Apple has an incredible talent for making me admire its products while simultaneously questioning what on earth it’s thinking with the pricing. This isn’t even something as bizarre as a monitor stand, but the audacity for starting a new laptop lineup from $2,000 doesn’t surprise me.
The newly announced 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 is just the latest to showcase this. The funny thing is, I already know that it’s going to be a reliable workstation. You get a powerful new 2nm M6 processor, a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display, and up to 24 hours of battery life. We were impressed by the M5 MacBook Air, so the high-end M6 powered MacBook Pro definitely won’t let us down.
Apple has also improved connectivity and AI performance, making an already capable laptop even better. However, the starting price of $1,999 is just ludicrous. When the Windows laptop market was suffering the impacts of RAMmageddon, the iPhone maker was in a perfect position to leverage its supply chain advantages. But that seems to have run out now. Just a year ago, the entry-level M5 MacBook Pro launched at $1,599. We’ve effectively witnessed a $400 increase in the starting price within a single generation.
How did we get to a $2,000 entry-level MacBook Pro?
To be fair, Apple didn’t suddenly raise the price by $400 with the M6 launch. The increase happened in stages, and the circumstances behind it are understandable. It just seems like the ongoing memory and storage shortage finally caught up with Apple.
Now, with the M6 generation, Apple has retained that higher price. The memory crisis is certainly real, and Apple deserves some credit for absorbing rising component costs longer than several competitors. However, it’s difficult to overlook how quickly the price of admission has climbed.
Adding on to the rising prices is newer hardware. You now get Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and improved memory bandwidth. The XDR display, excellent speakers, versatile port selection, and premium aluminum construction are all reasons I’d happily recommend a MacBook Pro to someone who needs a reliable workhorse.
But the advertised 24-hour battery life was already available on the M5. The overall design is virtually unchanged, and the entry-level model continues to offer 16GB of unified memory. If you read the fine print, the faster 170GB/s memory bandwidth only applies to configurations with 24GB or 32GB of memory.
Apple knows exactly what it’s doing
Apple had to properly define the MacBook Air and Pro lineups. The 13-inch MacBook Air with M5 starts at $1,299, while the larger 15-inch model costs $1,499. Both have enough performance for everyday productivity and plenty of creative workloads. The Pro’s brighter 120Hz XDR display, additional ports, active cooling, and stronger processor are genuine advantages, but the $500 to $700 starting-price difference isn’t something to scoff at.
At the other end, the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M5 Pro starts at $2,499, giving users more memory and substantially greater performance for sustained professional workloads. So this new standard M6 MacBook Pro is in a weird spot. Spending less on a MacBook Air or stretching the budget for a proper Pro-class chip could be better depending on the workload.
If you haven’t caught on yet, it actively encourages buyers to keep climbing the pricing ladder, with each upgrade promising just enough additional capability to make the next purchase tempting. I’m still convinced the MacBook Pro is among the finest laptops available. But price hikes worth hundreds of dollars each year will quickly make powerful laptops inaccessible.
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