New 16-inch MacBook Pro to retain Touch Bar but with physical, separated ESC key and Touch ID key

Apple has a lot of work to do in order to rebuild the once stellar MacBook name following a disastrous past few years with its repeated inability to get its “revolutionary” butterfly keyboard mechanism to work reliably in successive generations. That work will start with the new 16-inch MacBook Pro that could go on sale this year or early next year depending on which rumors you are to believe. Now, 9to5Mac has uncovered a new render of the device in macOS 10.15.1 that shows it will be adopting a different approach to the “love it or hate it” Touch Bar.

Apple continues to insist that large trackpads and the Touch Bar are a better way of interacting with their MacBooks than the touchscreen approach seen in Windows laptops and Chromebooks. Although the Touch Bar has been controversial, Apple will keep it, but has made a couple of changes that may help appease critics of the OLED strip. The most notable, and welcome change is the return of a physical ESC key while the company has also taken the opportunity to separate the Touch ID/Power key.

Of course, although you can’t see it in the render, Apple is reported to have dumped its even more controversial butterfly keyboard mechanism. The 16-inch MacBook Pro will herald the return of a traditional, albeit, low-profile scissor switch mechanism that has long been the mainstay of keyboard designs. In all other regards, however, the new 16-inch MacBook Pro looks very much like the current gen 15-inch models it will be replacing, but perhaps with thinner display bezels too.