I definitely wouldn’t go with less than 16 GB. I have 32 myself, but that’s for professional work on a rather heavy project.

Also if you plan to run Windows/Linux, well, you’ll need more RAM for virtual machines.

A bigger screen is also very useful, but it’s a tradeoff and not absolutely necessary.

MBP 14 plus an external monitor works great for me. Without an external monitor, I’d probably stick with 16" and use it for all purposes, but I don’t travel often.

Not every workload needs fast RAM. I was absolutely fine at my previous job with 16 GB of DDR3-1600, and that’s for professional software development. The same PC had 8 GB before and was barely usable, so I had to upgrade.

And if you don’t have enough RAM, it doesn’t really matter how fast it is, as you’ll be bottlenecked by swapping, which is limited by SSD speed. If anything, a faster SSD could help, not faster RAM, though trying to compensate with SSD speed for lack of RAM is kind of crazy.

For professionals?! 32 GB is the bare minimum now, what the fuck?

I had 64 GB in my previous PC, that was overkill, I admit, I only got as much because I ran into RAM issues on my previous PC which had only 16 GB (built in 2014) and had to upgrade to 32 GB later on, so I decided 64 is the way to go.

Now I have a corporate MacBook, a corporate ThinkPad and my own PC. All three have 32 GB, and while it’s enough for now, I definitely use more than 16.

16 GB is OK for a professional that only does light office work.