That new Space Black MacBook is sure cool and Patently Apple covered Apple's original patent on this back in a December 2020 IP report titled "Would you love to own a cool Matte Black Aluminum MacBook? Well, Apple Researchers are working on just that." The patent related to techniques for etching the surface of the dyed anodized part such as to form light-absorbing features that are capable of absorbing generally all visible light incident upon the external surface such as to impart a black appearance.

Although enclosures formed of anodized metal can be dyed a variety of different colors, it is well established that dyeing the enclosures certain colors, such as black, is notoriously difficult to achieve. The best attempts in the industry have only been able to attain a dark grey color. Apple's patent detailed how they would achieve a true matte black finish that we see today.

The iFixit team put together a separate report about the Space Black finish pointing to a few Apple patent figures, some of which were presented in our 2022 report as illustrated below.

Apple's patent FIGS 3A and 3B below illustrate various views of a sealed anodized part prior to undergoing an etching process; FIGS. 4A-4B illustrate various views of a sealed anodized part subsequent to undergoing an etching process.

Apple's patent FIG. 5 below illustrates a method for forming an anodized part having light-absorbing features; FIGS. 6A-6B illustrate exemplary images of an anodized part having light-absorbing features, in accordance with some embodiments.

Apple's patent FIG. 8 above illustrates an exemplary graph indicating gloss units and L* value using a CIE L*a*b* color space as a function of etching time.

This is now another patent fulfilled.

The iFixit report on the Matte Black finish for the new MacBook Pro could found here.

The iFixit M3 MacBook Pro Teardown