If you cast your mind back to Apple's 'Let Loose' event, you’ll remember that one of the biggest selling points of the OLED iPad Pro was just how thin the tablet is. With the “thinpossible” tagline, Apple made a big fuss about how it’s currently the thinnest Apple device ever - and this could be the start of a new downsizing trend.
According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, this is just the beginning of Apple’s thin and trim era. In his Power On newsletter, Gurman details the company’s plan to bring out a “significantly skinnier” iPhone next year. He also notes that thinner MacBook Pro models and Apple Watches are also on the way, although the leaker gives us no further information than that.
Gurman further observes that this move may lead to the creation of the “thinnest and lightest products in their categories across the whole tech industry,” no less.
Of course, while Gurman has a long history of being one of the more respectable sources for Apple leaks, we have to take every rumor with a grain of salt, no matter where it comes from. If it’s true, however, this move to thinner devices would be a shift in Apple’s strategy, considering the last few iterations of its iPhones and MacBooks have remained the same size for the most part.
Furthermore, this rumor makes us wonder just how much thinner Apple products can actually get without turning into potentially fragile pieces of paper-like hardware! At some point, I struggle to imagine the reasons for further pushing the boundaries of ever-thinner technology besides just seeing if it’s possible.
Still, it will be interesting to see if there’ll be a future trend where rival tech giants rush to match Apple in making their products a lot thinner. While I’d hesitate to call Apple a trendsetter, it’s true that it is such a popular brand that the company tends to set the tone for the computing industry in a lot of different ways. Moves like ditching headphone jacks or the grey MacBook style and their simplicity have definitely had an impact across other rival brands.
So, if Apple decides to make its various product ranges a whole lot thinner, MacBooks included - could the rest of the computing industry follow? It’s not unthinkable.
