CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA / ConSynSer / – Apple has brought touch to the Mac for the first time with a redesigned MacBook Pro featuring a tandem OLED display it calls PROLED XDR. The company unveiled the 14-inch and 16-inch laptops on Wednesday. They run on M5 Pro and M5 Max chips and promise up to 24 hours of battery life. Customers can pre-order from October 28, with deliveries and in-store availability beginning on November 6.
Apple says PROLED XDR is the world’s best laptop display. It offers up to 2,000 nits of peak HDR and SDR brightness and a 10,000,000:1 contrast ratio. ProMotion technology adjusts the refresh rate between 10Hz and 120Hz. The panel supports both the P3 and Adobe RGB colour spaces, a feature aimed at photographers and designers. Apple’s display engine controls the colour and luminance of every pixel at the sub-millisecond level.
Johny Srouji, Apple’s chief hardware officer, said the laptop marks a major step forward for the Mac. He said the display combines tandem OLED technology with advanced algorithms to deliver the visual fidelity professionals want. Srouji added that touch and the M5 chips create a new way for pros to interact with their work. The display also includes reference modes for film, photography and design, plus DICOM modes for nondiagnostic medical image review.
Touchscreen works with apps and gestures
The touch sensor sits inside the display panel instead of on top of it, cutting latency. Users can pinch to zoom on photos, swipe through webpages and flick windows into tiled layouts. Designers can draw across the full screen, while musicians can play software instruments directly on the display. App developers can also test how touch works in their iOS and iPadOS apps. Touch input works alongside existing keyboard shortcuts and trackpad gestures.
Apple’s own apps are optimized for touch, and macOS converts touches into clicks for many other programs. Notion, Canva, Zoom, Microsoft Office apps, Adobe Lightroom, DaVinci Resolve and Blender will support touch later this year. The Dynamic Island also moves to the Mac, hosting Spotlight, Live Activities and Siri AI. The laptops ship with macOS 27, which adds Siri AI and new Apple Intelligence features in apps such as Safari and Photos.
Thinner, lighter and more powerful
The 16-inch model weighs 4 pounds and is nearly a millimetre thinner, while the 14-inch model weighs 3 pounds. Slimmer borders increase the larger display to 16.3 inches. M5 Pro and M5 Max feature a Neural Accelerator in each GPU core and a third-generation ray-tracing engine. Memory reaches 128GB, and storage can now be configured up to 16TB. The machines can charge to 50% in 30 minutes.
Prices start at US$2,899 for the 14-inch M5 Pro model and US$3,399 for the 16-inch version. M5 Max configurations begin at US$4,499 and US$4,799. A redesigned six-speaker system delivers 50% deeper bass. The new laptop follows Apple’s earlier MacBook Air refresh and is available to order in 30 countries and regions. It contains 55% recycled content, including 100% recycled cobalt in the battery. Apple said it is manufactured with 45% renewable electricity across the supply chain.