Apple Discontinued the 12-Inch MacBook Three Years Ago Today

[Mcsnee]

I owned the 12" and absolutely loved its tiny size, but hated the keyboard and the single port, which required lugging around either one big dongle or a selection of smaller ones. A 12" MB Air with the new keyboard and with, say, 2 USB ports and a magsafe would be an instant buy for me.

 

[0134168]

To each their own, of course.

But I can assure you I have more than 5 bags where the 12" MacBook fits in snuggly - while the Air would not fit at all - without destroying the bag or the MacBook Air.
It is quite surprising how much 1 inch difference in width makes.

Admittedly, I deliberately looked for very small bags, that is because I did not want the bag to look like "a laptop bag", enticing people to potentially steal my bag. With its tiny size, and a snuggly fitting small bag - no one assumes that there is a whole laptop in my bag.
People are always surprised when I take the 12" MacBook out - "You've got a whole laptop in there?!?" is a common comment I get.

To me it's peace of mind - and a smaller bag to carry.
This is how I do "laptop bags".

But feel free to consider it "grasping at straws".
You are of course entitled to think size and weight differences are irrelevant for your purposes.

I have the Tom Bihn Ristretto for Ipad bag. Well, in fact, two of them, on for spare. The Macbook 12 fits perfect, though it was made for the Ipad. Imposible to fit a macbook air or a mba 11".

It´s perfect size for me. The Macbook 12" is always with me.

By the way, it supports Ventura. So I have 3 years more of support.

 

[monkeybongo]

Great laptop, I switched to the m1 MBA but it's certainly not as light. I sold the MB for a pretty good price.

It would be great to see a m2 with this form factor but I would also wouldn't mind a dual boot MacOS on the iPad.

 

[SactoGuy18]

I have my doubts that Apple will build another 12" MacBook even with "Apple Silicon." Especially now with supply chain issues.

 

[Sport92]

Sadly the butterfly keyboard on my 2017 12" MacBook started having issues back in December, so I swapped it for a base M1 MBA. Think I paid $550 for the M1 after selling my old MacBook. This machine is awesome and I don't have any complaints at all. I told myself that I'd be holding on to the M1 MBA as long as possible, but if they ever reintroduce the 12" MB then I'll absolutely go back on my word just to get that form factor again.

 

[suns93]

I remember touching one in a store and thinking 'People actually use these?'. It seemed very small, cramped even. More toyish than I expected, but I'm sure it would be tremendous for people that travel a heck of a lot.

You’re not wrong. It was the only Mac I could get my hands on for my kindergartener at the time as the pandemic hit. I obviously never thought my kid would need their own laptop at such a young age but this was actually pretty perfect for the situation and he still uses it to this day. So thankful I wasn’t having to troubleshoot a Chromebook while everything else was going on during that time.

All that being said, outside of extremely privileged young children, not sure I would ever say this model was a “success”.

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

You’re not wrong. It was the only Mac I could get my hands on for my kindergartener at the time as the pandemic hit. I obviously never thought my kid would need their own laptop at such a young age but this was actually pretty perfect for the situation and he still uses it to this day. So thankful I wasn’t having to troubleshoot a Chromebook while everything else was going on during that time.

All that being said, outside of extremely privileged young children, not sure I would ever say this model was a “success”.

My 13" MBP was cramped, and took me some getting used to whenever I changed to it on a trip. Not uncomfortable, but inconvenient. *shrug* Small wrists and big hands. Could be worse... I did actually try to carry a larger style keyboard, but it was odd to use, and the dang batteries keep dying from either the heat or the cold. Never seemed to be worth it in the end. (And you can destroy a Magic Mouse with damage to the thin aluminum lip. Done it twice. Yikes)

 

[AppleInLVX]

if an iPad and a keyboard is the answer, you really didn't need a 'computer', you needed a tablet with a keyboard. Don't look shocked

I'm not shocked at all, as that is the truth for me in that particular scenario. When I'm mobile, I usually only write, email. surf, watch youtube, etc. I'm not doing any movie rendering, pro photo proessing from a digital SLR, coding or managing my home server (although I have done some of these in the past, but that's where I begin to agree with Gruber's assessment from years ago that using an iPad to do these things is like having mittens on--everything's a hack and takes longer). For the sake of what I'm doing, the iPad is ideal. I honestly prefer it when it comes to those tasks.

