The MacBook Neo changed expectations from affordable laptops. Built to pamper today’s students and young professionals, it established that no longer do they need to settle for an inferior display, a poorly built keyboard, subpar battery life and average performance. Hence, we expected the Windows universe to react, and they sure did – Dell reintroduced its XPS lineup to India, and the XPS 13 is its answer to the MacBook Neo.
Starting at a price of Rs 79,990, the XPS 13 presents a different idea of a compact ultra-portable notebook that’s relatively affordable for the student community. To make a strong case for itself, the XPS 13 brings certain key features like a 120Hz high refresh rate display, Wi-Fi 7, and a backlit keyboard, all compressed into a package costing Rs 79,900. This makes the MacBook Neo under-specced.
But with two distinct operating systems and radically different engineering trade-offs, which one actually delivers better value?
Dell XPS 13 vs MacBook Neo: Key categories compared
Price plays a major role in this category, and hence, we look at what the base variants of these laptops set you back.
– Dell launched the XPS 13 at Rs 79,990 for the base variant.
– The MacBook Neo costs Rs 79,900, which is almost on the same price level as the XPS 13.
While both devices bring along individual discounts and purchase offers, the base price remains the same. Hence, it all goes down to what these laptops offer in terms of experience.
1. Design and portability
At 1 kg, the new XPS 13 is over 200 grams lighter and 3 per cent smaller in footprint than the 1.23 kg MacBook Neo, all while managing to fit a slightly larger 13.4-inch screen compared to Apple’s 13.0-inch panel. This makes the XPS 13 a tad lighter while fitting a larger display.
Hence, for students sprinting across campus or professionals commuting on the metro, the lighter laptop will always have an edge.
Note that both laptops feature solid aluminium unibody builds, but Dell includes a critical everyday feature that Apple omitted – a backlit keyboard. Hence, the MacBook Neo’s non-backlit keys can make late-night study sessions or dim lecture halls frustrating. The XPS 13 keeps every key illuminated in low-light environments.
2. Display
The Dell XPS 13 packs a 2.5K InfinityEdge LCD with 100% DCI-P3 colour coverage, interactive touchscreen support, and a 30–120Hz variable refresh rate. Hence, scrolling through long documents, PDF textbooks, or web feeds should feel fluid, and the touchscreen functionality should make it easy for quick navigation gestures.
On the other hand, the Apple MacBook Neo features a bright (up to 500 nits) 60Hz Liquid Retina display. While it lacks touch capabilities and 120Hz smoothness, it boasts crisp colour calibration out of the box.
On the whole, the Dell XPS 13 offers a superior display experience with all the features it provides.
3. Performance
Under the hood, Apple brought its smartphone silicon prowess to the laptop arena by powering the MacBook Neo with the A18 Pro chip. Benchmarks show the A18 Pro delivers impressive single-core CPU speeds and near-instant application launches. For basic web browsing, word processing, and light photo editing, macOS feels blazingly fast. However, the Neo is strictly capped at 8GB of unified memory with narrow memory bandwidth and slow SSD swap memory, which can choke under heavy browser-tab usage or resource-heavy tasks – a drawback we observed during our extensive review.
On the other hand, the Dell XPS 13 is powered by Intel’s latest Core Series 3 processors. On paper, the XPS 13 promises to handle multi-threaded workloads efficiently. More importantly, Dell allows configurations with 16GB or 32GB of RAM, giving power users and engineering students the headroom required for heavy multitasking on Windows 11 – an option lacking on MacBook Neo.
Dell packs a 52Wh (Watt-hour) 3-cell battery into its 1 kg frame. Apple fits a significantly smaller 36.5Wh battery into the MacBook Neo. Dell rates the XPS 13 for up to 17 hours of continuous local/online video playback, whereas Apple claims up to 16 hours of video streaming and 11 hours of wireless web browsing for the MacBook Neo. Both devices charge via USB Type-C and support quick-charging, shipping with ultra-compact GaN (Gallium Nitride) wall adapters in the box. The XPS 13, as a result, seems to have an advantage here.
Our conclusion
The Dell XPS 13 seems to be a better laptop overall when compared to the Apple MacBook Neo. However, both these laptops have their own advantages and disadvantages, which leads us to arrive at this conclusion:
Buy the Dell XPS 13 if:
– You are a student or night-owl worker. The backlit keyboard, 1 kg ultra-light frame, touchscreen, and Wi-Fi 7 support deliver a more versatile daily machine for campus environments.
– You need more than 8GB RAM. Windows 11 thrives with over 16GB RAM, thus making higher-tier XPS 13 models far more future-proof for heavy multitasking. Note that the base model comes with 8GB RAM only.
– You want maximal connectivity. Wi-Fi 7 guarantees faster speeds on crowded public networks.
Buy the Apple MacBook Neo if:
– You live in the Apple ecosystem. Features like iPhone Mirroring, AirDrop, Universal Clipboard, and seamless iCloud sync make it an unbeatable companion for iPhone users.
– You prioritise macOS efficiency. For writing, media consumption, and general productivity, the A18 Pro chip offers remarkable battery efficiency and silent performance in a sleek aluminium shell.