The problem is that your use case (retina + 16GB) is easily satisfied by the 13" rMBP, and the vast majority of Apple's consumer customers will not need more than 8GB of RAM for the next few years. Apple made the design decision to focus on consumer for the Macbook, making 8GB RAM standard across the board. This probably works well as they can optimize the size to fit the exact memory modules required, but leaves a few high-end people like yourself out in the cold.
I guess Apple assumes (probably correctly) that if you really need 16GB of RAM, you can afford an rMBP.
Five years later and I still can't buy a new 13" laptop from Apple with more RAM than my 2015 MBP.
Edit: Apparently you can configure a (Early 2020) Intel-based 13" MBP with 32GB of RAM - I was not aware of that. Hope they bring that option to the ARM versions ASAP, especially if the performance gains are as good as Apple claims.
I am going to have to agree with Nicole060 here.
I recently bought one of the new Macbook Pros for work - non retina, 4GB RAM.
It became as slow as hell. I am a developer.. I need at least one VM with IE open, I need to have Chrome open, photoshop open, xcode, etc. Luckily I was able to upgrade it with 16GB of Corsair Vengeance RAM, and it's now a pleasure to work with.
Apple only offers an 8GB increase on their online store at 100$ for my macbook pro.. and at a 100$ increase.. In my opinion, 8GB should be standard.
I love my Macbook, wouldn't give it up, I like using OSX, but I really do believe that Apple tends to rip us off when it comes to specs. And FYI, I can't imagine using OSX with 2GB.. my mac mini had 2 GB of RAM and it ran like a pig until I got 4GB of RAM into it.
We all know Apple has outrageous margins on their products.. fine, I am not against them making money. However, I do wish they invested more into their products.
I had 16GB in my Hackintosh 3 years ago. I noticed that 8GB seem to be enough for more of the things I do, even with some big apps such as XCode and Final Cut Pro X in simultaneous use. I think my next Macbook will only have 8GB.
Apple tends to charge a huge premium on extra RAM and SSD space anyway.
The basic configuration still ships with 8GB of RAM. 16GB is $200 extra. I had an 8GB MacBook Pro in 2013. It wasn't enough then, it's absolutely inadequate now.
8GB isn't enough for everyone, but it is enough for a lot of common consumer tasks. If you check out comparisons between the 8GB and 16GB M1 models, it's surprising how hard you have to push them before the difference in RAM becomes apparent.
I personally would have liked to see Apple bump up the base spec to 16GB. But hey, the 16GB models are available if you need them.
Being able to get a 16GB MBA would tempt me about as much as a Retina MBA.
A slightly-lighter rMBP 13 or 15 would probably meet my needs, and would be Retina and 16GB. My MBA 13 2011 only has 4/256 which is kind of limiting. It's not quite worth upgrading just to go to 8/512/non-Retina.
Differentiation. The MacBook is designed to be the thinnest and lightest possible laptop that provides adequate performance for the majority of users. Users who need more ports or more performance are expected to opt for the 13" MacBook Pro Retina, which provides a far better price-performance ratio.
Not unreasonably, Apple assume that most people who need large amount of RAM will also need a fast processor; Adding the option for 16GB on the MacBook would increase the size of the logic board for the benefit of a very small niche of users.
Jony Ive has always been ruthless about avoiding feature creep, going back to the original G3 iMac and the highly contentious decision to drop legacy ports and the floppy drive.
Hopefully the macbook pro with retina display supports 16gb of ram. Everything else sounds amazing, but being limited to 8gb of ram for another few years is going to hold me back.
I'm in the same boat. My current MBP is a 2012 model, yet it has 16GB of RAM already. The biggest boost I would hope to see in a new MBP would come from increasing the RAM (I do a lot of work with large data sets and ETL, plus I run VMs concurrently with MacOS).
There are now enough competitors (Dell and Lenovo for sure) with 32GB that I was among those who were genuinely surprised that Apple kept the cap at 16GB.
My MacBook Pro maxes out at 16Gb. Putting that much in would have cost me 4-5x as much as going for 8Gb! RAM is cheap, but there's a definite sweet spot much of the time.
Seriously? This is a $200 upgrade to a Dell or Lenovo laptop and with their current gen chips and support for more ram it will run circles around the Mac. To me that is a really poor argument. Apple soldered in the SSD and RAM so you can't even upgrade it to a better or more recent SSD as they come out. Not to mention I can't even upgrade the RAM as demands and applications change. Yet we pay a hefty premium for the Apple Macbook, way more then the $200 or so upgrading to a quality SSD would cost you.
Don't get me wrong, I work daily on a Macbook Pro, but I think it is likely limited unless Apple takes the Macbooks seriously. I understand that most people don't need more then 16Gb of Ram daily, but running VM's and IDE's etc can eat through RAM pretty fast, so having 32Gb would really be nice. Apple used to lead the pack when it came to this stuff, now they trail. That is I guess what is mainly just disappointing.
I agree. A 13" rMBP w/ Haswell and 16Gb ram to me is the perfect balance of power, function and footprint. I don't have high hopes for Apple increasing the max to 16Gb though :(
Miffed that you gotta by the $2,600 model with dGPU (which most people don't want or need) to get 16GB of RAM. You can get a 13" rMBP with 16GB for only $1,500.
The latest Macbook Pro 16" supports 32GB or 64GB RAM [1]. It's been that way for a few generations. I have the 2018 model and it has 32GB. I think that might have been the first generation where that much RAM was supported.
I think the problem of the RAM is mostly because the things are soldered and non upgradable. And while 16GB may be definitely enough today, that "may" change in the future.
When I bought my Macbook Pro in 2011 it came with 4GB RAM and at that time it was suffice but through the years I did upgrade it. The RAM and SSD upgrade makes that I still use my machine till today. The fact that you can use a Macbook Pro for years makes it a bit sweeter to swallow the bitter price pill. With the "limited" 16GB RAM I'm not sure that will be also the case here.
Although it's at the point I simply can't afford it anymore. While it's nice to show off all the accessibility options for people with disabilities or health problems, the irony is that because of my disability (which has a big influence on my income) the apple ecosphere is becoming just to expensive.
I guess Apple assumes (probably correctly) that if you really need 16GB of RAM, you can afford an rMBP.
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