Stop overthinking Apple’s use of the term “Pro” in its product names
It’s a common staple amongst the corporate tech press group think, and it’s predictable and tired.
Over at The Verge, Mitchell Clark has a lengthy column dissecting Apple’s use of the words “Pro” and now “Studio” in its product branding. Here’s a little taste:
Apple has a “Pro” problem — while some products bearing the label are clearly intended for professional use (like Logic Pro, Final Cut Pro, and the Mac Pro), years of Apple and competitors slapping the name onto wireless earbuds and slightly fancier phones have made it hard to tell what “Pro” even means.
And:
The reason Apple may need to, though, is because it led the industry in thoroughly overusing the word “Pro” to the point where it’s lost all meaning. It’s hard to pinpoint where exactly this started (though, in my mind, it was with the two-port MacBook Pro model), but now the word gets slapped on everything. Want to sell wireless earbuds for even more money? Those are Pro earbuds now. Want to have a regular and fancy version of your phone? No problem, call the nice one the Pro.
This kind of complaint about Apple’s use of the word “Pro” is a longstanding staple of corporate press over-analysis of Apple. A lot of people in media are looking for rigid branding logic, and I can appreciate that to a point! I kind of loved the era of Apple’s iPod naming in which each year’s new model just got a new generation appended to the end. iPod (5th generation). In a way it was maddening when we started getting iPhone names that followed no consistent convention. (For example, the “iPhone 5” was really the sixth generation of the iPhone.)
But Apple’s naming conventions aren’t meant to appeal to hardcore Apple enthusiasts (or even “dispassionate” observers like those in the corporate tech press). Apple is trying to reach an unimaginably vast audience of mostly regular consumers, and the names are meant to a) stand out and b) be meaningful, but meaningful to a wide audience. The “bionic” in Apple’s A15 Bionic chip doesn’t really meaning anything. It’s just intended to convey something abstract like “advanced” to ordinary iPhone customers.
Pro likewise means a couple of things. In Apple’s range of consumer products, it means both “nicer” and “higher-end features.” That may frustrate users and journalists for whom the word “pro” must specifically mean designers, video editors, and web developers, but it makes it really easy for consumers to look at the AirPods line and immediately understand which product is “better.”
And despite what that segment of high end Mac users and journalists want the word Pro to mean, that branding logic works for the Mac too. If you’re in an Apple Store and you see six MacBook Airs on one table and six MacBook Pros on the next, it’s pretty easy to deduce from just the name what the difference is. That helps consumers narrow down their choices, which helps Apple make a sale.
I also find all of the gatekeeping around the word “pro” to be annoying and often hubris-infused. Again, when “pro user” gets mentioned in articles about Apple products, it’s almost always used to mean graphic designer, video editor, and web developer. But the vast majority of MacBook Pro purchasers are none of those things. They’re college students. They’re office workers who need more than one external display and more ports than what a MacBook Air provides. Is the executive assistant who spends all of her day managing hundreds of calendar entries not a “pro” user? Is the analytics person running advanced Excel spreadsheets on multiple displays not a pro user? Heck, I’m an IT guy and the 14-inch MacBook Pro is the perfect Apple product for my daily needs, and I’m mostly working in Safari, Mail, Microsoft Teams, and Numbers.
My message to the Apple community is, stop fretting over Apple’s use of the word “pro” and just buy the Apple product that best suits your needs.
Honestly, I don't think it's that big of a deal. Like you said, "Pro" just means a better (and more expensive) version