How the Surface Book compares to the iPad Pro, MacBook Pro, and Surface Pro
Microsoft made a big deal today about going after Apple. And today more than ever, it's worth believing. There are two reasons why: first, Surface sales are on the rise. They accounted for $888 million …
Context & Ripple Effects
Microsoft's Surface event is explicitly framed as an attack on Apple, and for once the numbers back the posture: Surface revenue of $888 million and rising gives the line real commercial weight rather than hobby status. The Wall Street Journal's 'New Hope for Windows Hardware' review two weeks later confirmed the products could carry the claim.
The comparison piece matters because it forces a three-way framing — Apple's iPad Pro, Apple's MacBook Pro, and Microsoft's own Surface Pro — which is exactly how the market came to judge it: a year later reviewers were still running MacBook Pro vs Surface Book head-to-heads, and by 2018 the strategy had matured into what one outlet called a coherent lineup built while Apple increasingly dropped the ball in premium PCs.
First-order effects
- Buyers choosing between a tablet-laptop hybrid and a traditional laptop now have a credible Windows-first answer, with Microsoft competing directly against Apple on both sides of its own portfolio.
- Apple faces a first-party Windows rival with growing sales momentum, not just OEM partners, in the premium device segment.
Second-order effects
- Comparison reviews become the durable marketing battleground — the Surface Book keeps getting benchmarked against successive MacBook Pros, keeping pressure on Apple to differentiate beyond specs.
- The Surface playbook extends into new form factors: the lighter, cheaper Surface Laptop aimed below the MacBook Air and the Surface Laptop 2 refresh show Microsoft widening the line rather than defending a single device.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the PC industry shifts toward first-party vertically integrated hardware as the prestige tier, with Microsoft acting less like a software licensor and more like a direct Apple competitor.
- A sustained Microsoft hardware push pressures Apple to respond on price and form-factor flexibility in laptops and tablets, reshaping where the two companies' product lines collide.
The trend: Microsoft is converting Surface from a niche experiment into a full first-party hardware franchise that competes with Apple across laptops and tablets.