apple – Tech News

Apple launches its new touchscreen MacBook Pro

After years of resisting, Apple today launched a MacBook Pro with a touchscreen starting at $2,899. The release comes nearly 10 years after the company first tried integrating touchscreens on its laptops, with its Touch Bar on a MacBook Pro, which it later went on to remove. To make the new MacBook easy to use, Apple designed a hinge that stabilizes the screen when users touch it. This also helps to stabilize the camera when you are on a video call and trying to access content on the display.
https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/28/apple-launches-its-new-touchscreen-macbook-pro

The iPhone Duo is a messy, expensive good time

The iPhone Duo is the riskiest Apple product in years. It’s a huge rethink of what an iPhone is and could be, and it contains the seeds of many fascinating ideas that might be great in the future. But that future is yet to come. The iPhone Duo is also one of Apple’s messiest first-generation products in a long time, and right now it will delight gadget nerds and early adopters and likely frustrate everyone else.
https://www.theverge.com/tech/1015028/iphone-duo-review

The Apple Next Vision Pro Is Reportedly on ‘Life Support’

Apple could apparently still produce another VR headset in the coming years, but according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the project is on “life support” internally, in large part because a much less awkward product from Meta that can do much of what the Apple Vision Pro can do was just announced last week. “You know, Vision Pro, to me, is an amazing device, right, it’s an absolutely amazing device, but I think of it as, like, the early days of computers[…] It is the early days of a long journey, that’s how I feel about Vision Pro.”
https://gizmodo.com/the-apple-next-vision-pro-is-reportedly-on-life-support-2000817916

New From Apple: Pricey iPhones and a Watch That Eavesdrops

The big phone news, though, was about a device that is kind of not a phone: the iPhone Duo, a $2,000 foldable device that Apple describes as like a “passport.” When closed, it looks like a slightly widened 5.4-inch iPhone; when opened, it expands into a 7.6-inch miniature tablet. Like numerous Android folding devices before it, it relies on a mechanical hinge and a flexible display with a seam (ideally, not prone to failure) in the middle.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/new-at-apple-pricey-iphones-and-a-watch-that-eavesdrops.html

What we expect from the upcoming Apple launch

It’s finally happening — this week, we are (probably) about to see Apple’s first foldable iPhone, more than five years after Samsung launched its first foldable phone. While the foldable iPhone is most exciting, we’re also anticipating news about AirPods, HomePods, and the non-foldable iPhone 18 line.
https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/07/what-we-expect-from-the-upcoming-apple-launch/

MapQuest’s app surges to No. 1 in Navigation after refusing to rename Lake Ontario

The “OG of online mapping,” as the company calls itself, announced on Thursday that it would not change the name of Lake Ontario on its maps to Lake America, despite Trump’s executive order directing the U.S. Department of the Interior to update the lake’s name in the U.S. geographic naming service. As a result, MapQuest’s mobile app downloads soared, sending the iOS app to the No. 4 position on the U.S. App Store’s Top Charts for apps (not including games) as of Monday morning on the U.S. east coast.
https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/31/mapquests-app-surges-to-no-1-in-navigation-after-refusing-to-rename-lake-ontario/

Apple’s Camera-Equipped AirPods Confirmed: See Them in Action

Apple is working on camera-equipped AirPods that appear to be nearly ready to launch, based on a video MacRumors found in the macOS Tahoe 26.7 release candidate. In a short demo, a man holds a book up so the camera in the AirPods can see the title. "With Visual Intelligence, your world becomes savable. See something you like? Just ask me to save it for later," says the voiceover text.
https://www.macrumors.com/2026/08/17/camera-equipped-airpods-macos-26-7/