ago | parent

I think my comment was internally consistent with my phone use.

My comment was not about touchscreens in general, it was about touchscreens on laptops. The phone touch experience is excellent because everything is designed for touch. Correspondingly, if you plug a KBM into a phone, it's a very poor experience.

If my phone's display is oil repelling, it simply doesn't work very well. I regularly wipe the screen to keep it clean. Luckily, this is very easy to do since my phone is the size of my hand and the display is attached to a solid box with no hinges involved. I can clean it with my shirt when I notice smudges and am in the habit of doing so. A laptop screen is much more annoying to keep clean.

minimaxir 1 hour ago | parent

Their demo example for the touch interface is piano keys? That's a 2010 Scott Forstall level of skeuomorphism that doesn't translate well for a laptop screen because it's not convenient.

AndroidKitKat 1 hour ago | parent

The hands are also almost in the exact same image Steve Jobs had on a slide during the iPad keynote showing touch on a laptop is not ergonomic. It's poetic, almost.

gizajob 1 hour ago | parent

Soon, if they attach an alternator to Steve’s coffin, they’ll be able to run the Apple campus off it.

lysace 1 hour ago | parent

"We've done tons of user testing on this, and it turns out it doesn't work," Jobs said at the company's "Back to the Mac" event in 2010. "Touch surfaces don't want to be vertical. It gives great demo but after a short period of time, you start to fatigue and after an extended period of time, your arm wants to fall off," Jobs continued. "It doesn't work, it's ergonomically terrible."

https://tech.yahoo.com/ai/apple-intelligence/articles/ergono...

benoau 1 hour ago | parent

That was looking at it as a usability problem.

Now it's a "how will you still need an iPad" problem, that they have solved perfectly because it's a usability problem.

solarpunk_enthu 55 minutes ago | parent

Maybe users changed over the span of 16 years, while being daily exposed to touch screens? Remember, in 2010 the idea of using a finger was novel.

threetonesun 19 minutes ago | parent

Well my arms didn't get longer, that's for sure. Also MacOS and software made for MacOS doesn't optimize for touch targets unlike something that will be distributed on iOS/iPadOS.

kps 16 minutes ago | parent

It's not the finger, it's the arm. Remember light pens?

samatman 1 hour ago | parent

Yes it is. I mean, you’re not going to play Chopin on it, obviously. But for selecting notes into a DAW? Hella convenient.

dsego 1 hour ago | parent

How is it convenient? A pro workflow is not holding your arm with the finger up in the air trying to avoid accidental taps, when you can get a small 25 key akai midi controller for a 100 usd. And it's small and comes with velocity-sensitive keys and pressure-sensitive pads.

officeplant 41 minutes ago | parent

we have computer keyboard playing mode in nearly every DAW under the sun. It's useless

SirMaster 1 hour ago | parent

Their demo is also mobile app development using touchscreen for testing apps in the simulator.

dsego 1 hour ago | parent

Pretty useless, it's easy to simulate touches and gestures already.

iainmerrick 59 minutes ago | parent

Not multi-touch gestures.

sllewe 52 minutes ago | parent

Seems like a slim use case, no?

hectdev 47 minutes ago | parent

yea but if the company is footing the bill...

freeone3000 25 minutes ago | parent

Macbook Pros attempt to cater to every slim use case simultaneously, with the idea that if they can handle a use case someone else can’t, they’ll sell another laptop.

dsego 52 minutes ago | parent

I think there was a modifier key + click and drag to simulate a pinch, so at least some gestures can be simulated. But since one is developing for the mobile device, it makes sense to tether the device and send builds to test out on the target device itself.

Slow_Hand 1 hour ago | parent

As a longtime laptop musician, using the QWERTY keyboard to play notes in the absence of a MIDI controller is infinitely preferable to this goofy demo.

Apple better have some better use examples than THAT.

oefrha 44 minutes ago | parent

Reminds me of that stupid DJ demo of the touch bar. Did any DJ actually use that in practice? Well if they do they better hold on to their now vintage MacBook.

Y-bar 50 minutes ago | parent

I agree that a piano demo seems like a bad idea. But damn if I don’t daily long for the iOS 6 days where buttons and tappable areas were well defined and there were some fun and whimsy to the interface. As compared to the flat unintuitive desolate landscape of recent years. I would rather have a big animated cassette deck in my music player than the current overly polished full page advert I get every time I open the app. At least Forstall and his team cared enough.

ecommerceguy 1 hour ago | parent

If i wanted a touch screen mb air, id get an ipad. i will actively avoid these. apple has been dropping the ball big time lately. ive noticed siri has a 5 second delay on my phone now, making reminder setting not so easy.

is graphene os ready for primetime yet?

jasonvorhe 1 hour ago | parent

Has been for a whole. Don't get a Pixel 11 though or wait for the new Motorola flagship.

fumar 1 hour ago | parent

Dynamic Island looks good. I am glad I picked up an M5 max prior to the price hike.

koiueo 20 minutes ago | parent

"A hole in my screen looks good"

This is so bizarre. I'll never understand Apple fans.

boplicity 1 hour ago | parent

They're finally getting OLED, which is one thing that's kept me on competitor laptops. They're just so much easier on my eyes.

ndiddy 1 hour ago | parent

It's interesting that they've decided to release a new high-end model this year even though they aren't coming out with new high-end M6 chips. Apparently they have decided to not make Pro/Max versions of the M6 in favor of accelerating development of the M7 series, which will have improved support for on-device AI. https://www.macrumors.com/2026/06/25/2027-macs-m7-chips/

otterley 1 hour ago | parent

Historically speaking, the Pro/Max versions of the chips have become available at around the same time the next-generation base chip does. So, M4 Pro/Max shipped when M5 shipped, M5 Pro/Max shipped when M6 shipped, and so forth.

ndiddy 1 hour ago | parent

The Macbook Pro with M5 Pro/Max came out in March, while the Macbook Pro with M6 came out yesterday.

sgarman 18 minutes ago | parent

ONLY on the 14", no M6 MAX etc.

ajaimk 1 hour ago | parent

They’ve done it before: first retina model has the same cpu and GPU as the previous gen

sourdecor 1 hour ago | parent

I was hoping a 2-in-1 foldable that acts like an iPad too. I have been waiting decades for that.

codybontecou 1 hour ago | parent

Was also hoping for this.

jasonvorhe 1 hour ago | parent

Looking at all the broken Duo folding screen issues I wouldn't count on it.

Huawei made a Fold laptop that seems to be running Linux already if you're into that.

Robdel12 1 hour ago | parent

Will this be another touchbar? Only time will tell but I never want to touch my screen. I don't even really do it with my iPad, lol

erxam 1 hour ago | parent

The product itself is fine, I have no strong opinions on it. But what a hell of a disappointing unveiling.

Take down the store and website for a few minutes, boot it back up, boom. That's it. They couldn't even bother with a keynote or a livestream or something.

For their flagship laptop receiving a substantial update after six years. Okay.

minimaxir 1 hour ago | parent

There is apparently an in-person event that is not livestreamed. https://www.tomsguide.com/news/live/apple-touchscreen-macboo...

erxam 1 hour ago | parent

That's cold comfort, unless the influencers were meant to livestream it themselves… which I still don't particularly like, but it's something?

cbm-vic-20 1 hour ago | parent

Makes sense this event is in LA- this this is designed to be a mobile media creation device. Most users don't care about most of the features that are highlighted in the press release, but someone creating any sort of visual media would.

fckgw 1 hour ago | parent

Doesn't look like it folds back or does tent mode. Those are some good use cases for touchscreen PCs, being able to walk around in tablet mode in something like a warehouse, for example.

