Apple just announced its first ever MacBook with a touchscreen

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Apple once scoffed at the idea of a laptop with a touchscreen.

But that all changed on Wednesday when the tech giant announced the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display, its first laptop with a touch-sensitive display.

For years, PC makers have been releasing touchscreen computers in an attempt to modernize laptops for the mobile era. Apple is late to the game, but is betting its touchscreen laptop will appeal to the MacBook Pro’s core audience of creative professionals and app developers.

Today’s announcement marks the latest in a blitz of new Apple products to launch during John Ternus’ first two months as the company’s CEO. The touchscreen MacBook – along with other Apple firsts like the iPhone Duo and HomeView home hub – will test whether Apple can still develop hit products that anticipate users’ needs.

The new touchscreen MacBook Pro, which launches on November 6, will come in 14-inch and 16-inch versions and runs on Apple’s M5 Pro or M5 Max chips. The smaller model starts at $2,899, the bigger at $3,399.

Apple is touting the touchscreen as being useful for dragging and dropping slides between presentations, allowing developers to directly test on their computers how their apps work. It also highlighted its usefulness for graphic designers and musicians, saying they’ll be able to draw sketches and play virtual instruments with just a touch of the screen.

The company also claims many existing apps will work with the touchscreen right away because the software will register touches as clicks.

The Dynamic Island, or the pill-shaped carveout topping iPhone screens with information and the front camera, will also be included on the new laptop. The MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display also includes additions aimed at creatives, like higher peak brightness than non-touch versions and Adobe’s RGB color space.

The company says the touch sensor is built into the display itself rather than layered on top of it, which it claims will reduce latency when swiping and scrolling.

Touchscreen laptops have existed for more than a decade. Microsoft made a major push to shift the industry in this direction with the release of Windows 8 in 2012. That software featured a new design with larger tile-shaped icons meant to resemble phones and tablets. However, it was widely panned because the operating system was confusing to navigate.

The hardware also needed work; early touchscreen laptops were clunky, expensive and awkward to use as tablets. PC makers struggled to keep pace with the rise of smartphones and tablets.

“Our competition is different, they’re confused,” Tim Cook, Apple’s then-CEO who is now executive chair of its board of directors, said during a 2013 event . He said rival laptop makers were trying to “make PCs into tablets and tablets into PCs. Who knows what they will do next?”

Despite those early gripes, touchscreen laptops have improved over the years thanks to lower component costs, lighter designs and enhancements to Windows. They’re widely available from major PC makers like Dell and Lenovo.

Even Apple, which previously criticized hybrid computers, has been inching in its products in this direction for years. It overhauled the iPad’s software in 2019 with more productivity features, like the ability to use more than one app at once. It’s also made its Mac software look more like the iPhone’s by incorporating elements like the control panel for managing settings and the Liquid Glass translucent design for app icons.

Yet touchscreen devices only accounted for 16.3% of global laptop shipments in 2025, according to market research from the International Data Corporation. That’s largely because touchscreens aren’t popular with commercial buyers since most workers just plug their laptop into a monitor when they’re at their desk, according to Ryan Reith, group vice president for the IDC.

Apple previously tried incorporating touch technology into the MacBook Pro in 2016 with the introduction of the Touch Bar, a touch-sensitive strip located above the keyboard for accessing app controls and other shortcuts. But it largely flopped with consumers because its utility didn’t justify the additional cost.

Apple is known for being late to technologies – usually for good reason. It wasn’t the first company to launch MP3 players, tablets or smartwatches, but it made those products popular with consumers by making its devices simpler and easier to use.

The touchscreen MacBook Pro is the latest of several recent examples to follow this playbook. The company introduced its HomeView smart home hub earlier this month, attempting to challenge Amazon’s dominance in the smart home industry. And last week, Apple’s first foldable iPhone went on sale, debuting long after chief rival Samsung established a lead in that market.

Apple has long faced pressure to come up with new blockbuster products, especially given Ternus’s background in hardware compared to Cook’s operations expertise. Wall Street will be watching for signs of how Apple’s new products are being received on the company’s earnings call next week, especially following reports of broken iPhone Duo screens .

Still, some analysts think Apple’s new laptop will raise the bar for Windows rivals.

“Apple’s entry will not dramatically change the PC market, but it will change the status of touch-enabled laptops,” Francisco Jeronimo, an analyst covering mobile devices and computers, said in an email following Apple’s announcement.

