Apple’s New MacBook Is Cute, Colorful, and $100 Cheaper for College Students

As a senior in college, my laptop is my lifeline. It’s where I turn in all my assignments, how I contact my classmates, and how I watch a show in bed after a long day. It’s a college essential and also the most valuable item I own, which is something a lot of students can probably relate to. And if you’re in the market for an Apple MacBook, you’re ready to see a pretty high price tag.

Of course, you can use your student discount to save a meaningful chunk of money on high-priced devices, but now Apple has released the brand’s lowest-priced laptop ever and Apple’s new MacBook Neo looks great and is so much more affordable than the company’s other computers. 

The MacBook Neo is an all-new laptop offered at a much lower price point — $599 without a student discount — than Apple’s standard MacBook Pro, which is $1,699 for the cheapest version (the 14-inch M5). To lower the price, the brand cut down on some features, like memory: The MacBook Neo only comes with 8GB of unified memory, compared with 16GB in the cheapest MacBook Pro. As opposed to RAM (random access memory), unified memory increases a machine’s efficiency. According to writer Tony Polanco at Tom’s Guide, this laptop is “more capable than you would expect,” but he warns in his article that more demanding tasks than basic computing will likely cause it to slow down. It’s available with 256GB or 512GB of storage, and it also runs on an A18 Pro iPhone chip as opposed to the M5 MacBook chip. 

This Wired review spells out some of the other ways the MacBook Neo differs from other Apple laptops, like no keyboard backlighting and slow-to-use USB-C ports. Still, writes Luke Larsen, “As you expect in an Apple product, [there are] no compromises with build quality.” It has a liquid retina display, dual side speakers, and a 16-hour battery life, so you can get through your whole day of classes. You can use Apple’s compare feature to take a side-by-side look at the MacBook Neo’s features compared with other models, too. 

Beyond the incredibly low price point for a MacBook, the MacBook Neo also comes in several really cute colors: silver, blush, citrus and indigo. 

The MacBook Neo was released on March 11, so you can get your hands on one now. You can order it directly from Apple, or buy it wherever you typically find Apple products, like Best Buy, Walmart, Target, or Amazon. 

Maybe the best part about the MacBook Neo is that Apple offers education pricing that takes the 256GB version price down to $499, making it even more accessible for college students. Or you can get the Touch ID version that also comes with 512GB of storage for $599, rather than $699. To cash in on this student discount, you just have to buy the laptop through Apple’s Education Store, which is only for verified college students, educators, and staff. If you want to add to your Apple ecosystem, you can also browse the Education tab to see what other exclusive discounts for which students are eligible.