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

I'm not shocked at all, as that is the truth for me in that particular scenario. When I'm mobile, I usually only write, email. surf, watch youtube, etc. I'm not doing any movie rendering, pro photo proessing from a digital SLR, coding or managing my home server (although I have done some of these in the past, but that's where I begin to agree with Gruber's assessment from years ago that using an iPad to do these things is like having mittens on--everything's a hack and takes longer). For the sake of what I'm doing, the iPad is ideal. I honestly prefer it when it comes to those tasks.

I know I'm embarrassed after buying a new MBP to replace the one I had that had the keyboard issue, and then got the IPP and MK, and find that it does almost everything that I need. DOH! I figure that the MBP is for 'the future', if I end up getting a real job at some point...

 

[sideshowuniqueuser]

I think you're right for the MBA, I've always said that I'd love for it to be in three sizes, 12" for travel, 14" for everyday and 16" for desk-bound work.

I think that the Pro should be 14 & 16 or 15 & 17, I don't think they'd be able to make a pro-spec Apple laptop ultralight as well, and the 12" real estate would likely be too small for AV professionals.

Personally, I think that 18" would be too excessive and would start looking hideous, but who knows. I suppose the shell size would be the same as the discontinued 17" MBP, but looking back on pictures of that machine, it does indeed look hideous.

"too small for AV professionals" - wow, like they are the only pros in this world.... Why is everyone so convinced that people who want a particular size of screen, must therefore only want either the Pro spec, or the non-Pro spec? Completely unrelated.

"18" would be too excessive" - it would be the same physical size as the 17" Unibody MBP pre-2012. Yep, I had one, it was great, and nope, it did not look hideous or too big.

By your logic of "too small for AV professionals", you'd think that you'd be clamouring for much bigger MBP's than 16" for the AV Pros.

Just because you don't have a desire for a particular size yourself, doesn't mean they shouldn't make it. I would never buy a 12" in a million years, but I still think they should make it for those that do want it. I bought a 16" M1P MBP, and ignored the M1 MBA when it came out, simply because I didn't want to have to deal with a screen that small.

 

[thisMRguy]

The 12 is still my daily laptop getting 5-6hours on lite usage. I dock it to my dell u3421, Crunching numbers, programming, editing lite video's. things that would be tedious on an ipad pro.

I'm fine with one USB-C, but two would be better by replacing the headphone jack.

Things I hate:
Keyboard
480p webcam


Things I love:
size & weight
battery (even after 6 years)
screen quality

I'd be first in line to buy a new 12inch 🤙

 

[HaddockW]

Well that is sort of "it depends" situation though. If you are mostly touching cloud/remote assets then you really don't need a lot of power and I believe there are tools for the iPad to facilitate those interactions.

Local software development is probably never coming to iPadOS, so if you want to do that with something like the 11in iPad Pro + Magic Keyboard Case then you're SOL.

This is exactly why I liked the 12 inch Macbook. Mine had Docker and Kubernetes (minikube running). Whatever I needed, I could spool up a docker container.

 

[balticgreen]

These are the results: people UNABLE to accept a product for others. The same imbecile dynamic pervades the history of Mini products, from iPhones to iPads, but for this we must also thank the all-American imbecility of compensating the size of your toy between your legs with UNNECESSARILY huge products.

LOL. I don't understand why people feel that it's necessary to verbally fart all over products that meet someone else's needs. I'm a man and have no use for tampons but I'm not out here like "Oh my god, why do these exist? No one needs these!" Clearly they're not intended for me. If the 12" MacBook didn't meet your needs, then it wasn't for you. It met the needs of plenty of people like me who bought one for travel and loved it (other than the keyboard). The inability to accept that any product meets the needs of other people, even if it doesn't meet your own, is asinine.

iPad Pro killer?!?

Sometimes I wonder whether Apple killed the 12" MacBook because it became a serious threat to the iPad Pro.
If you buy an iPad Pro with a keyboard folio it is bulkier, heavier and more expensive than a 12" MacBook.

