Macbook air 13 inch review 2023 năm 2024
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The 13-inch Air is fantastic for web browsing, working on documents, coding, and light photo and video editing. And for those seeking a large screen, better speakers, and slightly better thermal performance, we recommend the new 15-inch MacBook Air with the M2 processor as our upgrade pick. Show
We still recommend the M1 MacBook Air as a budget MacBook pick. It’s a fast, reliable laptop and has already been seen on sale for $200 off its list price since the new, 15-inch M2 MacBook was announced. Everything we recommendOur pickThe 2022 M2 MacBook Air has an updated design, a brighter screen, and a better webcam, and it restores the fan-favorite MagSafe port. Buying OptionsBudget pickThe M1 MacBook Air has a comfortable keyboard, good performance, and a reasonable amount of storage—things that haven’t always been true of previous MacBook Airs. Buying OptionsUpgrade pickThe 15-inch MacBook Air has a larger screen and improved speakers, and it runs just a little cooler than the 13-inch version. Buying OptionsOur pickThe 2022 M2 MacBook Air has an updated design, a brighter screen, and a better webcam, and it restores the fan-favorite MagSafe port. Buying OptionsRecommended configuration Processor:Eight-core Apple M2 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Eight-core Apple M2 GPUScreen:2560×1664 IPSMemory:8 GBTested battery life:15.5 hours The M2 MacBook Air has a few great updates over the slightly older M1 model that we think make the device feel better to use. The 2022 M2 MacBook Air has a brighter display that lets you see the screen more clearly outside on a sunny day. And it has a higher-resolution webcam that makes you look a little bit more clear on video calls. Apple also added a MagSafe port, which allows a magnetic charging cable to securely stick to the MacBook Air and harmlessly detach if a passerby’s foot catches it in a coffee shop. However, this laptop isn’t ideal for people who edit photos, videos, or otherwise process large media files. Our tests found the laptop would get hot to the touch even after a minute of exporting video or batch editing photos, to levels that would make the laptop uncomfortable to use. But for everyday work tasks, browsing the web, watching movies, and even playing App Store games, the M2 MacBook Air offers a bunch of great upgrades over the previous generation. Budget pickThe M1 MacBook Air has a comfortable keyboard, good performance, and a reasonable amount of storage—things that haven’t always been true of previous MacBook Airs. Buying OptionsRecommended configuration Processor:Eight-core Apple M1 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Seven-core Apple M1 GPUScreen:2560×1600 IPSMemory:8 GBTested battery life:14.4 hours We recommend the basic $1,000 version of the MacBook Air, which has enough speed, memory, and storage for most day-to-day computer tasks. Apple’s new M1 processor is much faster than the low-power Intel processors in previous MacBook Airs, and its battery life is so good that you should almost never need to charge it during the day if you don’t want to. And unlike previous MacBook Air models, the M1 version doesn’t require a cooling fan, which keeps it dead silent even when you’re maxing out the processor by exporting a video or playing a game. The Air includes only two USB-C ports (which support Thunderbolt 3) plus a headphone jack—but Thunderbolt docks and USB-C hubs and adapters are common enough and inexpensive enough that this isn’t as big of a problem as it used to be. Upgrade pickThe 15-inch MacBook Air has a larger screen and improved speakers, and it runs just a little cooler than the 13-inch version. Buying OptionsRecommended configuration Processor:Eight-core Apple M2 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Ten-core Apple M2 GPUScreen:2880×1864 IPSMemory:8 GB The 15-inch M2 MacBook Air is an upgrade over the 13-inch model, with a significantly larger screen and better speakers. The bigger display feels less cramped than the 13-inch model when you switch between multiple windows or work with two documents side by side. The 15-inch M2 MacBook Air’s upgraded speaker system has a noticeably fuller sound. We also think this laptop is better for editing audio or video than the 13-inch version. In addition to its upgraded screen, its larger size helps the laptop run slightly cooler during processor-intensive tasks like exporting large files. The researchWhy you should trust usDave Gershgorn has reviewed and covered technology since 2015 at publications such as Popular Science, Quartz, Medium, and now Wirecutter. He has also built, repaired, and largely avoided frying his own computers since 2006. At Wirecutter, he tests laptops, monitors, and tablets. Who this is for and when to buyThe best reason to buy a MacBook is that you need or prefer macOS to Windows, or the physical design of Apple’s laptops. The operating system is stable and easy to use, but