MacBook Pro 13

 

The new 2022 13-inch MacBook Pro is in a really weird place. Launched almost as an afterthought at this year's WWDC - it got exactly 1 minute and 32 seconds of stage time (yes, I timed it) - it brings back the same design and external hardware as its last two predecessors, which wouldn't be a big deal. except that Apple had already switched to a new MacBook design language last year, with thinner bezels surrounding a better display, the return of the MagSafe charging port and an improved webcam. In fact, at the same event, Apple also launched the MacBook Air with this new design (the Air got almost six minutes of stage time, by the way).

Who is this new MacBook Pro for, therefore, given that it has essentially similar internals to the new MacBook Air, including brand-new M2 silicon and up to 24GB of unified memory?

Sure, there's an extra fan and slightly larger battery in the MacBook Pro compared to the Air, but the M2 is also so efficient that the fan is rarely needed. This new M2 MacBook Pro is, in my opinion, Apple's most special MacBook yet, aimed at a small group - those who need a bit more performance than a fanless MacBook Air, but the 14-inch M1 Pro MacBook Pro is too expensive.

The good news is that Apple's consumer base is so large that even a small niche of this group can still lead to millions of units sold. And in a vacuum where it's not overshadowed by other MacBooks with newer designs and shinier colors, this M2 MacBook Pro is an amazing laptop for productivity and creative work.

Apple Macbook Pro 13: Price

The new 13-inch MacBook Pro with M2 is now available for pre-order on Apple's website and at select retailers including Best Buy. It will arrive at retailers worldwide and customers who ordered online on June 24. The base model with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage starts at $1,299. Basically, adding RAM (up to 24GB) or storage (up to 2TB) will cost an additional $200 per tier up. Some configuration examples:

·       $1,299 for the base model with 8GB of RAM and 256B of storage

·       $1,499 for 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage

·       $1,499 for 8GB of RAM and 512GB of storage

·       $1,699 for 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage

·       $1,899 for 24GB of RAM and 512GB of storage

·       $2,499 for a fully loaded model with 24GB of RAM and 2TB of storage

 

FYI, the base model 2021 14-inch MacBook Pro with the more powerful M1 Pro chip starts at $1,999 for 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. The base model 2021 16-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Max starts at $3,499 with 32GB of RAM and 1TB of storage.

When it comes to colors, this MacBook Pro doesn't have the fun color options of the MacBook Air - it's only available in space gray or silver.

Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch (2022): Specs

Macbook Pro 13 Inch Case
Weight	1.4 kg (3.09 lbs)
Dimensions	304.1 x 212.4 x 15.6 mm 11.97 x 8.36 x 0.61 inches
Area	646 cm2 (100.1 inches2)
Screen-to-body ratio	~79.4%
Side bezels	8.8 mm
Colors	Silver, Gray
Transformer	No
Cooling solution
Cooling system	Active
Number of fans	1
Noise level	49 dB
Macbook Pro 13 Screen
Display	2560 x 1600
Size	13.3 inches
Type	IPS LCD
Refresh rate	60 Hz
PPI	227 ppi
Aspect ratio	16:10
Resolution	2560 x 1600 pixels
HDR support	Yes, HDR10
Touchscreen	No
Coating	Glossy (Antireflective)
Display tests
Contrast	1658:1
sRGB color space	100%
Adobe RGB profile	87.9%
DCI-P3 color gamut	98.8%
Response time	35 ms
Max. brightness	500 nits
Macbook Pro 13 Battery
Capacity	58.2 Wh
Full charging time	2:30 hr
Battery type	Li-Po
Replaceable	No
Fast charging	Yes
USB Power Delivery	Yes
Charging port position	Left
Charge power	67 W
Weigh of AC adapter	274 grams
Macbook Pro 13 CPU
CPU name	Apple M2
Base frequency	3.5 GHz
Cores	8 (4P + 4E)
Threads	8
Integrated GPU	Apple M2 GPU
Fabrication process	5 nm
Macbook Pro 13 Graphics Card
GPU name	Apple M2 GPU (8-core)
TGP	15 W
Type	Integrated
Fabrication process	5 nm
GPU base clock	500 MHz
GPU boost clock	1456 MHz
FLOPS	3 TFLOPS
Memory size	System Shared
Memory type	LPDDR5
Memory bus	128 bit
Memory speed	5.2 Gbps
Shading units (cores)	1024
Texture mapping units (TMUs)	64
Raster operations pipelines (ROPs)	32
GPU performance	3 TFLOPS
Macbook Pro 13 RAM
RAM size	8GB 16GB 24GB
Clock	5200 MHz
Type	LPDDR5
Upgradable	No
Storage
Storage Size	256GB 512GB 1024GB 2048GB
Bus	Custom
Storage type	SSD (M2)
Channels	1x256 GB
Upgradable	No
Macbook Pro 13 Sound
Speakers	2.0
Dolby Atmos	Yes
Loudness	81.9 dB
Microphones	3
Macbook Pro 13 Connectivity
Wi-Fi standard	v6
Bluetooth	v5
Fingerprint	Yes
Optical drive	No
Webcam	Above the display
Webcam resolution	1280 x 720
Macbook Pro 13 Ports
USB-A	No
USB Type-C	2x USB 4.0
Thunderbolt	Thunderbolt 3
HDMI	No
DisplayPort	No
VGA	No
Audio jack (3.5 mm)	Yes
Ethernet (RJ45)	No
SD card reader	No
Proprietary charging port	No
Input
Macbook Pro 13 Keyboard
Keyboard type	Island
Numpad	No
Backlight	Yes
Macbook Pro 13 Touchpad
Surface	Glass
Windows Precision	No

