You may be right, but the counter argument is that fanless iPads now have the M1.
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I don’t think so, actually. It was basically a low-spec, minimalist laptop that only had two iterations - one in 2015, and one in 2017. That spot is currently being served by the M1 MBA, which is less than 1" larger than the 12" in the longest dimension.
That said, if they release a 12", I would expect it to be because they recalibrate the lineup and replace the 13" - not add to it. Kind of like the 14" and 16" MBPs replaced the 13" and the 15", respectively. Only the other direction.
I’ve not handled a MBA from the Apple Silicon era, but the 12" I had was so thin and light it handled like an iPad. I could reasonably hold it by a front corner between finger and thumb. So I checked and a MBA is a third heavier than the 12" MacBook, even though the MBA is thinner.
My point is I think there is still a space for the lightest, sveltest MacBook of them all. They could put an M1 in it and pare away everything except one USB port and one power connector (because the original combining those two was problematic reasonably often).
Heck… make an 11" again!
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Oh, sure, that’s all we need, an even more confusing Mac line-up!! 
It would be more versatile to include two USB C ports instead of one and a magsafe.
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Bring back the 11” MBA.
Those things were incredible.
A and M chips have little to distinguish them. The biggest distinction is the thunderbolt interface, really. Same core architecture just different core configurations.
There’s no real heat concern putting an M chip in a smaller MacBook, they’ll just use binned chips or thermally constrain them as they have in the past.
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Would you want the short and wide aspect ratio screen of the old 11” or the taller one used on other MacBooks?
I feel like the aspect ratio is basically dictated by the keyboard tbh.
How so? Unlike Apple’s other laptops, the 11 inch Air used the shorter, wider 16:9 aspect ratio/1366 by 768, which was the standard Windows generic laptop screen at the time.
I’d guess that was because the 11 inch MacBook was always a niche, low volume product, and the generic off the shelf 1366 by 768 panel was easier and cheaper to source.
If we assume:
- They make the keyboard with full size keys
- They shrink the space at the side of the keyboard as much as is technologically feasible
- They’re not interested in giant side bezels on the monitor
- The screen will be 11"
then we’ve largely solved for two sides of a triangle. The hypotenuse is 11", the long regular leg is whatever width they can get away with the keyboard being, and the vertical part scales accordingly. Changing the vertical size at that point requires changing one of the above 4 assumptions.
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Interesting. I suppose they could have adjusted the size of the deck and trackpad, and produced a custom panel with an aspect ratio that was closer to the standard MacBook, like the later 12 inch MacBooks.
The 11 inch Airs had the only screen on an Intel or later MacBook I know of that seemed to have been pulled out of a bin of generic components used for building modestly priced Windows laptops or netbooks.
Well, it also capped out at a very low resolution. The 11 inch never got Retina. So they could have, in theory, used commodity panels.
None of the Airs in that era had retina. But the 13 inch models still had 16:10 aspect ratios. They were custom panels made for Apple machines that afaik no one else was using.
It always makes me smile when I see people using the “the iPad doesn’t allow recording multitrack audio” as the key example of how the iPad is “crippled.” How many users have a need or desire to record multiple streams of audio? How many of that special class, “power users,” have that need or desire? In the grand scale of things, a drop in the ocean of iPad users.
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Are they damning iPads as a class for everyone or just giving examples of why an iPad can’t replace a laptop or desktop computer?
I think the origin of what @Denny is talking about in his original post goes back to Apple’s misleading “It’s a computer” ads for the iPad. While technically true (so is a smartphone), the slogan implied that iPads could replace laptops and desktops, which has never been true except for a subset of mostly casual users, and another smaller subset of professional users who were better served by a device that prioritizes touch and stylus input over keyboard and pointing device input.
Unfortunately, that set up the endless “which are better, iPads or MacBooks?” debates. I need a laptop, but for me a tablet like an iPad falls into the “nice to have” category. For some people it’s the other way around, and some people genuinely do need both to get their work done efficiently.