more importantly, it integrates well with iPhones and iPads—for example, iMessages and SMS messages sent from your Mac also appear on your iPhone and vice versa, and features such as AirDrop and iCloud make it easy to share notes, pictures, videos, reminders, contacts, passwords, bookmarks, and other data between your devices. Macs are also a good choice if you want great support. Apple’s tech support is routinely rated above that of most, if not all, other PC and phone makers, and Apple Stores and Apple authorized service providers offer accessible in-person tech support and repairs in many locations. Apple has moved away from Intel CPUs to its own processors for MacBooks (or “Apple silicon”), and the result is better performance than most Windows laptops in some key ways. Apple’s processors have much better performance and faster integrated graphics, and they get stellar battery life. Their batteries are also less prone to draining quickly when you’re using an energy-hogging app like Zoom or Google Chrome. Macs aren’t a great choice if you have less than $1,000 to spend on a laptop, if you want to run high-end games, or if you want to be able to make upgrades or repairs yourself. Windows ultrabooks provide decent performance and more kinds of ports at or below the price Apple charges for the MacBook Air. Budget Chrome OS and Windows laptops are a better choice if you have only $500 to spend, while business laptops make it easier to fix and upgrade components over time. And Windows gaming notebooks and pro laptops, while typically large and bulky, usually have newer and faster dedicated graphics processors than Apple’s laptops do (and you can buy some of them for less than half of what a 16-inch MacBook Pro costs). How we pickedThe 13-inch MacBook Air (left) and 13-inch MacBook Pro (right). Photo: Dave Gershgorn As of this writing, Apple offers six different laptops in multiple configurations. We considered the following criteria when deciding which ones to recommend:
Our pick: M2 MacBook Air (2022)Photo: Dave Gershgorn Our pickThe 2022 M2 MacBook Air has an updated design, a brighter screen, and a better webcam, and it restores the fan-favorite MagSafe port. Buying OptionsProcessor:Eight-core Apple M2 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Eight-core Apple M2 GPUScreen:2560×1664 IPSMemory:8 GBTested battery life:15.5 hours The M2 MacBook Air is the MacBook we recommend for most people. After launching the 15-inch MacBook Air, Apple reduced the 13-inch model’s price by $100, making an already-great laptop more appealing and slightly more accessible. It’s a spectacularly thin and light laptop. It has a bright screen, which makes it easier to use outside, and a better webcam for video calls. And it has a MagSafe charging cable that easily detaches when snagged by an errant foot. The most noticeable difference between the M2 MacBook Air and the previous M1 generation is the shape of the laptop itself. Previous MacBook Airs featured a “wedge” design, where the laptop gets progressively thicker toward the hinge of the screen. The M2 version is now uniformly thin. This revised design feels fantastic to use and carry around, and makes the laptop even easier to slip into backpacks. The M2 Air also has slightly longer battery life than the M1 version in our tests that simulate web browsing. However, the battery life is shorter when the screen is at maximum brightness; we were still able to work for more than eight hours on a charge. A welcome upgrade to the M2 MacBook Air is a brighter, 500-nit screen, which makes the laptop more versatile and easier to read outside or in bright lighting conditions. (I’ve taken the liberty of writing much of this guide outside on sunny days using the M2 Air, for the sake of an accurate and well-tested piece.) The 13.6 inch, 2560×1664 resolution screen is slightly larger than the previous MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro. The display is also incredibly color-accurate, and our tests measured it as accurate enough for professional creative work. Like the previous M1 MacBook Air, the laptop only supports one external display. At the top of the Air’s display you’ll find a notch for the webcam, much like the notch in iPhones and larger MacBook Pros. Apple has upgraded this webcam to 1080p resolution, a welcome change after the 720p webcams of previous MacBook Airs. The 1080p camera is sharp and made me look a bit less washed-out on video calls. The M2 MacBook Air also includes a MagSafe port. These magnetic charging cables were a mainstay on MacBooks until about five years ago, when the company switched to USB-C ports that offered all-in-one charging, data transfer, and video connection. We’ve missed them ever since, but now they’re back on the MacBook Air, alongside those multi-use USB-C ports. The included MagSafe cable clips onto the laptop’s port securely but easily detaches if snagged by someone’s foot at a coffee shop or if you hoist your laptop in an exuberant eureka moment. You