Apple pushes on: the notch on the new MacBook is smart

The MacBook Pro presented last week has a notch for the camera. Apple is very happy with this and calls the notch very smart. Uh, okay.

Last week was the Apple Event. A lot of cool products were launched there. The MacBook Pro was one of them. Before the event it became clear that the laptop would come with a notch. Just like an iPhone. Not everyone is happy with that, according to the many reactions on the various forums. Apple has now responded.

MacBook notch is very smart

The screen now has a notch. Not the most beautiful solution, while Apple has sleek designs. Not for nothing did this cause some commotion. People are not so happy that their screen space is being violated in this way. But is that so?

Fortunately, Apple responded to this outcry. The company reassured everyone that the MacBook Pro notch is actually super intelligent. Shruti Haldea — the Pro Mac Product Line Manager at Apple — appeared on the Same Brain podcast to discuss the new devices, and the conversation quickly turned to the notch. You can watch the podcast on YouTube.

The relevant segment begins around 10:20 am. Haldea is talking specifically about the 16-inch notebook. She said the laptop still has a 16-inch active area — and the screen remains a “16:10-inch window.” So it doesn’t get smaller because of the notch.

MacBook Pro notch

What Apple has done is grow the screen and move the menu bar “up and out of the way”. This, she says, is a “very smart way to give you more space for your content.” Well, she’s right about that. It eases the pain of a notch, because no space is sacrificed. And if you go full screen, the notch is black and about the same thickness as the bezel on previous MacBooks. Yet many people continue to find it ugly and unnecessary. The technology is so far that there is also another solution. However, Apple rambles on about how smart and clever and “seamless” this design is without ever acknowledging the downsides of this design decision.