Which MacBook to Buy in 2026? Neo Vs Air Vs Pro

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:01]And the audio has been synced up. Hey guys, Hersh here and welcome back to the channel. In front of me, I have three laptops and these three laptops represent the MacBook lineup in 2026.

[00:00:11]So, Apple has done a very good job in terms of segregating their lineup and now one can buy a MacBook across price ranges depending on the use case. It starts with the MacBook Neo, then we have the MacBook Air, and finally the MacBook Pro. I've had the privilege of using all these laptops. And today in this video, let's try to figure out which one is right for you. It's going to be an interesting one. So, sit back with the beverage of your choice, relax, and have fun.

[00:00:39]Now, before I get to the actual differences, I want to say that these laptops are very similar in a lot of aspects. They differ a lot as well, but they're also very similar in terms of the feeling. Like, all of these laptops feel very premium and wellb built.

[00:00:53]There's kind of a trend here. MacBook Neo has the basic stuff like the bare minimum stuff then the MacBook Air slightly improves that stuff and the MacBook Pro takes it to the absolute limit you know for professionals or pros that is a theme you will see across features and I want to start the conversation by talking about design and build quality now first of all let's compare the thickness of these laptops I'm going to stack them and then kind of rotate them to show you the thickness so as you can see MacBook Air and MacBook Neo are similar in terms of thickness but the MacBook Pro is way thicker as compared to these two laptops and that is for a couple of reasons. First up, it is the only laptop between these three which has active cooling which means it has a fan inside. The Neo and Air do not have a fan inside and the MacBook Pro also has a bigger battery. And with that, there are a couple of thing that I would like to mention. Let me quickly arrange these laptops again. All right, first thing is weight. MacBook Neo and MacBook Air are very similar in terms of weight around 1.2 kg. But the MacBook Pro is 1.5 kg. So it is significantly heavier as compared to the Air and Neo.

[00:01:53]And while carrying these laptop inside a backpack, that does make a difference.

[00:01:56]So whenever I carry a MacBook Pro, my backpack is heavier and I do feel that.

[00:02:00]So clearly these two are more lightweight and portable. And if I talk about the build quality, all of them are similar in terms of build quality. Metal unibody which feels premium and industrially. No complaints there. Just one thing left that is color options.

[00:02:12]And I would definitely prefer the color options of the MacBook Neo because they're more fun. MacBook Air and MacBook Pro have very basic color options because you know professionals are using these laptops. The MacBook Neo is mainly used by students that's why the fun colors. Anyway, let's get to the second point that is screen size. For that, I'll just open up these laptops.

[00:02:28]We start with the MacBook Neo. This laptop only comes in one screen size that is 13-in. It does not have a bigger variant, but the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro do have two size options, 13-in and 15-in on the MacBook Air and 14in and 16in on the MacBook Pro. So if you're someone who prefers a bigger laptop, then you are left with only these two options. The Neo does not have a bigger laptop option. And if I talk about the displays themselves, that's where that theme that I talked about earlier will come into play. Let me quickly, you know, keep them down and then I will talk about the displays. MacBook Neo has a liquid retina display with a peak brightness of 500 nits and it is clocked at 60 Hz. A good quality glossy display for the price. In fact, in its price range, it has one of the best displays out there. There's one thing that most laptops in this price range are at 90 Hz. This is still at 60 Hz. That is kind of okay. I really like the display on the MacBook Neo. It is bright and color accurate. It supports the sRGB color space. So, yeah, good display. Now, what about the MacBook Air? Now, this laptop has a slightly better display as compared to the MacBook Neo. It is the same liquid retina panel with 500 nits of peak brightness and it is still at 60 Hz. So, where is it better? It's a bit bigger and different in terms of technology. Now the display on the MacBook Air actually supports the P3 color space which is better as compared to sRGB. So more color accurate and then it also has something called as true tone wherein the display adapts its colors based on the environment it is in. Essentially the display on the air is a bit better as compared to the MacBook Neo. But then the display on the MacBook Pro takes it to a whole new level. Here we have a liquid retina XDR display. It's a mini LED panel with a peak brightness of 1,600 nits in HDR mode. And then the cherry on the cake is 120 Hz prootion. This is one of the best displays in any laptop that I have ever used. Bright, color accurate, and so fun to use. Video editing is awesome.

[00:04:13]Watching content is awesome. And it also comes in a nano texture option, which is the one that I have over here.

[00:04:18]Nanoexture option is not there on the Air or Neo. So, if display is high priority and you want the best display in a MacBook ecosystem, then the MacBook Pro is the one to go for. Hands down, it has the best display out of the three.

