Apple Really Does it Better - MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR

Summary

The video reviews Apple’s first touchscreen MacBook Pro, which also introduces an OLED display branded ProLED XDR. The review focuses on touch controls, display quality, construction, speakers, and comparisons with earlier MacBook Pros and Windows laptops.

Touchscreen and macOS

• The touchscreen feels responsive. macOS adjusts some interface elements depending on whether the user taps or clicks, making menus and window controls more spread out and easier to use by touch.
• The presenter found window resizing and touch-based window snapping smooth. However, Windows still offers a more familiar full-screen grid for arranging windows without third-party tools.
• Touchscreen gestures can be configured separately from trackpad gestures, unlike the reviewer’s experience with Windows 11.
• The display hinge resists movement during tapping. It bounces slightly, but the presenter found this minimally distracting.
• The Mac has a camera cutout associated with the Dynamic Island interface. The reviewer was unsure how useful Dynamic Island is on a laptop. The back logo is reflective and reportedly illuminates and dims with the display.

ProLED XDR display

• The display has a resolution of 3472 × 2266 and ProMotion refresh rates ranging from 10 to 120 Hz.
• Compared with the previous MacBook Pro’s mini-LED display, the OLED panel offers deeper blacks, less blooming around bright objects, and sharper contrast. The reviewers also noticed differences in color and highlights, while viewing angles appeared strong on both screens.
• The OLED panel is Apple’s first laptop display with an Adobe RGB mode. Lab testing found roughly 99% coverage of sRGB, P3, and Adobe RGB. HDR BT.2020 coverage measured 80.6%, compared with about 72% for the mini-LED model.
• The lab measured 600 nits in SDR. In HDR, the display reached Apple’s stated 1,000-nit sustained brightness and 2,000-nit peak, exceeding the previous display’s peak result by about 400 nits.
• SDR color accuracy was excellent, though slightly worse than the mini-LED model: Delta E 2000 of 0.39, versus 0.24 on the earlier display.
• HDR accuracy improved substantially: Delta E ITP of 1.44, compared with 5.24 on the mini-LED screen. The lab tester said the display should be suitable for color grading.
• A microscope comparison showed a different, rounder OLED pixel layout, with pixels that appeared more tightly packed than those on the mini-LED panel.

Design, sound, and other features

• The 2026 model is about half a pound lighter than the 2023 version. The teardown found the thermal design and fan arrangement broadly similar; the weight reduction appears to come mainly from small material and chassis changes. The new back panel alone was measured as about 20% lighter.
• The laptop retains a six-speaker setup. Apple claims 50% more bass, and the reviewers heard a clear improvement over the older model. Audio remained usable with the lid closed, though it sounded somewhat more muted.
• The webcam image looked good in color and lighting, but the claimed stabilization while touching the screen did not seem convincing in the demonstration.

Overall assessment and price

The presenters considered the display and touch experience major strengths, and described the speakers and lighter chassis as worthwhile improvements. They also noted that macOS touch support feels like an added capability rather than a move toward combining the Mac and iPad into one platform.

The touchscreen OLED version costs $400 more than the comparable predecessor. The stated starting configuration is $2,900, with an M5 Pro, 24 GB of unified memory, and 1 TB of storage. Higher configurations were described as going up to an M5 Max, 128 GB of memory, and 16 TB of storage.

Reviews and guides

This is a hands-on product review with display-lab testing and an internal teardown. The presenter also recommends a separate video explaining Delta E color accuracy; no step-by-step tutorial is included.

Main speakers and sources

• Presenter/host: Leads the hands-on review and comparisons.
• Brad: Joins the touchscreen, webcam, and display demonstrations.
• Pancratz: Provides the earlier MacBook Pro used for comparison and comments on display differences.
• Labs display tester: Reports brightness, gamut, and color-accuracy measurements.
• Teardown segment: Compares MacBook Pro internals from 2012, 2016, 2023, and 2026.