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What's interesting is that Apple was the one responsible for removing the jack from their phones but they've stubbornly kept them on all their computers.

The only port in common between a 2015 Intel Macbook Pro and a 2026 Macbook Neo is the 3.5mm headphone jack. But also, the only port in common between a 2015 Intel Macbook Pro and a 1991 Powerbook 100 is the 3.5mm headphone jack.

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Because the MacBook isn’t particularly short on space. The MacBook neo appears to have massive blank space blocks where the speakers are.

The 3.5mm jack is fine, there isn’t any need to replace it on the MacBook where you can afford to have both. On the iPhone it makes more sense to use the usb c for audio.

That hasn't stopped them from periodic stalinist redesigns in an attempt to purge other ports from their machines. But the audio jack always survives.

I'm guessing there are some key "user journeys" for scientific / industrial customer base, that involve using 3.5mm jack for something other than audio signal, and said customers would probably sooner change hardware suppliers than deal with dongles and all the problems of introducing USB into the signal path.

My guess is MacBooks are just used for pro audio work a lot where latency is unworkable. While few have latency sensitive work on an iPhone.

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