How big is the MacBook notch?
Apple does not publish the size of the notch. The tech specs pages for MacBook models list the display size, resolution and pixel density, and a footnote that the displays have rounded corners at the top, but no width or height for the cutout. This page therefore gives no millimetre figure, because any number would be a guess.
What Apple does list
The MacBook Pro (14 inch, 2021) page lists a 14.2 inch Liquid Retina XDR display at 3024 by 1964 pixels. The MacBook Air (13 inch, M5) page lists a 13.6 inch Liquid Retina display at 2560 by 1664. Those numbers describe the whole screen. Apple adds that the screens are measured as a standard rectangle, so the actual viewable area is less.
How software finds the real size
macOS tells each app where the cutout is. Apple’s developer interfaces expose a top safe area for a screen and the usable regions on the left and right of the camera area. An app subtracts those from the full width to work out the cutout, so it does not have to know the model. NotchStar reads these values for the screen that has the cutout and sizes its closed panel from them.
That is why a notch app can match the cutout on different models even though you never tell it which Mac you own.
How to judge it on your own Mac
Look at the top of the screen with a plain desktop and compare the cutout with the height of the menu bar and the text in it. For a design that depends on the exact width, read it from the system the way an app does, as the code and Apple’s developer documentation describe, rather than from a screenshot. A screenshot shows pixels, and the pixel count depends on the resolution you chose in Displays.
Does the size change with resolution
The cutout is hardware. If you change the resolution in Displays, the scale of everything on screen changes, including how large the cutout looks next to the menu text, but the physical shape does not change. See make the menu bar bigger or smaller for the setting.
Read what the notch is for the basics. NotchStar’s Screenshot Tray hangs under the cutout, so it follows whatever size your Mac reports.
