The first MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR display reviews are out ahead of the November 6 release, and critics praise the tandem OLED screen, with several calling it the best they have used on a laptop. Most of them treat touch as a bonus, and the $2,899 starting price draws the most complaints.
All six reviews bring up the price, since the 14-inch model costs $900 more than the standard 14-inch MacBook Pro and the 16-inch model costs $400 more. Battery life results range from about 8 hours to more than 24 hours, depending on the test each outlet ran, and eight YouTube reviewers who posted on November 5 agree on the display and the lighter body but split on touch.
MacBook Pro With PROLED XDR Display Reviews Start With Engadget’s 8.8 out of 10
Engadget’s Devindra Hardawar calls it a meaningful redesign with a lighter body and a better OLED screen at a steep price. He praises the true blacks, but says the difference from the previous mini-LED models is hard to notice in everyday use. His 14-inch unit with an M5 Pro and 48GB of memory scored 4,217 in Geekbench 6 single-core, and he says the six speakers are among the best in any laptop.
The 14-inch model lasted about 12 hours and 30 minutes in his mixed workflow, and the 16-inch lasted 10 hours and 15 minutes in a coding simulation, well short of the up to 24 hours Apple claims for video streaming. He says touch is not a game changer, since it is treated as mouse clicks with no tablet mode and games such as Angry Birds Reloaded have occasional glitches under a finger.
Apple sells the 14-inch model with an M5 Pro for $2,899 and the 16-inch for $3,399, and the M5 Max versions start at $4,499 and $4,799. Hardawar recommends the 16-inch over the 14-inch because its premium over the standard model is smaller.
Tom’s Guide Gives the MacBook Pro Its Editor’s Choice Award
Tom’s Guide measured 4,323 in Geekbench 6 single-core and 29,219 multi-core on the 14-inch, against 2,839 and 16,975 for the Dell XPS 16. Tony Polanco says the tandem OLED panel is the best display he has used on a MacBook, and the lab measured 1,980 nits of HDR brightness on the 14-inch and 1,949 nits on the 16-inch.
He calls it the most responsive touchscreen laptop he has used, says tapping and pinch-to-zoom feel as smooth as an iPad Pro, and says he used touch more than he expected. He also likes how the Dynamic Island expands during music and video playback.
The web browsing test ran 16 hours and 56 minutes on the 14-inch and 21 hours and 24 minutes on the 16-inch M5 Max, slightly longer than the previous 16-inch M5 Pro at 21 hours and 10 minutes. Polanco says performance is about the same as the March 2026 MacBook Pro models, and that the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 starts at $1,999.
TechRadar Scores the 16-Inch Model 4.5 out of 5
TechRadar’s Matt Hanson tested a 16-inch M5 Max with 128GB of memory and 2TB of storage that costs $7,399. The review unit scored 3,766 in Geekbench 7 single-core and 35,679 multi-core, and a looped 1080p video test at 50 percent brightness lasted 24 hours and 21 minutes.
He praises the color accuracy out of the box and says the screen at 50 percent brightness looked brighter than the previous Liquid Retina XDR mini-LED model at full brightness. He says the touchscreen features feel undercooked, with no Apple Pencil support and a hinge that keeps the screen from lying flat.
Hanson rates performance and battery life 5 out of 5 and value 3 out of 5. He recommends the model to creative professionals who need the screen and the power, and tells everyone else to consider the MacBook Air or the standard MacBook Pro.
Gizmodo Calls the Screen the Best It Has Used on a Laptop
Gizmodo’s Kyle Barr gave it a 4.5 and called the screen the best he has used on a laptop, though he says the gap shows most in side-by-side photo comparisons and less in video. Touch is useful for quick photo crops and for tiling windows with a flick, but he says it is not essential.
His favorite change is the Dynamic Island, and his writing and streaming test lasted about 8 hours. The M5 Max scored about 35 percent higher than the Surface Laptop Ultra in Geekbench 7 multi-core and about 28 percent higher in Cinebench 2026.
A 92GB Qwen model wrote a Python script in about 2 minutes and 20 seconds on the MacBook Pro, against more than 4 minutes on the Surface. He says the fans are loud under heavy load.
Tom’s Hardware Awards Editor’s Choice but Faults the Missing Face ID
Tom’s Hardware gave its Editor’s Choice award, and Andrew E. Freedman measured 542.6 nits of SDR brightness, 1,964 nits in a 40 percent HDR test and 83.6 percent DCI-P3 coverage. A HandBrake transcode took 1 minute and 43 seconds, the fastest in the group.
He likes touch in iPad apps and in Blender, but says it gets tiring over long sessions, and that the hinge wobbles and does not lie flat. The Dynamic Island is more useful than the notch, but he faults the missing Face ID, since the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display unlocks with Touch ID.
