Apple is expected to unveil a new MacBook Pro with an OLED display and a touchscreen at an event called “Pro and Tell” on 28 October, at 10am local time in Los Angeles.
Not a keynote
Greg Joswiak, Apple’s senior vice-president of worldwide marketing, announced it on X on Monday: “Can’t wait for Pro and Tell next week.” The format is different from the usual filmed keynote — invited journalists and content creators will see the products in person and use them. Sales could begin by 6 November.
What is expected
The MacBook Pro is rumoured in 14-inch and 16-inch sizes with OLED screens and touch. The iPhone’s Dynamic Island may appear on a Mac for the first time, and the new models are expected to be lighter than the current MacBook Pro.
The chips are likely to be M5 Pro and M5 Max rather than M6. Early this month, signals relating to touchscreen support were spotted in a beta of macOS 27.2, which is what moved the touch rumour from speculation to something with evidence behind it.
Apple may also show a 14-inch MacBook Pro with the M6 chip and a new 24-inch iMac — the M6 first appeared in the Mac mini in August — though no large design changes are expected for either. An eighth-generation iPad mini is also possible, with an 8.4-inch OLED display.
Why a touchscreen is a story at all
Because Apple spent more than a decade arguing against it. Steve Jobs said vertical touchscreens were ergonomically wrong, and every Apple executive since has repeated some version of that while selling the iPad as the touch device and the Mac as the keyboard one. A touchscreen MacBook Pro is not a feature; it is a reversal, and the interesting question is what changed — most likely that a decade of iPad usage has made reaching for a laptop screen feel natural to people who grew up doing it.
What it means in Dhaka
Two practical things. First, if the rumours hold, the current MacBook Pro becomes the previous generation on 28 October, and prices for existing stock in Bashundhara City and the online resellers usually soften within a fortnight of a launch. Anyone who does not need OLED is about to get a better deal on a machine that is still excellent.
Second, treat the launch price as the beginning of the arithmetic rather than the end. A MacBook Pro bought officially here carries duty and VAT on top of the US figure, and the grey-market units that arrive from Singapore and Dubai within weeks come without a local warranty — which matters more on a laptop with a new display technology in its first generation than on a mature product. For a freelancer whose income depends on the machine, the warranty is part of the specification.
What to be sceptical about
Two cautions are worth holding on to until the event. First, none of this is confirmed: the touchscreen and OLED are rumours supported by beta signals, and beta code frequently contains groundwork for features that ship a year later or never. Second, a first-generation OLED laptop panel is exactly the kind of component that attracts early complaints — uneven brightness, burn-in anxiety on a screen that displays a static menu bar all day.
If the machine is a working tool rather than a toy, the unglamorous advice applies: let the first production run reach reviewers who use it for a month before committing several lakh taka to it.
