Whenever someone expresses a desire for Apple to produce a macbook with a 5G or LTE modem, someone always responds with "tether to your phone" or "use a hotspot" and I don't find these comments particularly useful.
Hotspot/tethered data is a separate pool from general mobile data. Once you've consumed the guaranteed "high" speeds (60GB on AT&T's current Unlimited Premium Plan), all hotspot speeds are then hard capped at 128Kbps. AFAIK you can't even purchase additional data at these speeds if you wanted to. Mobile data on an iPhone or iPad won't have that hard cap. Although in the past, once the guaranteed 5G speeds were consumed, your mobile data speed was simply deprioritized but could still achieve 5G speeds based on current network conditions/congestion.
There are scenarios where a notebook would need this much data and speed and there are Windows notebooks available for this purpose. The "just tether your phone" cohort either hasn't considered this or simply dismisses it because they may have not experienced this limitation personally. I suppose that Apple doesn't see the demand for a macbook with a mobile modem or otherwise doesn't see the need to make this option available.
> Hotspot/tethered data is a separate pool from general mobile data.
This is only true if your device has an anti-user feature that prioritizes your carrier's interest over your own. Most Android custom ROMs allows you to bypass this, and iirc jailbroken iPhones too.
The whole point of this is to stop you from using mobile data on your laptops. I find it hard to believe that Apple wouldn't collude with mobile carriers to implement restrictions if they do make such a device.
TIL if you plug your iphone into your mac, it will automatically switch to mobile data, if you have hotspot on, even if you have wifi. Wasn't exactly delighted to find out.
Maybe Apple moving into the modem space will get us there but it does feel like some sort of purposeful market segmentation