Hello all, I am starting college for the first time this spring semester and am now looking for a new laptop to buy. I’m a VERY accident prone person when it comes to electronic so my plan was to get a macbook with apple care in case I screwed it up somehow. I’ve noticed none of the current or recent year models have usb ports??? I’m a very big lover of thumbdrives and don’t really want to part from my use of them. WHERE DID THE USB PORTS GO??? WHY DID THEY GO MAN??
I guess I meant usb-a? Not a tech oriented person guys 
For a simple answer, they do this all to make a laptop slimmer and because of this they are finding ways to use USB-C with everything which would require a dongle if you are using flash drives, mice, keyboards, etc. It seems very stupid in my opinion but that is just the way 2025 is I guess.
I think you have a previous model, like an M1 or M2 variant because the M3 and M4 have all the ports again.
Also all MacBooks have USB ports, they’re just USB-C ports, there’s many hubs for them and even thumb drives and external SSDs.
To note here, I do have a MacBook, the 1 with a single port, and a MacBook Pro 16" M4 Max.
@Blakeley
Just to be clear, while the newer MacBook Pros have more ports than previous models (including hdmi, sd card and a dedicated charging port), they definitely do NOT have usb-a ports.
Sage said:
@Blakeley
Just to be clear, while the newer MacBook Pros have more ports than previous models (including hdmi, sd card and a dedicated charging port), they definitely do NOT have usb-a ports.
Then use a USB-C hub, they’re useful because they also work on phones, giving your phone more ports😅
Also USB-A is slowly being phased out, eventually we all have to go to USB-C.
@Blakeley
My mom has a dell xps and that’s even worse only ports are 2 type c one on either side no headphone jack no sd card reader no Kensington lock either just 2 type c ports
Sawyer said:
@Blakeley
My mom has a dell xps and that’s even worse only ports are 2 type c one on either side no headphone jack no sd card reader no Kensington lock either just 2 type c ports
The 2018 MacBook refresh has 1 port, which means you can’t charge and use the port at the same time 
@Blakeley
Sound about right for a company that puts power buttons on the bottom of computers… and charging jacks on the bottom of mice. Appearance over function!
Dane said:
@Blakeley
Sound about right for a company that puts power buttons on the bottom of computers… and charging jacks on the bottom of mice. Appearance over function!
What Mac has a power button on the bottom?
Dane said:
@Blakeley
Sound about right for a company that puts power buttons on the bottom of computers… and charging jacks on the bottom of mice. Appearance over function!
In their words “Battery lasts the entire day”, funny enough the battery life was shorter than a Surface Book 2 15" on Linux
the industry is slowly moving into one universal port for literally everything, that is why most phones, tablets, earphones, headphones, etc., come with the same port, reducing proprietary cables and the amount of cables wasted, in 10+ years all devices will use the same cable, making it easy to charge them and share them around.
@Tan
In the EU is this mandantory be law.
The USB C Port.
U can Connect all with this. They mean, U only have one charger.
This is a little bit dumb. Tablet, Laptop, Smartphone, shaver, watch…
How many charger I have? 
@Sullivan
Yep, supposedly that’s why the new iPhone went USB C. The EU.
Funny story, my wife got a new iPhone the other day, and I noticed she was still using her old phone. I asked her what the deal was. She was a little mad that apple switched to USB C, and they didnt include one. So she ordered one. From apple, of course.
Then I walked into living room with like 12 USB C cables. “Babe… the rest of the world has been using these for years.”
@Jules
something like that happened to mi too! My mom gifted me airpods 4 and they use usbc, and she thought i didn’t have a charger , so she bought one from apple 
Turns out in my household almost everyone has an android phone, so there are tons of USBC cables around!
@Tan
Oh wow most people are so clueless about tech
@Sullivan
And this is stupid law because it doesn’t say what standard it has to be and there’s at least 50 of them.
@Tan
Yeah bluetooth used to eat away at batteries and people dreaded using wireless headphones but that isn’t really an issue anymore. I’m all for making usb-c the standard across all platforms I just wish software support also came with it.
Get an USBC hub.
Or get a Thinkpad.
Industry has moved to usb c, not just apple. usb c to old usb a adaptors are like under 10 bucks. No MacBook Pro since 2015 has had usb a, and no MacBook Air since 2017 has had usb a so you are a little late to the party noticing here lol, all Macs have usb c which is miles better than usb a and can do so may more things like display out, charing both directions, thunderbolt for external high speed PCIE devices and more.
@Drew
These comments make me feel super late lol… idk I currently just have an old HP with multiple usb ports and my middle school gave us MacBooks that had usb (not usb c) ports so ig looking at MacBooks for the first time since 2016 and not seeing any usb(a??) ports kinda shocked me. Time for an adaptor I guess
Would like to add that I’m in no way a techy person, I’m more of a hand me down person buying my own laptop for the first time 