Technologies

M2 Pro MacBook Pro 16 Review: Apple Amps Up Its Creative Workhorse

Upgraded Wi-Fi and new M2 Pro and M2 Max processors deliver a nice generation-over-generation uptick.

Editor’s note: Our testing of the 2023 MacBook Pro 16 is ongoing; we’ll update this review when we’ve completed our evaluation.

Apple’s 2023 update to its flagship MacBook Pro 16-inch line follows the company’s usual MO. It offers a modest refresh from the more significantly redesigned 2021 model; notably, upgrades to the latest generation of M2-class processors, Wi-Fi 6E and HDMI 2.1, which means support for displays up to 8K/60Hz and 4K/240Hz as well as variable refresh rates. The combination of the old and new enhances the veteran laptop’s chops as a powerhouse computer for creation and development work.

These updates add to the more significant noncosmetic changes introduced with the 2021 MacBook Pro 16: We see a return of the HDMI connector, SDXC card slot, MagSafe charging connector and function key row on the keyboard because buh-bye Touch Bar. There’s also a vastly improved 1080p webcam and, the biggie, a migration of the line to Apple’s own silicon for the CPU with integrated GPU.

Apple MacBook Pro 16 (M2 Pro, 2023)

$3,499 at Amazon

$3,499 at Best Buy

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Like

Fast with solid battery life
Good, bright screen
Wi-Fi 6E and HDMI 2.1 support

Don’t Like

Heavy
That notch

I won’t apply the marketing kiss of death and call it a «mobile workstation,» but yeah, that’s what it is. And that’s the primary way to justify the price, especially for the $3,499 configuration we’re testing and the types of applications Apple highlights performance for. (Apple’s aiming for the market I tend to mentally classify as «people who create shows for Apple TV Plus, Disney and the like.»)

There’s a much easier case to make for gaming laptops at that price, but sorry, Apple, still no. And given the entry price of $2,499, there’s a big hole for recommendations of a big-screen Apple laptop, for people who just want to be able to see more but don’t need performance beyond a MacBook Air.

Furthermore, that base configuration includes only a 512GB SSD. The base M2 Pro processor with 12 CPU cores (8 performance and 4 efficiency) and 19 GPU cores delivers fine performance for a lot of photo editing — I’d probably go higher for, say, medium format work. If you’re performing tasks that require the outlay for the laptop, you likely need at least 1TB SSD, and would probably benefit from upping to 32GB RAM. That bumps the price to almost $3,100.

Going all-out with the configuration, with an M2 Max (12 core CPU/38 core GPU) 96GB memory and 8TB SSD will run $6,499, which is a lot to swallow and excessive for the components, at least on paper. It’s a little more annoying that it doesn’t support 128GB RAM, but 96GB is still more than the last model’s 64GB maximum. I suppose more memory will have to wait for the equivalent of an Ultra chip, though that never made it into a laptop for the M1 generation.

The nice thing, though, is that performance for Apple’s CPUs is consistent across the lines, meaning the same chip delivers roughly comparable performance in a similarly equipped Mac Mini as it does in a MacBook Pro. On one hand, It would be nice if you got better performance on more expensive hardware, but the consistency makes buying decisions a little easier.

Design and performance

As mentioned earlier, the design hasn’t changed since we first saw it in 2021, and hasn’t started looking old yet. I love the features Apple’s brought back, especially the dedicated function key row and SD card slot, and the screen seems to still be excellent, at least pending my formal screen testing.

I do have some nitpicks. The notch at the top of the screen bothers me, though not nearly as much as it does on the iPhone — there it’s functionally intrusive because you’re actually losing space to display necessary information, but here it’s just aesthetically annoying. And I’m probably in the minority on this, but I don’t like MagSafe power connectors and I never have. While I think magnets usually make everything better, with MagSafe the power cord disconnects more frequently than I need it to, like if I put it down on the bed when it’s plugged in. (A power corollary to that is I’m really ready for Apple to redesign its awful brick-with-plug that requires babying to remain in almost any outlet I’ve ever plugged it into.) Plus, despite the previous generation’s webcam upgrade, there’s still no Face ID support.

I still have a lot of specialty testing to do — important aspects, notably the video editing and encoding performance, VRR over HDMI and the updated neural engine improvements — as well as several more battery test runs. But I do have a handful of observations based on what I’ve already run.

I had some initial issues with Wi-Fi 6E, such as connecting to and staying connected to my router (an Asus ROG Rapture GT-AXE11000E), but finally narrowed them down to a default. After I switched «wake for network access» in the battery settings from «only on power adapter» to «always,» it connected immediately and stayed connected. It’s been bulletproof ever since. I don’t know yet what impact that might have on battery life.

I generally get more reliable performance from 6E than 6, at least in my environment. For instance, a casual Speedtest run delivered a consistent 483Mbps download on 6E but an average 392Mbps on 6 (for 400Mbps service). The latter started higher but dropped partway through as well.

MacOS has two power settings for on-battery performance. The default leaves the system running at full power draw, as if it was plugged in. On that setting, you’ll get nearly identical speed to when it’s plugged in. But also, surprisingly, excellent battery life, about 19.5 hours on the one run I had time to perform. One could assume the lower power setting will increase that.

