Apple MacBook Pro (16-inch, Late 2023) Review: Elegant Monster

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Judging by its Q4 (FY23) figures, Mac sales are not where Apple would like them to be. You’d think that with the success of the M-series chip rollout, MacBooks would be flying off the shelves, but they’re not.

There are a lot of reasons why people aren’t buying, but the product and the technology behind the latest Macs are not the problem. The M-series MacBook Pro rollout has been successful from an execution standpoint, but there still are lots of people using Intel-based MacBooks. Apple makes high-quality products that simply last a long time, and it’s easy to hold on to an older MacBook just a little while longer.

Apple has now released the M3 series of chips, which are featured in the MacBook Pro. It’s the third generation of the chip and the redesigned laptop, and with this release, Apple is hoping the third time is the charm that will persuade customers to invest in a new MacBook.

With this laptop, they just might. The new Space Black finish is alluring, the brighter display is eye-opening, and the performance is very satisfying. It all combines to make a charming MacBook Pro that is so very hard to resist.

After a couple of generations of M-series chips, Apple has proven that a chip’s performance is mostly consistent regardless of the form. For example, an M2’s general performance is the same whether it’s in a desktop Mac mini or a laptop MacBook Pro. So the charts below focus on comparing the results against other chips instead of other Macs. (The specific model is called out in certain instances, especially in graphics-oriented tests where throttling can occur.)

Geekbench 6 is an indicator of general, overall performance. In its Multi-Core tests, the M3 Max MacBook Pro posted a significant 43 percent improvement over the M2 Max it replaces. That’s more than the typical 15 to 20 percent boost we’ve seen from generation to generation, though the M3 Max does have more two CPU cores (and two more performance cores) than the M2 Max. In Single-Core tests, the M3 Max showed a more modest 11 percent boost.

The M2 Ultra’s Multi-Core performance keeps up with the M3 Max, but the Ultra is not available in a laptop, it’s only in the Mac Studio and Mac Pro. But it’s a good point of reference and maybe even a preview of what to expect from the M3 Ultra.

The Intel-based laptop in the chart is Apple’s fastest (and last) Core i9 MacBook Pro, released in 2019. It gets completely blasted by the M3 Max MacBook Pro. If you’re still using this or an older Intel laptop, imagine how much more productive you can be if you upgrade.

The results in the chart (and all the benchmarks in this review) were performed on the M3 Max MacBook Pro in High Power Mode, a setting available only on the 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros with Max-level chips. This mode makes the cooling fans run faster so the chip can use more power to get top performance. High Power Mode is activated in the Battery System Setting and can be used while the power adapter is not plugged in.

High Power Mode does make a difference, but our testing in Cinebench 2024 showed only small gains. Our scores were 2-3 percent faster in High Power Mode than at the default Automatic setting where macOS balances power consumption and performance. The lack of significant difference is due to the benchmark tool simply not being strenuous enough and not a fault of the Mac.

The older Cinebench R23 benchmark isolates CPU performance and not the GPU. Here we see a whopping 62 percent increase in the MacBook Pro’s M3 Max over the M2 Max in a Mac Studio. The benefit of more CPU performance cores is shown here.

We used HandBrake to encode the Tears of Steel video from 4K to a 1080p H.265 file. When doing the encoding completely in software using the H.265 (x265) video encoder, the M3 Max displays a significant 33 percent speed improvement over the M2 Max. With HandBrake’s H.265 (VideoToolBox) encoder, the app takes advantage of available hardware acceleration, so here the M3 Max had a 33 percent improvement.

In our iMovie 4K video benchmark, we exported a 10-minute 4K video at two settings. Our testing found that the M3 Max MacBook Pro had a very small improvement over the M2 Max in the Mac Studio. This test uses the video encoders on the chips, but the bottleneck is the SSD, which explains why the results are so similar.

The write speeds between the Max chips new and old are relatively the same, but the read speed of our MacBook Pro was about 10 percent slower than the rest of the field, even while testing in High Power Mode. It’s a curious result, but you probably won’t notice the difference in real life, unless you’re working with gigantic files.

Geekbench’s Compute benchmark tests GPU performance using Metal or OpenCL APIs. In both of these tests, the M3 Max and its 40-core GPU were 7 percent faster than the M2 Max and its 38-core GPU. The boost is more significant between the M3 Max and the M1 Max’s 32-core GPU, where the M3 Max was 29 percent faster with both Metal and OpenCL.