Dynamic island looks nice.

dsr_ 1 hour ago | parent

This. No 360 hinge, no desire for a touchscreen.

You'd think Apple would understand the form factor.

mckn1ght 1 hour ago | parent

Not a fan of touchscreen on inclined surfaces, personally. I think the ergonomics of this will be bad for shoulders/elbows.

Like the iPad when it’s docked to its smart keyboard, I don’t like touching it at the point, it’s better to use the trackpad that’s laying flat.

It also wobbles when you do touch it. The macbook may not do the wobble, but it will constantly push further open and this may weaken the hinge mechanism over time.

maxdo 1 hour ago | parent

the angle they show for music is sooo unnatural, what a gimmick

otterley 1 hour ago | parent

I'm curious as to how the touch feature will work (if at all) with privacy screens.

int32_64 1 hour ago | parent

Pro tip always get the silver macbooks because they wear out considerably better. On the black ones the paint near the charger ends up looking terrible and any dents/nicks/scratches look bad.

adrianN 1 hour ago | parent

I like scratches on my machines, it gives them character.

buildbot 1 hour ago | parent

Yeah the “brassing” is really cool

Maxion 1 hour ago | parent

FWIW a brass macbook would be pretty dope

ch_sm 48 minutes ago | parent

Very Steampunk.

buildbot 36 minutes ago | parent

Given $$$$ that might actually be reasonably possible to do if you can get a good enough model of the chassis.

brailsafe 1 hour ago | parent

I wish there was a red or green one. Sick of only having two options.

smith7018 35 minutes ago | parent

Annoys me to no end that fun colors are limited to the "cheap" lines like the Neo, Air, and Duo while Pros are boring. If I'm spending $4k on a laptop then why can't I get it in green? It genuinely makes no sense.

Bud 59 minutes ago | parent

Except there is no "paint". Neither are there any "black ones"; space grey isn't very close to black, and I've seen no wear issues of any kind on any of the Macs I support.

dbbk 44 minutes ago | parent

Life is too short

dmitrygr 42 minutes ago | parent

the champagne color for airs looks really nice when worn too, but i mirror your sentiments on black - it does not age well

wpm 38 minutes ago | parent

Champagne/Starlight is definitely the way to go when available. Starlight especially, it's mostly silver but sometimes the light catches it just right to give it this sort of iridescent gradient to a light gold.

I liked the old Gold they used in the mid 2010s too.

arttaboi 1 hour ago | parent

Apple perfected the trackpad to the point where a touchscreen never felt necessary; and that’s how they got away with not building one.

This feels more like a marketing gimmick, anyone remember the Touch Bar?

joshuat 1 hour ago | parent

I wish I could buy this without touch just for the rush of nostalgia, having the illuminated Apple logo on the back

imwally 1 hour ago | parent

One MacBook Air with a glowing Apple logo on the lid, please!

speedping 1 hour ago | parent

No cellular which is literally the only thing missing from the macbook pro :(

1. Mini LED is fantastic so the OLED jump is marginal at best 2. I know many people with a touchscreen windows laptop. None of them uses the touch function on a regular basis

Larrikin 1 hour ago | parent

Cellular on my first iPad felt like such a waste of money. Every time I needed Internet I had Wi-Fi or my phone became a hot spot

brailsafe 1 hour ago | parent

My first iPad entirely felt like a waste of money. Any time I'd want to do something useful with it, the mac was a better choice. Not sure what cellular on the iPad would have ever offered me, but I know why I want it on my laptop.

Zenbit_UX 1 hour ago | parent

What’s your use case for cellular on a laptop? At least here in Canada data plans are expensive enough that I could blow through my monthly limit in 30min with a laptop. I would be quite annoyed if my wifi dropped and I had discovered only later that I’d exhausted my data unknowingly

speedping 58 minutes ago | parent

I'm always on the go, working from trains, light rails, cafes with bad internet etc.

iPhone hotspot is slow, unreliable and drains the phone's battery quickly

Luckily i'm in a country where a 600GB 5G plan costs the equivalent of 15$ a month, with 3$ per extra eSIM (watch/computer/car/whatever)

rvz 1 hour ago | parent

I would not buy this, unless you can fold the machine's screen backwards beyond 120° and use it like an iPad.

So without that, having touch doesn't make any sense and once again, won't buy this unless the second generation of touch Macbooks are available.

Worked well with the first foldable iPhone Duo didn't it? /s

thehamkercat 1 hour ago | parent

For local LLM people:

(for comparison, M4 pro has 273 GB/s and M1 pro has 200GB/s and M1 max has 400GB/s)

M5 Pro (20-core GPU): 307 GB/s memory bandwidth (supports 24 GB, 48 GB, 64 GB).

M5 Max (32-core GPU): 460 GB/s memory bandwidth. (36 GB)

M5 Max (40-core GPU): 614 GB/s memory bandwidth (supports 48 GB, 64 GB, 128 GB)

abhikul0 46 minutes ago | parent

IMO getting a studio for LLMs is a wiser choice since it doesn't heat up and there are no batteries to degrade.

For an M5 max top bin with 128GB Ram:

- mac studio: $5,899.00 (with 2TB ssd bump to match the default macbook sku)

- macbook 16: $7,399.00

Portability gets a hit but I feel you can have a thin client and let the studio do the heavy lifting back at your home/studio(heh).

f6v 9 minutes ago | parent

I have a limited understanding of local LLMs, but from what I gather 128GB is not enough to match DeepSeek v4 Flash or GPT 6.1 Luna. And these models are so cheap right now. What's the use case besides having your data locally?

alasano 40 minutes ago | parent

What's are the odds that the M7 Max goes above 128GB? (Presuming the rumors about Apple skipping the M6 Pro/Max are true)

benoau 31 minutes ago | parent

At this point it's pretty certain they've skipped M6 Pro/Max or they'd be a flagship feature of today's laptop.

The odds of > 128GB are very good, AMD have already bumped the Strix Halo to 192GB of RAM and both AMD and Nvidia should have successors to their offerings in 2028 that will compete with the M7 Pro and Max. Both AMD and Nvidia will be using TSMC N2 too so the competition will be ramping up.

JaggerJo 1 hour ago | parent

Personal highlight: Seems like the GLOWING apple logo is back!

(don't care about the touchscreen)

katbyte 42 minutes ago | parent

Wait for real.. for real! https://www.macrumors.com/2026/10/28/illuminated-logo-return...

