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MacBook Gets Touchscreen: Is macOS Ready?
28 Oct
Summary
- New MacBooks feature touchscreens with app-focused interaction.
- Dynamic Island integration offers new touch controls.
- Touch input serves as secondary input, not a primary system interface.
Apple has introduced its first MacBook models with integrated touchscreens, signaling a significant hardware shift. While the operating system, macOS, has not undergone radical changes to optimize for touch, the functionality is primarily embedded within individual applications.
The new MacBook Pros will feature Apple's Dynamic Island, providing added touch controls for convenient interactions such as managing AirDrops and music playback. Standard touch gestures like pinch-to-zoom, drag-and-drop for presentations, and swipe-to-scroll on web pages are supported.
Third-party applications like Notion, Canva, Zoom, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Lightroom, and DaVinci Resolve are expected to leverage these new touch capabilities. Multitouch integration in professional creator applications presents an interesting prospect. However, touch input is largely positioned as a secondary input method.
This move follows a series of notable hardware and software developments from Apple this year, including the iPhone Duo and the HomeView smart display. The company is also evolving its software with updates to Apple Watch, Siri, and macOS.
