The Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) was officially unveiled alongside the Apple MacBook Pro 14-inch (2021), and we can say that it’s one of the most exciting laptops we’ve seen this year, and possibly the best laptop ever made. The new MacBook Pro 16-inch hit the stage at Apple’s Unleashed event and it’s well worth the wait.
After the success of the M1 chip and the new, smaller MacBooks and iMac, all eyes were turned to WWDC 2021 in June in hopes of an announcement, but the anticipated announcement never came. Instead we had to wait until October for the new MacBook Pro 16-inch to finally be ready to be shown.
Powered by the new 10-core M1 Pro or M1 Max chips with eight performance cores and two efficiency cores, the new MacBook Pro 16-inch is a significant step forward in terms of performance.
Also, Apple says that both the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips are twice as fast as the Intel Core i9 in the MacBook Pro 16-inch (2019). The M1 Pro maxes out at 32GB of RAM, while the M1 Max can max out at 64GB.
The company also claims that the efficiency of the new MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) can extend battery life by up to 21 hours, far beyond the capacity of the longest-lasting Intel or AMD laptop processors.
On the GPU side, the M1 Pro MacBook Pro 16-inch features a 16-core GPU, while the M1 Max MacBook Pro 16-inch features a 32-core GPU for the fastest graphics ever in a MacBook Pro.
The new Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) is up for pre-orders and delivery is expected to begin on October 26. The Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) M1 Pro model starts at $2,499, while the M1 Max model starts at $3,499.
As for the design of the Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021), there aren’t many changes beyond the updated ports. The case is offered in two colors, silver and space gray, and while there are those of us who would like to see brighter colors, we can say that color preference is not so important given everything we see today.
In terms of ports (inputs), MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021), Magic Keyboard with Touch ID, Force Touch trackpad, and 140W USB-C power adapter, plus three Thunderbolt 4 ports, an HDMI port, an SDXC card slot, and a MagSafe It has 3 ports.
The MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) features another technology from Apple with a Liquid Retina XDR display with mini LED technology that delivers up to 1000 nits of continuous, full-screen brightness. What’s more, the MacBook Pro 16-inch (2021) can offer peak brightness of up to 1,600 nits and a contrast ratio of 1,000,000:1.
The display offers P3 wide color gamut coverage and supports one billion colors for smoother gradients. The display also comes with the much-loved and expected 120Hz refresh rate, making it the fastest MacBook Pro 16-inch display ever.
The M1 Pro chip provides a big boost over the Apple M1 chip, which is the first generation Apple silicon. Apple says the M1 Pro and M1 Max are twice as powerful as the Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (2019) powered by an Intel Core i9 processor, and while this claim needs to be tested and verified after meeting its users, it’s definitely Intel Core i9’s efficiency. Considering that it is an octa-core chip without a core, we can easily say that it seems possible.
Here are some stats Apple has provided for expected performance gains for the MacBook Pro 16-inch (2019):
- Up to 3.7x faster project creation using Xcode.
- Up to 3x more Amp Designer plugins in Logic Pro.
- Up to 2.8x faster computational fluid dynamics performance on NASA TetrUSS.
- Up to 9.2x faster 4K rendering with M1 Pro and 13.4x faster with M1 Max in Final Cut Pro.
- Up to 5.6x faster combined vector and raster GPU performance with M1 Pro and 8.5x faster with M1 Max in Affinity Photo.
- Up to 3.6x faster effects creation with M1 Pro and 5x faster with M1 Max in Blackmagic Design DaVinci Resolve Studio.
- Up to 8.7x faster object tracking performance with M1 Pro and 11.5x faster with M1 Max in Final Cut Pro.
- Up to 7.2x faster scene editing detection on 1080p ProRes 422 video in Adobe Premiere Pro.
- Up to 2.6x faster performance when selecting objects in images in Adobe Photoshop.
- Up to 3x faster computational fluid dynamics performance on NASA TetrUSS.
- Up to 2.1x faster project builds in Xcode.
- Up to 2.1X faster publishing performance in Vectorworks.
- Combined vector and raster GPU performance in Affinity Photo up to 2.9x faster with M1 Pro and up to 4.5x faster with M1 Max.
- Up to 2.5x faster rendering with M1 Pro with Redshift and up to 4x faster with M1 Max in Maxon Cinema 4D.
- 8K rendering in Final Cut Pro up to 1.7x faster with M1 Pro and 2.9x faster with M1 Max.
- Up to 4.4x faster scene editing detection on 1080p ProRes 422 video in Adobe Premiere Pro.
- Up to 3.6x faster object tracking performance with M1 Pro and 4.9x faster with M1 Max in Final Cut Pro.
- Up to 1.5x faster performance with M1 Pro and 2x faster performance when selecting objects in images in Adobe Photoshop.
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