This is just my opinion, but I don't think so. Apple has and has had overlaps in product lines for a while. Look at all the different SKUs of iPads and iPhones to fit every need and budget. They could simplify those two lines, but they don't. They fill every opening in the market with some option that's just slightly better or slightly worse than the product on either side of it to maximize sales/profit. They clearly aren't worried about one iPhone cannibalizing another iPhone, so why worry about an ultra-portable MacBook cannibalizing the iPad Pro. There are greater differentiating factors between those two than some other products Apple sells. If you want a touchscreen, a MacBook isn't an option; you buy an iPad. If you want a full-featured OS, an iPad isn't an option; you buy a MacBook. A sale is still a sale regardless of what was sold. The alternative is not meeting the customer's needs and losing the sale completely because they bought a competitor's product that did meet their needs.

I think the 12" reached the end of the line of appropriate processors that could meet the thermal requirements for the design, very similar to what happened to the Trash Can MacPro. Intel dropped many balls (thus the switch to AS) and although I have no direct knowledge, I strongly suspect that this was one of them.

Admittedly, I deliberately looked for very small bags, that is because I did not want the bag to look like "a laptop bag", enticing people to potentially steal my bag. With its tiny size, and a snuggly fitting small bag - no one assumes that there is a whole laptop in my bag.
...
To me it's peace of mind - and a smaller bag to carry.
This is how I do "laptop bags".

Same for me. I won't use a bag that was designed for laptops because (1) they're hideous, and (2) they practically scream "STEAL MY LAPTOP!" I have a slim backpack that has a separate compartment, which was not intended for laptops; however, my 12" MacBook fit perfectly in that separate compartment and protected the laptop from the things in the main compartment. My 13" Air's size is larger enough that it does not fit in that compartment where the 12" did. I had to buy a laptop sleeve for the main compartment so now I'm carrying around both the sleeve and the heavier laptop compared to what I was carrying before. Is it a lot? No, but it's noticeable.

 

[johngordon]

I had one and absolutely loved it. My main machine was a 27" iMac, so didn't need loads of power, just wanted something light and portable to take to coffee shops to do a bit of light work or meet with clients. It did start to struggle a bit after a couple of years though.... the new MacBook Airs feel like the absolute sweet spot of portability and power though. Well, or me anyway. Other needs are available.

 

[peanut48]

I had a look at the new M2 MacBook Air and it looks massive compared to my 2015 Retina MacBook. So much more heavier too. Will definitely not be buying one.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I had a look at the new M2 MacBook Air and it looks massive compared to my 2015 Retina MacBook. So much more heavier too. Will definitely not be buying one.

I have the 2017 MB, M1 MBA, and the new M2 MBA. I think the new M2 is miles ahead of the old MB and while I am glad I still have the 12" MB, I am glad I bought the new M2. It has been worth it to me, even though it is bigger than the 12" MB.

 

[Qu1ckset]

I had a look at the new M2 MacBook Air and it looks massive compared to my 2015 Retina MacBook. So much more heavier too. Will definitely not be buying one.

I wish I never sold mine, was perfect, and ya I won’t be buying a MacBook till they replace the 12”.

I’m not dying for a notebook so I have all the time in the world to wait

 

[jfc531]

I love my MacBook 12 inch 2017 model more than life itself (or most of life). I will keep buying them until no more are for sale anywhere in the wide world.

 

[dandeco]

And we just got one at my workplace!

But I think the display might bad or something; it just stays on that screen among booting. Of course that single USB-C port is pretty inconvenient, too. (If I can get it to work I'm going to need to wipe the on-board SSD and re-install the highest MacOS version it'll support.)

 

[aespana]

And we just got one at my workplace!
View attachment 2235392
But I think the display might bad or something; it just stays on that screen among booting. Of course that single USB-C port is pretty inconvenient, too. (If I can get it to work I'm going to need to wipe the on-board SSD and re-install the highest MacOS version it'll support.)

Send me one of those Macbook Pro 2013/2015 🤣.

Yeah, looks like the display is broken or something. Really sad