can still charge the laptop via USB-C as well. Apple has also added fast charging, so the Air will charge to 50% battery in just 30 minutes when using a charger with at least 67 W of power. The new MacBook Air also has an updated M2 processor, which is slightly faster than its predecessor, but most people won’t be able to notice the difference while browsing the web and writing documents. In our tests, the new Air performed up to 20% faster in benchmarks and real-world tests like video editing. However, the M2 MacBook Air’s performance comes with two caveats. During any kind of video exporting, photo processing, or other media creation, the M2 MacBook Air gets uncomfortably hot after just a few minutes of work. The processor radiates heat from the keyboard and the bottom of the device, with external temperatures up to 110 degrees Fahrenheit. Separately, the M2 MacBook Air with 256 GB of storage has a slower storage drive than M1 MacBook Airs and M2 versions with 512 GB of storage. While the 512GB version’s storage can be up to 50% faster, you’ll likely only notice the difference while transferring or creating large, gigabyte-size files. Frankly, these are annoying flaws in an otherwise great device that introduces several upgrades many have asked Apple to implement for years. But these flaws are also unlikely to affect a vast majority of users, which is why we’re comfortable still recommending the M2 MacBook Air. Overall the new MacBook Air is a great update to the line, though Apple has some issues to work out in the device’s next iteration. The most affordable Mac laptop: M1 MacBook Air (2020)Photo: Andrew Cunningham Budget pickThe M1 MacBook Air has a comfortable keyboard, good performance, and a reasonable amount of storage—things that haven’t always been true of previous MacBook Airs. Buying OptionsProcessor:Eight-core Apple M1 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Seven-core Apple M1 GPUScreen:2560×1600 IPSMemory:8 GBTested battery life:14.4 hours The 13-inch MacBook Air was released in 2020, and it is still a fantastic laptop for the price. Apple comes out with new machines multiple times a year, and just because there are newer laptops, that doesn’t make this one any worse. It’s more than fast enough for browsing, working on documents, and making light photo and video edits, and it has an excellent high-resolution screen, a great trackpad, a totally silent fanless design, and a reasonable price. Its battery life is excellent, long enough to survive through a full day of work or classes and then some. While there’s a newer version of the MacBook Air with Apple’s M2 processor, it doesn’t offer a major difference in any day-to-day tasks, so we think you can save $200 with the older (but still fantastic) version. The Air’s light weight, solid construction, and industry-leading support make it a great laptop, especially if you also own an iPhone or other Apple devices. The biggest downside is its mediocre webcam—if that’s a priority, we recommend upgrading to the newer M2 MacBook Air, which has a higher-quality webcam and other upgrades for $100 more. We recommend the $1,000 model, which includes an Apple M1 with a seven-core GPU, a 256 GB SSD, and 8 GB of memory. If you regularly work with a couple of dozen browser tabs open or if you edit large image files or videos, consider upgrading to 16 GB of memory for an extra $200. If you need more storage, we recommend adding an external hard drive or portable SSD rather than paying Apple’s upgrade prices. Don’t spend extra for the version of the M1 with the eight-core GPU; most people won’t notice the difference. The MacBook Air has a bright and colorful 13-inch 2560×1600 IPS screen—this display has a higher resolution than the 1080p screens in most of the PC laptops we recommend, and text and images look sharp and detailed. The Air’s display supports both the sRGB color gamut and the wider DCI-P3 color gamut, which can display more shades of certain colors, though this feature isn’t hugely important unless you’re doing high-end film or photography work. The Air’s screen also supports the True Tone feature, which subtly changes the screen’s color temperature to match the ambient lighting in the room. The MacBook Air has two USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 ports on its left side. You’ll need adapters or dongles to plug in other kinds of accessories. Photo: Andrew Cunningham The Air has a headphone jack on its right side plus two Thunderbolt 3/USB-C ports on its left side for connectivity and charging, so to connect your other devices. Each port supports charging, 40-gigabits-per-second data transfers, external displays (up to 6016×3384 resolution, or 6K, though you can only connect one external monitor at a time), and basic USB peripherals like flash drives, printers, and mice. The Air uses Apple’s Magic Keyboard with a scissor-switch design, which it introduced to replace the stiff, shallow, breakage prone butterfly-switch keyboard that came with most MacBook