The launch reverses years of resistance from Apple leadership, who previously claimed vertical touchscreens caused arm fatigue and ruined the ergonomic experience of typing. Past efforts to bridge this divide included the 2016 Touch Bar, which was fully phased out by 2023 in favor of physical keys. Now, Apple credits the inclusion of its first laptop OLED panel as the essential foundation for enabling direct screen interaction. The device represents a complete pivot from past executive insistence that pointer precision was mandatory for macOS menus.
Key points
The new MacBook Pro completely reverses Apple's longstanding executive stance against com…: The new MacBook Pro completely reverses Apple's longstanding executive stance against combining touch functionality with traditional laptop hardware.
Apple's previous touchscreen compromise, the 2016 keyboard Touch Bar, was fully abandoned…: Apple's previous touchscreen compromise, the 2016 keyboard Touch Bar, was fully abandoned in 2023 in favor of physical keys.
Under CEO John Ternus, the company is directly embracing touchscreen capability after yea…: Under CEO John Ternus, the company is directly embracing touchscreen capability after years of relying solely on large glass trackpads.
Sources checked by our analysis pipeline: 1
For 16 years,
Apple had an answer ready whenever someone asked about a touchscreen Mac, and the answer was always some version of no.
Steve Jobs gave it first, with the most theatre. Tim Cook gave it with kitchen appliances, and Phil Schiller with user studies. In 2021, Apple's then hardware engineering chief, John Ternus, told The Wall Street Journal's Joanna Stern that the Mac was built around the keyboard and trackpad, adding: "We haven't really felt a reason to change that."
Apple has now found one.
The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display is a mouthful even by Apple's standards, so I'll call it the touchscreen MacBook Pro from here on. It is the first Mac that responds to a finger on its screen, and also the first MacBook with an OLED panel, which, as Apple tells it, is the very reason touch could happen at all.
When Wired asked Ternus, now nearly two months into the CEO job, whether Apple was about to break its oldest Mac taboo, he kept it brief: "Who knew?" On X, he was…
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