I was gonna get it for the oled (also don’t care about touch screen) but now it’s also for the glowing logo!

sim04ful 1 hour ago | parent

There's no universe this doesn't negatively affect the UX of the OS for non-touch users. You can't simply support (or rather you can half-arse) new affordances without contorting the rest of the already well worn paths.

wahnfrieden 1 hour ago | parent

Those changes are already in the latest macOS. So feel free to share your opinion on what we’ve already been using instead of speculating.

robmccoll 1 hour ago | parent

I'm still on Sequoia for this reason. I want a UI optimized for displaying text content and mouse and keyboard control. Mostly keyboard. I definitely don't want the larger border radius on the windows that would seem to be designed for touch.

mrpippy 7 minutes ago | parent

The big UI changes for touch were years ago, with Big Sur

cruano 39 minutes ago | parent

Isn't that his point though ? Their plan seems to half-ass touch support (i.e. the menu bar, minimize/close buttons, etc. all stay in their current size), so it seems like a waste of hardware to include a touch screen just for very little functionality. If instead they make the UI friendly to fat fingers, they'd very much affect the mouse/trackpad experience.

embedding-shape 55 minutes ago | parent

Does that mean you also believe the same to be true for mouse affordances ruining it for keyboard users and vice-versa? Or "touch" is special in this regard?

sunaookami 50 minutes ago | parent

Just look at Windows 8?

wpm 41 minutes ago | parent

Mouse affordances don't usually ruin it for keyboard preferrers. Keyboard shortcuts and control are often an afterthought or downright written off because "they can just click" but thats down to laziness or lack of care than some hard and fast rule. However, a keyboard affordance is usually invisible, and a mouse affordance isn't, so they can very happily co-exist without affecting one another. For instance, the Alt modifiers in menus in classic Windows, those have almost no effect at all on anyones ability to click the menu item with a mouse.

Touch affordances and UI does have to be visible, and there is only one screen. So the touch affordances and mouse affordances are mutually exclusive: targets get larger, padding expands, UI gets dumbed down, etc etc.

sim04ful 24 minutes ago | parent

well put!

dbbk 45 minutes ago | parent

But they have already done it. The updates are already in macOS and they have not negatively affected the UX.

latexr 32 minutes ago | parent

Er… Yes they have. Liquid Glass is awful. It’s not only ugly (that’s preference, though), it has definitely negatively affected the UX. That’s why they’re adding sliders and options and reversal left and right.

elxr 19 minutes ago | parent

How do you think webapps work today? Is macOS UX actually well thought out to begin with? (no)

It's a nonissue when you look at the state of macOS attention to detail nowadays, regardless of which side of the fence you're on.

kps 9 minutes ago | parent

>Is macOS UX actually well thought out to begin with?

To begin with, yes. The decline only started around ten years ago.

ipsum2 6 minutes ago | parent

Most Windows laptops have had touch for a very long time now.

arjie 1 hour ago | parent

I see. The iPad and Macbook are converging. Interesting. I can’t say I get the use case but perhaps it will fold in some interesting way that makes it usable. I have no problem using a touchscreen occasionally but in the standard configuration the screen will wobble if you touch it.

jerlam 46 minutes ago | parent

Apple's been trying (in vain?) to sell iPad users a Magic Keyboard for six years and add a windowing system to iPadOS to pretend it's a real operating system, so I suppose they're trying to bridge the gap from the opposite (Macbook) side.

pavlov 1 hour ago | parent

Wasn’t the Touch Bar also supposed to be “a new dimension for pro workflows”.

I guess if users don’t touch it, then you just have to keep trying with something bigger to touch.

hmokiguess 1 hour ago | parent

It's sort of outrageous to launch a new product like that but not with M6, I am gonna wait for the M7 version

wahnfrieden 1 hour ago | parent

I just don’t understand stabbing pointed fingers at the screen to use it vs tapping the pads of my fingers like an iPad.

Besides holding my arms up it’s also painful to keep my wrists bent to get a better angle for my fingers to articulate.

lbreakjai 1 hour ago | parent

I had to double check when I saw the "piano keyboard" demo picture. I assumed I was on a parody website. How the mighty have fallen ...

00deadbeef 1 hour ago | parent

I want it for the OLED but not for the touch or glowing logo

JeremyHerrman 1 hour ago | parent

looks like they brought back the glowing apple logo on the lid for the first time in a decade!

the older macbooks used the display's backlight to illuminate the logo, but since these new OLED displays light up individual pixels I wonder how they're lighting it up now...

okso 1 hour ago | parent

If the main reason to use macOS is that it's required to develop iPhone apps, a touch screen helps with testing them.

vincnetas 56 minutes ago | parent

Would it not be just easier to connect actual iphone to the laptop for testing?

elxr 54 minutes ago | parent

I don't own an iphone

okso 23 minutes ago | parent

Not for fast user interaction tests.

I have a Linux laptop with touchscreen, and my main use is to test the touch interactions on web apps, sometimes Android apps.

Sure it's possible to open it on the phone, but that's an extra step usually not justified.

nsbk 1 hour ago | parent

My god the prices. Good thing I lost interest in high-end laptops. Beefy desktop + light laptop is how I roll nowadays

varispeed 1 hour ago | parent

I like how I can see its screen quality on my screen.

chakintosh 1 hour ago | parent

What's the point of a touch display if the laptop doesn't have a 360 hinge !? The interaction looks very awkward and unless they stiffen the hinge compared to previous model, the thin screen will keep tilting backwards.

asdff 59 minutes ago | parent

Macbook hinges always get loose with time too

at1as 52 minutes ago | parent

"Touch screens don't want to be vertical" "After an extended period of time, your arm wants to fall off" "ergonomically terrible"

- Steve Jobs

Apple: check our new vertical touchscreen!

ChrisLTD 16 minutes ago | parent

Jobs died 15 years ago, and since then, Apple has been successfully selling iPads in vertical/laptop like configuration for nearly a decade.

ipsum2 5 minutes ago | parent

I wish I hadn't read this comment, because now I really feel like a 360 hinge is sorely lacking.

jerojero 1 hour ago | parent

I like OLED screen but don't care at all for the touch screen.

The price is really high too.

thecatapps 1 hour ago | parent

So unbelievably disappointing, right after the disappointment of the Duo. I was in the market for both, the early reviews of the Duo stopped me from upgrading, and the landing page of this new Mac has stopped me from upgrading that.

1. No cellular? This was honestly one of the biggest selling points in my eyes. The iPhone hotspot has been so unreliable lately.

2. Never would use the touchscreen in software engineering. Agree with others that I don't understand a real use case for it, and apparently their website designers can't either.

3. OLED is nice.

4. 24h battery life is nice.

5. No M6 Pro/Max. Just getting one generation up?

6. Not even a cool name? No Macbook Ultra? Macbook Studio? Obviously not important, but even they couldn't justify it as its own separate product from the existing Pros.

On the bright side, the wallet savings are nice. Absolutely not worth a $4,150 hit (using my M4 Pro 48GB/1TB 16" as reference)

rowanG077 1 hour ago | parent

Very worried to see it's 1mm thinner. The existing macbook pro was already struggling way too much with heat. And now they shave off 1mm.

jayd16 1 hour ago | parent

I guess they're testing the water before turning on native iPad app support? Not sure why they wouldn't ship it straight away.

losvedir 1 hour ago | parent

Cue the folks who have used nothing but Apple laptops for the past 20 years coming here and wondering who would possibly want a laptop with a touch screen.

bitpush 52 minutes ago | parent

I think the confusion is lot of Apple enthusiasts drank the kool-aid the company served them saying touch screen is "yuck". And now they have a touch screen, it takes a while to re-orient themselves.

We saw this with foldables. It was a bad idea, but when Apple did it, it was a great idea all of a sudden.

