The MacBook Neo Is Actually (Somewhat) Repairable

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MacBook used to be largely repairable, upgradable things. If too many tabs slowed down macOS, you could add more RAM; if you ran out of storage, you could install a larger hard drive; if the battery was old, you could easily replace it. But as Apple—and the industry at large—chased thinner and sleeker designs, laptops in general became harder to work on. Companies started soldering all components together onto the board, which made it possible to produce thin and light machines, but made it impossible to upgrade them, and wildly impractical to repair.

This hasn't changed all that much in the Apple silicon era. While Apple's modern MacBooks have some serious staying power and offer a lot of value for the money, they aren't easy to fix. Far from it, actually. Take the M5 MacBook Pro: When iFixit took a look at this laptop, they found that Apple requires you to remove all of the components from the MacBook just to replace the battery—at least, following Apple's official instructions.

The MacBook Neo is Apple's most repairable laptop in years

But there is hope for those of us that want Apple to make their devices more repairable, from a product I wouldn't have expected Apple to make all that repairable in the first place: the MacBook Neo. Apple's new, budget-friendly MacBook has been all the rage over the past week and a half, largely, in part, due to its starting price of $599 ($499 with an education discount). While that MSRP makes the Neo a great choice for students, parents, and, really, anyone who wants an affordable Mac, I imagined it would also make it more of a consumable product. Would Apple really put all that much effort into making a $500 MacBook last that long?

As it turns out, they kind of did. In addition to using more premium parts than other products in this price range (i.e. aluminum vs. plastic), the MacBook Neo simplifies the repair process and makes it easier to replace key components. Ars Technica dug into the Neo's documentation, and found that repairs for most components have fewer steps and use fewer tools than the M5 MacBook Air. That will be good news for anyone who keeps their MacBook Neo for a few years, and deals with an aging battery: When it comes time to replace that battery, you'll simply need to remove screws, clips, and flex cables. That might sound a bit complicated, but it's far simpler than other MacBooks, which deal with batteries that are glued down with adhesive. On these models, you need to pull on finicky tabs to break that adhesive, after removing even more screws.

YouTube channel TECH RE-NU came to similar conclusions in their "speedrun" teardown. They were able to disassemble the Neo in less than 10 minutes, "which is absolutely amazing for an Apple laptop." They praised the lack of adhesives and sticky tape, and the inclusion of modular parts (including modular USB-C ports, speakers, and headphone jack) all while keeping the price down:

Another key point? The keyboard is replaceable by itself. For years, if something was wrong with your MacBook's keyboard, Apple made you replace the entire "Top Case," or the top half of the bottom of your laptop. That also includes the battery, making this an unnecessarily expensive fix. Now, the keyboard and Top Case are separate repair parts. You'll have to deal with a number of screws to get to the keyboard, but that's much simpler (and cheaper) than replacing a significant fraction of the MacBook itself.

Now, the Neo still isn't upgradable. It infamously comes with only 8GB of RAM, and it'll run that 8GB of RAM until the day you part with it. You're also stuck with the storage size you choose at the time of purchase, so if you think you'll want more than 256GB, you'll want to opt for the 512GB model (which, conveniently, comes with Touch ID in the keyboard). If you run out of space on yours, you'll need to pick up an external drive to keep saving files locally.

Why is the MacBook Neo Apple's most repairable Mac?

So, why is the MacBook Neo, Apple's cheapest MacBook ever, also its most repairable? Apple doesn’t say, but seeing as the MacBook Neo is targeted towards students—especially younger students—it’d make sense to make these things easier and cheaper to fix. If parents and schools start buying the MacBook Neo for elementary-aged students, these things are going to be subject to drops, spills, and other rough use. To make them unrepairable would get expensive fast, and may dissuade parents and schools alike from investing in them further over something like Chromebooks.

If that's true, this is only a net benefit for consumers in general. Anyone who buys a MacBook Neo gets the advantage of a machine that isn't too costly to repair when it comes time. And while the A18 Pro may start to show its age sooner than a brand-new M5 chip, this policy could stretch your time with your MacBook Neo even longer.