16-inch MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display review: Simply irresistible
Macworld ·
Macworld At a glance Expert's Rating Pros Amazing tandem OLED display Excellent performance Smaller and lighter Touch input Cons Some Touch UI quirks Our Verdict The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display raises the bar of Apple excellence. It’s a landmark addition to the Mac lineup, and it’s a reminder of what makes users devoted to the Mac. It’s a good time to be a Mac user. Price When Reviewed This value will show the geolocated pricing text for product undefined Best Pricing Today With its newest MacBook, Apple takes the idea of a Pro laptop to another level. The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display is the most expensive model in the lineup. It’s made to appeal to the most demanding professionals, especially those who take content creation seriously and are willing to pay a premium. The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display isn’t for everyone, but even if you don’t fit into its intended audience, you will want this laptop. All it takes is one look. It is glorious, it is profound, and it is effing awesome–pardon my thinly-veiled language, but that’s just how I feel about this laptop. This, dear reader, is Apple’s finest MacBook to date and probably the best laptop ever made. Our model’s specifications This review looks at a model that’s been customized from Apple’s standard offerings. It has some hefty add-ons that increase the price significantly. Here are the specifications of the laptop in this review: CPU: M5 Max with an 18-core CPU (6 super cores, 12 performance cores); 16-core Neural Engine GPU: 40 cores Memory: 128GB unified memory Storage: 2TB SSD Display: 16.3-inch tandem OLED; 3472-by-2266 native resolution at 254 pixels per inch; 1000 nits sustained XDR brightness, 2000 nits peak (HDR content only); 1000 nits SDR brightness, 2000 nits peak (outdoor); 1 billion colors; P3 + Adobe RGB wide color gamut; True Tone; standard glass Ports: 3 Thunderbolt 5/USB-C; MagSafe 3; SDXC Card slot; HDMI; 3.5mm audio Networking: Wi-Fi 7 (802.11be); Bluetooth 6; Thread Input devices: Touchscreen; Magic Keyboard with Touch ID; Magic Trackpad Weight: 4.1 pounds (1.84 kg) Dimensions: 0.63 x 14.0 x 9.62 inches (1.60 x 35.55 x 24.42 cm) Price (as tested): $7,399/£7,399 The touchscreen MacBook Pro’s OLED display offers new highs in brightness and great color fidelity Roman Loyola/Foundry PROLED MacBook Pro: Display As the name implies, the tandem OLED display is the key feature of the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. This is the main reason to spend the extra $400 over the MacBook Pro with a mini-LED backlit display. When I unpacked the laptop, opened it for the first time, and the display lit up, I instantly knew I was in for a special experience. The brightness of the tandem OLED makes an immediate impression. With the right wallpaper, such as the macOS Golden Gate default photo , the brightness gives the image an aura that feels magical. It’s an admirable feat to outdo the mini-LED backlit displays that Apple replaced, because they’re excellent displays in their own right. The tandem OLED is more than up to the task. Color saturation and evenness are more pleasing, and the contrast and blacks are deeper. At the Macworld office, my desk is set up with a first-generation Apple Studio Display and a Dell UltraSharp 32 4K QD-OLED Monitor U3226Q, which is made for production work. Yet I prefer looking at the PROLED XDR Display. You will want to work on photos, video, and graphics on this MacBook Pro. If that work takes you outside, well, don’t worry. I’m currently writing this display section of the review in my backyard, because it’s a perfect San Francisco day, a bright and sunny 68 degrees Fahrenheit (20°C). It’s early afternoon, and the sun is bearing down directly on the display and me. Yet the screen shines through like a champ. Glare and reflections? No problem, thanks to the OLED’s brightness working with the antireflective coating on the glass. Don’t hesitate to go outside or take this MacBook Pro on location. I’d actually stay outside longer if it wasn’t for the fact that the sun is starting to cook me, which makes me a little concerned about the laptop heating up, too. MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display with standard glass (left) is much more visbile in direct sunlight than the MacBook Pro with a mini-LED backlit Nano-texture glass display (right). Roman Loyola/Foundry Since this is the first time OLED is on the Mac, you might be concerned about burn-in–if you’re going to spend the extra $400, it better last. Only time will tell with the new MacBook Pro, but Apple updated the display engine for OLED, and it monitors the OLED’s condition to maintain optimal performance and minimize the burn-in risk. Apple uses OLED displays in its iPhones, and it introduced a tandem OLED in the iPad Pro in 2024. We haven’t heard of widespread burn-in problems with those devices. PROLED MacBook Pro: Touch UI There’s been a lot of anticipation about this being Apple’s first touchscreen Mac. Touchscreen Windows laptops have long been available, and Apple has repeatedly said that touchscreen input on the Mac wasn’t going to happen. Times change. Generations of people have grown up with touch interfaces, and the lack of touch on the Mac is something that prevented some from switching from Windows. There’s a demand for touch. Touch on the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display is responsive, and macOS’s main elements have been adjusted to accommodate fingers. Roman Loyola/Foundry I wrote a separate article that details the Touch experience , but here’s the TL;DR version. Apple’s Touch implementation is so good, it can replace the trackpad as your regular input device. Apple didn’t half-ass it here. The company made thoughtful decisions about how the interface should respond to touch, and the result