But none of that makes either class of device “better than” the other except in the context of “better for what?”
In the context of the original post, it’s just as lazy to argue, as I’ve seen iPad enthusiasts do, that adding a Magic Keyboard to an iPad makes it a good laptop. No, it makes it a more versatile device than an iPad without one, but even with it an iPad still makes a mediocre laptop, even though that may be all the laptop some people need.
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Some criticism does exactly this, which I would agree is a valid purpose of critically examining a machine like the iPad. But I think much of the critical antipathy toward the iPad is not a result of this.
Before I proceed, I want to be cautious with the “they,” because I’m not accusing all critical coverage of the iPad. The class of criticism I take umbrage with is the class that seems not to be doing what you suggested. Rather, there is a lot of criticism that seems to hold the iPad to the standard that it must be able to replace a laptop function-for-function to be valuable or useful. Holding the iPad to the laptop replacement standard is faulty. Nobody holds a laptop to being a failure even though it is not a complete iPad replacement.
Laptop replaceability is a good metric, but not the sole metric. For some people, they might not want an iPad unless it matches function-for-function for everything they need to do on a laptop. I don’t want two computers, they say, so I’m going to get the one that does all the things I need, not some of them. Perfectly fair.
The problem for commentators is that the concept of laptop replaceability has become a shibboleth that lacks meaning. This is what the commentators need to start recognizing. There is no single test where an iPad must meet these X qualifications to be able to replace everyone’s laptop. An iPad absolutely can and absolutely does replace a laptop or desktop for many people. So, it’s not an objective measure to say an iPad can’t replace a laptop (or desktop). It may not be a laptop or desktop replacement for a class of people. In 2024, developers cannot go native ipad only.
The lack of appreciation of this substantial nuance makes much of the iPad coverage—from what I read of it, and I read a lot—shallow, mis-focused, and unhelpful.
Nobody faults a rabbit because it cannot swim like a fish. Both animals propel themselves quite remarkably. iPads, laptops, and desktops are different classes of machines that perform a lot of powerful functions quite remarkably. In some cases all three overlap, in other cases how you do things on one differs from how you do it (or whether you even can do it) on the other. Desktops and laptops, are obviously much closer to each other than an iPad is to either, of course.
Today’ iPad is well suited for an increasingly larger swath of uses cases and applications. It doesn’t need to be maligned for missing some arbitrary mark that a laptop can perform. The question to ask is whether it can do the job the user needs it to do.
Those distinctions between laptop functionality and ipad functionality are, of course, valid. This is particularly so when one is trying to weigh the pros and cons of both devices to make a purchasing decision. Whether those distinctions are shortcomings or not depends on the purchaser’s needs. The problem, going back to the start of this thread, is that a great many of articles analyzing the iPad treat these distinctions as shortcomings across the board. That’s not a meaningful analysis.
This is exactly apropos to my point. The ad was not misleading at all — it made many people realize that they could anccomplish all their computing needs on an iPad. The ad was accurate and reflects reality for a lot of people; the pundits define computer more narrowly than they ought to and say the iPad isn’t one. It is definitely a computer, does it mean it should be your computer? No, of course not. The iPad has redefined what a computer is, that does not mean that Apple or anyone expects the iPad to replace any and every other machine. If Apple felt that way, it probably would have stopped investing in developing Macs.
Generally speaking, critics would offer more meaningful and nuanced analysis if they would accept that two propositions can be simultaneously true: an iPad is a computer; and even so, an iPad is not right for everybody. Some critics do this well, some do it poorly.
Also, I’m not criticizing commentators who are commenting from a specific use case scenario. Sticking with my example of developers, if a commentator is writing an article on using iPads for software development, she can criticize the iPad for not having a compiler without having to say how good the iPad is for watching videos. This is not about balance, but it is about dealing more faithfully with nuance.
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I don’t really believe this is a good metric.
