Remember the ultra-thin, underpowered, absolutely crazy 12-inch MacBook from Apple? It was mostly wonderful, despite its flaws.
It’s Time to Bring Back the 12-inch MacBook, Now that Apple Silicon Exists
When someone mentions the name ‘MacBook,’ your mind immediately goes back to the white plastic one which Apple discontinued in 2011.
That was more than 10 years ago.
Interestingly, whenever someone mentions an ultra-portable MacBook, the 11-inch MacBook Air comes to mind, nothing else. Another fantastic laptop Apple discontinued in 2016.
However, back in 2015, Apple revived the ‘MacBook.’ Apple gave it the butterfly keyboard which was awful, a 12-inch Retina display that was stunning and a design so thin, it put the MacBook Air to shame.
The funny thing is – this notebook was thinner and had a better display than the MacBook Air at the time, despite the MacBook-only name.
When it comes to ports, the 12-inch MacBook only had two – one USB-C and one headphone jack. You get nothing else, unless you were planning to connect a dongle.
On the power front, this MacBook was not known for that, because it was powered by some of the most under-powered Intel chips on the planet. It was meant for browsing the web, checking some emails and if a macOS update showed up, good luck installing it immediately.
This thing was slow. It took forever to do anything at all.
However, this notebook was a battery life champ. You could easily get up to a full day’s worth of use on a single charge. And thanks to that USB-C port, charging was easy.
In all the excitement and bashing everyone gave the MacBook, I definitely bought one, because I just had to. For every minute I owned that MacBook, I absolutely adored it. I did not care if it was slow. The only thing I did care about how beautiful this laptop was. Carrying it around was a joy. It would fit inside every single sleeve you had lying around.
Ultimately, I had to let go of the MacBook because the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar came out and I was way too tempted by the OLED emoji picker which most of you still refer to as Touch Bar.
Fast forward to 2020, when Apple announced the first Apple silicon Macs, I was hopeful it would bring back the 12-inch MacBook. Each year I wait for a rumor regarding its return. Secretly I believe there’s someone at Apple who is pushing for the notebook’s revival.
If a device as thin and powerful as the M4 iPad Pro can exist, the 12-inch MacBook can definitely exist, thanks to Apple silicon. It’s the notebook that’s truly worthy of having Apple silicon inside.
Though we have the best-ever MacBook lineup Apple has ever made, but a true ultra-portable notebook remains missing. The 12-inch model was definitely worthy of the ‘MacBook’ name, and it remains to be seen if something else will show up to carry the torch forward.
So far, we have nothing.
