By 
Apple MacBook Air M4
The Good Stuff
- Impressive overall performance
- Solid build, slim & lightweight
- Up to 14 hours battery life
- Lower price
- Comes with Apple Intelligence
- Impressive quality display
- Includes Center Stage Camera mode
The Bad Stuff
- Problems with Apple Intelligence
- Not a touch screen
- No drastic changes to the design
New MacBook Air M4
Apple MacBook Air (M4)
“The new MacBook Air M4 promises a more refined and capable experience, ready to tackle your tasks with even greater speed and finesse.“
Because the air just got a whole lot thinner and a whole lot more powerful, we’re diving head first into the world of the new MacBook Air M4, the latest whisper of innovation. Forget those bulky laptops of yesterday – this sleek slice of silicon is here to redefine what it means to be effortlessly mobile and seriously capable. So, if you’re curious about the next evolution of Apple’s iconic ultraportable, you’ve come to the right place. Let’s crack open this delightful device shall we, and see what makes the new MacBook Air M4 tick.
Overview
Let’s begin by seeing what makes the new MacBook Air M4 a step up from yesteryears M3 Apple MacBook. The new MacBook Air M4 isn’t just a minor refresh; it brings significant updates to the table, building upon the solid foundation of the older M3 chip. Here’s a quick peek at the key innovations:
Expect a noticeable leap in processing power and efficiency thanks to the M4 chip. This translates to faster app loading, smoother multitasking, and even more demanding creative workflows handled with ease. Think less, do more.
While the stunning Liquid Retina display remains a hallmark, the new MacBook Air M4 might introduce improvements in brightness, color accuracy, or even a new display technology for an even more immersive visual experience. Keep an eye out for those pixels.
Gamers and creative professionals can rejoice. As the M4 includes a more powerful GPU, meaning smoother graphics performance for your favorite games, and faster rendering times for video editing and 3D work.
Apple’s silicon is renowned for its power efficiency, and the M4 aims to push this even further. Expect even longer battery life, allowing you to work and play for even more hours on a single charge.
While it retains its iconic Liquid Retina display, its weight and thin design, along with the already comfortable keyboard and responsive trackpad, the only design changes are the new color options. From Sky Blue and Midnight, to Silver and Starlight, you have a of trendy colors to go with your personality. And with the input ports, no changes have been made. Yet we could see upgrades in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth standards, offering faster and more reliable wireless connections.
So, while the core DNA of the MacBook Air remains, the new MacBook Air M4 promises a more refined and capable experience, ready to tackle your tasks with even greater speed and finesse. It’s the next chapter in the story of Apple’s beloved ultraportable.
Specs
13-inch MacBook Air (M4)
15-inch MacBook Air (M4)
Reasons to Buy
Bright & Colorful Display
The 13-inch model comes with a Liquid Retina display with a 2560 x 1664 screen resolution, and brightness measuring 500 nits. It’s a fantastic display for all tasks, from gaming and video streaming to video editing and content creation.
The 15-inch display also comes with similar specs, and delivers the same quality, so for the benefit of this review let’s focus on the 13-inch MacBook Air M4. On the top notch of the screen, there’s a 12MP ‘Center Stage Camera’, which is an ultrawide lens; moves with you when you do to keep you in the frame; and is good for video conferencing.
As amazing as the display, one feature that is not available is that it doesn’t come with a touch screen. There’s always the option of picking the iPad Pro 13-inch M4 instead. Overall, both the 13-inch and 15-inch displays looks really amazing. It’s sad that there’s no touch screen.
Same Design, New Colors
There’s nothing ground breaking about the design. From the keyboard and trackpad, to the aluminum finish, the new MacBook Air M4 still looks premium. It’s also really slim, compact and portable. You would swear you stored it in your backpack and forget it cause of its light 1.24 kg/2.7lbs in weight. The only difference it has from the last model are the color options available. There’s Sky Blue, Silver, Starlight, and Midnight to choose from.
With input ports, there’s just two Thunderbolt 4 ports and the MagSafe charging port on the left side, and the headphone jack port on the right. If you want more ports you’ll have to buy a USB-C hub adapter.
Did I mention the keyboard is backlit? Guess I missed that. The backlit keyboard offers a comfortable typing experience. It also comes with all your function keys and a multipurpose power / sleep / Touch ID button that’s useful for unlocking the MacBook Air and logging into various apps and services with your scanned fingertips.