Rise of the Tomb Raider and Civilization VI are older games written for Intel and not optimized for Apple’s Metal graphics API. Still, the M3 Max (as well as the new macOS Sonoma Game Mode) helps improve performance. However, the MacBook Pro’s cooling fans kicked in and were very active during these benchmarks, which meant that the performance was likely throttled to maintain a proper operating temperature. The M2 Max in Mac Studio has a very big thermal system to keep it cool.

I’m about to take a deep dive into the MacBook Pro’s colour, which may seem like a trivial pursuit to a lot of people, but Apple and its customers know that colour choices play a huge role in creating a premium product. Apple does an excellent job with its colours and finishes and the excellence continues with Space Black, a new choice for the MacBook Pro.

Space Black isn’t really black; it’s a deep, dark grey. If you’re familiar with hexadecimal colours, then Space Black is a close match for hex #414a4c, which is often referred to as Outer Space. Space Black does appear lighter when a direct light is upon it and in photos. It’s much darker than Space Grey, which is no longer available for the M3 Pro or M3 Max MacBook Pro. Your choices here are Silver or Space Black.

When Apple unveiled Space Black during the Scary Fast event, my immediate reaction was, “Want.” But then upon seeing it in post-event videos and then up close in person, my enthusiasm waned a bit. I wanted black, as close to hex #000000 as possible, but the reality is that it’s not possible to do that with anodised aluminium.

In my time with the new MacBook Pro, my enthusiasm for Space Black has grown. The colour is more impressive when the laptop is open than when it’s closed. There’s almost no contrast between the black keyboard and the Space Black body, even with the backlighting turned up to the max. It’s a different aesthetic from Silver and Space Grey, one that I welcome very much.

Does anyone remember Apple’s last truly black laptop? It was the 2008 13-inch MacBook, and it was made back when Apple used plastic cases for its non-pro MacBook line.

It looked cool until you touched it, and then the body would be coated in fingerprints. Apple seems to remember that, too, so with the Space Black MacBook Pro, the company created, “a breakthrough chemistry that forms an anodization seal” and reduces the fingerprint effect. In my short time with the laptop, the seal seems to work. Fingerprints don’t appear on the laptop when my hands are clean, and if they do appear, they’re easy to wipe away.

There’s one major caveat to Space Black and that it’s not available with the base M3 14-inch MacBook Pr – your choices are Silver and Space Grey. There doesn’t seem to be any real reason for this, other than to entice customers to step up to at least an M3 Pro model.

Apple might reason that Space Black is a reward for paying for a higher-end model. Regardless, if you spot a Space Black MacBook Pro in the wild, you now know that it’s at least an M3 Pro model.

As for the design of the laptop, it hasn’t changed since the M-series 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro was introduced in 2021. It still has a sturdy aluminium body, rounded corners that are gentle on the hands, four rubber feet on the bottom, and a glossy Apple logo. There’s no need to mess with success.

The 16-inch MacBook Pro weighs close to five pounds. Combine that with the 0.66 by 14.01 by 9.77-inch (1.68 by 35.57 by 24.81-centimeter) size when closed, and it is too unwieldy for some users. Those who invest in the 16-inch model need the larger screen and understand the physical burden involved. For others, the weight and size of the 14-inch MacBook Pro is much more manageable.

Ports and connectivity

• No changes from the previous model

Apple offers the same ports as it has before. The M3 Pro and Max models include:

• Three Thunderbolt 4/USB-C ports
• HDMI 2.1
• SDXC card slot
• MagSafe 3 charging port
• 3.5mm audio jack

Apple does not include any Thunderbolt or USB-C cables to connect devices. If you do need to buy cables, make sure you’re buying the proper ones. For example, if you’re using a Thunderbolt device, you need a Thunderbolt cable, which can also be used with USB-C devices. There are USB-C-only cables available that are much more affordable than Thunderbolt cables, but they don’t support Thunderbolt and its speeds.

When Apple issued the 14- and 16-inch M2 Pro/Max MacBook Pro in January 2023, it made a major change to the HDMI port, upgrading it from HDMI 2.0 to 2.1. This was an important upgrade because it expanded the MacBook Pro’s ability to support external displays. That HDMI 2.1 support continues with the M3 models.

As for wireless connectivity, the MacBook Pro includes Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3. I’m not able to cross off cellular connectivity from my MacBook Pro wish list with this laptop release, and probably never will.

Display and speakers

• Higher SDR brightness on the Liquid Retina XDR display
• Booming six-speaker system

The Liquid Retina XDR (mini-LED) display that Apple has been using has gotten a tweak. When in Standard Dynamic Range (SDR) mode (which usually means under general use), the display is capable of a maximum brightness of 600 nits, a boost from 500 nits in the last two generations of MacBook Pro. It’s quite a noticeable difference, and that extra brightness is handy,…