LOS ANGELES — Apple introduced its first MacBook Pro equipped with a touchscreen on Wednesday, overhauling its premier laptop line with an organic light-emitting diode display, tactile controls and an updated design, while pushing top-tier configurations into unprecedented price territory.
Announced during the company’s “Pro and Tell” event in Los Angeles, the laptop features what Apple calls a “PROLED XDR display” and incorporates a Dynamic Island screen cutout akin to modern iPhones, Business Insider reported. The new models are powered by Apple’s M5 Pro and M5 Max chips and mark a historic departure from the company’s long-standing reliance solely on trackpads, mouses and keyboards for macOS navigation.
Touch controls and returning design cues
The addition of touch input brings standard gestures to the macOS environment without drastically modifying the underlying interface, according to Engadget. Users can navigate full-screen spaces with trackpad-style multi-finger swipes, adjust sliders in photo editing programs, sketch in creative software and flick application windows across the screen. Interface elements, including window management controls in the upper-left corner, slightly enlarge when tapped. Engadget also noted that the laptop features a slimmer, lighter body and marks the return of a glowing Apple logo on the display lid.
The screen itself uses tandem OLED technology that delivers exceptionally deep black levels, Engadget reported. The display can also be fitted with a matte nano-texture glass finish for an additional $150.
Steep costs in an industry crunch
The high-end technology carries a significant premium, arriving amid broader price increases across the computer industry. The 14-inch model starts at $2,899, while the 16-inch version begins at $3,399, according to Business Insider. By comparison, a non-touch 14-inch MacBook Pro powered by an M6 processor that was announced Tuesday starts at $1,999.
Fully customized models hit unprecedented price tags, The Verge reported. Upgrading either the 14-inch or 16-inch laptop to Apple’s top-tier M5 Max processor — featuring an 18-core central processing unit and 40-core graphics engine — alongside 128 gigabytes of system memory and a new 16-terabyte solid-state drive elevates the total price to $14,249 and $14,549, respectively. According to The Verge, the 16-terabyte storage option alone adds $7,000 to the bill, influenced heavily by global memory constraints.
Those sharp increases reflect a broader memory shortage spurred by heavy investment in artificial intelligence and cloud server infrastructure, Business Insider reported. Market analysis from Counterpoint Research shows that worldwide personal computer shipments tumbled 21 percent year-over-year between July and September as manufacturers passed higher component costs on to consumers.
Rolling product updates
The new laptop caps a series of hardware announcements from Apple this week. The tech giant unveiled an OLED-equipped iPad mini on Monday and an M6-based desktop iMac on Tuesday, Business Insider reported.
Preorders for the touchscreen MacBook Pro began Wednesday, and official retail shipments are scheduled to start Nov. 6. How mainstream professional users react to the blend of touch controls and elevated price tiers remains to be seen as retail units reach customers.