And if you rewind a while back, you'll see "large phones are bad because one handed use .. blah blah" and then Pro Max.

theanonymousone 1 hour ago | parent

Wasn't "touchscreen for a laptop" another one of those things that Apple intentionally refused to do? Is this the effect of the new leadership?

socratics 49 minutes ago | parent

Admittedly, Apple has “refused” to do many things over the years (pen support on iPad comes to mind) and yet ends up doing them. Apple refuses to do something until they want to sell it. FWIW, I don’t understand the appeal of this device at all, but I don’t expect much consistency from Apple.

theanonymousone 9 minutes ago | parent

Could be cool to collect a full list. From the top of my head:

- Native mobile apps

- Bigger iPhone

- Pen, as you mentioned

- Foldable iPhone

- Now touchscreen laptop

tidbeck 41 minutes ago | parent

Yes it is (as people already have discussed in this thread). A link to the keynote where Steve Jobs talk about it: https://youtu.be/7zfir0Ide0A?si=fKF68UUoLhXK8cPJ

valine 1 hour ago | parent

I always thought if Apple did touch on the macbook it would come with a redesign to merge macOS with touch elements from the iPad. As it stands this feels like more of an afterthought.

If there’s one killer feature though, it’s iOS device mirroring and the iOS simulators. I’ve instinctively reached up to touch the iOS simulator so many times.

I wonder how they do the glowing apple logo with no backlight.

dsego 58 minutes ago | parent

I thought that they would basically replace macbooks with ipad pros. Sort of like microsoft surface, a tablet-laptop combo. Not sure what their plan is now.

super_mario 1 hour ago | parent

If the screen were detachable and you get a giant 16'' ipad, I would consider it. I do not want touch interface on a laptop and will never buy this. I do want non-touch OLED screen though.

Dynamic island sounds like it will be huge distraction if animations will play there.

giwook 1 hour ago | parent

This is truly groundbreaking! I've always wanted to play piano on a 14" screen.

joshstrange 1 hour ago | parent

Does anyone use/like touch on their windows (linux?) laptops? I've never really been drawn to wanting to do that. My mouse is far more accurate and doesn't block my view. But maybe it's just because I don't have it and I would find tons of uses for it. Also, I don't love the idea of putting fingerprints all over my screen. I guess I can understand for testing iOS/iPad apps but past that I just don't see myself wanting to use that.

Then again, it really doesn't matter to me at all what the screen looks like or what features it has, I use my MBP docked 99% of the time with the screen closed, to the point that my next computer will almost certainly be a Mac Studio and I'll just use my MBP on the rare occasions I need it on the go.

rottencupcakes 58 minutes ago | parent

I've had a touch screen Lenovo for 10 years. It was a huge mistake and I never use it. It's uncomfortable and doesn't work with laptop interfaces or form factor.

All the cons are real (which Apple figured out in the aughts), but enshittification at a corporate bureaucracy is inevitable without a strong person in charge.

njovin 58 minutes ago | parent

In my limited experience providing tech support for family members with touchscreen laptops, it's awful. The touch-targets are mostly designed for mouses, so they're easy to miss. Your screen gets filthy. Moving from keyboard to screen and back is tiring.

I'm sure there are good use-cases, but IMO everyday average-home-user computing is not one of them.

embedding-shape 56 minutes ago | parent

I got a Surface laptop/tablet hybrid thingy, which was weird at first to get used to, but actually kind of nice. I mostly got it for notetaking, drawing and 3D work, which it worked very well for, until the machine bricked itself during a Windows Update like a month after the warranty, and now it no longers powers up itself.

While it worked, it was useful for me, mostly the drawing I guess was the most different, as I used to use Wacom tablets for that, but seeing exactly where you draw makes things a lot easier.

If I was still in the market for a laptop, I'd probably again get a touch-based one, as long as it's not Microsoft, as that was the first and last time I bought any Microsoft hardware. Probably not Apple either as the OS and software is such a mess, so probably leaning Asus or Thinkpad with Linux on it, if anything.

christophilus 54 minutes ago | parent

I dislike it very much. It's never what I want, and in the cases where I have it, it generally only gets used accidentally (e.g. when one of my kids pokes the screen). It's not ergonomic for normal use.

craftkiller 54 minutes ago | parent

> Does anyone use/like touch on their windows (linux?) laptops

My retired parents. When they borrow my laptop, I see them trying to touch my regular non-touch screen.

varispeed 52 minutes ago | parent

I bought a laptop for a relative and didn't realise it doesn't have touchscreen. They complained for a day and I often saw them try to touch the screen and then being disappointed it doesn't work. Week later they never mentioned it again and use the laptop just fine.

When I was buying them a second one and asked about touchscreen, they said they don't care anymore for it, so second laptop also was without touchscreen.

diabllicseagull 52 minutes ago | parent

To be honest, I'm more often than not more concerned about not having smudges on my laptop's screen.

Kd368 51 minutes ago | parent

It’s on my X1 Thinkpad. I find it more convenient to use the mouse as that’s where my hands are naturally and a habit.

However I have noticed that when I am dictating more using typeleas or whisperflow I use the touchscreen more as it’s more faster and has a good flow if you wanted speed

Maybe this is the reason they doing it now

opwieurposiu 50 minutes ago | parent

I got a 24" all in one computer with a touch screen because the kids were into drawing on the computer. The kids managed to scratch it up somehow, they had a stylus and I think the tip broke.

Anyway that experience made me think that touching a super high image quality screen will only lead to heartbreak. Better to use a cheap screen if you want to touch a lot.

Moosdijk 28 minutes ago | parent

If you want your kids to touch a lot.

wombat-man 49 minutes ago | parent

I worked at MS when they were putting out win 8, so I'm maybe biased. I enjoyed the touch interface laptops but I'll fully acknowledge that in my case they were making up for a bad touchpad experience.

katbyte 47 minutes ago | parent

I had one a decade or so ago and I did use it because it was there, sometimes. But it’s not a feature I would ever go out of my way to get or pay extra for - the only thing I was looking forward to here is the oled so guess I’ll find out if I will use it.

jmyeet 46 minutes ago | parent

Oh how far we've come. Steve Jobs in 2010 stated [1]:

> Steve Jobs told a crowd at an Apple event in 2010 that the company did “tons of user testing” on putting touchscreens on MacBooks and decided against it because, he said, “It doesn’t work. It’s ergonomically terrible.”

> While previewing Mac OS X Lion in 2010, Jobs explained the main issue was comfort, saying, “After a short period of time, you start to fatigue, and after an extended period of time, your arm wants to fall off.”

Design is the art of compromise. A laptop works. Physical keyboards are better than onscreen keyboards. Laptops with detachable tablets end up with a heavier screen so the base has to be heavier so it doesn't tip over.

I honestly don't know what the use case for touchscreen Macbooks really is. OLED? Sure. Why not? But touch? Who is this for?

[1]: https://www.cnet.com/tech/computing/steve-jobs-said-a-touchs...

brador 10 minutes ago | parent

The screen is too far away and when you touch it it moves back a little ruining your sensitivity and wiggling your touch point.

If you lock the screen position with hardware it just lifts the keyboard when you touch just a little too hard.

You need stability for touch and a superlight laptop just does not have that.

rbanffy 46 minutes ago | parent

It's not a huge thing. My Thinkpad has a touchscreen, a clickable trackpad, and 3 buttons on top of the trackpad. The only thing it doesn't have is a trackpoint in the middle of the keyboard.