is responsive and reliable. There are a few quirks, but nothing that stops you in your tracks, and you can always retreat to the trackpad. Touch worked with all the Apple apps and third-party software I tried, but it didn’t work on some games. For example, Resident Evil Village and Total War: Warhammer III do not let you use Touch, and I suspect this is the case for a lot of games that originated on Windows and implement their own maps for input. You probably wouldn’t want to use Touch during gameplay, but it would be convenient when starting a game and navigating its setup screens and settings. Unfortunately, Touch doesn’t work in those situations, either. The touchscreen supports Multi-Touch gestures, which can be modified in a new Touch Display section of System Settings. Apple While Apple has done a good job with its first Touch implementation, it’s not a spotlight feature–Touch isn’t even in the name of this new MacBook. I’d go so far as to say that the laptop just happens to have Touch. Apple hasn’t done anything here that requires Touch, so you can buy it, never use Touch, and you won’t miss out on anything. But if Touch is the main reason why you’re considering this laptop, you’ll find it a satisfying implementation, and Apple has gone on record saying it is committed to its development . PROLED MacBook Pro: Design Apple took this opportunity to make the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display lighter and a little smaller. Below is a comparison of the dimensions for the 16-inch MacBook Pro models in Apple’s current lineup. Dimension 16″ MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display M5 Max 16″ MacBook Pro M5 Max Height 0.63 in (1.60 cm) 0.66 in (1.68 cm) Width 14.0 in (35.55 cm) 14.01 in (35.57 cm) Depth 9.62 in (24.42 cm) 9.77 in (24.81 cm) Weight 4.1 lb (1.86 kg) 4.7 lb (2.15 kg) The size difference between the two laptops is inconsequential overall. The feet are slightly recessed as well, so it rests closer to the table and a smidge lower than the standard model, so you’ll get a bit more wiggle room in tight spaces. The mini-LED backlit MacBook Pro with an aluminum logo is a bit taller than the new MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. Roman Loyola/Foundry On the other hand, the weight difference is huge. The PROLED XDR Display laptop is 12 percent lighter than the standard MacBook Pro, and that’s noticeable when carrying it around on a bus commute. The laptop’s shell retains the same general design as before, in the same two colors Space Black and Silver. However, the corners of the display are a bit more rounded than before and now the bottom of the display is rounded as well. Also the hinge has been adjusted to better accommodate taps and swipes. However, since you’ll want people to know you’re using one of these laptops, Apple added a bit of flourish to the back by replacing the shiny aluminum Apple logo with one that glows. It’s a callback to the era when the Mac laptops had the glowing Apple logo from 1999 to 2015. No other MacBook has it, and with its placement on Apple’s most expensive and extravagant laptop, the glowing Apple is now a status symbol. As with the older implementations, the logo’s brightness is tied to the screen’s brightness. Turn up the screen, and the logo brightens; turn down the screen, and the logo dims. If you want to turn it off completely, you need to use a Terminal command, as detailed in an Apple support document –odd that it’s not an option in System Settings. The glowing Apple logo on the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display (right) used to be on older laptops, such as the 2010 MacBook Pro (left). Roman Loyola/Foundry PROLED MacBook Pro: Dynamic Island Did you hate the notch at the top of Apple’s MacBook displays? It’s gone! Rejoice! But it’s not forgotten, because there’s still a camera hole at the top of the display. Apple opted to cut an opening for the FaceTime camera rather than place it under the display as it does with the iPhone Duo ‘s inside display. Considering how poor we found the Duo camera’s image quality is, sticking with a cutout (and a smaller one at that) is the right choice. One small side effect: The new camera cutout is slightly lower than the notch was, so it means the menu bar is a little deeper. Instead of simply replacing the notch with a static pill-shaped cutout, Apple has brought the Dynamic Island to macOS, displaying notifications, Spotlight search, Siri AI, Live Activities, and more. It works as it does on the iPhone. I’m glad it’s on the Mac, but it did take some adjustment, because these elements are now at the top center of the display, whereas before they either popped up in the middle of the display or off to the right. The notch is gone on the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. A less distracting, iPhone-like pillbox replaces it. Roman Loyola/Foundry An important thing to know is that Live Activities isn’t a feature that’s only for Dynamic Island. In the macOS 27.3 beta , the feature works on other Macs, appearing as a small oval in the menu bar. But it’s much more elegant here. The FaceTime camera has CenterStage, like the standard MacBook Pro. But it also has advanced video stabilization, which you won’t find on any other MacBook. I’m not sure how crucial this feature is, since I don’t typically move my laptop around while using the camera. But since this laptop is targeted at content creation, it’s a feature Apple felt was necessary. PROLED MacBook Pro: Performance New laptop, new chip, right? Nope. Apple is using the M5 Pro or M5 Max for the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display, the same chips that were released in the MacBook Pro earlier this year. This decision stems from changes to Apple’s chip development plans in response to growing demand for AI processing. However, the chip series Apple decided to fast-track, the M7, isn’t ready, so M5 chips it is. The M5 Max is impressive, and fortunately, the