The original 12-inch MacBook released in 2015 has been added to Apple’s list of “obsolete” machines. Despite what the word implies, this doesn’t mean the notebook just became useless. But it will now be much harder to get one of these laptops serviced.
Apple labels products as obsolete seven years after it stops selling them.
Apple products stay usable for many years
Don’t take the existence of Apple’s “vintage and obsolete” list as evidence that the company doesn’t properly support older products. Every product can get service for at least five years, and many Macs, iPhones and iPads that are even older still get OS updates.
But at some point, Apple has to stop servicing aging computers. And the 12-inch MacBook introduced in early 2015 just reached that milestone.
The compact machine is seen as a turning point for Apple’s notebook line as a whole, introducing many of the technologies that eventually rolled out to other devices, such as USB-C and the infamous butterfly keyboard.
It offered 8GB of RAM and either 256GB or 512GB of storage. The processor was a dual-core Intel Core M at 1.1 GHz, 1.2 GHz or 1.3GHz. To see how far we’ve come, the first 12-inch MacBook with the 1.3 GHz chip scores 1323 on the Geekbench 6 benchmarking test. The 13-inch MacBook Air from 2022 with Apple silicon scores 9585 on that same test — more than seven times faster.
MacBook models go vintage, then obsolete
macOS computers are classified as vintage five years after they were last manufactured. This happened to the original 12-inch MacBook in 2021. Vintage products can still get serviced by Apple and authorized service providers, but that’s “subject to availability of inventory,” according to Apple.
After two more years, products are labeled obsolete, which is the end of the line for authorized repairs. “Apple discontinues all hardware service for obsolete products, and service providers cannot order parts for obsolete products,” notes the Mac maker.
The 12-inch MacBook from 2015 now falls into that category. The early 2016 version is labeled vintage, and the clock is ticking on the 2017 edition — it was discontinued in 2019.
