The 2022 M2 MacBook Air has been in the hands of several different publications for the past week or so. And it seems the results are just as we expected, with the MacBook Air offering a better experience than the 2022 M2 MacBook Pro. However, there are a few caveats that you’ll need to consider if you’re planning on picking one of these up.
The M2 MacBook Air is set to be released on Friday, July 15, with a starting price of $1,199. The price is a bit higher than the M1 MacBook Air for several reasons, largely because the M1 MacBook Air is still available at the $999 price point. But if you’re still on the fence about picking one up for yourself (or someone else) here’s what the reviews have to say.
iMore – Rating: 5 / 5
“This feels like the real start of the M2 chipset generation, hardware worthy of the leaps Apple silicon is quickly making. We can’t wait to see what the next wave of 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros, powered by whatever souped-up M2 iteration Apple conjures, has in store next.”
“2022’s MacBook Air isn’t quite that old friend. It’s got something old (MagSafe), something new (the M2), something borrowed (the design of the 2021 MacBook Pro), and something blue (if you choose the Midnight color option). It’s a new Air for a new era. It will almost certainly become Apple’s best-selling Mac, and with good reason. The definitive Mac of the 2010s has finally entered the 2020s, and not a moment too soon.”
“It’s remarkable to think how far the MacBook Air has come since 2008. It used to be overpriced and underpowered, a testament to Apple’s tendency towards style over substance. Since then, the entire PC industry jumped aboard the ultraportable bandwagon, and Apple found a way to pack a ton of power into a razor-thin case. Now, the MacBook Air is arguably Apple’s best laptop yet.”
“The new MacBook Air is a success on virtually every level. It’s got a better screen, thinner and lighter design, better speakers, a much-improved webcam, an excellent keyboard and trackpad, more convenient charging, and excellent build quality.
But that success comes at a cost, literally, and the performance advancements over the M1 model aren’t as stark as the design and feature improvements are. The M2 Air is a better choice for the vast majority of people over the 13-inch M2 MacBook Pro model, even though the Pro has slightly better performance and longer battery life.”
“The M2 Air, meanwhile, strikes a harmonious balance. It’s thin and light, has some of the line’s best new features and boasts enough power for most needs, without going overboard for daily use. It’s the right MacBook for most consumers and a warm reminder of why the Air struck a chord with so many users so many years ago.”
“The MacBook Air with the M2 chip is making a two-pronged attack on your wallet. For power users, the M2 chip offers significant though incremental improvement over the M1 chip, although the lack of fans will throttle sustained high-level performance. For everyone else, the redesign to the laptop’s screen, webcam, keyboard, and charging makes this feel like a significantly more modern device that feels in tune with the rest of Apple’s current ecosystem.”
“For most of us, the new M2 MacBook Air is all the laptop we’ll ever need. Unless you do some seriously high-end video editing or other computationally-intensive work all the time, you have no need for MacBook Pro. Sure the extra ports of a Pro might seem handy, and the HDR ProMotion display is really nice, but you’re paying a lot more for power you’ll never need, not to mention lugging around a bigger, thicker, heavier laptop.”
Andrew Myrick is a freelance writer based on the East Coast of the US. He enjoys everything to do with technology, including tablets, smartphones, and everything in between. Perhaps his favorite past-time is having a never-ending supply of different keyboards and gaming handhelds that end up collecting more dust than the consoles that are being emulated.
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