MACBOOK PRO 13 DESIGN & HARDWARE

·       It shares the exact same design as the 2020 13-inch MacBook Pro, making it feel out of place compared to Apple's other recent MacBooks.

·       Lack of ports

·       Excellent trackpad and keyboard as usual

In the laptop review space, the term "spec bump" is often used to refer to new machines that look practically the same as previous models, just with a newer processor. This new 2022 edition of the 13-inch MacBook Pro is also special – it looks and feels exactly the same as the last two 2020 13-inch models.

So if you've never seen this ubiquitous MacBook in airports and coffee shops, you're probably very familiar with the design and aesthetics of this new machine: a solid aluminum case with a sturdy hinge that can be opened with one hand; relatively thick frames that measure about an inch at the top and bottom; an LED display strip above the keyboard (which Apple calls the Touch Bar); and a power button that doubles as a fingerprint reader.

The machine weighs three pounds and measures about 0.6 inches (15.24 mm) thick, making it portable enough to carry in a bag. The 13.9-inch iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard weighs about the same, and my 16-inch M1 Max MacBook Pro feels significantly heavier. Of course, the M2 MacBook Air is slightly lighter and thinner at 2.7 pounds and 0.44 inches (11.17 mm) thick, but that difference is negligible when it's inside a backpack.

MACBOOK PRO 13 Display

The 13.3-inch 2560 x 1600 LCD display is the exact same panel as the last few 13-inch MacBook Pros, so it's an absolutely great panel to work on and I'm sure most average consumers won't have any issues with it.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro's LCD display isn't bad per se, it's just not as good as the MacBook Air's Mini LED screen.

But there's no arguing that, technically, it's behind not only many high-end Windows machines, but also the display of all the other latest MacBook models. The 2022 13-inch MacBook Pro's display bezels are thicker, the refresh rate is just 60 Hz, and its LCD panel can't pump out the same deep blacks as the Mini LED displays used in other MacBooks. Color contrast is better on the Mini LED displays of the 2021 14- or 16-inch MacBook Pro.

I haven't seen the new MacBook Air in person, but it uses the same Mini LED display technology as the 2021 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros, so the Air's screen will likely be similarly superior to the 13-inch MacBook Pro's LCD display. .

Let me be clear: this new MacBook Pro display isn't bad per se, it's just not as good as the screens on other recent MacBooks.

MACBOOK PRO 13 Keyboard and trackpad

Making a quality laptop keyboard, in my opinion, is not difficult.I can hit my top typing speed of 103 wpm on virtually any normal sized Windows PC, even a $400 laptop from a small Chinese brand like Chuwi. The only time keyboards are bad is because of space limitations on mininotebooks or when a company is trying to be cute with the engineering (like Apple's butterfly keyboard experiment). So I have nothing to complain about the keyboard here. The keys are evenly spaced, have enough key travel, and I can hammer out words at my maximum speed.

Where I want to wax poetic is the trackpad: I can't say I'm an expert on Windows laptops, but I've used several new models from Huawei, Dell, and Samsung over the past few years, and I've found the Apple trackpad to be more accurate and less prone to random click than all these Windows machines. Apple's trackpads are simply amazing - and this one is no different.

I don't mind the Touch Bar either. I know I'm in the minority here, as most of my media colleagues have cheered for the return of the traditional row of function keys in newer MacBook designs, but I kind of like the contextual nature of the Touch Bar, which lets me scroll through videos when watching YouTube or quickly switching between tabs in Safari (and even display a small preview of the site on the Touch Bar).

MACBOOK PRO 13 Ports

That's my biggest gripe with this new MacBook Pro: there are only three ports: two Thunderbolt USB-C ports and a headphone jack. And since this machine doesn't have MagSafe charging, charging can only be done via USB-C, so you really only have one free port when the machine is plugged in.

