The MacBook Neo 2 Might Not Be the ‘Touching’ Upgrade Some Expected
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If the reports we’ve seen are accurate, at least some of this year’s M6 MacBook Pro models may finally get a touchscreen, but one of the original sources for that tidbit is walking back the claim that Apple could also bring this to the next MacBook Neo.
At $599, nobody was really surprised that the affordable new MacBook had relatively few bells and whistles. While Apple manages to put touchscreen technology in even its lower-cost iPad, putting that into an entry-level MacBook would have blurred a line that Apple isn’t ready to approach just yet.
Even the notion of a touchscreen on a high-end MacBook Pro is something Apple once said it would never do. Of course, times change, but we can also expect Apple to debut this as a premium Mac feature, so it’s not about to lead with the MacBook Neo.
Nevertheless, when Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reported in September that the OLED MacBook Pro would gain a touchscreen, “further blurring the line with the iPad,” he also hinted that the second-generation of the “more affordable MacBook model powered by an iPhone processor” — what we now know is the MacBook Neo — “could include touch support.”
To be fair, Kuo never proclaimed that definitively. He merely suggested that it was something Apple was considering. The prevailing theory from Kuo and a few other analysts is that touch would better position the MacBook Neo to compete with Chromebooks, many of which offer touchscreens.
Still, not everyone shared the opinion that this would be a necessary addition. While Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman also predicted the low-cost MacBook would be a strong play against Chromebooks in education, he was silent on the question of a touchscreen being added to that model at any point, focusing instead on its addition to the OLED MacBook Pro.
Now, Kuo has walked back his earlier comments, nothing that while the MacBook Neo is expected to sell like hotcakes, with volume only increasing later this year as the back-to-school and holiday seasons hit, Apple has no plans to follow that up with a touchscreen model.
Neo 2 was originally expected to feature a touch panel to compete with Chromebooks (50%+ of which support touch), but my latest industry checks suggest Neo 2 may not adopt it.
We may never know whether that was ever seriously in the cards, since Apple also still sells a lot of iPads into the educational market. A touchscreen MacBook Neo wouldn’t necessarily replace those, but it would create an overlap in functionality that might cut into sales.
Apple has also likely done its homework to get a pretty good idea on how many Chromebook users actually need the touchscreen. After all, over half the Chromebooks out there may support touch, but that doesn’t mean that many people are actively using it.
It also helps that Apple is sitting in a very comfortable position with the MacBook Neo, digging into its deep pockets and taking advantage of what Kuo calls the current “memory market chaos” to grab more market share. Plus, while PC laptop competitors are facing significantly rising chip costs for RAM, SSDs, and even entry-level Intel and AMD processors, Apple is using an 18-month-old iPhone chip that it’s already produced at a scale of hundreds of millions for the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max — and the MacBook Neo uses a “binned” version that can be produced at a lower cost or possibly even pulled from the iPhone’s leftovers. It’s little wonder that the MacBook Neo is giving PC makers the shakes.
[The information provided in this article has NOT been confirmed by Apple and may be speculation. Provided details may not be factual. Take all rumors, tech or otherwise, with a grain of salt.]
