MacBook Neo Review – 6 Months Later

By Josh Teder

It’s been six months since I got the MacBook Neo, the Apple laptop everyone’s been talking about this year. After using it for pretty much everything I do day to day, I want to walk through my favorite things about it, the downsides, and whether I think it’s actually worth buying.

Everyday Performance Is Genuinely Great

The first thing that impressed me about the Neo is that for normal laptop tasks, web browsing, writing, watching content, even more demanding stuff like editing 4K video, it holds up. That’s impressive considering this thing runs macOS on 8GB of RAM and an A18 Pro chip, the same chip family Apple uses in the iPhone. The A18 Pro actually beats the older M1 and M2 chips found in previous MacBooks in single-core performance by a solid margin.

Over six months, I’ve used this for coding projects with Claude, running my website, writing, browsing, and watching content, and I genuinely can’t think of a single instance where I ran into a performance wall.

Where the RAM does become a limitation is with heavier workflows. I didn’t even attempt my video editing workflow on the Neo, since I need more horsepower and RAM for my plugins to run smoothly and my exports to take minutes instead of half an hour. If you’re a student running graphics-intensive modeling software or doing statistical analysis on large datasets, that’s where I’d still point you toward more RAM and a stronger chip. If you already know you need that kind of horsepower, you probably know it before you ever consider the Neo.

Design, Feel, and Size

For a laptop in this price range, the Neo has a great keyboard and trackpad, even though the trackpad is a physical, clicking one instead of the haptic trackpad found on Apple’s other laptops. The only thing you’re really missing is the Force Touch lookup gesture, which, honestly, a lot of people don’t even realize their haptic trackpad has.

It also just feels fun to use. The more vibrant colors help (I got Citrus), and Apple color-matched parts of macOS to the color of the laptop, which is a genuinely nice touch.

The 60Hz refresh rate didn’t bother me here the way it did on the iPhone 17e I reviewed recently. The activities most people do on a laptop just don’t involve as much scrolling and UI animation as iOS does, so it’s not as noticeable.

Size is another win. The Neo only comes in one 13 inch variant, and I think that’s the perfect, portable size for students carrying it around campus, or for anyone who wants a laptop to use on the couch or on a bigger display than their phone for things like planning a trip or buying tickets. Power users might also find a use case here as a secondary machine for more experimental projects, kind of like how people use Mac minis. I’ve used mine for vibe coded programs I wouldn’t want to run on my Mac Studio in case something goes wrong.

Where the Neo Cuts Corners

This has been a lot of sunshine and roses so far. There have to be some catches here, otherwise no one would bother paying more for a MacBook Air or Pro. Here’s where the Neo compromises.

The Neo only has two ports, and if you’re charging it, only one is actually free, since it doesn’t have MagSafe like the Air and Pro. Its ports are also slower for transfer speeds. And the Neo shipped without Apple’s latest networking chip, so it’s capped at WiFi 6E instead of the WiFi 7 you get on newer Macs. That’s still fine (it’s what I have at home), but it’s a step behind.

Charging is another small hit. The Neo ships with a 20W charger, and unlike most Macs, going with a more powerful charger doesn’t unlock meaningfully faster charging. In my testing it topped out around 30W even with a stronger charger, like the one Anker sent me. It’ll still save you a bit of time over the stock charger, but it’s nowhere near fast charge capable like Apple’s other laptops.

That same 8GB of RAM and A18 Pro chip also means the Neo is going to miss out on some of Apple’s newer on device AI features tied to Siri, like more expressive, customizable voice options and the next generation of high accuracy dictation. If the Neo is already missing features the same year it launched, I wouldn’t count on future Mac features that depend on heavier on device models making it here either.

There are a few smaller omissions too that I’d call nice to haves rather than dealbreakers: True Tone (which adjusts the display’s color based on your environment), the 12MP Center Stage camera, and P3 wide color, which matters more if you do serious color work in something like Photoshop or Lightroom. The anti reflective coating is also slightly weaker than the Air’s, though I don’t think that’s a dealbreaker either.

One personal note: my Mac Studio and MacBook Air both have 3.5mm jacks that support high impedance headphones for my editing and audio work. The Neo’s 3.5mm jack doesn’t support that, so keep it in mind if you’re editing podcasts or doing serious audio work with high impedance headphones.

Update (September 2026): Apple raised prices on the MacBook Neo lineup back in June, citing the ongoing memory chip shortage that’s driven up RAM and storage costs across the industry. The base 256GB model that launched at $599 is now $699, and the 512GB Touch ID model that launched at $699 is now $799 (education pricing still knocks $100 off both). The math from the original review still holds. Touch ID is still a $100 upgrade, it’s just $100 on top of a higher starting price now.

Should You Spring for Touch ID?

To me, having Touch ID is so much more convenient than constantly typing in a password, especially if this is a laptop you’re planning to load up with photos and videos and keep for several years. That upgrade is a no brainer for me.

Who Should Actually Buy This

Given how well it handles general computing, that’s a lot of people honestly. If you’re writing, browsing the web, using tools like Claude Code or Google Docs, or doing casual computer tasks like social media and email, the Neo handles all of it without complaint.

For its size, the battery life easily gets me through a full day, though it is a step down from my MacBook Air’s battery. Compared to its actual Windows competition, if we can even call it that, you’re going to have a hard time finding anything that matches this build quality, performance, and battery life at this price.

For a laptop that runs on an iPhone chip, the MacBook Neo has no business being this good for daily use, and that’s exactly why it’s worth taking seriously.

So those are all of my thoughts after six months with the MacBook Neo. Let me know what you think of Apple’s newest MacBook line in the comments, and whether you’ve been tempted to pick one up. For more on how it stacks up against the alternatives, check out my MacBook Neo vs. MacBook Air breakdown and my MacBook Neo vs. iPad Air comparison.