MacBook Neo review: premium feel at an affordable price
17.3.2026
Apple’s laptop for the masses sets new standards in its price segment. The compromises are unlikely to be deal-breakers for the target group.
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The MacBook Neo is Apple’s most important product in years. Costing 579 francs or 699 euros, it appeals to people who would never have considered a Mac before. But a few compromises had to be made. Does the Neo still feel like a real MacBook?
Top-tier design and build quality
As soon as I lay my eyes on the laptop, I can tell that Apple hasn’t skimped on the design or build quality. The MacBook Neo looks just as robust and high-quality as my MacBook Pro, which set me back 4,000 francs. Aluminium unibody. Perfect gap width. A hinge with just the right resistance. Other manufacturers in this price segment make you settle for creaky plastic.
The edges are more rounded than on the MacBook Air, for instance, making the Neo feel a little «friendlier». The bright colours also give this effect, especially if you buy it in Citrus or Blush. The Neo is 1.4 millimetres thicker and slightly smaller than the MacBook Air. So although they weigh the same, the new model feels a little bulkier when you compare them directly. The wide edges around the display also look a little more dated.
The quality of the LCD’s excellent for this price range. It has the same pixel density of 219 pixels per inch (ppi) and the same maximum brightness of 500 nits as the MacBook Air. This provides a sharp, high-contrast image. Only outdoors would I rather have my MacBook Pro, since that’s even brighter. And in the dark, the lack of local dimming means black isn’t really black. But both of these criticisms also apply to the Air, and Windows offers nothing comparable at this price.
Scrimping on the little things
The finer details are where you really notice that Apple’s cut back. For example, the Neo doesn’t have a TrueTone sensor to adjust the colour temperature of the display to the ambient light. Plus, the webcam has a resolution of just two megapixels instead of 12. The HD resolution’s still more than enough for video calls, so this doesn’t bother me much. The speakers sound a little less clear compared to the Air, but have more bass.
My biggest complaint’s the lack of backlighting on the keyboard. This makes it difficult to type in the dark when I want to reply to some messages in bed. The touch ID sensor’s also absent from the configuration with 256 GB SSD. Apart from that, the Magic Keyboard feels as good as I’m used to from other MacBooks.
It’s a similar story with the trackpad. It’s smaller due to the Neo’s form factor, but my finger glides over the glass surface as smoothly as ever. The Neo clicks mechanically. I physically push the whole plate downwards, whereas on the more powerful models it’s fixed, with a vibration motor simulating the clicking sensation. The mechanical click doesn’t feel quite as good – but it’s almost there.
The compromises become more noticeable when it comes to ports. The two USB-C ports on the left-hand side don’t support Thunderbolt cables. One transfers a maximum of 10 Gb/s (USB 3), the other only 480 Mb/s (USB 2). This means you can only connect a single external monitor with a maximum resolution of 4K at 60 frames per second. At least the laptop display still works when you do. Apart from that, there’s only one headphone socket at the bottom left. There’s no MagSafe. Whether you see these as a minor inconvenience or a total deal-breaker depends on you as an individual. The target group’s unlikely to charge and connect several things at the same time. Most peripherals are connected wirelessly these days anyway.
Fast sprinter, but not a marathon runner
The MacBook Neo runs on an iPhone chip. More precisely, the A18 Pro from the iPhone 16 Pro from 2024. To reduce manufacturing costs, Apple uses a binned version of the chip. While the chip in the iPhone 16 Pro had six GPU cores, the MacBook Neo only has five. Deactivating one core means less waste, as not every wafer needs to be perfect. The small RAM with just 8 gigabytes (GB) can’t be expanded in the configurator – another consequence of the efforts to maximise production efficiency.
The smartphone chip still achieves impressive scores in synthetic benchmarks. The single-core performance in Cinebench is slightly above the level of the M3 (slide 1 in the graph below), while in Geekbench 6, the A18 Pro’s almost at the same level as the M4 (slide 4). It outperforms the best mobile chips from Intel (Core Ultra X9 388H) and AMD (Ryzen AI Max+ 395) by 17 and 20 per cent, respectively. Only the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme from Qualcomm is 15 per cent faster.