The 13-inch Intel-powered machine for 2020 had the option to go with four USB-C ports, and last year's 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros offered three USB-C ports with an HDMI port and an SD card slot. The move back to just two USB-C ports guarantees a return to the Dongle Life, a life I happily left behind when I upgraded to a 16-inch Max MacBook Pro last year.

MACBOOK PRO 13 Webcam

The 720p webcam from earlier MacBook Pro models is returning in this 13-inch edition. In my opinion, it's perfectly fine for business video calls, but video and photos are clearly not as sharp as the 1080p cameras used in the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro and MacBook Air. To be honest, I don't really care, but maybe those who make FaceTime or Zoom calls all the time do.

Apple MacBook Pro 13 Performance, benchmarks & battery life

Whether using battery power or an electrical outlet, M2 silicon performance is reliable and effective. A ventilator is rarely needed.

Well, the only reason this 2022 update needs to exist is because of the M2, Apple's second-generation silicon with an 8-core CPU and 10-core GPU, with an 18% faster CPU and according to Apple, the M1's GPU is 35% quicker. The comparative figures support these claims.

2022 MacBook Pro 13 with M2 and 16GB RAM benchmark apps With M1 and 8GB of Memory, the 2020 MacBook Pro 13 2021 MacBook Pro 14 with 16GB RAM and M1 Pro

3DMark: Wild Life Extreme 6,279 4,993 9,202

Cinebench R23 1,573/8,704 1,499/7,699 1,530/9,532

Geekbench 5 1,902/8,964 1,742/7,693 1,755/9,954

CrossMark overall 1.495 1.333 1.510

CrossMark Productivity 1,376 1,252 1,327

CrossMark Creativity 1,837 1,594 1,938

CrossMark response time 1,036,939 1,052

From the numbers above, we can see that the M2 is a step up from the M1, but not as powerful as the M1 Pro. In fact, Apple's marketing team was keen to mention to reviewers that the M2 is intended as a successor to the M1, not against the M1 Pro or M1 Max, as those chips are increasingly capable as they have more cores.

I also tried exporting a four-minute 8K video using Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere Pro, and DaVinci Resolve to the M2 MacBook Pro, and here's how it compares to other machines.

Note: Rich Woods, one of my colleagues, conducted some tests. "n/a" either means that the software was not available for testing, or we did not have time to test it.

4-minute 8K/30 video export test 2022 MacBook Pro 13 with M2, 16GB RAM 2020 MacBook Pro 13 with M1, 8GB RAM 2021 MacBook Pro 14 with M1 Pro, 16GB RAM 2021 MacBook Pro 16 with M1 Max, 64GB MacBook RAM 20123 with 10th Gen Intel i7, 32 GB RAM 2022 Huawei MateBook X Pro with 11th Gen Intel i7, 16 GB RAM

Final Cut Pro 2:52 n/a n/a 1:31 16:24 n/a

Adobe Premiere Pro 32:17 1:02:38 32:22 22:04 50:12 53:24

DaVinci Resolve (Export as 4K file) 3:56 6:21 2:27 2:18 - not available 22:17

 

We can see that Apple's silicon is absolutely optimized for Final Cut Pro, as export times were much faster than with non-optimized software like Adobe Premiere Pro. With Adobe Premiere, the M2 rendered twice as quickly as the M1, but the M1 Pro and M1 Max were still quicker. I've thrown in the older Intel machines (1st and 11th gen) just as a point of reference, I'm fully aware that they're not Intel's most powerful offerings.

High-end Intel and AMD machines can perform as well or better, but what sets the Apple M chip apart is its efficiency

The thing is, what makes Apple's silicon special isn't necessarily raw power—high-end Intel and AMD machines can do better—instead, what sets Apple's M chip apart is its efficiency. I actually ran these tests twice – once with the MacBook Pro plugged in, the second time on battery power. Moreover, the outcomes were frequently fairly similar. Regardless of whether the M2 notebook was plugged in or not, there is no noticeable drop in CPU or GPU performance. This cannot be said for Intel or AMD processors. For example, the Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 7 Pro with an AMD Ryzen 5000 processor saw its benchmark score drop by a third when not connected to power. Intel processors don't drop quite as badly - but they still do. The efficiency of the M2 is huge for digital nomads who can work in coffee shops or on a lounger by the beach.

Another feature of the M2 MacBook Pro that caught my attention was that while having an active cooling system with a fan, it seldom ever used the fan. It didn't jump during Geekbench or CrossMark, nor when I render 4K videos under five minutes. It wasn't until I ran the 8K video export test and the later parts of 3D Mark's Wild Life Extreme test that I really heard the fan whirring.

