Mac Book Pro M5 Max 16-inch review: Still the pinnacle

Overview

Mac Book Pro M5 Max 16-inch review: Still the pinnacle

But it may soon feel outdated if OLED touchscreen models arrive this year.

Details

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) on a deck (Devindra Hardawar for Engadget)

We've loved Apple's 2021-era Mac Book Pro design from the start, and the M5 Max edition is once again the professional notebook to beat. But it's hard to deny that the star of Apple's recent laptop rollout wasn't its most powerful Pro systems — all eyes were on the $599 Mac Book Neo. The Mac Book Pro's next time to shine is likely this fall, when Apple is expected to finally deliver OLED models and a dynamic touchscreen interface. (I’ve argued before that, at this point, Apple has no excuse not to give us touchscreen Macs.)

This generation of Mac Book Pro might just be the last gasp of the 2021 remodel. It's still an incredibly powerful machine that's been honed to near-perfection, but if you're looking for something that feels truly new, it may be worth waiting several months.

Apple’s Mac Book Pro remains the pinnacle of professional laptops, and it’s faster than ever with the new M5 Pro and M5 Max chips.

It's not too surprising to see the M5 Pro and Max Mac Book Pros be relatively low-key efforts. Apple launched the M5 14-inch Mac Book last fall with a mere press release. But at least that model delivered a noticeable leap in graphics performance. The new M5 Pro and Max chips are a bit faster than before, but they don't really have any major features to call out. (Unless you're super excited about Neural Accelerators for AI work.)

I don't want to sound like I'm complaining too much, though. The 16-inch M5 Max Mac Book Pro I'm reviewing is still a gorgeous laptop, with an overall design that most premium Windows PC makers are still trying to copy. Apple's unibody metal frame design still feels rock solid. There's a generous amount of ports, including three Thunderbolt 5 USB-C connections, HDMI, a headphone jack and a SD card reader. Its 16-inch Liquid Retina XDR screen also looks incredible, thanks to its bright Mini LED backlighting, and there's once again a nano-texture option to reduce glare.

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) from the back, on a deck.

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) keyboard and trackpad

What else could you want in a laptop? I suppose there's the lingering feeling that an OLED screen would look better, with sharper contrast and pure black levels. But you'd be hard pressed to find much else to complain about with the Mac Book Pro's screen. I'm also intrigued to see how Apple implements a touchscreen interface alongside mac OS in upcoming Mac Book Pros, but I'll admit, I haven't really been compelled to touch this laptop's display much.

Touchscreens always seemed like a quixotic effort for laptops — they're nice to have, but Microsoft has been trying to shove them into PCs for 15 years now. The addition of touchscreens really didn't improve the overall Windows experience much. So I wasn't surprised to see Apple take its time bringing the technology to mac OS — if you really want to swipe around screens, just get an i Pad.

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) keyboard and trackpad (Devindra Hardawar for Engadget)

But back to this Mac Book Pro: I still love everything about Apple's current design. Sure, the keyboard could have a bit more depth, but it withstood my furious typing like a champ. (Unlike Dell's XPS 14, which tried so hard to be a Mac Book Pro-killer.) And the Mac Book Pro's glass touchpad is still one of the best I've ever seen in a laptop.

Our review unit was also equipped with 32GB of RAM, a 4TB SSD, a 40-core GPU and Apple’s

150 nano-texture display upgrade, bringing the total for this M5 Max system to a whopping

6,149. That may seem excessive to most consumers, but for creative professionals who actually need the power of the M5 Max chip, it’s not that unusual. You can also save over $1,000 by opting for the M5 Pro chip instead.

So what does the M5 Max bring to the party? Obviously, it's speedier than the M4 Max. Our review unit was 30 percent faster than the M4 Max-equipped Mac Book Studio in the Geekbench 6 multi-threaded CPU benchmark. It's only 10 percent faster in Geekbench's single-threaded test, but that still gives Apple room to claim that it has the fastest chip core around. If you've got an M4 Max machine, you certainly don't need to dump it for this lineup. But if you've been hammering on an M1 Max or M2 Max system for years, you'll see some meaningful benefits from upgrading now.

Apple says this new line of Mac Book Pros also feature its latest SSD technology, which is up to twice as fast as before. Our review unit reached 13.8 GB/s write speeds and 13 GB/s read speeds in the ATTO disk speed test, whereas previous Mac Book Pros hovered around 6 GB/s for read/write speeds. If you're working with huge data files every day, you'll likely notice the difference. Another benefit to the new hardware? Apple is now equipping every Mac Book Pro with 1TB of storage by default.

All of the M5 chips feature faster GPUs than before, but that's less noticeable on the M5 Max. I've never had trouble running a high-end game like Lies of P on the M2, M3 or M4 Max hardware, and once again it still runs incredibly well with the M5 Max in its native resolution, and with all of the graphics settings cranked up. All I'm looking for is a smooth 60 fps frame rate, and the Mac Book Pros have delivered on that for years. mac OS isn't the sort of platform where you'll be playing many high fps games, but the Mac Book Pro's 120 Hz refresh rate is equipped to handle them.

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) on a doorstep. (Devindra Hardawar for Engadget)

Beyond raw performance, the Mac Book Pro continues to be a joy to use. Its screen is gloriously bright, and its smooth refresh rate makes scrolling through documents and websites easy on the eyes. Its six-speaker setup remains the best audio experience I've ever heard on a laptop, allowing for crisp, detailed and surprisingly dynamic bass. When I'm too lazy to cast music to my Sonos speakers, I can still have a decent jam session on the Mac Book Pro's built-in setup.

It's hard to improve much on the 30 hours and 16 minutes of battery life we saw on last year's 16-inch Mac Book Pro, but the M5 Max model managed to beat that by 30 minutes. Realistically, it means you can likely use the Mac Book Pro for a few days without needing to recharge, assuming you're not doing heavy-duty work the entire time.

Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) (Devindra Hardawar for Engadget)

You don't need me to sell you on the Mac Book Pro; all you need to know is that the M5 Max actually delivers. Given how well the standard M5 14-inch Mac Book Pro performed, I'd also expect a decent speed bump from the M5 Pro model. The only downside to the M5 systems is that they'll feel out of date quickly if the rumored OLED and touchscreen models arrive later this year. But if you need the best performance now, it's hard to go wrong with any Mac Book Pro.

Key Takeaways

Mac Book Pro M5 Max 16-inch review: Still the pinnacle
But it may soon feel outdated if OLED touchscreen models arrive this year
Mac Book Pro 16-inch (2026, M5 Max) on a deck (Devindra Hardawar for Engadget)
We've loved Apple's 2021-era Mac Book Pro design from the start, and the M5 Max edition is once again the professional notebook to beat
This generation of Mac Book Pro might just be the last gasp of the 2021 remodel