Want a MacBook Neo? You'll be waiting 2-3 weeks for delivery — and rumor has it delays could get much worse

Apple can't make enough of its budget laptop

08 Apr 2026, 14:54 by https://www.techradar.com/uk/author/darren-allan · TechRadar

News By Darren Allan published 8 April 2026

(Image credit: Jacob Krol/Future)

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All flavors of the MacBook Neo are delayed by 2-3 weeks at Apple's online store
You'll be lucky to pick one up at a bricks-and-mortar Apple store in the US, too, although some outlets do have stock
The popularity of the laptop seems to have taken Apple by surprise, and rumor has it that supply issues could be a real problem going forward

The MacBook Neo is a victim of its own popularity, it seems, and if you're ordering the notebook online, it won't be delivered for quite some time — and there are rumblings that Apple is going to struggle meeting demand going forward.

First off, 9 to 5 Mac flagged up that no matter which configuration of the MacBook Neo (model or color) you select at Apple's US online store, there's a 2-3 week waiting time before the laptop ships.

Even if you're heading to a bricks-and-mortar Apple store, you most likely won't be able to buy a MacBook Neo there and then. While availability varies as you might imagine, you'll typically be waiting 3-4 weeks for an in-store pickup to be ready. That said, some stores do have on-the-day availability for the Neo, if you get lucky.

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Checking in the UK, I can see it's a similar situation for online orders via the Apple website, although you can pick up a MacBook Neo right away in most Apple stores in the country.

Here's where this gets really interesting — in a very tricky way for Apple — because as MacRumors spotted, we're hearing from a tech writer in Taiwan (an ex-Bloomberg reporter, Tim Culpan) that the Neo has been way more popular than expected.

The theory is that Apple drafted in A18 Pro chips that couldn't be used in the iPhone 16 Pro due to having a faulty GPU core. Instead of a 6-core GPU as needed in the iPhone, these chips only had 5-cores, but were otherwise good – so with the faulty core disabled, they were put in the MacBook Neo.

This is a common strategy for chips that don't make a certain grade, as it avoids the silicon going to waste. However, it means that Apple only had a certain amount of CPUs based on the shortfall with these iPhone chips. That isn't going to be enough, Culpan informs us, now that sales of the Neo have taken off so strongly, and therefore Apple could be in some hot water here, or so the rumor runs — obviously add plenty of seasoning to this claim.

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