I love Thinkpads but the trackpads, screen, and build quality leave a lot to be desired. Every Mac is the same level of assembly/quality but ThinkPads vary too much from one to another.
The prices for the high-performance models are almost as high as Apple and the power bricks are actually bricks.
I have a t490 with 500 nit display. 100% ARGB / SRGB. I haven't seen any macbook display that's sharp. Btw I have a personal 2012 Retina Macbook pro & a 2018 Macbook pro that I use for work for frontend.
The 2012 Retina displays are no less sharp than the best display on the T490. Are you sure you aren't just comparing macOS to Windows?
I'm the biggest critic of modern Apple notebooks there is, but I can't fault the quality of the MacBook Pro displays. They are, and have been for a long time, the best displays on notebooks.
How is the keyboard on the T490? I have a T460s at home where I like the keyboard a lot. I have a T470s at work, where the keyboard is a little less to my liking and I tried a colleagues T480s where it felt awesome again - so how about the T490? Can't really decide between T480s, T490, T490s or 6th gen X1 carbon.
The T490 does 100% Adobe RGB? I'm impressed. Seems like Lenovo has been really listening to people complain about the horrendous gamut ThinkPads have been afflicted with for some time.
The modern X1 carbon does not have this problem. I’m using the 8th generation and the trackpad is very good, along with a screen that accomplishes full-on HDR, and much better color depth.
There are other issue with almost every ThinkPad, X1 Carbon included.
Speaker quality is a lottery with every model, and none of them are as good as the 2013+ MacBook Pro. Coil whine and electrical noise is almost a given from either the machine itself or Lenovo's chargers. The quality of the audio output on the machine is almost certainly not as good as that on the MacBook Pro.
Oh, and I can all but guarantee that the battery in a MacBook Pro will have better longevity than that of the ThinkPad.
You also have to pay almost MacBook Pro prices to get decent specs out of the Lenovo machines.
The prices for the high-performance models are almost as high as Apple and the power bricks are actually bricks.