Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has released a new report regarding the folding screen MacBook project. Apple is reportedly targeting a release for the year 2026.
After the release of the Apple Vision Pro and the cancellation of the automobile project, the next big project expected from Apple is the brand’s adoption of folding screens. Initially, we should not be talking about a folding iPhone, like the Galaxy Z Flip, but rather a folding MacBook like the Asus Zenbook Fold.
Ming-Chi Kuo, analyst and specialist in predicting future Apple products based on indiscretions around production lines, has delivered a new report. Published on Medium, he provides his latest estimates regarding this folding screen MacBook project.
An overpriced machine
Recently, a source suggested a release for the end of 2025. Ming-Chi Kuo is more cautious and leaves a range between the last quarter of 2025 and the first half of 2026. In both cases, we are getting closer. In just over a year, Apple could present its first folding screen machine.
Still according to the analyst, the device should integrate an Apple M5 chip. Here again, this gives us a clue as to the release period of the object, since Apple has just unveiled the Apple M4 chip. We can imagine that the Apple M5 chip will be planned for sometime in 2025. For such a showcase product, however, Apple could be a little behind on the integrated chip. Thus the Vision Pro integrates an Apple M2 chip while the M3 and M4 devices are on the market. This is partly due to the complexity of the object’s design, which prevents it from moving from one generation to the next as easily as in a desktop PC.
Apple would equip itself exclusively with LG Display, but has not yet decided on its choice between a 20.25-inch panel or an 18.8-inch panel. We are talking here about whole and unfolded slabs. By folding them, the machine would take the format of a MacBook of 15 and 13 inches respectively. This is also what indicates that it should rather be a MacBook and not an iPad, even if there is room for doubt.
This state-of-the-art panel could cost the brand very dearly. Apple obliges, the brand would like a very modern design and without the defects that we experienced on the first folding screens, in particular with the appearance of the fold. We’re talking $600 for the screen and $200 for the hinge. In fact, Ming-Chi Kuo expects an ultra premium product whose manufacturing price would be at the level of the Vision Pro. The latter being billed 3499 dollars to the end user.