On the low power setting intended to run more quietly and for longer, single core performance dropped the most between power settings (no worse than Intel, though). GPU showed the least differential, though the tests I ran aren’t terribly stressful GPU tests. Multicore differences fell about where I expected, and I’ve yet to figure out what my web (HTML5, Javascript and WebAssembly) reveal. It does run notably cooler, which is a nice boon if you actually use it as a laptop on your lap. It’s also on the heavy side, but, unfortunately, that’s how these dense power laptops roll.

Unless you need every little speed increase you can get, you needn’t feel the FOMO if you’ve got the last-generation MacBook Pro 16. But if you didn’t jump onto the Apple Silicon bandwagon last go-round and don’t rely on any applications that will only run on the Intel processors, it’s probably smart to consider the upgrade this time around. As for more specific recommendations, that will require more specific testing. Stay tuned.

Originally published 9:00am ET Jan 23, 2023 and updated periodically.

Preliminary performance tests

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections Hints, Answers and Help for May 18, #707

Hints and answers for Connections for May 18, #707.

Looking for the most recent Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections puzzle is a mix of difficult and easy. The purple category does what most purple categories do, and makes you really break down how you think about the words. Read on for clues and today’s Connections answers.

The Times now has a Connections Bot, like the one for Wordle. Go there after you play to receive a numeric score and to have the program analyze your answers. Players who are registered with the Times Games section can now nerd out by following their progress, including number of puzzles completed, win rate, number of times they nabbed a perfect score and their win streak.

Read more: Hints, Tips and Strategies to Help You Win at NYT Connections Every Time

Hints for today’s Connections groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group, to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: School days.

Green group hint: About there!

Blue group hint: Sure, let’s go.

Purple group hint: The Scarlett Letter.

Answers for today’s Connections groups

Yellow group: Tasks for a student.

Green group: Encouraging responses in a guessing game.

Blue group: Up for anything.

Purple group: What «A» might mean.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is tasks for a student. The four answers are assignment, drill, exercise and lesson.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is encouraging responses in a guessing game. The four answers are almost, close, not quite and warm.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is up for anything. The four answers are easy, flexible, game and open.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is what «A» might mean. The four answers are area, athletic, excellent and one.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for May 18, #441

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle No. 441 for May 18.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands will probably be easier if you have some basic knowledge about a certain type of vessel. You don’t really need to have ever been on one, since the answers show up in books and movies all the time. If you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Riding the wind.

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: famed song by Christopher Cross.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints, but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

DULL, TILE, TILER, SEER, GALE, GALES, HAIL, SAIL, LEEK, GLUE, HALL, TALL, HEAT

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you’ve got all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

HELM, HULL, KEEL, MAST, STERN, RIGGING, RUDDER, TILLER

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is SAILBOAT. To find it, start with the S that’s four letters down on the farthest row to the left, then wind across, up and down.

Technologies

Google I/O 2025: How to Watch and What to Expect

With Android 16 out of the way, Google I/O will certainly be all about AI.

Google I/O 2025 takes place on May 20 and 21 with Google’s big keynote happening on day 1. We expect Big G to talk about its myriad innovations across its ever-expanding portfolio of products — almost certainly with a huge focus on AI every step of the way. If we collectively cross our fingers, promise to be good and eat all our vegetables then we may even be treated to a sneak peek at upcoming hardware.

Read more: Android 16: Everything Google Announced at the Android Show

Google also hosted a totally separate event that focused solely on Android. The Android Show: I/O Edition saw the wrappers come off Android 16, with insights into the new Material 3 Expressive interface, updates to security and a focus on Gemini and how it’ll work on a variety of other devices.

By breaking out Android news into its own virtual event, Google frees itself to spend more time during the I/O keynote to talk about Gemini, Deep Mind, Android XR and Project Astra. It’s going to be a jam-packed event, so here’s how you can watch I/O 2025 as it happens and what you can look forward to.

Google I/O: Where to watch

Google I/O proper kicks off with a keynote taking place on May 20, 10 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EDT, 6 p.m. BST). It’ll almost certainly be available to stream online on Google’s own YouTube channel, although a holding video is yet to be available. There’s no live link on the I/O website yet, either, though you can use the handy links to add the event to your calendar of choice. Expect links to a livestream to be available closer to the day.

What to expect from Google I/O 2025

Little chat about Android 16: As Google gave Android 16 its own outing already, it’s likely that it won’t be mentioned all that much during I/O. In fact at last year’s event, Android was barely mentioned, while uses of the term «AI» went well over a hundred.

Android XR: Google didn’t talk much about Android XR during the Android show, focusing instead on the purely phone-based updates to the platform. We expected to hear more about the company’s latest foray into mixed-reality headsets in partnership with Samsung and its Project Moohan headset, so it’s possible that this is being saved for I/O proper.

Gemini: With Android being spun out into its own separate event, Google is evidently clearing the way for I/O to focus on everything else the company does. AI will continue to dominate the conversation at I/O, just as it did last year (though hopefully Google can make it more understandable) with updates to many of its AI platforms expected to be announced.

Gemini is expected to receive a variety of update announcements, including more information on its latest 2.5 Pro update which boasts various improvements to its reasoning abilities, and in particular to its helpfulness for coding applications. Expect lots of mentions of Google’s other AI-based products, too, including DeepMind, LearnLM and Project Astra. Let’s just hope Google has figured out how to make this information make any kind of sense.

Beyond AI, Google may talk about updates to its other products including GMail, Chrome and the Play Store, although whether these updates are big enough to be discussed during the keynote rather than as part of the developer-focused sessions following I/O’s opening remains to be seen.