I use the trackpad most of the time, even for right and middle clicks (2/3 finger click), but I prefer the buttons when I have to select, and the middle button when I need to paste repeatedly. I don't use the touchscreen much, but it's the easiest way to swipe between virtual desktops on Linux. The touchscreen works well with the laptop turned "inside out" (my kid's laptop does that). Screen doesn't get smudges because of its texture. The example shown mentions the desktop swipe, and the piano keys are for setting up a chord, not playing a tune, both of which make sense (and try to set up a chord without multi-touch).

A bit of a shame there is no M6 Pro and M6 Max...

__mharrison__ 45 minutes ago | parent

I have a touchscreen ThinkPad. As an instructor, I found it useful to draw on slides with the pen. I rarely touch it otherwise.

I mostly use MBPs now and resort to using my iPad as a mirrored screen to draw on slides. It is hacky.

ghawkescs 45 minutes ago | parent

I have used Surface laptops for years and touch is a definite nice-to-have. I especially like having it when diagramming and designing. Paired with the Surface Pen is can really unlock a lot of digital whiteboarding experiences.

cruano 44 minutes ago | parent

Pen support sounds 10x more useful than touch, particularly when they already have a pen for the iPad.

cromka 43 minutes ago | parent

But based on the Ad, they did not show own usage and it doesn't look like the hinge is 180. If that's correct, Apple went absolutely against its own beliefs for UX/UI.

hbn 42 minutes ago | parent

Windows benefits from a touchscreen more often on something like a diagram where you'll be panning around up/down/left/right, zooming, etc because the trackpad situation isn't very good.

I've never felt the need for a touchscreen when e.g. using Miro because I can scroll and all directions and zoom intuitively on the Mac's trackpad.

chocochunks 33 minutes ago | parent

Eh. I don't think the Macbook's trackpad is that good. It's better sure, but it's still not as intuitive panning or rotating over the image directly on a touch screen. And it's still useless for drawing.

dmitrygr 44 minutes ago | parent

I always look for a way to disable it

sxg 32 minutes ago | parent

Why? I'm genuinely curious. Couldn't you simply not touch the screen? It's what you're supposed to do for all non-touchscreen laptops anyway.

elxr 24 minutes ago | parent

My guess is so they can wipe the screen without triggering an errant click. Like how you'd lock your phone when wiping oil off the screen.

nanapipirara 44 minutes ago | parent

I use a Wacom Cintiq with touch, it is only useful for testing during mobile gamedev because it can simulate touch easily without leaving the editor and having to export a build to my phone or tablet. Quite an expensive trick. I wouldn’t purchase it again if it broke. (I would buy the same model without touch and save some bucks)

rhinoceraptor 39 minutes ago | parent

I've had it on a few laptops, I always disable it. My current work laptop is a Thinkpad which doesn't even have an option in the BIOS to disable its touchscreen, I had to write a udev rule to do it.

bsimpson 38 minutes ago | parent

For a long while, my home laptop was a Chromebook Pixel. It had touch and a retina-quality screen when both those things were novel.

I found the touch useful for momentary interactions, like buttons. It's quicker and easier to reach up and hit NEXT than it is to find the cursor, move it to the button, and click.

Definitely don't use it nearly as much as on a phone, but it is useful for surfing.

cpursley 37 minutes ago | parent

My wife loves her surface book specifically for the touch. No touch is what held her back from going Mac. She's a teacher and is constantly making assets and stuff in Canvas and those sort of things.

jmuguy 12 minutes ago | parent

My wife is also a teacher and also loves the touch screen on her notebook, she will instinctively touch to scroll whenever she's on my macbook.

rtkwe 33 minutes ago | parent

Sometimes tapping a button is easier or faster than grabbing my mouse and navigating over to it but it is pretty infrequent.

Projectiboga 32 minutes ago | parent

It is more a nice extra than truly useful. Especially if trackpad or keyboard are starting to have issues. On occasion it can be easy to just fat-finger an onscreen button or on a long read just gently scroll. On videos they can be paused by tapping the play window. This is probably a step in their grand scheme to further merge Mac and ios together.

A fun aside is a New York Times reporter pulled up some drawing app on his phone at a holiday party to show my kid and was visibly shocked when my kid just started creating using the on screen icons before the guy could even start tutoring him. I don't recall if the Microsoft thing had any intro or demo that guided him on the tools a little or if he just absorbed it.

WillAdams 29 minutes ago | parent

I use it (for choosing tools) with a drawing program and a stylus (for the actual drawing) and it makes things quick/interactive --- no Apple Pencil support, and no ability to lay the entire device down flat means it doesn't suit my needs.

ed_elliott_asc 28 minutes ago | parent

I’ve had a few and liked it- is nice to be able to move my finger straight to a point on the screen and do something - is faster than using a mouse in some contexts

ptaffs 26 minutes ago | parent

I've been an enthusiast for whiteboarding, diagramming and handwriting, and had several Work HP Tablets and 360s, for several years I found good use taking notes in OneNote (specifically) for in-person meetings, for any other use like video conferences (which every meeting is now), giving presentations on screen-share, using office tools, etc, they just aren't convenient and are more prone to activating the wrong element with inadvertent touch. I write notes on paper and scan them for archive. This Mac Book doesn't fold flat which really should make it a non-starter unless Apple has a use-case I can't think of.

Groxx 25 minutes ago | parent

As a primary/only mode of use: oh hell no, it's awful. It's too far away from your hands, the ergonomics suck.

As an occasional "pinch to zoom that thing centered on my fingers, and adjust it to show what I want to someone 10 feet away" tool: it's fantastic. I could learn the key combo, but "use two fingers" is dramatically easier to remember and control.

Or to guide someone through something on screen, you can just tap it rather than having them mouse to precisely the control you meant. (yes this is often a terrible idea for teaching, but not everyone has fine motor control and sometimes there's random interruptions from other software - having them push those away can make it harder for them to learn/remember the actual goal)

Or for signing your name on a document, or anything else even slightly related to drawing.

Or if it's propped up on your chest in bed and your hands are naturally more comfortable on the screen than the keyboard (which is far too close).

Or if it's dark or you're at a low angle and can't read the keys.

It doesn't cost much, doesn't influence the display much, and is very useful occasionally. A great hardware feature to have IMO.

nicoburns 6 minutes ago | parent

> As an occasional "pinch to zoom that thing centered on my fingers, and adjust it to show what I want to someone 10 feet away" tool: it's fantastic. I could learn the key combo, but "use two fingers" is dramatically easier to remember and control.

Perhaps, but on a Mac you can already do this via the touch pad.

elxr 25 minutes ago | parent

I've used a few touch laptops. First one was a chromebook 9-10 years ago, and even then I got great use of the touchscreen just doing web browsing or navigating my files/google drive or scrolling through ebooks.

Always enjoyed touchscreens on my laptops. Nice thing is, you can just ignore it when you don't want it. It doesn't affect battery life, or thinness, or brightness, or clarity provided the implementation is good; it's just a bonus input method. I'll never say no to a laptop offering a touch option.

delecti 22 minutes ago | parent

I found it was something I didn't appreciate much until I had a touchscreen laptop. It doesn't fully replace the mouse or touchpad, but it is convenient enough of the time that I miss not having it. It also is a much bigger benefit when you're using the laptop by itself. But when reading something on the couch, it's helpful to scroll with a touchscreen, and it's handy to quickly interact with modal dialogs.

bpye 21 minutes ago | parent

I like some of the 2-in-1 devices that come with a pen - Surface Pro type devices or ones with a 360 degree hinge.

