2021 MacBook Pro teardown reveals easy-to-remove batteries

Apple may have given us a glimpse of what the new 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros’ insides look like, but it had a surprise waiting for the folks at iFixit nonetheless. The iFixit team said removing batteries from recent MacBook Pros required “infinite patience, a bottle of isopropyl alcohol, and an optional bottle of human-friendly alcohol.” They expected the same from this generation of laptops but were pleasantly surprised by the presence of pull tabs instead when they tore down the new MacBook Pros.

The outer battery cells have noticeable pull tabs that you can, well, pull to detach them from their adhesive underneath. Even the central battery cells have pull tabs — they’re just harder to find inside the laptop chassis beneath the trackpad. iFixit was able able to confirm that the laptops will recognize and work with battery replacements just fine.

In addition, most of the laptops’ ports, except for the SD card reader and the HDMI port, are modular. That means they can be easily and cheaply replaced if they suddenly break or malfunction. Conversely, the laptops’ keyboard will still be hard to replace, but hey, at least the days of Apple’s butterfly keyboard are now …read more