There will be no MacBook Air upgrade this year as the focus will be on the ultraportable 13-inch MacBooks, which a new report said Apple will issue in two variants - a slightly bigger version of the 12-inch MacBook and a 13-inch MacBook Pro 2016 with OLED display panel. It will be a staggered release date with the first instalment expected soon after the 2016 WWDC this coming June.
According to Ming-chi Kuo of KGI Securities, the overhauled MacBook and MacBook Pro will negate the need for a MacBook Air refresh this 2016. Per Apple Insider, the analyst, noted for his mostly accurate forecasts on upcoming Apple products, said in a new research note that Apple's redesign of the 2016 MacBooks will eventually kill the MacBook Air.
And it seems that Mac fans will not miss the Air as Retina display, which the MBA lacks, will be a standard MacBook feature starting with the 2016 builds. Kuo said that as follow up to the 12-inch 2016 MacBook, a 13-inch version will soon come out that largely reflect the build, design and specification of its smaller sibling.
The KGI note hinted too that with Retina MacBooks soon to be available in two screen sizes that are close replicas of the MacBook Air but with significant enhancements, the latter will be bumped off eventually. Kuo is convinced that production of the MBA will cease but the old models will continue selling as the budget MacBook option.
But what could prove as the more exciting revamp is of the MacBook Pro 2016, which Kuo said are the new Mac generation packed with game-changing features.
"The MacBook line is the brightest spot for Apple's 2016 rollouts. This is particularly true of the two new MacBook Pro models, to be introduced in 4Q16, as they will have a thinner and lighter form factor, Touch ID, use OLED display touch bar (to replace physical function keys, located above the keyboard) and adopt USB- C/Thunderbolt 3," MacRumors reported Kuo as saying.
Of note is the Touch ID component inclusion, which syncs with the recent reports that part of the OS X 10.12 feature upgrades for the next MacBook Pro 2016 is the ability to unlock the laptop using the iPhone's fingerprint sensor technology.
OLED, on the other hand, is long-rumored to become part of the Apple supply chain but for an upcoming iPhone model, likely the iPhone 7S or iPhone 8 release that is set in 2017. It appears though that the MacBook Pros will get a first taste of Apple's adoption of OLED display should the Kuo prediction prove correct.
The KGI report indicated that release date of the MacBook Pro 2016, to unbox in 13-inch and 15-inch form factors, will not happen until the last quarter of the year or October at the earliest, suggesting that it is the 13-inch Retina MacBook that Apple will unpack within or right after the June 2016 WWDC.