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Apple has been bombarding us with new product announcements this week, but its latest, the Apple MacBook Neo, is the most exciting of the lot by some margin.
The pedigree of Apple’s laptop range is undisputed, with the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro both receiving favourable reviews from us in their various guises over recent years. Both of those models are being upgraded with new processors this year, and you can read more about them in our M5 MacBook Air and M5 Pro and M5 Max MacBook Pro articles.
The MacBook Neo, however, treads territory the tech giant hasn’t walked for over a decade. With a starting price of just £599 for the 256GB SSD model, the MacBook Neo could well be the affordable macOS laptop many people have been longing for. Like its more expensive stablemates, the Neo sports a traditional MacBook design crafted from aluminium, and its rounded edges give it a very familiar look and feel.
Weighing 1.2kg, it’s the kind of take-anywhere laptop that appeals to a huge range of consumers, including students, office workers and those who want a general-purpose machine for web browsing or casual entertainment. And to cater to various tastes, the MacBook Neo will be released in four colourful finishes (by Apple standards, at least): Blush, Indigo, Silver and Citrus.
Apple MacBook Neo: Powered by a mobile chip
Naturally, the MacBook Neo is not as powerful as the new Air and Pro models revealed this week. In fact, it’s powered by a phone processor, the A18 Pro, which is found inside the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Max.
This may seem surprising, but given that our mobile phones are effectively mini laptops in our pockets, it actually makes a lot of sense that Apple would use a relatively new mobile chip to power its most affordable MacBook.
My initial feeling is that we’ll need to temper our expectations regarding performance. Still, Apple is confident that it has more than enough grunt “to power through” day-to-day tasks such as web browsing, document creation, streaming and even photo editing. To reinforce the point, it says the chip is “up to 50 per cent faster for everyday tasks than the best-selling PC with the latest shipping Intel Core Ultra 5.”
Like the MacBook Air revealed on Monday, the MacBook Neo’s processor has a 16-core Neural Engine that handles AI functionality, including the numerous features that fall under the Apple Intelligence banner. According to Apple, on-device AI workloads are handled three times faster on the MacBook Neo than on the best-selling Intel PC mentioned above.
Apple MacBook Neo: Designed within 13in of its life
The display on the MacBook Neo seems very similar to that found on the new MacBook Air, though it’s a fraction smaller at 13in, versus the 13.6in diagonal measurement of the Air. It has slightly fewer pixels at 2,408 x 1,506 but is said to achieve the same peak brightness of 500 nits while supporting one billion colours. To assist the MacBook Neo’s “use it anywhere” status, there’s an anti-reflective coating on the screen.
On the battery life front, Apple is quoting 16 hours on a single charge, which is ample for casual users and enough to see me through many of the short trips I take to the continent to cover product launches. And, as the MacBook Neo uses Apple’s Magic Keyboard, I’ll feel perfectly at home typing on it and using its Multi-Touch trackpad. It’s worth noting, however, that only the more expensive of the two MacBook Neo options – which comes with a 512GB SSD – supports Touch ID.
As Apple’s “budget” laptop, one shouldn’t expect too many bells and whistles, but it’s got the essentials covered in terms of connectivity, cameras, speakers and mics. There’s a single 1080p FaceTime camera where you’d expect it to be (dead centre above the display), a pair of microphones that use beamforming to help enhance voice clarity on calls, and dual side-firing speakers that support both Spatial Audio and Dolby Atmos.
Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 6 enable you to connect wirelessly to a range of devices, while a pair of USB-C ports and a headphone jack make up the Neo’s physical connectivity. Both USB-C ports can be used for charging,
Apple MacBook Neo: When can I buy one?
The MacBook Neo officially goes on sale on 11 March, which is just one week away, but you can preorder it right now. The 256GB SSD model without Touch ID will set you back £599, with the 512GB model with Touch ID costing £100 more at £699.
Two of my mates have asked me about buying new laptops this year, and I recommended they check out Apple’s MacBook range based on how well my trusty MacBook Pro serves me. Ultimately, however, they were put off by the price of the newest MacBooks and didn’t want to go down the refurbished route.
If the MacBook Neo had been around then, it may have swayed them. Of course, we’ll have to wait and see how well it performs in our tests, but it’s hard to see the MacBook Neo being anything other than a smash hit.
