The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is often significantly more expensive, offering a high-quality display, long battery life, and a lightweight, slim design, which is excellent for portability and general use. Its MacOS operating system is preferred for certain software and development environments, and this MacBook excels with tasks that benefit from its strong CPU and integrated graphics, like video editing or 3D design. Give Feedback
this description is based on the product variant with some specs and product variant with some specs. At the time of writing, the variant with some specs cost some dollars and the variant with some specs cost some dollars.
Advantages of the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023)
Very good for general use
Very good for software development
Excellent overall display quality
Best in class overall build quality
Good portability
Best in class battery life
Best in class speakers
Best in class keyboard
Advantages of the Gigabyte Aero 5
The Gigabyte Aero 5 has no clear advantages over the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023).
Key differences
General Use
8.8/10
7.9/10
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
3840 x 2160
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
OLED
487.0 nits
DISPLAY BRIGHTNESS
446.0 nits
17.5 Hours
BATTERY LIFE
7.0 Hours
9.5/10
KEYBOARD QUALITY SCORE
8.5/10
7.6/10
PORTABILITY SCORE
6.7/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is very good for general use, while the Gigabyte Aero 5 is good.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) excels in general use due to its high-quality mini LED screen with better color accuracy and brightness, more RAM, and a powerful Apple M3 Pro chip, which together with its longer battery life and lighter build, increases portability and performance. Meanwhile, the Gigabyte Aero 5 is a good fit for general use because it offers more storage and an excellent OLED screen, but it's bulkier with a shorter battery life, and while it has a strong CPU and GPU for diverse applications, it doesn't match the MacBook's optimized balance of power and efficiency.
Content Creation
8.9/10
8.2/10
9.1/10
OVERALL CPU SCORE
9.1/10
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
3840 x 2160
18.0 GB
RAM
16.0 GB
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
OLED
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Gigabyte Aero 5 are both very good for content creation, though the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is somewhat better.
PerfectRec’s Content Creation Score takes into account the many different features of the laptop that make it more or less suitable for photo editing, video editing and other content creation tasks.
Software Development
8.9/10
7.9/10
9.1/10
OVERALL CPU SCORE
9.1/10
18.0 GB
RAM
16.0 GB
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
3840 x 2160
9.5/10
KEYBOARD QUALITY SCORE
8.5/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is very good for software development, while the Gigabyte Aero 5 is good.
PerfectRec’s Software Development Score takes into account the many different features of the laptop that make it more or less suitable for software developers.
Screen Quality
9.3/10
8.6/10
16.2in
SIZE
15.6in
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
3840 x 2160
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
OLED
120Hz
REFRESH RATE
60Hz
487.0 nits
BRIGHTNESS
446.0 nits
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 has a better screen than the Gigabyte Aero 5 for general use, AI, engineering and design, software development, and content creation.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 uses a high-resolution, bright display that is known for its wide color gamut, offering vivid and accurate colors for general use and design tasks, but it typically has a standard refresh rate, making it less ideal for 3D applications that benefit from faster screen updates. On the other hand, the Gigabyte Aero 5 also boasts an excellent display with vibrant colors and high resolution, appealing to both general users and professionals in engineering and design who need accurate color representation. However, like the MacBook, it falls short for 3D and gaming where a high refresh rate is crucial for smooth motion rendering.
Battery
17.5 Hours
7.0 Hours
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 has 17.5 hours of battery life. The Gigabyte Aero 5 has 7 hours of battery life.
Battery life estimate is based on a mix of common use patterns. More portable and higher performing laptops tend to have less battery life.
Portability
Good
Fair
16.2in
SIZE
15.6in
4.7 lbs
WEIGHT
5.0 lbs
0.6in
THICKNESS
1.0in
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) has good portability, while the Gigabyte Aero 5 has only fair portability.
The most portable laptops are small, thin, and light.
Build Quality
10.0/10
7.8/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) has best in class build quality, while the Gigabyte Aero 5 has good build quality.
PerfectRec’s Build Quality Score incorporates case materials, display and keyboard flex, hinge quality, and overall reliability.
Cost
$2,499
$1,250
$500
$1,000
$1,500
$2,000
$2,500
$3,000
$3,500
$4,000
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) has a price of $2,499 and the Gigabyte Aero 5 costs $1,250.
The Gigabyte Aero 5 and Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) are both good for gaming and AI.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is equipped with its own high-performance GPU and a high refresh rate display, making it suitable for 3D work, but keep in mind that its macOS may limit gaming options due to incompatibility with many games.
Engineering and Design
8.9/10
8.7/10
9.1/10
OVERALL CPU SCORE
9.1/10
6.2/10
OVERALL GPU SCORE
8.3/10
18.0 GB
RAM
16.0 GB
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Gigabyte Aero 5 are both very good for engineering and design.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 with its Apple M3 Pro CPU and integrated M3 Pro GPU delivers powerful performance for engineering and design, complemented by a high-quality Mini LED screen; its build and hardware make it quite portable despite its size. The Gigabyte Aero 5 features a high-performance Intel CPU and Nvidia GPU, alongside an OLED screen providing exceptional color accuracy and contrast, favoring those who may compromise on portability for top-tier screen quality and graphical power.
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How the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and the Gigabyte Aero 5 compare to other laptops
"The Apple MacBook Pro 16 2023: M2 Max challenges GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. The new MacBook Pro 16 2023 with the M2 Max SoC is the most powerful laptop Apple has on sale right now. While we do not get the expected performance and efficiency improvements from completely new 3 nm chips, which we expected ahead of the launch, the 2023 model is still a solid update. The CPU of the M2 Max can be up to 20 % faster than the old model and we also see an advantage of 25-30 % for the GPU with 38 cores. However, both components also consume more power, so the efficiency did not change that much under maximum load."
"It is unfortunate that the Gigabyte AERO notebook series have seem to lost its charm, as it’s not exactly any much different from the AORUS series now. Regardless, content creators and designers will certainly still appreciate the features on the AERO 5 XE4, which are fundamental to their work. This largely revolved around the notebook’s display, which is colour calibrated and validated, high resolution (4K) and with great AMOLED colour representation. Now that the AERO 5 XE4 has improved its performance with the latest CPU and GPU, the professionals can also appreciate the improved productivity from the notebook."
Get a great deal on the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) or the Gigabyte Aero 5
About Apple
Apple, an American technology company, is one of the world’s largest company in terms of market capitalization. Their MacBook laptops feature a slim, minimalistic design, class-leading battery life, and premium display and speaker quality. In 2020 Apple switched from using Intel processors to their own silicon chips which have excellent performance and efficiency. The macOS operating system is the second most widely used OS, after Windows.
About Gigabyte
Gigabyte is a Taiwanese computer hardware manufacturer. While Gigabyte mainly focuses its business on desktop hardware, Gigabyte is known for its value-oriented G series laptops, thin and light Aero series, and performance-oriented Aorus series. Gigabyte laptops offer a strong value proposition to compete with mainstream alternatives.
This information was produced and vetted by the PerfectRec laptops team. We are a product research and recommendation organization that meticulously reviews and evaluates the latest laptop information and makes it digestible for you.
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Joe is an entrepreneur and lifelong electronics enthusiast with a Ph.D in Economics from the University of Michigan.
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Staff Expert & Software Engineer
Chandradeep is a staff expert and software engineer and expert in televisions and monitors. He’s been making monitor recommendations for ten years.
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Laptops Expert
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