Apple just did something that was, until very recently, almost unthinkable: It put a Mac laptop on sale for $599. And, no big surprise, the new MacBook Neo announced Wednesday already sparks predicted concerns among PC mavens about hordes of users rushing to Apple. A new report from Windows land shows it.
“Windows OEMs are going to feel the heat, too,” the commentator wrote. “For years, OEMs have gotten away with shipping what can essentially be described as e-waste in this price bracket.”
MacBook Neo sets off panic in Windows land
The new MacBook Neo carries a 13-inch display and runs on the A18 Pro chip — the same silicon found in the iPhone 16 Pro — delivering performance comparable to the M1 chip. The result is a fully capable macOS machine at a price point that has long been Windows-only territory. And the ripple effects across the PC industry could be enormous, as a Windows Central commentator who’s no fan of macOS pointed out. Among other things, Senior Editor Zac Bowden said Microsoft should be panicking.
PC laptops: ‘… e-waste in this price bracket’
Image: Apple
For years, the argument for buying a Windows laptop at the low-to-midrange end of the market was simple: You had no real alternative. MacBooks started at $999 and climbed steeply from there. But that argument evaporates the moment Apple plants its flag at $599 (or $499 for students).
Yes, the MacBook Neo makes compromises to hit that number — no backlit keyboard and just 8GB of RAM among them — but for the vast majority of mainstream buyers who use their laptop for browsing, streaming, email and light productivity, those trade-offs are essentially invisible. What is very visible is the Apple logo and the promise of macOS.
Bowden put it plainly when it comes to the wider PC manufacturing ecosystem with his blunt but accurate “e-waste” comment, above. The sub-$600 Windows laptop market has historically been a race to the bottom, dominated by machines with sluggish processors, cheap plastic builds and frustrating software experiences. Apple’s entry into this space doesn’t just raise the bar — it vaults over it entirely.
Microsoft’s worst nightmare
Photo: Apple
The timing could scarcely be worse for Microsoft. Windows 11 has never been less popular with mainstream users, and millions of Windows 10 machines are now running on hardware that Microsoft has declared unsupported. That leaves users facing an unwelcome choice: Pay to upgrade, limp along on an aging OS, or switch platforms entirely.
Into that moment of maximum vulnerability, Apple has dropped a $599 MacBook with a dedicated “Switch to Mac” section on its product page, openly courting disgruntled Windows users.
Bowden does not mince words about the implications for Microsoft:
“If I were Microsoft, I’d be on full-blown panic alert at this point,” he wrote. “Unlike Chrome OS, which was never desirable even at lower price points, a full-blown macOS laptop at $599 is a serious threat to Windows.”
The Chrome OS comparison is instructive. Google’s platform never truly challenged Windows because, for all its affordability, it was seen as a lesser product — a compromised, browser-bound experience rather than a full desktop OS. macOS carries no such stigma.
The long game
Photo: Cult of Mac
Perhaps the most pointed element of Bowden’s analysis concerns not today’s buyers but tomorrow’s. Young people discovering computers for the first time, or upgrading from an aging hand-me-down, now get offered a genuine MacBook at a price their parents might actually agree to spend. As that generation matures, their platform loyalty forms around macOS, not Windows. The downstream consequences for Microsoft’s OS market share — already under pressure in education from Chromebooks — could compound for years.
The Windows PC market has faced existential challenges before and survived them. But those previous threats, from tablets to smartphones to Chromebooks, never came wrapped in Apple’s hardware design language and backed by the full weight of the macOS software ecosystem. The MacBook Neo is different. It is not a compromise product aimed at customers who cannot afford a real laptop. It is a real laptop, priced to recruit.
How aggressively Microsoft and its hardware partners respond in the coming months may well define the shape of the personal computing market for the rest of the decade.
The MacBook Neo is Apple’s entry-level laptop. It has Apple’s signature all-day battery life and ease of use. It can swim through web browsing, document editing and other basic work tasks.
But if you want higher specs than its 8 GB memory or the maximum 512 GB storage, the MacBook Air may be a better choice.
- 16-hour battery life
- Bright, fun colors
- Thin and light design
- No MagSafe
- USB 3 and USB 2 ports
- No support for high-resolution displays
David Snow, an expert on Apple hardware and software, writes on a variety of technological and cultural topics for Cult of Mac. They include Apple news, technology buying guides, and features about computer setups and Apple TV shows and movies.
With 30 years of experience covering technology and other subjects, he has written and edited for numerous print and online publications, including CMP Media, TechTV.com, CNET, Wired News, Red Herring magazine, Law.com, The National Law Journal and Law Technology News magazine. Among other roles, he served as executive editor of the Law.com network of websites and editorial director, technology, for ALM Media.
Snow graduated with a B.A. from Syracuse University with majors in magazine journalism and psychology. While there, he worked as a reporter for The Daily Orange newspaper and associate editor of Equal Time magazine.
Founder of the blog At the Waterline, he can be reached on X (formerly Twitter) via @atthewaterline and on Mastodon via @dsnow.