But with a conventional laptop I've only ever accidentally used the touch screen.

yokoprime 19 minutes ago | parent

I had a surface pro and later a surface book, and i think i can count on 1 hand the number of times i found touch to be useful. Might just be windows fighting me all the way, but i have since moved over to using Macs for work and never missed touch at all.

InsideOutSanta 17 minutes ago | parent

It's great for convertibles, but less useful for regular laptops. One great use case is mobile app development, though.

FacelessJim 16 minutes ago | parent

My work laptop has a touchscreen. I use it so rarely that I keep forgetting it has one and every time I clean the screen with my fingers I get confused for a couple of seconds and then I remember.

c0nsumer 12 minutes ago | parent

I'm working on a very niche sports scoring app and designed it to have nice, clickable buttons. But when trying it out in the field one of the officials had a touch-screen laptop, and it was pretty nice for clicking/tapping to enter finishers of a race in order. So much so that I reworked the rest of the UI to allow for touch.

It's not a tablet-doable thing, really, and I don't really want to take the effort to get it in an app store. But adding touch-able buttons made it a bit nicer UI overall, so I'm glad I did it. Now this person, and anyone else, can also use it with a touch screen if so deired.

tasuki 12 minutes ago | parent

> Does anyone use/like touch on their windows (linux?) laptops?

Sometimes I use it in Linux. Sometimes it makes my system freeze, requiring a hard restart. Perhaps it would be wise to disable it in BIOS.

tetraodonpuffer 11 minutes ago | parent

the convertible laptops are great, flip the screen back and use it like a big e-reader/ipad, if the macbook pro worked that way with full pencil compatibility (and being able to run all ipad apps) it'd have been amazing

moralestapia 10 minutes ago | parent

These comments are LLM-tier now, if not LLM-generated already.

"""

Does anyone actually use <the new feature>?

I personally prefer <the status quo> and don't think I ever have a need for <the new feature>.

Also, I don't like <some drawback that comes with adopting the new feature>.

But that's just me, I'm a simple guy, like and subscribe!

"""

garretraziel 6 minutes ago | parent

Not a HUGE usecase, but when reading a longer text, webpage or something, I like to put my palm around the edge of the display, fingers from behind, use thumb for scrolling.

But I also only ever bought 2-in-1s. Not an obvious “must have” for me, but I prefer closing it “the other way around”, holding laptop in panorama rotation, when reading a pdf or something. I really don’t like reading longer texts on laptop opened in a typical “clamshell” way.

rubicon33 6 minutes ago | parent

Not me personally, but my wife does. She will not buy a laptop unless it has touch screen. "So get an iPad" everyone tells her.

No, you don't get it. She wants the keyboard, she wants a first class desktop experience, and she wants a touch screen.

Watching her work is... different. She mostly uses her laptop on her lap, on the couch, scrolling and "clicking" with touch... and when she needs to type something she slides it back slightly, and types. Almost never uses the track pad.

SuperShibe 1 hour ago | parent

Seems like this is essentially a 400$ upgrade for the M6 Pro MacBook Pro. Those 400$ get you better sound, a better display and touch.

This is clearly targeted at creatives, the touchscreen feels more like a nice bonus they give out so people can experiment with touchscreen macOS and polish their apps for it - my guess is that this is preparation for a more convenient touch-based macOS device they're going to launch in a year or so.

elxr 54 minutes ago | parent

Better sound is not really a selling point to anyone in the real world.

IMO, this is a macbook pro but ~200g lighter and with an improved screen that's finally oled. Absolutely NOT worth 2900. An M6 mbp specced to 24GB is $700 cheaper directly on their site. Yeah it's an M6 and not an M5 pro, but I guarantee the performance difference won't matter 99.9% of the time.

$2900 is just ridiculous. So many better options with this budget.

robotresearcher 17 minutes ago | parent

> Better sound is not really a selling point to anyone in the real world.

Have you heard a recent 16" MBPro? They sound great. The Spatial Audio works. Maybe most people don't prioritize it, but it's a real quality of life thing. Same with deep black pixels: you don't know what the experience is worth until you have it. I value it highly.

The screens recently have been very good, but this one is better. Same with the sound. I'm glad it exists because it drives everyone to get better.

elxr 14 minutes ago | parent

Which is why "better than existing macbook pros" isn't a selling point. It's already more than good enough.

The parent comment was saying "better sound" as one of the upgrades you get for the $400, which is a comparison to the currently available macbook pros.

malshe 52 minutes ago | parent

Not an M6 Pro chip here. It's either M5 Pro or M5 Max

tap-snap-or-nap 1 hour ago | parent

Will the keyboard and trackpad leave a mark on the screen despite us keeping surfaces clean?

thisisauserid 59 minutes ago | parent

No gorilla glass for gorilla arm?

tristor 59 minutes ago | parent

I have never wanted a touch screen on my laptop. I still don't. Who is this for?

mastercheif 59 minutes ago | parent

OLED screens often exhibit poor text rendering.

I'm curious to see this in person. Looks like the "PROLED" is not using an RGB stripe layout.

Pixel density can reduce text fringing, but I have not seen a laptop OLED panel that renders text as well as an LCD yet.

AlanYx 40 minutes ago | parent

It's got a very interesting pixel layout, different even from previous tandem OLEDs. Hard to describe quickly in words, but shown in Figure 2 here: https://www.apple.com/ca/macbook-pro/proled-xdr-display/pdf/... I imagine some of the C-shaped empty space is probably to accommodate the per-pixel emitter transistor.

K7PJP 57 minutes ago | parent

I fail to see how Terminal.app benefits from a touchscreen, so what's the point? /s

wslh 57 minutes ago | parent

At this point an Apple robot or car make more sense than a touchscreen.

soci 56 minutes ago | parent

Didn't OLED screens age bad with use as with plasma back in the day? I'd rather not want a less bright mac screen in a few years.

Don't take me wrong, OLED displays on a a MacBook screen is quite a nice feat compared to regular the regular displays we have as of today.

mmcnl 50 minutes ago | parent

OLED displays now are tandem OLED displays which stack multiple layers. This means you don't need to exponentially crank up the voltage to provide more brightness which also increases lengivity of the panel (and increases battery life).

AnthonBerg 35 minutes ago | parent

I have a, what, 2019 LG CX OLED TV. 55". Used in anger as computer monitor since new. With complete disregard for burnout. It's… perfectly fine? I can't see any dimming or patterns or faults at all.

aavshr 53 minutes ago | parent

is it just me or a lot of Apple's copies these days seem too LLM generated?

skadamat 52 minutes ago | parent

I'm so perplexed that they chose this product name, while still retaining their existing Macbook Pro product line.

faitswulff 51 minutes ago | parent

I guess I’m skipping MBPs until they take this feature out like I did with the Touch Bar.

at1as 50 minutes ago | parent

Sure, we wanted OLED (my ROG G14 has a wonderful screen compared to my mac).

But touch will go about as well as the touchbar did

nntwozz 50 minutes ago | parent

It's ergonomically terrible.

It doesn't work.

Steve Jobs said this in October 2010 during Apple's "Back to the Mac" special event, where the company was previewing Mac OS X Lion.

Everything is going down the drain right in front of our eyes.

I can't make sense of any counterargument as anything but copium.

t1234s 49 minutes ago | parent

You can find the steve jobs video showing where they wouldn't make a touch screen laptop. He is probably rolling over in his grave now.