In multi-core operation, the A18 Pro lags far behind the latest generations of M chips (slide 2). The cheapest MacBook Air with the binned M5 achieves scores that are 114 per cent higher on average, while the latest generation with the M4 still outperforms the A18 Pro by 106 per cent. The gap widens in longer tests like Cinebench R24 (slide 9). In my graphics benchmarks, which work with 8 GB of RAM, the last two Air models outperform the MacBook Neo by 106 and 51 per cent, respectively (slide 3).
RAM bottleneck
Thanks to its high single-core performance, the Neo feels lightning-fast in most everyday tasks, such as web browsing or word processing. This can be measured using the Speedometer browser benchmark, for instance (slide 1 in the graphic below). But the RAM’s soon maxed out when you’re running several programs or tabs at once. In this case, the SSD has to step in as temporary storage (swap memory). But with a read and write speed of around 1,500 MB/s, this isn’t particularly fast.
Still, it does the job if you’re just needing to bridge short load peaks using swap memory. If you use it excessively on a daily basis, the SSD can wear out over time, although most people will probably replace their device before this becomes a real problem. Tab hoarders and multitaskers are still better off with the 16 GM of RAM they get from a MacBook Air. Even from day one, it feels less quickly overwhelmed by a high RAM load.
If I launch power-hogging programs without background tasks running, the MacBook Neo does a surprisingly good job. Normal image processing in Lightroom runs smoothly. Having said that, I’d definitely like to see a more powerful chip for exports (slide 2 in the graphic above) or complex filters like AI denoising (slide 3). This also applies to videos: editing a vacation movie using iMovie isn’t an issue. But animated titles and effects push the A18 Pro to its limits. In a similar vein, my test project also takes a long time to export in DaVinci Resolve (slide 4).
Battery life
The MacBook Neo’s battery has a capacity of just 36.5 watt-hours – 32 per cent less than the 13-inch MacBook Air (53.8 watt-hours). Presumably, a bigger battery could fit into the body, but that would make the budget laptop more expensive and heavier. And because the smartphone chip requires very little energy, the battery life’s still impressive. Apple claims it’s enough for 16 hours of video streaming, only 12 per cent less than the M5 MacBook Air (18 hours). I can’t quite confirm this in my test.
When I’m continuously watching YouTube, the MacBook Neo’s battery lasts for around 25 per cent less time than the current MacBook Air. Five exports of my test video also use up three times as much battery power: the MacBook Neo still has 47 per cent left, putting it on a par with the M3 MacBook Air. After performing the same task, the M5 MacBook Air still has 82 per cent left in the tank. These differences are significant in relative terms. But in absolute terms, the Neo should still last a whole working day – something that can’t be said of many Windows devices in this segment. What’s more, the compact MacBook remains silent at all times thanks to its passive cooling.
In a nutshell
The new benchmark for budget models
The MacBook Neo achieves something similar to the Apple II in 1977, the first iMac in 1998 and the M1 MacBook Air in 2020: it combines a level of usability, design and performance that previously wasn’t available or came with a much higher price tag. This is how Apple’s reaping the benefits of an optimised supply chain that CEO Tim Cook built up over decades. No other manufacturer currently offers as much bang for your buck.
For everyday tasks like web browsing, word processing or simple image editing, the MacBook Neo offers a premium experience at a competitive price. Programs open quickly and run smoothly. There’s no need for a fan. The display, keyboard and trackpad are all above-average. The aluminium unibody feels as high-quality as its counterpart on a MacBook Pro.
Having said that, demanding features and multitasking take the A18 Pro and its limited 8 GB RAM to their limits. If you need high performance or have lots of apps open all the time, you’d be better off with a MacBook Air, or even Pro. These also have better ports and a backlit keyboard. Still, the MacBook Neo raises the bar in its price segment. Need a laptop for school, office work or your grandmother? Look no further.
Pro
- Fantastic price
- Premium design
- Amazingly powerful
- Good display
- Remains silent and cool
- Decent battery life
Contra
- Low on RAM and SSD
- Ports leave a lot to be desired
- No keyboard lighting
Samuel Buchmann
Senior Editor
Samuel.Buchmann@digitecgalaxus.chMy fingerprint often changes so drastically that my MacBook doesn't recognise it anymore. The reason? If I'm not clinging to a monitor or camera, I'm probably clinging to a rockface by the tips of my fingers.
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