MacBook Pro M4 review: The best laptop ever made

Here we go again. The new MacBook Pro is the best laptop you can buy, plain and simple. It runs MacOS, which isn’t for everyone, and it’s not cheap — but if you love MacOS (like me) and have a bunch of money to spend (unlike me ????), then the new MacBook Pro is the laptop to get if powerful performance is a priority for you.

Perhaps the more important question to ask around this particular generation of MacBook Pro, however, isn’t whether or not the MacBook Pro is worth buying, but how long it’ll go essentially without competition. Qualcomm’s new ARM-based chips are proving incredibly promising, while Intel’s new x86 Lunar Lake chips represent some big improvements when it comes to the all-important power efficiency metric.

So, once again, here’s the overall takeaway. You cannot beat the MacBook Pro when it comes to do-it-all laptops right now. There are exceptions — like gaming — and frankly, the cheaper MacBook Air is still plenty of laptop for most users. That said, with a good port selection, great screen, solid keyboard, and stunning performance, Apple is continuing the streak of incredible laptops that started with the very first M-series models.

But just how far is Apple’s lead extended with the M4? Are Qualcomm and Intel really knocking on Apple’s door?

MacBook Pro M4 specs

Design

The overall design of the MacBook Pro remains the same for this generation, which is a good thing. It’s sleek and stylish, not overly bulky, and in classic Apple fashion, feels incredibly premium. As in past years, the laptop is available in 14- or 16-inch variants. Also just like past years, I’m reviewing my preference, the more portable 14-inch model. It comes in Silver and Space Black, and I have the Space Black model.

The overall design is pretty much perfect for a modern laptop, at least without being thinner and without sacrificing ports or performance. Again, it isn’t overly bulky, and its build quality is a step above the rest.

Ports

The port selection is the same as before, but that’s not a problem. The MacBook Pro has a HDMI port, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a MagSafe charging port (a port I don’t really use in a world of USB-C). Speaking of USB-C ports, there are three — two on the left edge and one on the right — and new for this year, they support Thunderbolt 5 if you get the M4 Pro or M4 Max. Unfortunately, it seems as though the base M4 only supports Thunderbolt 4, but that should be fine for most workflows.

Some users will need to use adapters and dongles, of course. There’s no ethernet port for wired network connectivity, and there are no USB-A ports. If you have accessories that use USB-A and plan on keeping them for a while, you should buy a dongle or USB-A to USB-C cable, as Apple isn’t going to add back USB-A any time soon (nor would I want it to).

Display

The display on the new MacBook Pro is stunning. You’ll get options for a 14.2 or 16.2-inch display, but both are what Apple calls Liquid Retina XDR screens. Both screen sizes have a pixel density of 254 pixels per inch, which essentially makes the display very crisp, and ensures that it’s impossible to see individual pixels at reasonable viewing distances.

On top of being crisp, the display is bright and vibrant too. It supports a peak HDR brightness of 1600 nits or 1000 sustained full-screen brightness. Put simply, in a dark room I kept the brightness at around a quarter of the brightness, while in brighter rooms, it was around half. It gets plenty bright for even outdoor use.

The notch is still there, and I still don’t care. I also still would have liked to see Face ID included in it, but I’ve softened a little on that stance. After all, you might not want the laptop to automatically log in just because you open it, and if an action is required, then Touch ID is just as convenient. Who knows, though? Maybe Apple will find a way to make it more convenient at some point in the future.

There are other ways in which Apple reduced the need to crank up your brightness. New for this generation is the option for a nano-texture glass over the display, which is incredibly effective at cutting down on reflections. Nano-texture was included on my review model, and I was a little skeptical of its efficacy before receiving the laptop. It worked very well, though, and all but eliminated all but the brightest of reflections, diffusing light in a way that ensured a glare-free experience. Theoretically, the nano-texture screen comes at the cost of some contrast, but I didn’t notice any difference in contrast between the nano-texture M4 model and the M3 Max model I’ve been using, and I think the trade-off is easily worth it if you have the cash to spare.

There are displays in the Apple ecosystem that are better than that found on the M4 MacBook Pro — namely in the form of the Tandem OLED screen found on the current-generation iPad Pro. Apple could adopt it in some future generation model, but I didn’t really miss it all that much here — plus the tech is still very expensive, and likely would have resulted in a price bump. When Apple can keep the price the same and add the new tech to the laptop, I’ll be all for it, but rest assured that the screen on the MacBook Pro looks detailed, vibrant, and natural.

Keyboard and touchpad

I’ll keep this section short. The new MacBook Pro has the same keyboard and touchpad as last year, and I’m glad. I love the feel of the keyboards on current-generation MacBook Pros (they’ve come a long way since the Butterfly Keyboard days), and Apple’s touchpads remain head and shoulders above the competition. I’m not sure that Apple touchpads have gotten better over the last decade or so — it’s just that everyone else was so far behind that they still haven’t caught up. The fingerprint sensor is fast and accurate, too.

I mentioned that the keyboard is the same on this year’s model as last year, but I did notice a more clicky feel on the new MacBook Pro. After consulting with some other reviewers, I came to the conclusion that the difference is down to the wear that happens naturally over a year of moderate usage, and not a change in keyboard technology — but it’s still interesting what a year of usage can do. To be very clear, the keyboard on the M3 Max model that I had been using still felt great, though, so don’t worry too much about it starting to feel mushy — just slightly mushier but still very high-quality.

Speakers

Apple has refined the speaker system in the MacBook Pro over the years, and while the speakers built into the current generation model are the same as last year's, that's a good thing. The speakers in even the 14-inch MacBook Pro blow almost all of the competition completely out of the water. Are they the most Hi-Fi speakers out there? Certainly not. But for built-in speakers, they sound incredible. They offer solid depth and decent bass, considering their size, along with some clarity in the high end. I typically use studio monitors at my desk when I'm working, but when I'm on the go with the laptop, such as in a hotel room, I find the speakers built into the MacBook Pro to be perfectly adequate for casual listening.