I do like how they are brining back ports. I think they need to add back the Ethernet port.

elxr 49 minutes ago | parent

Everybody worried about the usefulness of touch (which I do find occasionally useful), meanwhile they've literally set base pricing at $2900. For a 14 inch mbp, with 24GB. Hilarious.

How on god's green earth is this worth $2900?

NorthSouthNorth 49 minutes ago | parent

Got the m5 pro like last month. Actually no FOMO this time. I wonder how the AMOLED looks irl, I bet it's sweet but the current pro motion is already top notch.

psoga 48 minutes ago | parent

how did they reduce the weight? the design looks the same

__mharrison__ 48 minutes ago | parent

No pen support is lame.

Having said that, I'd be afraid to touch it. On one of my MBPs, I held it by putting my hands near the hinge, with my thumbs resting in the lower corners of the screen. Over (a short period of) time, the protective(?) coating on the screen wore away.

msie 47 minutes ago | parent

I feel Apple had to release a touch display to quiet all the few complainers out there. And the next version won't have touch.

jon128 47 minutes ago | parent

Looking forward to running Gentoo with Asahi patches on this some day.

malshe 47 minutes ago | parent

Some of my students use touchscreen Windows laptops. They seem to be OK with them but I never found them usable particularly for coding. A touchscreen laptop has ergonomically bad design. Or it could just be a generational thing.

asdff 47 minutes ago | parent

Funny how half the press release tries to hide the notch/island/whatever its called. I almost thought they gave up on that, then I finally saw it like 7 or 8 images in.

drcongo 46 minutes ago | parent

Why would anyone touch their screen? Madness.

toddmorey 46 minutes ago | parent

Aside: Does anyone else find the new AI texture explosions Apple's using on their marketing pages now a little unsettling and un-Apple? I guess I'm desperate for at least one tech brand to feel / remain human.

bilalq 45 minutes ago | parent

Touch is probably not going to be useful in most contexts, but there are two things that come to mind:

1. Since many iOS apps can run on Apple silicon Macs now, this might be useful for apps where touch matters for more than just clicking buttons.

2. For mobile app developers, you can actually try real touches events on the simulator/emulator while developing and get better sense of how it feels without needing to pull out a physical device.

I have a touchscreen on my Googlebook (I know, early adopter issues galore, but I love mine now). I basically forget I have it most of the time, but every now and then, it's been cool.

chrisfosterelli 43 minutes ago | parent

That's a good point, the use case for mobile app dev would be quite appealing even if a little niche.

achairapart 42 minutes ago | parent

Does this mean that macOS will natively support touch screens so I don't need to look anymore for after-market solutions[0] for mine? That would be cool.

[0]: https://www.touch-base.com/

kayodelycaon 17 minutes ago | parent

I’m not sure. macOS has had some degree of support for touch screens internally for a very long time (2010) but required hardware specific drivers.

So this probably isn’t the matter of macOS finally adding native support. More that they revealed what was already there.

Or it can be a complete rewrite. Either way they would have to explicitly implement support for external touchscreens using a generic driver instead of a specific one for each device.

randyrand 42 minutes ago | parent

> PROLED

Really... I would expect this naming from an Onion article.

usui 41 minutes ago | parent

No Apple Pencil is a huge miss for consumers. I guess they don't want to cannibalize the iPad though.

I would probably never touch the screen with my fingers, but I would draw with it. Would also be really useful during calls.

eutropia 39 minutes ago | parent

tandem OLED is one of those techniques that makes me think "why didn't we just do this in the first place?"

thealexliang 36 minutes ago | parent

For those HDR video editing / color grading specialists, how do these compare to Samsung + LG OLED TVs, Sony HDR Reference Monitors, or else?

I’ve always been interested in HDR video (HDR 10 +, Dolby Vision, HLG) and have wondered if the marginal upgrade in producer display quality will further impact the consumer HDR consumption. Also I think it’s noteworthy that they showcase DaVinci Resolve instead of Final Cut Pro, which is their own non linear editor and color grading app.

supersing 35 minutes ago | parent

Such an advanced OLED display only to be covered by fingerprints after a week of use.

canuckintime 34 minutes ago | parent

Will touch and dynamic island be supported in clamshell mode? Can they be enabled in other Macs?

grishka 34 minutes ago | parent

It's very unfortunate that there now isn't a single desktop operating system not ruined by touchscreen support.

swader999 33 minutes ago | parent

Finger prints on my screen are a capital crime or at least family meeting time.

rjrjrjrj 33 minutes ago | parent

Can you use the touchscreen for the "run iPhone and iPad apps" feature of Apple Silicon Macs?

And if so, has Apple changed the policy from developer opt-in to automatic on touchscreen Macs.

ryzvonusef 32 minutes ago | parent

Ah, HN is truly the successor to /., developers crying about touchscreens on laptops and gorilla arms.

Brothers, there is a market beyond your bash shells!

;p

unconscionable 32 minutes ago | parent

The touchscreen would make sense for a hybrid laptop convertible. But in this form factor I cannot understand.

baxuz 32 minutes ago | parent

Touchscreens on vertical screens are ridiculous.

Especially if they don't even have stylus support

nu11ptr 31 minutes ago | parent

I wasn't sure how I would feel about my newish MBP M5 Max when they released this, but given the price increase, and the fact that I have zero interest in a better screen since I dock most of the time, I am happy I paid $2K less for the same horsepower earlier this year.

Update: The one nice thing I noticed is the weight of the 16" is only 4.1lb vs. 4.7lb from the previous model. I guess OLED is a lot lighter. THAT would be nice.

thrw0090389jfhM 30 minutes ago | parent

The fancy OLED display would actually be a potential reason to finally upgrade from my M1 Pro but even if I could afford it, I find prices like that hard to swallow (and I couldn't care less about touch in a laptop fwiw). Guess I'll buy one used in a year or three, maybe.

nightc1tyrogue 30 minutes ago | parent

1. Improved thermal system

2. Even better speakers

3. Thinner and lighter while retaining the 100 Wh battery

4. No more notch

Seems like a solid all-around update to be. Other than cellular, I can't possibly imagine what more people could want.

einpoklum 30 minutes ago | parent

A massive overpriced laptop with a novelty touch feature on its monitor gets free promotion on HN. Ah well.

infecto 30 minutes ago | parent

I am going to jump on the touch hate bandwagon but more specifically I think it’s odd in the format they designed. I think the MSFT surface is brilliant because you can fold it down into an iPad like device which can be great for travel and other non-desk uses.

Touch while still being a normal laptop does feel odd. I would be curious who wants touch in this form factor.

wffurr 6 minutes ago | parent

NFL announcers called the Surface tablets the teams were using "iPad-like devices": https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-nfl-surface-ipads-...

miguel-muniz 29 minutes ago | parent

For work I have a Windows laptop with a touch screen and these were the only times I have wanted to use it:

1. The trackpad on it is so god awful that using any sort of multi finger gesture is a non-starter. In this case the touch screen works significantly better.

2. I wanted to draw in a whiteboarding tool. Drawing with my finger is not ideal so I tried a passive stylus. Drawing with a passive rubber-tipped stylus leaves a lot to be desired. I would much rather use an active stylus or a pen display for artists if I could.

Apple is known for the best trackpads. They have set the bar high and they have consistently met that bar for over a decade. I don't need a touch screen for gestures when their trackpad feels just as good. To my next point, there is no pen support on this screen.

