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Microsoft’s 15-inch Surface Laptop Ultra starts at $2,599, positioning it below Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Pro, which starts at $2,999. The price difference gives Microsoft a lower entry point for customers considering a large-screen laptop, while the company says the Surface is aimed at creators and developers.
The Surface Laptop Ultra is set to launch on October 16. Microsoft is also offering eligible MacBook owners an incentive to switch: customers who trade in an eligible MacBook when purchasing the new laptop can receive up to $1,000 cash back. The offer is described as a bonus for people ready to “break up” with their MacBooks.
That potential cash back is a maximum, rather than a guaranteed amount for every trade-in. The offer applies to eligible MacBooks, so customers will need to meet Microsoft’s trade-in requirements to qualify. Combined with the Surface’s lower starting price than the 16-inch MacBook Pro, the trade-in promotion gives MacBook owners another price consideration as they weigh the two laptops.
The Surface Laptop Ultra is powered by Nvidia’s Arm-based RTX Spark chip, pairing a Blackwell RTX GPU with up to 6,144 cores and a Grace CPU with up to 20 cores. It supports up to 128GB of unified memory, while a new thermal architecture is designed to support the hardware. The laptop runs Windows on Arm, with Microsoft’s Prism emulation handling x86 apps.
Microsoft calls it the most powerful notebook it has made and says the display is its brightest, sharpest, and most vivid in a Surface device. The mini-LED touchscreen supports gestures and navigation, and its peak HDR brightness is 25% higher than the M5 MacBook Pro’s. However, the screen does not support pen input.
Microsoft calls the Surface Laptop Ultra its most powerful notebook to date, pairing that claim with a design that is lighter than the 16-inch MacBook Pro. The 15-inch laptop also includes a large haptic trackpad and upgradeable storage, giving users a tactile input surface and the option to update its storage.
For charging, Microsoft has added Magnetic Connect, a magnetic USB-C charging feature it describes as the “world’s first built-in magnetic USB-C charging on a laptop.” It provides a magnetic connection while using USB-C charging.
The Surface Laptop Ultra has a broad selection of ports for connecting accessories and peripherals:
Together, the port selection includes options for newer USB-C devices as well as USB-A accessories, HDMI connections, SD cards and wired headphones. The combination of upgradeable storage, Magnetic Connect charging and multiple built-in ports gives the laptop a range of practical features alongside its lightweight design.
Alongside the Surface Laptop Ultra, Microsoft announced the $5,999 Surface RTX Spark Dev Box, positioning it as a competitor to devices such as the Mac Studio and Mac mini. It uses an Nvidia RTX Spark chip and offers up to 1 petaflop of AI performance, with support for AI models containing up to 120 billion parameters.
The Dev Box extends Microsoft’s push toward creators and developers, a market the company is also targeting with the Surface Laptop Ultra. Microsoft describes that laptop as built for demanding creative, software development, AI, engineering, and 3D workloads. The Dev Box, meanwhile, is focused on AI performance and large models.
Apple’s rumored MacBook Ultra could also appeal to users looking for a high-end creative machine. It is expected to feature an OLED touchscreen and M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, along with a thinner and lighter design. Those details remain rumors, while Microsoft has announced the Dev Box and its specifications. The two products therefore represent different approaches: Microsoft is emphasizing a desktop-class AI system, while Apple’s rumored laptop is expected to combine a touch-enabled OLED display with its next-generation Pro chips.
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