And let’s not forget the audio speakers which is hidden in the hinge below the screen. It’s a 4-speaker stereo sound system that works surprising well. The audio sounds clear and crisp but lacks the bass to make it epic. In the end, no drastic changes to the design of the new MacBook Air M4. Apple has made no drastic changes to the model but has stuck to what works.
Impressive Overall Performance
When it comes to raw power, this M4 chip is a beast. In the Geekbench tests, it scored really high – a whopping 21% faster than the M3 in single-core performance and 23% faster in multi-core!
If you’re into video editing, you’re going to love this! The M4 MacBook Air was a whole minute and a half faster than the M3, which is also awesome for converting 4K videos. The MacBook Pro is still a bit quicker, but that’s because it has a fan for better cooling, which the fan-less MacBook Air doesn’t need.
Now, there’s one tiny thing I noticed. While I don’t have any major complaints about the SSD speed, the read and write speeds on the 256GB storage were a bit lower than I expected. It’s still way better than the M2 MacBook Air, but surprisingly, the M3 actually had faster speeds here.
In terms of connectivity, the MacBook Air M4 comes with Wi-Fi 6E. It’s good, but honestly, I was hoping for Wi-Fi 7, especially since the new iPhone 16 already has it. Wi-Fi 7 would have given it even more bandwidth, less lag, and made it a bit more future-proof.
Despite the SSD speed, if you’re doing a lot of photo and video editing, this M4 MacBook Air absolutely shines. Overall, it’s a super impressive machine.
Impressive All-day Battery Life
So, you know how Apple always talks about how long their batteries last? Well, they claim the 13-inch MacBook Air M4 can go for up to 15 hours of internet surfing, and it actually got super close from our initial tests. And the result, the MacBook lasted for an impressive 14 hours and 51 minutes.
That’s a fantastic runtime, even if it’s slightly less than the MacBook Air M3. But honestly, that’s pretty much within the normal range. In my experience, I can definitely vouch for its staying power. I used the MacBook Air on and off for a good 8 hours, starting at 11 AM, and by 7 PM, the battery was still at a solid 38%. So, it’s certainly got the juice to get you through a long day.
Reasons Not to Buy
Minor Compromises
There’s a number of things to note about the new MacBook Air (M4). Firstly, there’s no touch screen display. Next, there’s no drastic changes to the design. Thirdly, there are some problems with the new Apple AI feature, namely Apple Intelligence.
You might run into some initial hiccups with things like language settings or even finding that some features aren’t available yet. And honestly, the AI capabilities might not feel super revolutionary or fully fleshed out when you first start using them.
However, while the MacBook Air M4 can definitely handle Apple Intelligence, just be prepared that it might not be a perfectly seamless, mind-blowing experience from day one. I’m sure it will be sorted out with software or security updates soon.
Problems with Apple Intelligence
You know how the MacBook Air M4 is being advertised with all those cool Apple Intelligence features? Well, just a heads-up, it might have a few little quirks right out of the gate.
You might run into some initial hiccups with things like language settings or even finding that some features aren’t available yet. And honestly, the AI capabilities might not feel super revolutionary or fully fleshed out when you first start using them.
Basically, while the MacBook Air M4 can definitely handle Apple Intelligence, just be prepared that it might not be a perfectly seamless, mind-blowing experience from day one. It sounds like there might be a bit of a settling-in period while everything gets ironed out.
Verdict
Even though the 13-inch and 15-inch (M4) MacBook Air comes with excellent performance, with a solid build and design, it’s no doubt going to be a favorite laptop for all MacBook fans. Even the superb, colorful display, the long battery life, and the clear crisp audio it delivers are much appreciated.
The input ports are few but it’s enough as it supports an external screen connected, and includes a headphone jack. And the macOS, along with the rest of Apple’s ecosystem feel unmatched compared to other operating systems.
As decent is the Apple Intelligence or Apple’s AI, it feels somewhat lacking as it’s not entirely up to par compared to other AI systems like ChatGPT and Gemini. However, we’ll hopefully see what the future holds regarding system updates in the next couple of months.
With the 13-inch MacBook Air being offered at a relatively lower price, makes it more desirable to buy, and the colors available just further enhances the design of the MacBook Air.
So if you want to experience the best of what Apple has to offer this year, get the new MacBook Air M4 laptop. Click on the red buttons above to see your purchasing options and start using your new MacBook Air. Don’t forget to leave your comments here below, along with any questions you might have 😀