Performance

The MacBook Pro is available in a number of different configurations, including one that finally shows a real commitment to the cheapest model. The base MacBook Pro comes with an M4 chip with a 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU, along with 16GB of RAM (up from 8GB on the previous generation). There are far fewer compromises for the base model — you’ll get the same number of ports (even if they’re Thunderbolt 3 instead of Thunderbolt 4), and you get the same overall design, screen, and other specs. It’s a great laptop, though if you’re buying the base model, you might also consider the cheaper MacBook Air.

Of course, specs range up from there. The top-spec model is the M4 Max, with a whopping 128GB of unified memory. That’s the model we’re reviewing, and yes, it’s a beast. Storage options range from 512GB to 8TB — and my review model has 4TB.

I’m no demanding graphic designer, but I do video editing from time to time, and that often involves exports of fairly large files, and conversions to formats more friendly for social media. I was astonished at how quickly the laptop performed these tasks. Again, I’ve been using Apple’s previous top-spec laptop (the M3 Max MacBook Pro), and I did notice a difference in how quickly these tasks were completed. To be clear, the M3 Max model certainly wasn’t slow, and if you have an M3 Max MacBook Pro, you still probably don’t need an upgrade. But, the M4 Max model seems to perform around 20% better in multi-core CPU processing and graphics processing, based on benchmarks. If you’re a very demanding user coming from an M1 or even M2 Max model, you’ll notice a big difference — and the M4 Max gets very close to the performance of the M2 Ultra, reserved for desktop computers like the Mac Studio.

It’s truly stunning where Apple has taken its computers over the past few years, all by ditching Intel and developing its own chips. Apple has built a massive lead over the competition, and that continues with the M4 series.

But there are finally some signs of competition. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X chips are in their first generation, proving that Windows on ARM is not only possible, but quite likely the future. That said, Intel itself is competing too, not by adopting ARM, but by adopting new process nodes and adopting some tricksy tech related to core architectures and hyper-threading.

But here’s the thing — Qualcomm and Intel both tout their best new chips (the Snapdragon X Elite and the Core Ultra 7 258V) as competing with the Apple M4, and in slightly different ways, they get close. But the M4 is Apple’s base-model chip. The M4 Pro and M4 Max seriously outperform the M4 and run circles around Qualcomm and Intel’s best.

To be fair, it’s clear the the likes of Intel were a little blindsided by Apple’s success, and while Qualcomm has been building chips into laptops for a while now, its current run at it shows renewed focus. Intel is prepping the launch of a higher-end Lunar Lake chip in the form of the Core Ultra 9 258V, and Qualcomm will almost certainly build higher-end chips to complement its lineup.

But either way, there’s certainly no guarantee that they’ll catch Apple any time soon — we’re far from signs of chips that can compete with the likes of the Apple M4 Max, which is so far ahead of the competition that creative users like video editors shouldn’t even consider an alternative at this point.

Battery

There is one downside to using a top-spec M4 Max MacBook Pro, and that comes in the form of battery life. The battery on the MacBook Pro goes from incredible on the base M4 model, to just very good on the M4 Max. I was still easily able to get through a full eight-hour workday on a charge, and the laptop even lasted long 10-hour working sessions on a long-haul flight without plugging in. The difference in battery is fairly significant, but if you’re used to Intel laptop batteries, you’ll still be shocked at the difference.

The laptop can charge through MagSafe or the USB-C ports, and it supports charging speeds of 140W, though not all variants ship with a power supply that facilitates that speed.

Conclusions

A literally perfect MacBook Pro would have infinite battery life, no weight, and come for free. In the real world, the M4 MacBook Pro is as close to perfect as you can possibly get. Its performance is incredible, its battery life huge, and its design the most premium you can get.

I can already imagine the comments — biased Apple fanboy. I’m biased towards quality, and the M4 MacBook Pro is higher quality than any laptop ever released. That doesn’t mean you should buy it — it’s still expensive, and most average users won’t need to pay more than the price of the MacBook Air for what’s on offer by the MacBook Pro. But, if you are a demanding user or simply have cash to burn, the MacBook Pro is the laptop for you.

The competition

If you’re looking for a laptop with great battery life and solid performance for productivity, the MacBook Air is more than enough laptop for your needs. If, however, you’re a highly demanding user who needs much better graphics performance, then the MacBook Pro is the laptop to buy. You’ll have to decide for yourself exactly how to spec out the MacBook Pro for your needs, but as a good rule of thumb, the base M4 model is for those who want MacBook Pro specs like a better screen and more ports, but don’t necessarily need huge performance, while the M4 Pro model is perfect for photo editors and those who perform basic video edits or so so as a hobby, and the M4 Max is for users who need the best performance for a professional graphics workflow.

Should I buy the M4 MacBook Pro?

Yes. It’s more than most people need, but the best option out there for demanding users.

The post MacBook Pro M4 review: The best laptop ever made appeared first on BGR.

Today's Top Deals

1. Black Friday blowout: Massive Apple sale, LG OLED TVs, KitchenAid mixers, Instant Pots, laptops, more
2. Black Friday blowout: 15% off PS5, $154 AirPods Pro, doorbuster deals, Beats headphones, Narwal Freo Z Ultra, more
3. Best Apple Watch deals for December 2024
4. Fire TV Sticks start at $15 with these unreal Cyber Monday deals

MacBook Pro M4 review: The best laptop ever made originally appeared on BGR.com on Mon, 9 Dec 2024 at 14:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.