Airs and Pros released between 2016 and 2019. The Magic Keyboard still isn’t as springy as the pre-2016 MacBook keyboards (or Lenovo’s excellent ThinkPad keyboards), but it’s a huge improvement. If you have a 2015 or older MacBook Air or Pro, and you’ve been waiting to upgrade because you didn’t like the keyboard of 2016 and newer models, this keyboard is good enough for you to stop putting off the purchase. The MacBook Air skips the Touch Bar in favor of a row of physical function keys and a standalone Touch ID fingerprint sensor, but most people don’t need the Touch Bar, so we don’t really consider that to be a negative. The new MacBook keyboard trades the shallow, stiff keys from previous generations for springier keys with deeper and more satisfying travel. Photo: Andrew Cunningham All of our picks include the same Force Touch trackpad, which remains the best trackpad we’ve used on a laptop because of its large size and its accuracy. It has no hinge, so it will recognize presses anywhere on the surface, but it also offers haptic feedback that makes it feel and sound as if it were “clicking” even though it doesn’t move. The Air’s trackpad isn’t quite as large as the Pro’s, but the difference isn’t noticeable if you’re not comparing the two side by side. The Air is not an exceptionally thin or light laptop, but it is as slim as it needs to be, and it is comfortable to carry in a backpack or shoulder bag. The M1 MacBook Air has great battery life and lasted longer than 14 hours in our test that simulates browsing the web and watching videos on YouTube. We also found that the M1 MacBook Air’s battery didn’t drain as quickly when using video-chatting apps like Zoom, which are typically pretty hard on a laptop’s battery. Flaws but not dealbreakersThis version of the MacBook Air includes a basic 720p webcam, which is a lower resolution compared with many competitors. This is fine for casual video chatting if, say, the person on the other end of the call merely needs to see your face, and the M1’s image processing does help with exposure and white balance. But the webcam in the $1,000 MacBook Air is still noticeably inferior to the front-facing camera Apple includes with the , or any of our less-than-$100 standalone webcam picks. The M1 MacBook Air uses Thunderbolt 3 for all connectivity, including power. (The only other port is a 3.5 mm headphone/mic jack.) This means that if you own any hard drives, scanners, printers, thumb drives, or card readers that use USB Type-A ports, you need a hub or adapter; similarly, if you want to use an external display or projector, you need the right video adapter. It also can’t connect to more than one external display. That external screen can have a resolution as high as 6K, which covers Apple’s astronomically expensive Pro Display XDR, but even if you just want to connect a basic 1080p budget monitor to your MacBook, the laptop can only handle one of them. Upgrade pick: 15-inch M2 MacBook AirPhoto: Dave Gershgorn Upgrade pickThe 15-inch MacBook Air has a larger screen and improved speakers, and it runs just a little cooler than the 13-inch version. Buying OptionsProcessor:Eight-core Apple M2 CPUStorage:256 GB SSDGraphics:Ten-core Apple M2 GPUScreen:2880×1864 IPSMemory:8 GB The 15-inch M2 MacBook Air is a worthy upgrade over the 13-inch version if you’re looking for a larger screen, better sound, and slightly cooler temperatures when you’re stressing the processor. It has the same general design as the smaller version, as well as the same ports, webcam, and keyboard. This laptop makes the most sense for people who watch movies or TV on their laptops, those who feel cramped using 13-inch laptops, or media editors who don’t have the inclination or budget to shell out for a MacBook Pro. The 15.3-inch screen is the centerpiece of this laptop, and it is the main reason to upgrade. The screen has a 2880x1864 resolution, which is higher than that of the 13-inch version, to match its larger screen size. We’ve come to hold Apple’s displays to a high standard when testing for color accuracy, contrast, and brightness, after years of the company consistently making high-quality laptop screens. The 15-inch MacBook Air passed all of our tests with flying colors, and Apple has yet again made a sharp, accurate display. Color imperfections are so slight that they’re invisible to the naked eye, so this laptop could be used for color-accurate print work. We also measured a contrast ratio of 1383:1, which is better than that of most similarly priced displays. Internally, the only difference in processing power between the 13- and 15-inch MacBooks Air is that the 15-inch version comes with an upgraded 10-core graphics processing unit. Though the 13-inch version can be ordered with that configuration as an option, it comes standard on the 15-inch model. The 15-inch MacBook Air otherwise has the same two Thunderbolt 3 USB-C ports, MagSafe 3 port, and headphone jack as its 13-inch sibling. It also has the same 1080p webcam, which