Commentary: Why the MacBook Neo is the crowning glory of macOS

25 years ago, Apple released Mac OS X. I still remember the switch from classic Mac OS to the Unix system. There was an outcry in the fan community because the apple was no longer in the top left of the menu bar, but in the middle. Apple quickly corrected that.

But much worse was the performance on the PowerPC computers of the time. Occasionally the calculations took so long that one had to suspect a Mac crash. Every mouse click could bring up the spinning beach ball.

Apple had to make improvements, on the one hand by optimizing the system, and on the other hand by switching to the much faster Intel chips of the time. macOS only really became fast with the Apple SoCs, which were originally developed for iPhones.

My iPhone was faster than my Mac

In the era of Intel Macs, my iPhone 11 Pro with the A13 Bionic was probably the fastest computer in my household. Since then, performance has played an ever-decreasing role in purchasing decisions, because all devices with Apple Silicon were always fast enough.

An opinion by Johannes Schuster

Johannes Schuster is a trained journalist and came to the Mac via desktop publishing during his studies. He has been testing Apple hardware and everything around it for various magazines since 1993.

Nevertheless, Apple continued to rely on the processor card, especially with new generations of the iPad Pro – most recently with an M5 powerhouse in a tablet that costs 3587 Euros in its most expensive configuration with pen and keyboard.

The Neo rounds off the portfolio – with an iPhone chip

With the MacBook Neo, Cupertino is now (finally) rounding off its portfolio downwards and – irony of history – is using an iPhone chip in a genuine Mac. It's also fast enough for macOS 26 and everyday applications, even if perhaps not suitable for every task.

All in all, I am very pleased about the addition of a cheap MacBook at Apple, which with a competitive price of 700 Euros will certainly turn many iPhone owners without a Mac into Mac owners.

This commentary first appeared as an editorial in Mac & i 2/2026 – now fresh on the newsstand and in the heise shop.

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(jes)