[00:04:29]All that is great, but what about performance? And again, this is where the theme is going to continue. See, Apple made a huge shift in terms of performance when they shifted to Apple silicon. It started with the M1 and kind of changed the industry and that gave them confidence for the MacBook Neo. The MacBook Neo has an A18 Pro chipset, which is an iPhone chipset, but still it performs very good in the MacBook Neo.

[00:04:51]And then the MacBook Air has the latest M5 chipset and MacBook Pro has a lot of options. It starts with M5, then M5 Pro or M5 Max. But let me tell you in very simple language which one performs how.

[00:05:00]Depending on the use case which laptop should you go for? Starting with the MacBook Neo. This laptop is meant for people who do very basic task. Web browsing, presentations, documents, YouTube videos, maybe some light video editing here and there. For people who belong in that bucket, MacBook Neo is more than enough. And then if you want a little bit more performance, you can go with the MacBook Air because now it has an M5 chipset which is way better as compared to an A18 Pro. It is a prolevel chipset. With the MacBook Air, you can do all those basic tasks and then do some professional workflows as well like 4K video editing or developing a software or using AI models locally. You can do that on the MacBook Air. And for most people out there, MacBook Air is going to be sufficient because it sits right in the middle. It gives a very good performance. But then if you are a professional and you need more out of your laptop, then you can go with the MacBook Pro. to people who do heavy video editing like you know 4K 8K videos or editing movies or animation work 3D modeling developing heavy softwares and stuff like that for them the MacBook Pro makes a lot of sense because it has three options in terms of processors M5, M5 Pro and M5 Max. I think this makes it very clear which laptop belongs to which type of use case. Now I want to touch on unified memory and storage as well. The MacBook Neo only has 8 GB of unified memory. It's a chipset level limitation.

[00:06:13]It cannot be upgraded even if you want to upgrade while buying the laptop. So, it is stuck at 8 GB unified memory. And storage options are 256GB or 512GB. If you want more than that in terms of unified memory or storage, you'll have to go with the MacBook Air. It starts at 16 GB unified memory and 512GB SSD and goes all the way up to 4TB. And same thing with the MacBook Pro. It starts at 16 GB unified memory and has a lot of storage options. If you have any questions about performance or use case, let me know in the comments below. Which gets me to ports, and this is where things get interesting. So as you can see on this side, these three laptops are similar in terms of ports. It may look like that, but the reality is quite different. We start with the MacBook Neo. It has only two ports, two USBC ports. One is USB 2 and the other is USB 3. Both of them can be used for charging or connecting external media. But if you want to connect an external display, that's where the USB 3 port will come into play. Very basic ports, you will have to use a dongle with the MacBook Neo. Then we have the MacBook Air. And this is where things get interesting because it is better in terms of ports.

[00:07:14]So it has two USB ports but now these two ports are Thunderbolt 4 which means way better bandwidth. You can connect external displays, high-speed SSDs or whatever you want on the Thunderbolt 4 port. Very useful. And it also has a Mac safe charging port. So if you want to use the two USBC Thunderbolt 4 ports, they are free. So while charging the laptop, you can use these two ports. A good move by Apple. That is great. Then we come to the MacBook Pro and this is where as I said the ports are pushed to their limits. MacBook Pro has two Thunderbolt ports on this side and these are Thunderbolt 4 or Thunderbolt 5 based on the laptop you go for. I have the M5 chipset here which has Thunderbolt 4 ports. But if you go for M5 Pro and M5 Max, you will get Thunderbolt 5 which is the latest version. But anyway, two Thunderbolt ports. Then again the same Maxive charging port, a headphone jack and on this side there are more ports.

[00:08:00]It starts with an SD card slot. Now I am a content creator and for me that SD card slot is absolutely important because all my cameras and recorders use SD cards. Very important. And then right beside that is one more Thunderbolt 4 port. So in total there are three Thunderbolt ports. And finally there is an HDMI slot as well. This again is very important to quickly connect this laptop to an external monitor, TV, projector, whatever. Most of the external displays out there use HDMI and that's why this port is important. So again I'm going to remind you of the theme. bare minimum on the MacBook Neo, a little bit better on the MacBook Air, and then, you know, for absolute pros on the MacBook Pro. By the way, all of these laptops have the headphone jack, which is good and appreciated. And while I'm on the topic of audio, there is a big difference in terms of speakers as well. MacBook Neo has a two speaker system and it is sidefiring. Good speakers for the price.

