the notch on the new MacBook Pro is superfluous
Apple recently announced new MacBook Pro models. The laptops are extremely powerful and bring back all kinds of missed features from older models. However, there is one change that I find very unfortunate: the notch.
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A notch, not a Face ID
We’ve been living with Apple’s notch for a while now. The iPhone X brought the much-discussed screen notch to life in 2017. At the time it was already a ‘either you love it or you hate itcase, but we all agreed on one thing: Face ID was great and the thin bezels were more than welcome. The notch allowed for a symmetrical bezel, and the iPhone didn’t get the ugly, fat “chin” that many Android smartphones still have.
We may have had to get used to it, but the notch on the iPhone doesn’t seem to get in the way. Whether you like it is up to you – but the screen notch doesn’t limit the ease of use. With the arrival of the iPhone 13, the notch has even shrunk a bit. The iconic snack has become an iconic iPhone design feature. Android smartphones have now almost all switched to a so-called ‘hole punch’. This one is much smaller than Apple’s screen notch. Do you see a fat, fat notch? Then you see an iPhone.
Why, Apple?
With the new MacBook Pros, Apple is bringing the notch to the laptop for the first time. The screen edges have become a lot thinner, so that the webcam no longer fits into the edge. In addition, space is needed for the True Tone sensor and the small LED light, which lights up when the webcam is in use. And so Apple came up with the notch as – I quote – ‘a smart solution to maximize screen area’.
It is striking that Apple has not given the new Pro laptop Face ID. Unlocking is still via Touch ID. This works fine, of course, but that’s not the point right now. Apple mainly sold the iPhone notch in 2017 under the guise of Face ID, but the manufacturer has now apparently forgotten that.
A bite from your screen is of course not the end of the world. Still, I wonder: why didn’t Apple make the screen edges a little thicker to make enough room for the sensors and the webcam? And the new screen edges are not that thin, so a few millimeters extra is probably enough.
A notch on a laptop just feels super redundant. In addition, the bezel at the bottom is now thicker than the rest – so the screen of the new MacBook Pro has a thick chin. And I can’t watch it.
Hate the notch? Just get used to it
It seemed for a while that Apple would say goodbye to the notch once and for all with the iPhone 14 in 2022. According to several rumors, at least the Pro model will have a camera hole, as we are used to from Samsung smartphones. Apple would hide the sensors for Face ID under the screen.
However, the question is whether Apple actually wants to throw the notch away. While the notch is a stumbling block for many users, the screen notch recognition factor is very important to Apple. Which brand does not want everyone to know at a glance which product it is?
According to new rumors, the MacBook Air will also get a notch in 2022. This is expected to be even more striking, because Apple will color the screen edges white. Who knows, the iPad and iMac will also get a notch in the future, but nothing is known about this yet.
So there is a good chance that I will also be typing with a notch in front of my nose in a while. Fortunately, there are plenty of options to hide him. For example, you can make the task bar at the top of the screen black, so that the notch is no longer visible. But maybe we just need to get used to it.
