With a price point of $599 (or $499 for students!) Apple had to make some cuts when designing the MacBook Neo.
Here’s a list of what separates the MacBook Neo from the $1099 MacBook Air, besides their sizes:
- Only supports 8 GB of unified memory
- No MagSafe
- One of the two USB-C ports is limited to USB 2.0 speeds of just 480 Mb/s
- No Thunderbolt support means the Neo cannot drive either of Apple’s new Studio Displays. However, it can push a 4K display with 60Hz refresh rate over USB-C.
- “Just” 16 hours of battery life, compared to the 18 hours quoted for the 13-inch MacBook Air
- Display supports sRGB, but not P3 Wide Color
- No True Tone
- No ambient light sensor
- 1080p webcam doesn’t support Center Stage
- No camera notch
- Dual side-firing speakers, down from four speakers on the Air
- Does not support Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking on AirPods
- Dual-mic system, down from a three-mic system on the Air
- The 3.5 mm headphone jack does not have support for high-impedance headphones
- No keyboard backlighting
- Touch ID not included on base model
- Trackpad does not support Force Touch
- Supports Wi-Fi 6E, not 7
- No fast charging
- The Apple on the lid isn’t shiny (Thanks, Jason!)
When I look at that list, the price difference between the Neo and the Air makes a lot more sense. My guess is that most folks in the market for a $599 Mac won’t care about most of these. (For goodness sake, the education price of this machine is HALF THAT of the MacBook Air!)
That said, if I could add two things back in, I’d choose keyboard backlighting and fast charging.
As far as an option for more unified memory, things are trickier. 8 GB is a limitation of the A18 Pro. I assume future versions of the MacBook Neo will have more RAM; the A19 Pro comes with 12 GB.