MacBook Air, MacBook Pro 2016 Release Date, Price and Rumors; Will We Have To Wait Until WWDC 2016?

Feb 09, 2016 03:01 PM EST

There are all kinds of rumors saying that Apple will announce the 2016 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro Release Date on some March event, very similar to what they did at last year's "Spring Forward" event when Apple announced the 2015 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro.  Of course, rumors can be wrong as there was a lot of buzz at the end of last year saying that Apple would announce their new laptops early, as early as before Black Friday. Yeah, that didn't happen, and this is what is known about MacBook Air, MacBook Pro 2016 Release Date, Price, and Rumors. 

According to a recent article from Yibada, but this new Spring event is expected to unveil the new Apple Watch, the new iPad Air 3, and possibly a smaller iPhone.  Now there are rumors that Apple will announce their lineup of the MacBook Air until sometime after the March event, perhaps at some separate event altogether.    

There is even a report saying that Apple will wait until WWDC, the company's annual Worldwide Developer Conference to display its new laptops, and that won't take place until the summer.  It is possible that with the addition of the new MacBook Pro, there could be three new products added to the lineup for the MacBook Air.  Some industry insider revealed that there will be a 12-inch version of the MacBook Air, as well as some 13-inch and 15-inch models. 

If these new MacBooks were announced at WWDC, that could mean that they won't appear until Q3 or Q4, just in time for the holiday, but with a bit of a gap in between models.  Does this mean that Apple is planning to use its extra few months to make some serious improvements? 

If so, then there have been many reports of what those improvements will be.  One of them would be an update to Skylake, Intel's sixth-generation range of Core laptop and desktop PC processors.  There have also been talks to extend the battery length, and this would be to support the additional power required to run 4K output.  Oh yes, it sounds like it is going there.  There have also been some rumors on Latinos Health saying that the next generation of MacBooks will have a touchscreen feature. 

The big question is the price.  Price cuts last fall led to rumors of newer 2016 models showing up in late 2015, and it isn't known why those cuts were made.  It is possible that the cuts were made to compete with other laptop markets, as Apple does have quite a new challenging competitor as Microsoft has stepped up their Surface Pro series.  It will be interesting to see what Apple does to compete with Microsoft and the laptop PC business other than the iPad Pro.