major new component of the laptop, the OLED, doesn’t affect chip performance. So, across the board, the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display and the standard model offer the same speed. If you want the fastest MacBook Pro, it’s the one with the M5 Max chip and the 40-core GPU, tested here. The M5 Max is 26 percent faster than the M4 Max and 45 percent faster than the M3 Max in Geekbench’s Multi-Core CPU benchmark. Geekbench checks the overall CPU performance. Cinebench is a benchmark tool that uses Maxon’s Redshift render engine, so it’s a good gauge for professionals who handle content. The M5 Max is 18 percent faster than the M4 Max, and 38 percent faster than an M3 Max. The difference between the M5 Max and M4 Max here isn’t noticeable. They both rely on the built-in encoder on each chip, and Apple didn’t make many changes between the two chips. A 4K iMovie video export at the High setting was 14 percent faster on the M5 Max than on the M4 Max. With the export set to Best (ProRes), there’s no difference. Apple introduced major SSD speed improvements with the MacBook Pro earlier this year, and they’re in this new laptop, too. Interestingly, the PROLED laptop’s read speed is noticeably faster than what we’ve seen previously. You know what looks really nice? Video games on the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. While there are gaming PC laptops, Apple’s new laptop doesn’t really compete with them, since those devices optimize for video performance. Apple’s laptop performs well, but Windows has a distinct advantage when it comes to the available game library. The M5 Max MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display mirrors the results of the M5 Max Mac Studio in Geekbench’s AI tests. If you’re an AI developer, it’s nice to know that you won’t lose performance while using a laptop. PROLED MacBook Pro: Battery life The 16-inch MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display has the same 99.6-watt-hour battery as its mini-LED backlit companion. Thus, both laptops with the M5 Max chip have the same rating of 22 hours of video streaming and 16 hours of wireless web use. Our test for battery life involves saving a video to the SSD and then running it on a continuous loop until the battery runs out. With the display set to 150 nits, the 16-inch M5 Max MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display lasted about 24 hours, the same as the 15-inch M5 Max MacBook Pro with mini-LED. Apple has not changed the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display’s ports. Pictured here: MagSafe, two Thunderbolt 5/USB ports, audio jack. Roman Loyola/Foundry Apple has not commented on whether OLED uses more power than mini-LED. Since OLED technology switches off to display black, it could conceivably use less power, since the backlight with mini-LED is always on, even with black. On the other hand, OLED gets much brighter than mini-LED, so it can use more power in high-brightness situations. With this in mind, macOS’s dark mode could help this laptop save energy (plus it looks great). The same stuff In addition to the chip options, there is a lot more about the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display that’s the same as the standard MacBook Pro. Here’s a quick summary of the features that are the same. Ports: three Thunderbolt 5/USB 4 ports, an HDMI port, a MagSafe connector, an SDXC Card slot, and a 3.5mm audio jack. If you want more details on the ports, you can read our M4 Pro MacBook Pro review. External displays : With the M5 Max, the PROLED MacBook Pro supports up to four displays at native resolutions of 6K at 60Hz or 4K at 144Hz. It can also display two screens at up to a native resolution of 8K at 60Hz, 5K at 120Hz, or 4K at 240Hz. Wireless connectivity : Wi-Fi 7 (802.11be), Bluetooth 6, and Thread. Speakers : six-speaker sound system with force-canceling woofers. Backlit Magic Keyboard with Touch ID, and Magic Trackpad . An SDXC Card slot, Thunderbolt 5/USB, and HDMI. Roman Loyola/Foundry Should you buy the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display? Gawd, I love the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. I’m excited every time I use it. The OLED display is a revelation. Touch is intriguing and sometimes fun. The performance is satisfying. The lighter weight and smaller design are a welcome relief. The pill-shaped camera cutout is much less of a visual detraction than the notch, and the Dynamic Island is useful. It’s a laptop that gets everything right. If you can afford it, I recommend the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display to anyone. No matter what kind of work you do, you should use the best tools available, right? That’s this MacBook. The reality, however, is that everything is more expensive than it’s ever been. We all need to take a deeper consideration of costs, so here’s more specific advice. If you are a professional whose work depends on visual integrity, this laptop is a vital tool. The OLED display will help you excel at what you do. It’s worth the investment, and you’ll find it will pay for itself in no time. For other professionals whose work isn’t graphically dependent, the M5 Pro or M5 Max MacBook Pro with the mini-LED backlit display is more than capable of meeting your needs. The display has always been great and doesn’t disappoint. It offers the same chip performance as the PROLED model, the same external display support, the same ports, and the same speakers. If you don’t need or really want the OLED display, there’s no need to pay for it. But you’ll still be happy that you did. The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display raises the bar for Apple excellence. It’s a landmark addition to the Mac lineup, and a reminder of what makes users devoted to the Mac. Customers now have plenty of laptop choices, with the MacBook Neo, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display. It’s a good time to be a Mac user.