13" M1 MacBook Pro in 2025?

The 13’ M1 MacBook pro was revealed on the 10th November 2020 and was the mark of a new era for Apple. It was one of the first Macs to use Apple silicon along with the Mac mini and MacBook Air that were introduced on the same day. The M1 chip is significant in Apple’s history as it marks where they stepped up the game and really broke bounds against the competition.

I use the mentioned 13” M1 MacBook Pro as my daily computer and here is my honest review.

Build and design

Being an Apple product, it has stellar design being made of a unibody aluminum enclosure making it feel very sturdy and there are no creaks in the body. The Silver finish is absolutely beautiful and is the classic Mac design and has held up very well over time. However, I do have alot of scratches on the Apple logo on the lid which I am not sure what they are caused by. The trackpad and keyboard are excellent as any other MacBook. Also, it is really light which makes it perfect for traveling around with.

However, the pros don’t last. First of all, the lack of ports; there are only 2 USB-C thunderbolt 4 and one of them is token up for charging and then a headphone jack. This is not nearly suffificient enough and makes me require a dongle for any serious work. The 13” display is not big enough for my design work and I would prefer a display that is more MASSIVE, even though it is a really high quality display I find that it is not large enough and it is also a bit too dim for the times when I want to work outside, and I live in the UK so it doesn’t even get that bright outside. The Touch Bar is, well, you have heard all about it, it really doesn’t live up to its standards and I would much rather have a function row. Also, the design of the case is reminiscent of old MacBooks from a sort of TAPERED design which does look quite old and I prefer the design of newer MacBooks having a uniform cross section.

Note: I am not, by any means, saying the 13’’ M1 MacBook Pro is ugly in any essence or I do not like the design, it is just worse compared to the models that have come out in the past few years.

Battery:

This is where Apple Silicon thrives. The battery life on the 13” M1 MacBook Pro is stellar. It will last me a whole day of intensive work on framer, Figma and Notion and still have 20% left at the end of the day so I can watch some videos. This is good because I can take it out with me and not worry about the battery. Also, one thing people don’t appreciate enough is the fact that the charging brick is really small. Compared to it’s Windows laptop competition which have bulky, beefy charging cables, this laptop is great for portability as I mentioned above.

The charging is also really quick when you use the brick that comes in the box, in my experience you can go from 20% to 80% in just under 2 hours which is quite good for when I need to top it up quickly. However, I would appreciate it if this laptop did have the magsafe port as it is just easier and also doesn’t take up one of the thunderbolt ports.

Speakers and Microphone:

This laptop is a brilliant all rounder, the speaker and microphone are really good and pack a lot of punch and they sound really good. I am no audio person but watching videos on here with these speakers is absolutely perfect for my needs. The microphone is good enough that I can use it in a Skype Zoom call without needing to switch to a dedicated mic.

Performance:

This is what you are here for. The performance. M1, now approaching 5 years of age is still holding up pretty well. My current version is specced with an upgraded 512GB SSD and the base 8GB unified memory. I find that the M1 chip can pretty much handle my workflow that consists of heavy apps like framer, Figma, Notion and Visual Studio Code. It blazes through all the tasks and I don’t experience many stutters…

…except, when I run 2 of those have apps at once I experience a lot of lag and stuttering due to the measly 8GB unified memory which is not nearly enough for my workflow. I find that I cannot have Notion in the background and work on my framer site at the same time without some lag and stutter.

Another problem I have recently run into is the fans spinning up when I am not even doing work that is that heavy for example, when I work with multiple layers in figma I find that the laptop gets really hot and the fans start to blow. I am not sure what this can be caused by as it used to be fine until quite recently.

So, should you get it?

My serious recommendation: no. If you are a light user, go for it but you would be better off with the M1 MacBook Air due to it’s portability and weight. However, if you really are a ”pro” user who uses applications like Figma, Cursor or Framer, you would be much better off investing in a newer model MacBook. Even the latest M4 MacBook Air is quite a bit more powerful than the M1 MacBook Pro and it also has that new design and the magsafe port.