[00:08:48]The MacBook Air has better speakers. It is now a four speakeraker system and again very good for the price. But then the MacBook Pro has a six speakeraker sound system which is absolutely incredible. Like MacBook Pro definitely has one of the best speakers out there.

[00:09:02]It sounds so good and so full, very balanced sound signature with a good amount of bass as well. Anyway, moving on, let's talk about the keyboard and trackpad. Three laptops in front of me which are different in terms of the keyboard and trackpad. Starting with the MacBook Neo, it has a very good keyboard which is fun to type on. The keys are clicky and they have a good amount of travel to them. But it is not backlit which is a very big letdown. I've mentioned this across videos that back lighting on MacBook Neo should have been there because it is a very useful feature and a necessary one. So no backlighting but the keyboard itself is good and then this Touch ID button is exclusive to the higher variant that is a 512GB variant. In the base variant Touch ID is absent. So those are the two things that you need to know about the MacBook Neo keyboard. Now if you move on to the MacBook Air it has a similar keyboard as compared to the MacBook Neo but now it has backlighting which is great. The typing experience is similar, so that is not an issue. And then it also has Touch ID standard across all variants. Great. And the same experience has been carried over to the MacBook Pro as well. Very good quality keyboard which is back lit and also has Touch ID across variants. And below the keyboard, MacBook Pro has this you know black background which looks really classy.

[00:10:05]Like I like the look of this keyboard as compared to MacBook Air and MacBook Neo.

[00:10:09]It looks so classy. Let me know what do you prefer in the comments below. Like which look of the keyboard do you prefer in the comments below. Then we have the trackpad. MacBook Neo has a physical trackpad. So if I click it is physically moving. But MacBook Air and MacBook Pro don't have a physical trackpad. They have something called a force touch trackpad. So it is simulating a click.

[00:10:27]And honestly these two trackpads are much better as compared to MacBook Neo.

[00:10:30]In terms of tracking, all of them are smooth. So if I want to use gestures and anything, all of them are smooth. But that force touch trackpad, you know, just feels better in terms of a click. I hope you get my point. Which gets me to battery life and charging. Before I talk about individual battery life, I want to say that all these laptops are very good in terms of battery life. Like if I charge any of this laptop in the morning, I can comfortably use it for the entire day. I'm talking about heavy use editing videos and still they will last me throughout the entire day with some juice left towards the you know end of the day for next day as well. Very good battery life across these laptops and we have to thank Apple silicon here.

[00:11:04]Apple silicon had a couple of advantages performance and battery life it clearly showcases here. So coming to the actual battery capacity, MacBook Neo has the smallest battery capacity. I think it is a 36.5Wh hour battery. And the MacBook Air has 53.8Wh battery. And finally, the MacBook Pro has 72.4Wh battery. I'm talking about these sizes here. In terms of real life, I do get the best battery life with the MacBook Pro. But with that being said, if I am doing something heavy on the MacBook Pro, like using After Effects, doing animation work, that's where the battery life will drain faster. Essentially, battery life is good on all these laptops. Apple has done a good job in terms of balancing the performance and battery life. Apple knows that MacBook Neo users are not going to push it to its limit like editing 4K videos for four or five hours. That's why the battery capacity is smaller. But with the MacBook Pro, they are going to do that. That's why the battery capacity is bigger and it does give a good experience. So I would say battery life is great on all these laptops. No issues in terms of that. But there is a difference in terms of charging. MacBook Neo has a 20 watt charger provided inside the box and by far has the slowest charging. Then the MacBook Air has 30 watt charging. Again, this is slow as well. It supports up to 70 watt charging, but you'll have to buy that charger separately. MacBook Pro by default comes with a 70W charger, which is very fast. It does support up to 96 watt charging, but again, you'll have to buy that charger separately. But by default, MacBook Pro has the best charging. Now, the final point on my list is the price. MacBook Neo starts at a price of Rs 69,900. MacBook Air starts at a price of rupes 1 lak 19,900 and MacBook Pro starts at a price of Rs 1 lak 89,900.

[00:12:36]Huge price difference between these laptops. Here's my recommendation. For most people out there, the MacBook Air is going to be the choice because it has a very good balance of features. But if you still have any doubts about your use case and which laptop to go for, let me know in the comments and I will definitely help you out. I hope you enjoyed this video and if you did, then let me know about that in the comments below. Hit that like button and subscribe to the channel if you haven't already because that would mean the world to me. My name is Hush Punjabi and I'll see you guys very soon in my next video. Bye-bye.