If someone needs functional/feature parity with a MacBook then they need a MacBook and lamenting that the iPad doesn’t have functional parity isn’t a particularly reasonable comparison. It’s also not a particularly reasonable assumption that making an iPad more like a MacBook, or introducing more MacBook features would be an improvement to the iPad.
We wouldn’t use this kind of logic to compare other tools. We’d just get the tool we need.
There’s this assumption with Apple folks in particular that every device Apple makes is for them. It isn’t.
“I couldn’t do my job for a whole week with just a Vision Pro! The Vision Pro is a bad device”
No it isn’t, it was just a bad and unfounded expectation.
I don’t think they were misleading. iPads are computers by any objective measure you choose. Given their success with many categories of users, and that for many users they are the only ‘computer’ they own, then they’re not only computers but they’re also very successful computers.
One of our local schools here was provided an iPad for every student by Apple in the last few years. All the students work is done on those iPads where previously they would have been expected to use the family or classroom desktop. For those students, their iPads are the only computer they need.
I think looking at an iPad and judging that it’s not a ‘real computer’ or that calling it a computer is somehow misleading is intellectually dishonest at best. It’s clearly a computer, and the fact that some specific work can’t easily be performed on it is fine. That’s not a failing.
You don’t see Pixar on here complaining that they can’t render Toy Story 18 on a MacBook Air. Because of course you can’t.
iPads do not need to be all things to all people to be legitimate.
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I think we’re both in agreement that iPads and laptops are different classes of device, each with their own strengths and limitations. But there are a few things I see differently.
Holding the iPad to the laptop replacement standard is faulty.
Then why do some iPad enthusiasts tout the iPad as a laptop replacement? And become resentful when they get pushback on that?
An iPad absolutely can and absolutely does replace a laptop or desktop for many people. So, it’s not an objective measure to say an iPad can’t replace a laptop (or desktop). It may not be a laptop or desktop replacement for a class of people.
The same is true for smartphones. They absolutely can and do replace a laptop or desktop computer for a class of people.
It is an objective measure to say that an iPad can’t replace the full functionality of a laptop, which is what I meant. And that’s something iPad enthusiasts sometimes gloss over.
Desktops and laptops, are obviously much closer to each other than an iPad is to either, of course.
Yes, just as iPads and iPhones are obviously much closer to each other than a laptop is to either.
The ad was not misleading at all — it made many people realize that they could anccomplish all their computing needs on an iPad. The ad was accurate and reflects reality for a lot of people; the pundits define computer more narrowly than they ought to and say the iPad isn’t one.
I see what you’re saying, but while it may have made some people realize they could do everything they needed to do on an iPad, it was misleading in that it implied that the iPad fell into the same computing class as laptops and desktops (which as you say are much closer to each other than the iPad is to either). And pundits and others have quite reasonably continued to push back against that notion.
The iPad, like the iPhone, is a computer, but it’s not what Cory Doctorow calls a general-purpose computational device. The OS is locked down and corporate controlled, and the user has much less control over what they can and can’t do with their device, than any laptop/desktop OS, including macOS. That doesn’t matter to everyone, but it’s a huge gulf that shouldn’t be minimized or ignored.
That’s not to say that iPhones and iPads aren’t useful computing devices. But they fall into a different class of devices and operations systems, and even though some of their functionality overlaps with laptops/desktops, they shouldn’t be confused.
Again, I think at least some of what seems like antipathy to the iPad is a reaction to the sometimes overblown claims of iPad enthusiasts. Yes, for some people Stage Manager on an iPad is good enough for multitasking, as is swiping up to switch apps on an iPhone. But it’s not even close to the multitasking capabilities of a modern desktop OS.
The bottom line is that I’m not sure why iPad enthusiasts are so thin skinned about some people discounting the device. Some people value its capabilities and some people don’t, just like everything. There’s no risk that the iPad is going away because of the criticism—on the contrary, that criticism may push Apple to make it even better. Certainly it’s not in danger of being ignored or discounted in the mainstream like desktop Linux is.