The 16-inch M5 Max lasted 15 hours and 57 minutes, ahead of the Dell XPS 16 at 13 hours and 3 minutes but behind the 14-inch mini-LED M5 Max at just under 18 hours. He also faults the keyboard temperature of 106.6°F under load and the soldered memory and storage.
Stuff Says Touch Is a Nice Option, Not a Reason to Buy
Stuff’s Dan Grabham says touch works well for flicking through photos and zooming but is not a natural fit on a vertical screen, and that the lid flexes too much to make it pleasant. He calls the Dynamic Island a nice addition because it frees up room for menu bar icons, and the tandem OLED screen super bright.
His 16-inch M5 Max is rated for 22 hours, and he estimates 18 hours of real use. He also faults the missing Face ID.
Grabham says few buyers will need the power and that most should choose the standard MacBook Pro, because the premium for the tandem OLED screen is large.
Tom’s Guide Video Says Buy It for the Display, Not for Touch
Paul Antill of Tom’s Guide calls it the best laptop display he has tested and says the OLED panel and the lower weight, not touch, are the reasons to pay $400 more. Touch was more intuitive than he expected, but he still prefers the trackpad for timeline editing. The 16-inch model lasted about 21.5 hours in the Tom’s Guide battery test, within a minute of the non-OLED M5 Max model.
ShortCircuit Lab Tests Show 99 Percent Adobe RGB Coverage
ShortCircuit’s lab measured about 99 percent coverage of sRGB, P3 and Adobe RGB, and 80.6 percent of BT.2020 in HDR against about 72 percent for the previous mini-LED display. HDR color error averaged 1.44 against 5.24 on the mini-LED model, while the sRGB color error of 0.39 was slightly worse than the 0.24 on the older display.
The hosts say macOS spaces menus out more when you tap than when you click, the stronger hinge still visibly bounces, and the extra bass is immediately noticeable next to the old MacBook Pro. They conclude Apple has delivered possibly the best display on any laptop.
Stephen Robles Calls Touch Impressive but Notes Quirks
Stephen Robles spent 12 hours with a 14-inch model and says the touchscreen is impressive, with no mis-taps in the menu bar or Control Center. To select several files in Finder you have to hold your finger on the screen before dragging, and the Dynamic Island cannot be moved while music plays.
Pinch-to-zoom did not work in the Final Cut preview. He says the lighter body could make the MacBook Pro his travel computer instead of a MacBook Air.
iJustine Finds the Price Gap Is $400 on the Same Specs
iJustine configured a regular MacBook Pro and a MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR display with the same specs and found the PROLED model costs $10,549 against $10,149. She mostly stayed on the keyboard and trackpad while editing, and used touch for quick scrolls and for dragging the Final Cut playhead.
After a day of use the fingerprints were manageable with a polishing cloth, and the 16-inch model felt significantly lighter than the M5 MacBook Pro.
Tim Pan Would Buy It but Turn Touch Off
Tim Pan says touch is only useful for developers testing iPhone and iPad apps, and that he would buy the MacBook Pro and switch touch off. In his 30-minute stress test, the new model with an M5 Max peaked at 118°F, more than 15°F cooler than the previous M5 Max model at 133.5°F.
After two hours of video playback the OLED model had 92 percent of its battery left while the mini-LED model had 78 percent. He says the new hinge is sturdier but still wobbles near the top of the screen.
HTX Studio Calls Touch a Free Extra and Warns About PWM Dimming
HTX Studio says touch is awkward because the screen wobbles, your arm tires and fingerprints show, and calls it a free extra you can take or leave. It measured about 600 nits full-screen and 2,100 nits in an HDR window covering 40 percent of the screen, and says the bigger gain over the old screen is the absence of halos around bright highlights.
The OLED uses 240Hz PWM dimming at every brightness level, which some people find tiring to look at. Under a full CPU and GPU load, the new and old models both reached 49°C on the surface.
Dave2D Says Touch Is the Least Important Part
Dave2D says macOS still feels like a mouse and trackpad system, touch works best for casual scrolling and pinch-to-zoom, and tapping small interface elements is awkward because enlarged buttons need two taps. He found the OLED screen fast with no ghosting or blooming, and performance identical to the thicker model.
He calls it super expensive but a good laptop, and says he would choose a non-touch version over this one even if it were only $50 cheaper.
Christopher Lawley Finds Touch Natural but Notices Heat
Christopher Lawley used a review unit from Apple for about four days and says touch felt natural, with testing iPhone apps in the simulator as the standout workflow. He says the wobble is not a big deal and the fingerprints were not bad, and that you can turn touch off in Accessibility.
His one yellow flag is heat, since heavy workloads made the fans spin up and the vents blew warm air toward his lap. He calls the $2,900 starting price the dark rain cloud over an otherwise perfect machine.
