What makes the touchscreen MacBook especially baffling is how unnecessary it is. Apple already figured out the touchscreen setup back in 2019, and it’s been hiding in plain sight all these years.
Sidecar attachment
Sidecar was released as part of macOS Catalina in 2019. Billed as a way to expand your workspace, it essentially lets you use an iPad as an external wireless display for your Mac. Once it’s connected via AirPlay, you can drag Mac windows to your iPad’s screen and interact with them as you would on your Mac. Most controls were previously limited to Apple Pencil or mouse and keyboard input, but with macOS 27, you can use your fingers, too. There’s even a handy Sidebar on the iPad for common controls, like bringing up the on-screen keyboard or returning to the iPad’s Home screen, along with the Touch Bar that was previously included with certain MacBook models.
Sidecar turns your iPad into a wireless external display for your MacBook.
Apple
Unhinged design
Steve Jobs famously opposed touchscreen laptops because “after an extended period of time, your arm wants to fall off.” When reading early rumors about the touchscreen MacBook, I had expected—or at least hoped—Apple would do something different by incorporating an innovative hinge mechanism. A convertible form factor would have allowed users to interact with the touchscreen horizontally and easily switch back to the traditional laptop mode whenever needed. Alas, that did not come to fruition.
I acknowledge that we shouldn’t take everything Steve ever said as gospel because technology evolves, but many of his remarks still hold true today. The main issue with touchscreen laptops has never been weight or thickness, as some Apple execs recently suggested. At no point while using my MacBook does it feel natural for me to extend my arm and touch its display, and most people would probably relate. The new MacBook Pro is no different, and a sturdier hinge and lighter chassis don’t resolve the actual problem.
Sidecar is a whole different story, however. My iPad is untethered from the MacBook’s keyboard, letting me flexibly touch its screen horizontally or otherwise. This allows me to utilize touch input on macOS when the need arises without straining my arm. It’s precisely the kind of innovation Apple is generally praised for, and we’ve already had it for years.
Out of touch
The MacBook Pro with a PROLED XDR Display caters to professional creatives by letting them interact with macOS apps using their fingers. Yet, curiously, the machine is seemingly incompatible with many of these professional creatives’ go-to accessory: the Apple Pencil. This bars power users from taking advantage of precise interactions, pressure sensitivity, tilt detection, and all the other perks they cannot achieve with their fingers.