Apple finally killed it. After years of keeping the OLED strip on life support, the Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch has officially exited the stage, replaced by the more uniform M3 lineup. But if you look at the secondary market, something weird is happening. People are still buying them. Not just because they're cheaper, but because for a specific subset of users, that glowing, shifting bar was actually… useful?
It's a polarizing machine. Honestly, it might be the most "love it or hate it" laptop Apple ever built. Some folks viewed the Touch Bar as a gimmick that solved a problem nobody had. Others found that once they customized it with tools like BetterTouchTool, it became an indispensable part of their workflow.
The weird history of the 13-inch Pro with a Touch Bar
Back in 2016, Phil Schiller introduced this thing as "revolutionary." It replaced the physical function keys with a Retina-quality multi-touch display. The idea was simple: the keys should change based on what you're doing. If you're in Safari, you see your bookmarks. If you're in Final Cut Pro, you see a timeline scrubber.
It sounded great on paper. In practice? It was a mess at first. The early 2016 and 2017 models were plagued by the butterfly keyboard disaster, which often overshadowed the Touch Bar itself. You’d have a key stick, and suddenly the "revolutionary" input method didn't matter because you couldn't type the letter 'E'.
Then came the silicon shift. When Apple dropped the M1 chip into the Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch in 2020, the hardware finally caught up to the vision. The battery life became legendary. It could run for 17 or 20 hours on a single charge. For the first time, the 13-inch Pro felt like a pro machine again, even if it was stuck with a design from 2016.
Why some people won't let go
I've talked to developers who swear by the predictive text on the bar. It’s faster for them than reaching for the mouse.
Think about scrubbing through a long video. Using a trackpad is fine, but there is a tactile—well, semi-tactile—satisfaction in sliding your finger across the Touch Bar to find that perfect frame. It’s fluid. It’s different.
Also, we have to talk about the "Escape" key situation. Early versions of this laptop didn't have a physical Escape key. It was just a digital button. That was a huge mistake. Apple eventually fixed this in 2020 by shrinking the Touch Bar slightly and adding a physical Esc key and a separate Touch ID sensor. That small change made the laptop ten times more usable for programmers who rely on that key for vim or just exiting full-screen modes.
The Hardware: More than just a glowing strip
Under the hood, the 13-inch model was always the middle child. It sat between the ultra-portable MacBook Air and the "real" Pro models (the 14 and 16-inch).
Because it had a fan—unlike the MacBook Air—the Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch could sustain high performance for longer. If you were rendering a 4K video, the Air would eventually throttle its speed to stay cool. The Pro just kept humming. That active cooling system is why a lot of "prosumers" chose it. They wanted the portability of a small laptop without the performance ceiling of a fanless design.
The screen was another high point. We’re talking 500 nits of brightness and P3 wide color gamut. Even by 2026 standards, those displays hold up remarkably well for photo editing. They don't have the 120Hz ProMotion of the newer 14-inch models, but most people don't actually notice that unless they're side-by-side.
Real-world quirks you should know
- The webcam stayed at 720p for way too long. In a world of Zoom calls, it looks grainy.
- Two ports. Just two. Unless you bought the high-end Intel versions, you were stuck with two Thunderbolt ports on the left side.
- The "Studio Quality" mics are actually pretty decent for podcasting in a pinch.
- It’s the last MacBook to use the "tapered" look before Apple went back to the chunky, retro-box design.
Is it worth buying a used one now?
This is where it gets tricky. If you're looking at an Intel-based Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch (anything from 2019 or older), the answer is almost certainly no. Those chips run hot. They loud. The fans kick in if you just open three tabs in Chrome. Plus, Apple is slowly cutting off macOS support for Intel silicon.
But the M1 and M2 versions? They are absolute steals on the refurbished market.
You get the efficiency of Apple Silicon, the battery that lasts all day, and that weird little Touch Bar that some people find charming. It’s a great student laptop. It’s a great "coffee shop" laptop.
Just be aware of the 8GB RAM trap. Apple sold a ton of these with 8GB of unified memory. In 2026, that’s barely enough for basic multitasking. If you’re buying one today, hunt for a 16GB model. You'll thank me when you aren't staring at a spinning beachball every time you have Slack and Photoshop open at the same time.
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Customization: Making the Touch Bar suck less
If you end up with one of these, don't leave the Touch Bar on the default settings. It’s boring that way.
Most people don't realize you can actually go into System Settings and change what shows up there. You can add a screenshot button, a mute button, or even a "lock screen" shortcut.
But the real pros use BetterTouchTool (BTT).
BTT lets you completely redesign the bar. You can put your calendar events directly on the strip. You can see live stock prices or weather icons. I’ve seen people set up custom macros where one tap on the Touch Bar opens their entire work environment: mail, browser, and music, all positioned exactly where they want them on the screen.
When you do that, the Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch stops feeling like a failed experiment and starts feeling like a personalized cockpit.
The Elephant in the Room: Repairability
Let's be real: these things are a nightmare to fix. The Touch Bar is glued in. The keyboard is part of the "top case" assembly. If your Touch Bar cracks or stops responding, Apple usually replaces the entire top half of the bottom chassis.
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If you're buying used, check the edges of the Touch Bar for any delamination. It looks like little bubbles under the glass. If you see that, stay away. It means the adhesive is failing, and a dead strip is in your near future.
What we lost when the Touch Bar died
When Apple went back to physical keys on the 14-inch and 16-inch Pros, the tech community cheered. "The nightmare is over!" the headlines screamed.
But we lost something too. We lost the ability to have a volume slider that you could just slide. Now, you have to tap a key repeatedly like it's 2005. We lost the emoji picker that was actually quite fast to use while typing.
The Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch represented a time when Apple was willing to be weird. Sometimes "weird" is just annoying, but sometimes it leads to something cool. The Touch Bar was probably 70% annoying and 30% cool, which isn't a great ratio for a $1,300 machine, but it gave the laptop character.
Actionable insights for current and future owners
If you are currently using or looking to buy a Touch Bar MacBook Pro 13 inch, here is the roadmap to making it work for you in 2026:
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- Avoid the Intel models at all costs. The 2016-2019 versions are prone to keyboard failure and overheating. Only look for M1 (2020) or M2 (2022) variants.
- Prioritize RAM over storage. You can always plug in an external SSD, but you can't upgrade the 8GB of RAM. Look for 16GB to ensure the laptop stays fast for the next three years.
- Install BetterTouchTool immediately. The stock Apple settings are the reason people hated the Touch Bar. Customizing it is the only way to make the hardware worth it.
- Check the cycle count. These laptops are often used as "daily drivers" by students. If the battery cycle count is over 500, factor the cost of a battery replacement into your purchase price.
- Clean the keyboard regularly. Even the "improved" scissor-switch keyboards on the later 13-inch Pros don't like crumbs. A quick blast of compressed air every month goes a long way.
The 13-inch Pro is a relic of a specific era of Apple design. It's the bridge between the old "everything is USB-C" philosophy and the new "give us our ports back" reality. It’s not for everyone, but for the right price, it’s still a powerhouse that fits in a backpack better than almost anything else in its class.