Note that the MacBook Air 2022 has basically the same performance as this MacBook Pro 2022, with the only difference being the fan, which theoretically allows the Pro to maintain peak performance for longer. But does it matter if the fan isn't utilised too often? I haven't had a chance to test the M2 MacBook Air yet, but I think that aside from rendering 8K videos or heavy graphics work, the performance of the Air and Pro should be about the same. You certainly won't feel it if you only use these laptops to write WordPress articles or send emails.

MACBOOK PRO 13 Battery life

Apple advertises "up to 20 hours of battery life" on a single charge of the 58.2 watt-hour battery, but I wasn't able to achieve the same results. For typical productivity use like Safari open with half a dozen tabs, Slack running in the background, and Spotify streaming, this 13-inch MacBook Pro drains the battery by 8% per hour, which I calculate is enough for a bit more. than 12 hours of continuous use. When I pushed the machine, like when I ran the 8K video rendering test, the 33-minute export process drained about 30% of the battery. So if you're not actively editing videos, the M2 Macbook Pro should last a full working day on a single charge. That's definitely better battery life than most Windows laptops I've tested.

Other miscellaneous thoughts about MACBOOK PRO 13

One of the weaknesses of the M1 silicon was that it could only support one external display, and unfortunately the same weakness is present in this M2 machine. It's not a big deal for me, but I have colleagues who are quite upset by this limitation. Also, while the stereo speakers here are pretty good, the M2 MacBook Air has a four-speaker system that should, in theory, be better. Remember that the MacBook Air is cheaper than this machine.

Apple MacBook Pro 13 Software

Ships with macOS Monterey, but macOS Ventura will be available in a few months

The MacBook Pro comes with macOS Monterey out of the box and behaves as you would expect. Apple's computer operating system is polished and easy to use, and if you own other Apple products like an iPhone or iPad, the synergy between those computers makes the experience very enjoyable. For example, I like that if I've previously logged into a Wi-Fi network with my iPhone, the MacBook will automatically connect as well. I'm also a big fan of recording voice memos on my Apple Watch and accessing a file on my MacBook in seconds.

The gap between iOS and iPadOS will be further closed by macOS Ventura. It's an exciting time to be in the Apple ecosystem right now

Now that Apple computers have mostly switched to Apple silicon, macOS can further improve synergy with iOS and iPadOS. The next update (macOS Ventura) will actually close the gap between these operating systems. For example, you can seamlessly move a FaceTime call from an iPhone to a MacBook. Applications can be transferred much more easily than before because Apple's M and A chips share a similar architecture. It's an exciting time to be in the Apple ecosystem right now, and I say that as someone who isn't fully into it because I still prefer using Android phones. But Apple does a good job luring me to the dark side.

Should you buy a MacBook Pro 13?

You should buy it if:

You want a versatile Apple laptop with enough power for creative tasks like video and photo editing, but you either can't or refuse to pay $2,000 for a 14-inch MacBook Pro

Apple's Touch Bar is something you truly enjoy and don't want to go without.

You should not buy this if:

You do not do any video editing or graphics intensive work. If you only use a laptop for email, NetFlix, Excel and Google Docs - get an M2 MacBook Air or even an M1 MacBook Pro instead

If you can afford to pay $2,000, the 14-inch MacBook Pro is simply the better choice

The 2022 13-inch MacBook Pro is a very good laptop in a vacuum, but as I said above, it's in a strange and difficult place. I think most average consumers who don't need to do intensive creative tasks will rather buy a MacBook Air because it's $100 cheaper, has a newer design with a better display/speakers, and still delivers the same performance as the Pro, the vast majority of the time (for this group average users).

If you're a heavy user and don't mind paying a bit more for a work machine – say you're a YouTuber who makes videos for a living – you should probably get a 14-inch or 16-inch MacBook Pro instead, as the M1 Pro and M1 Max are still clearly excellent. It's not like the 14-inch Pro is that much bulkier or more expensive than the 13-inch MacBook Pro! There's only a $300 difference between the 16GB/512GB configuration of this 13-inch MacBook Pro and the 16GB/512GB 14-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Pro.

So this particular M2 13-inch MacBook Pro really only suits one group: people who do heavier workloads but either can't afford or don't want to pay the $2,000 starting price for a 14-inch MacBook Pro. We're talking about someone who regularly creates videos or graphics, but wants to keep their work machine budget under $1,500. It's a small group, but I assume it still exists. Or for those of us who still really want to stick with the Touchbar.

The good news for Apple is that everybody who is unhappy with the 2022 MacBook Pro is also disappointed with the MacBook Air. So ultimately, consumer dollars still go to Apple through the illusion of choice.