looks very sharp. Photo: Dave Gershgorn We were surprised to hear a noticeable difference between the 13-inch and 15-inch M2 MacBook’s speakers. The 15-inch model has two additional speakers, for a total of six. This setup gives a wider soundstage, and generally increases the volume and fidelity of the audio played. One issue we had with the 13-inch M2 MacBook Air was that it got extremely hot—up to 110 degrees Fahrenheit on its surface—when exporting video or resizing images for even short periods of time. But the 15-inch version is made of more aluminum, by virtue of being larger to accommodate its screen, and that increase in material helps the laptop passively stay cooler. It still gets warm under a heavy workload, but not hot to the touch in the way that concerned us with the smaller model. This better thermal management also is the reason why we’re more comfortable recommending this version to media editors, and it's the budget pick in our guide to Best Laptops for Photo and Video Editing. We recommend the base model of this machine, with 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage. Though this isn’t the configuration in the model Apple sent us to test, the author of this guide bought and regularly uses the M2 MacBook Air with this configuration, after initially testing the laptop, and he hasn’t run into any issues due to insufficient RAM. However, if you edit photos or videos professionally, deal with large datasets, compile code, or other intensive tasks that bog down your computer’s memory, you should upgrade to 16 GB of RAM. We generally think that Apple’s storage is overpriced, however, and find that between cloud storage and external hard drives, upgrading isn’t entirely necessary. Again, this might vary depending on your specific situation, so if you always run out of space on your storage drives, then it might be a worthwhile decision. The competitionApple’s MacBook Pro (M3) is appealing because it harkens back to a time when Apple laptops with Intel processors were underpowered enough that normal users had to buy “Pro” machines to get work done. But that’s no longer the case. Those who aren’t editing HDR video or handling color-critical workflows don’t need the MacBook Pro’s XDR display, the biggest differentiator between the models. And even in our video editing tests, we only see a major difference between Apple’s Pro and non-Pro processors when editing 4K video. Unlike the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M3 Pro and M3 Max chips, the base-model M3 MacBook Pro lacks a third USB-C port on the right side of the laptop. The MacBook Air models we recommend are about a pound lighter, less expensive, and will perform nearly identically for most people. Apple’s other M3 MacBook Pros with M3 Pro and M3 Max chips in 14-inch and 16-inch varieties are incredibly fast and capable machines. However, they’re far beyond the needs of most people. If you’re a photo or video editor, work in 3D design, or compile huge chunks of code, then check out our guide to the best laptops for photo and video editing. Otherwise, you’d be better served by a MacBook Air. Apple’s refurbished store is usually a good place to save money on a like-new MacBook Pro or MacBook Air. The last generation of M2 Pro and M2 Max chips are still extremely competitive, but you’ll get diminishing returns for your money on M1 machines, which Apple still prices quite high. This article was edited by Caitlin McGarry and Arthur Gies. Meet your guideDave Gershgorn is a senior staff writer at Wirecutter. He’s been covering consumer and enterprise technology since 2015, and he just can’t stop buying computers. If this weren’t his job, it would likely be a problem. Further reading
The Best Laptopsby Kimber Streams and Dave Gershgorn From budget-friendly options to thin-and-light ultrabooks to powerful gaming laptops, we’ve spent hundreds of hours finding the best laptops for most people. Is the new MacBook Air worth it 2023?The Apple MacBook Air 15 (2023) is better than the Apple MacBook Air 13 (M1, 2020) in almost every way except for battery life, as the M1 MacBook Air's battery lasts about five hours longer. The 15-inch MacBook Air has a newer, sleeker design, a larger and brighter display, and a better 1080p webcam. Is MacBook Air 13 still good?Overall, the Apple M1 MacBook Air 13 remains a compelling option in 2023–2024, offering a combination of performance, efficiency, portability, and a user-friendly operating system. If your needs align with its capabilities, it's a worthwhile investment that can serve you well for years to come. What is the difference between MacBook Air 2023 and 2022?The Apple MacBook Air 15 (2023) is essentially the same device as the Apple MacBook Air 13 (2022) but with a larger 15.3-inch screen and better-sounding speakers. The 15-inch model's larger chassis helps with thermals, so the keyboard doesn't get as hot, and the SoC doesn't throttle as much under load. Which MacBook is the best in 2023?The best MacBooks of 2023. |