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苹果公司曾一度对带触摸屏的笔记本电脑嗤之以鼻。

但这一切在周三发生了改变，这家科技巨头发布了配备 PROLED XDR 显示屏的 MacBook Pro，这是其首款配备触控显示屏的笔记本电脑。

多年来，个人电脑制造商一直在推出触控电脑，试图使笔记本电脑适应移动时代。苹果虽然起步较晚，但它押注其触控笔记本电脑将吸引MacBook Pro的核心用户群体——创意专业人士和应用程序开发者。

今天的发布会标志着约翰·特纳斯就任苹果CEO头两个月以来推出的一系列新品中的最新一款。这款触屏MacBook，以及其他苹果首创产品，例如iPhone Duo和HomeView智能家居中心，将检验苹果是否还能开发出符合用户需求的爆款产品。

新款触控屏 MacBook Pro 将于 11 月 6 日发布，提供 14 英寸和 16 英寸两种版本，分别搭载苹果 M5 Pro 或 M5 Max 芯片。14 英寸机型起售价为 2,899 美元，16 英寸机型起售价为 3,399 美元。

苹果公司大力宣传其触控屏幕的实用性，称其便于在演示文稿之间拖放幻灯片，使开发者能够直接在电脑上测试应用程序的运行情况。苹果还强调了触控屏幕对平面设计师和音乐家的实用性，表示他们只需轻触屏幕即可绘制草图和演奏虚拟乐器。

该公司还声称，许多现有应用程序将立即与触摸屏配合使用，因为该软件会将触摸注册为点击。

iPhone 屏幕上方那个形似药丸的动态岛（用于显示信息和前置摄像头）也将出现在新款笔记本电脑上。配备 PROLED XDR 显示屏的 MacBook Pro 还包含一些专为创意工作者设计的新功能，例如比非触控版本更高的峰值亮度以及 Adob​​e RGB 色彩空间。

该公司表示，触摸传感器内置于显示屏本身，而不是叠加在显示屏表面，据称这将减少滑动和滚动时的延迟。

触屏笔记本电脑已经存在十多年了。微软在2012年发布Windows 8时，大力推动了行业向这一方向发展。该软件采用了全新的设计，使用更大的磁贴式图标，旨在模仿手机和平板电脑的界面。然而，由于操作系统操作复杂，它遭到了广泛的批评。

硬件方面也需要改进；早期的触摸屏笔记本电脑笨重、昂贵，而且作为平板电脑使用起来很不方便。个人电脑制造商难以跟上智能手机和平板电脑崛起的步伐。

“我们的竞争对手不一样，他们很迷茫，”时任苹果公司首席执行官、现任董事会执行主席的蒂姆·库克在2013年的一次活动中说道。他表示，竞争对手的笔记本电脑制造商正试图“把个人电脑变成平板电脑，再把平板电脑变成个人电脑。谁知道他们下一步会做什么呢？”

尽管早期存在一些抱怨，但得益于组件成本降低、设计更轻薄以及Windows系统的改进，触屏笔记本电脑近年来已得到显著提升。戴尔和联想等主流PC厂商均有销售此类产品。

就连此前一直批评混合型电脑的苹果公司，多年来也一直在逐步将其产品推向这个方向。2019年，苹果对iPad的软件进行了全面升级，增加了更多提升效率的功能，例如同时运行多个应用程序。此外，苹果还通过引入控制面板和类似iPhone的半透明应用程序图标设计等元素，使其Mac软件界面更加贴近iPhone。

然而，根据国际数据公司（IDC）的市场研究，到2025年，触屏设备仅占全球笔记本电脑出货量的16.3%。IDC集团副总裁瑞安·雷斯表示，这主要是因为触屏设备在商业用户中并不受欢迎，因为大多数员工在办公桌前工作时只是将笔记本电脑连接到显示器上。

苹果此前曾在2016年尝试将触控技术融入MacBook Pro，推出了触控栏（Touch Bar），这是一个位于键盘上方的触控条，用于访问应用程序控件和其他快捷方式。但由于其实用性不足以抵消额外的成本，因此并未获得消费者的认可。

苹果公司向来以技术创新姗姗来迟而闻名——通常这并非没有道理。它并非首家推出MP3播放器、平板电脑或智能手表的公司，但它通过简化设备操作、提高易用性，使这些产品广受消费者欢迎。

触屏版 MacBook Pro 是近期众多遵循这一策略的产品中的最新一款。本月初，苹果公司推出了 HomeView 智能家居中心，试图挑战亚马逊在智能家居行业的统治地位。而上周，苹果首款可折叠 iPhone 正式发售，此时距离其主要竞争对手三星在该市场占据领先地位已过去了很长时间。

苹果公司长期以来一直面临着推出重磅新产品的压力，尤其考虑到特纳斯在硬件领域的背景与库克在运营方面的专长相比更是如此。华尔街将密切关注苹果公司下周财报电话会议上新产品的市场反响，尤其是在iPhone Duo屏幕破裂的报道之后。

不过，一些分析师认为，苹果的新款笔记本电脑将提高Windows竞争对手的标准。

“苹果的进入不会对个人电脑市场产生巨大影响，但会改变触控笔记本电脑的地位，”移动设备和电脑分析师弗朗西斯科·杰罗尼莫在苹果公司宣布这一消息后在一封电子邮件中表示。