There’s no arguing that the humble MacBook is among the best laptops you can buy today, whether it’s the ultra powerful MacBook Pro or the everyday option of the MacBook Air. That doesn’t mean they are prefect, however, which brings us to our MacBook wish list.
As we entered 2023, the MacBook Pro 14 and 16-inch models were released and news slowly started to circulate that Apple was really struggling to sell all Mac products as a whole around the world. They were down 40% since the pandemic and things were looking a little bleak. As we look to the remainder of 2023 and first half of 2024, there is a bright light at the end of the tunnel, provided Apple fulfill our MacBook wish list!
1. Competitive pricing
This one should come as no surprise, but number one on our MacBook wish list is competitive pricing. It’s easy to look at a MacBook Air M2 and see that you’re getting quite a lot for $1,199, but the truth is, once you add some quality of life upgrades in the form of Unified Memory and storage, the cost inflates very quickly.
This is why the MacBook Air M1 is still so adored. It’s lower price point and age mean that you can often find them for well under $1,000 now, which is a steal. With whatever MacBook laptops are due to release over the next twelve months, we want to see the prices become super competitive with Windows laptops. One way of achieving this leads us onto our next wish list request…
2. OLED Displays
We have nothing against Liquid Retina displays but it’s time the Apple ditched this proprietary tech and just adopted OLED screens in MacBooks.
While currently unconfirmed, it does appear as though this is the plan from 2024 but we want to make it clear that we are after standard OLED with all the recommended certifications you can add on top. What we don’t want is Apple’s interpretation of OLED which could lead us back into Retina display territory where many users still don’t know or care what it means.
3. Take some design risks!
Nothing is worse than seeing a new MacBook reach the stores and thinking ‘wow, it’s new but it just looks like the old one, again’. We understand that the MacBook design is iconic and it takes a long time to adopt and change this in a way that pleases everyone, but it’s time for an overhaul.
The risks taken with MacBook designs could also be bold new color options (going further than they did with the Air M2) or changes to the keyboard and trackpad to just add a little spice. Either way, we want something new that tells us that Apple still take pride in the external design of a MacBook rather than having such a uniform approach for each release.
4. Upgradeability
One thing we love about a Windows laptop is the ability to throw some additional SSD storage or RAM in there if we need it. It’s something we just know will be possible provided that we research the internal hardware before making a purchase.
With the MacBook, this isn’t the case, meaning if you buy a 256GB MacBook Air, you cannot expand the internal storage at all. For Apple to open this up, even if they keep it in-house so that you had to have their engineers physically do the work, would be huge.
It helps MacBooks become more accessible as people have less concern about entering with a lower spec model knowing that they could upgrade further down the line. We would have this at the top of our MacBook wish list if not for how unrealistic it seems given that it would require deviation from Apple’s Unified Memory approach.
5. Ditch the mid-cycle releases
We don’t mind the idea that MacBooks reach customers and then updates or tweaks are necessary to reach a larger audience. This is why three new MacBooks are rumored for release following WWDC 2023, however, it kinda needs to stop.
What makes the release of a MacBook special is the fact that we should be expecting bold, new technological advances, and some of the recent mid-model options really haven’t scratched this itch.
Take the upcoming 15-inch MacBook Air M2, it’s simply a size upgrade and nothing else. There were rumors that a slight upgrade to the Apple M2 chip were coming but these have been, debunked.
