Rumors that Apple will one day produce a touchscreen MacBook have existed for almost as long as the MacBook itself, but the company has steadfastly maintained that it has no interest in creating such a product. That could be about to change, though, as a new report from analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says Apple is about to significantly revise its position.
According to Kuo, Apple is working on a touchscreen MacBook Pro that is due to enter mass production by late 2026. That’s not far away now, and it signals an abrupt about-face from one of the few computing companies that has unswervingly refused to dabble in this genre.
And truth be told, I’m really not a fan of the idea of a touchscreen Mac. My concern is as much about what it would say about Apple as a company as it is about the practical implications. Either way, though, I don’t think it looks good.
The pain game
The fact that Apple is apparently only just working on a touchscreen Mac might come as some surprise to you. After all, everyone else seems to be doing it – doesn’t that mean that Apple is late to the party?
Really, though, this is not a new stance, and Apple has long resisted the idea of a touchscreen Mac. One of the main reasons Apple has held out for so long is ergonomics.
Notably, Steve Jobs once said that touchscreen computers are so unergonomic that they make your arm want to fall off. After all, constantly reaching up to touch a screen is tiring after a while, and your arms don’t want to be held out horizontally. Making strain and pain a central aspect of your products doesn’t exactly seem like a sensible idea to me either.
And there’s another factor in play here: smudges. Sure, you can rest your arm at the base of your MacBook screen and use your thumb to scroll through web pages, and doing this doesn’t cause much arm strain. But that doesn’t avoid the fact that you still end up with a display covered in greasy fingerprints.
Apple will never admit it, but perhaps this is a significant reason why the company seems to dislike the idea of touchscreens on laptops: they mess up the unblemished appearance of its products. A dirty MacBook doesn’t exactly scream ‘premium’ and a smudged-up screen needs cleaning, which is another poor user experience. People buy laptops to use them, not to get distracted from their work by having to regularly wipe down the display.
A weakening identity
On a deeper level, I’m concerned about what Kuo’s report might signal about Apple as a company. Because sure, no one will be forced to use the touchscreen element of a touchscreen MacBook – you can just ignore it. But the fact that Apple might add it to its laptops in the first place signals a significant change in the firm’s attitude.
One of the arguments in favor of a touchscreen MacBook seems to be that “everyone else has done it, so Apple should as well.” But this is not a good reason to do something. Following the crowd has never been the blueprint for innovation.
It’s also not the way Apple traditionally goes about things. Apple contributes to a field if it thinks it can do something better than everyone else. Blindly diving into a project because you’re worried about being left behind has never been Apple’s way (although you could argue that its headlong rush into artificial intelligence (AI) signals a departure from that outlook).
Yet Apple has made several questionable decisions over the last few years, from its failed self-driving car to the Vision Pro headset to getting left behind in AI. My worry is that without a strong leadership presence at the helm, Apple is making bad decisions far more frequently than it ever used to.
It’s not that Apple never got things wrong under Steve Jobs, but more that he brought a vision and identity to the company that guided its decisions. Right now, it feels like that identity is weakening, leading Apple to follow threads that it never would have before – the rumored touchscreen MacBook being just the latest example.
Has something changed?
If Kuo is right, something has changed Apple’s mind. But what? People’s arms haven’t changed, after all. What compelling reason has arisen to create a touchscreen Mac has that wasn’t there before?
Kuo says the decision “appears to reflect Apple’s long-term observation of iPad user behavior, indicating that in certain scenarios, touch controls can enhance both productivity and the overall user experience.”
But when interacting with an iPad, people usually hold their tablet either flat or at an angle. This posture doesn’t strain your arms. In contrast, a MacBook screen is more or less vertical, which requires a more horizontal arm position. Perhaps Apple has suddenly decided that this isn’t uncomfortable after all.
Another possibility is that Kuo’s report means the touch element will be integrated somewhere other than the display, such as inside or alongside the trackpad, and this is something we know Apple is at least considering. The Touch Bar was a touch panel that wasn’t part of the main screen, after all.
Kuo’s wording is that Apple is working on a “touch panel,” and he doesn’t actually use the word “touchscreen” – does that distinction mean that Apple isn’t actually looking to implement this tech inside a screen, or am I merely overthinking things?
Whatever the case, my hope is that Apple has some convincing implementation of a touch panel that can add functionality without encountering the same old problems highlighted by Jobs. Apple is a company known for its persistent innovation. Simply adding features because everyone else is doing so would signal a serious change in the mindset that has served it so well over the years.
Steve Jobs would hate it
Steve Jobs would probably hate this touchscreen Mac idea, given what he said about the idea before he passed away. The likelihood is he would have shut it down with one of his infamous tirades before it even got out of the ideation phase.
Resistance to the concept of a touchscreen MacBook isn’t about sticking religiously to the whims of a previous CEO. If those ideas are still relevant, then they can provide useful guidance. And for all his flaws, Jobs was known for his excellent taste and forward-thinking designs.
Apple’s ideas have served it well over the years. It’s not a follower, nor a company that shamelessly imitates others in a desperate bid for clout (unlike some of its rivals). I just hope that this touchscreen Mac rumor doesn’t indicate a fundamental change in that mindset.
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alexblake.techradar@gmail.com (Alex Blake)