Given this, I feel the touch screen is going to be seen just like the touch bar, a pretty feature that receives some good niche support, but ultimately does not align with how the majority of users use a laptop. I just hope there's an option to turn off the touch screen when they inevitably start shifting this display down to the base model.

boringg 26 minutes ago | parent

"The trackpad on it is so god awful that using any sort of multi finger gesture is a non-starter. In this case the touch screen works significantly better."

probably the only reason -- and this is mitigated with a mouse.

gffrd 29 minutes ago | parent

This means they've figured out a way to keep the screen from wobbling when poked … let the theorizing commence!

Projectiboga 28 minutes ago | parent

Years ago like 2010, 11 Microsoft had demo touchscreen computers running an art application in the Kids Room at the MOMA museum in NYC. It was responsive to actual brushes and was quite an interesting interface. As far as I knew it was a beta.

karim79 27 minutes ago | parent

Touch screen on a laptop is objectively disgusting. I have a Lenovo yoga X1 or something with a touch screen (and it folds backwards into a tablet) hence the name. It is stupid and useless. I can imagine Steve Jobs turning in his grave right now.

If you want a screen to touch get a fucking tablet.

dep_b 24 minutes ago | parent

My god they’re really running out ideas in Cupertino. What I need is a screen that gives an electrical shock to anybody that dares to touch it with their filthy fingers.

treetalker 18 minutes ago | parent

MacBook Ice

mstaoru 22 minutes ago | parent

M5 MBP owners, did Apple finally manage to fix the permanent "keyboardprint" on the screen?

I had it very badly on Intel MBP, and now on my M3 Max. I tried some screen protectors, but none of them stuck (pun intended).

I suppose touch only makes it worse?

makeitdouble 17 minutes ago | parent

FWIW, it forces them to have a more sturdy and touch resistant screen. They demoed the piano app, and it means a minimum of impact resistance.

Windows laptop took the same path, for the better.

defraudbah 22 minutes ago | parent

so many complains on touch screen is how i know it will be a banger

I don't like it, it still will be a popular laptop and within 5 years - one of the best. I am moving away from Apple, thank you for a ride!

subsaharancoder 21 minutes ago | parent

devices have become so expensive you can now lease them like a car..you will own nothing and be happy

stryakr 21 minutes ago | parent

I think this is more for the generation that grew up on phones and tablets, who are now in the professional space and like that interaction model

usaphp 21 minutes ago | parent

15% weight reduction over previous gen macbook pro is great.

tamimio 20 minutes ago | parent

Touch screens are dead, no one ever said good things about them. Also, I think the best setup now (regardless macos or linux) is having your heavy lifting compute at home and you use something like macbook air and ssh into it, that way you get the best portability and also you are secure if your laptop is lost.

tristanj 20 minutes ago | parent

Everyone's focused on the touchscreen, but I'm seriously impressed how they managed to cut down the weight.

* For the 14-inch: 3.5 lb (1.59 kg) -> 3.0 lb (1.36 kg)

* For the 16-inch: 4.7 lb (2.13 kg) -> 4.0 lb (1.81 kg)

About 15% lighter on both models. Switching from LCD to OLED saves weight because the screen does not need a backlight and has fewer layers. They also made the laptop thinner by nearly 1 mm. But that's not enough to push the weight down by 300 grams. They must have redesigned internal components to cut weight as well.

There must have been a dedicated effort to reduce weight. Kudos to the MacBook Pro team!

usaphp 8 minutes ago | parent

To put in a perspective it’s the weight of a new iPhone duo.

ramijames 6 minutes ago | parent

That's crazy.

nicoburns 7 minutes ago | parent

Definitely appreciated. The increased weight is the one downside of my M1 laptop over my earlier 2015 Macbook.

HippoBaro 20 minutes ago | parent

I’m surprised because Apple has famously (and publicly) argued in the past that touchscreens on laptops were a bad idea. Things can change, of course, but I don’t see anything here that even attempts to invalidates any of the arguments they made against touchscreen laptops at the time, which I still think were pretty compelling.

For example, raising your arm to interact with a screen for any sustained period just doesn’t work ergonomically. In my experience, people who buy touchscreen-enabled laptops quickly loose the habit of using the touchscreen for exactly that reason.

It also makes the display look dirty. I expected Apple to pair this with some new coating or display technology that would reduce fingerprints and smudges, etc, but I’m not seeing anything like that either.

Overall I’m surprised Apple would add a whole new interaction model to the MacBook and barely explain why. Given how central UX has always been to Apple (they make a big deal of the mouse, the click wheel and multi-touch, etc.) That feels very... un-Apple.

mentalgear 19 minutes ago | parent

Steve Jobs on Macbook w/ Touch:

> “We’ve done tons of user testing on this, and it turns out it doesn’t work,” “Touch surfaces don’t want to be vertical. It gives great demo but after a short period of time, you start to fatigue and after an extended period of time, your arm wants to fall off,”

> “It doesn’t work, it’s ergonomically terrible.”

“Back to the Mac” event in 2010.

After the unnecessary iOS "glass", touchbar, and now this USD400 'arm-fatigue feature', and other - made soley for the media-money-shot 'features' - Apple is really just in the 'great demo' business and departs even further 'great product' business.

phaser 17 minutes ago | parent

If iPhone duo and touchscreen MacBook are the signs of what's to come under John Ternus then i'm really afraid for the future of Apple.

mcculley 15 minutes ago | parent

Have they figured out how to fit an LTE modem into a 16” MacBook Pro?

Or does one still have to go to Dell for that?

bob1029 14 minutes ago | parent

If only we could discuss the OLED display rather than an optional feature. I did not see anything in the marketing materials that indicated I would be punished for refusing to utilize the touchscreen.

I think half of y'all are trying to justify your most recent MBP upgrade. Those of us still on the M1 are probably looking at this thinking about how fortunate it is that we've waited this long.

m132 12 minutes ago | parent

Please tell me the rounded corners at the bottom of the screen are just for the effect and they aren't actually physically like that. This would be worse than the current notch, you can even see them clipping the text in the LM Studio picture.

colemannerd 10 minutes ago | parent

I am on board for touchscreen (and pencil support) for macOS due to my dream of only carrying an iPad Pro for all development; however, I think they’re making the same mistake as the touch bar - touch is only available on the most expensive Mac’s which will ensure they’re niche. Niche options for user input ensure very few apps get updated to use the new user input (foldable phones, I’m speaking about you).

wffurr 8 minutes ago | parent

Hoping for a follow-up convertible touchscreen pen-capable MacBook Air. iPad Pro is just too limiting with iPadOS and it's thicker and heavier than a MacBook Air or any of my convertible Chromebooks.

theanonymousone 7 minutes ago | parent

From the top of my head, things Apple said they wouldn't do, but later did:

- Native mobile apps

- Bigger iPhone

- Pen, as you mentioned

- Foldable iPhone

- Now touchscreen laptop

Anything else?

tristanlukens 7 minutes ago | parent

> Up to 13 more hours than Intel-based MacBook Pro

Even though this reveal seems genuinely cool, this stat sounds weird. Why compare it to Intel Macs when the status quo has been Apple Silicon for half a dozen years?

Arbortheus 6 minutes ago | parent

A touch screen MacBook is a mistake.

boredatoms 5 minutes ago | parent

Touch screen could be nice for running ipad apps