After months of rumors, Apple revealed the 15-inch MacBook Air during the WWDC event on 5 June 2023. Here’s everything that was revealed about the new laptop, which Apple claims is the thinnest 15-inch laptop on the market.
Design
- 11.5mm thin
- 3.3lbs
- 4 colors
The new Air has the same square-edged metal construction as the 13-inch MacBook Air M2, but obviously this time the chassis is a little larger to contain the 15.3-inch panel that is the star of the show.
All this growth hasn’t robbed the Air of its namesake though, with Apple stating that it is a remarkably thin 11.5mm and weighs in at just 3.3 pounds.
Apple claims that this makes it 40% thinner and half a pound lighter than the “best-selling 15-inch Intel Core i7 PC laptop,” although we don’t know for sure what that particular model could be.
Apple
Apple equips the new Air with two Thunderbolt ports (with support for external displays up to 6K), a 3.5mm headphone jack (hooray!), plus a MagSafe charging port.
The 15-inch MacBook Air is available in four colors, including starlight, space grey, silver and midnight. It not only looks good, but thanks to Apple revealing that it uses 100% recycled gold plating and tin soldering in the printed circuit boards, plus 100% recycled cobalt in the MagSafe connector and 90% recycled steel in the battery tray, the 15-inch MacBook Air is also better for the environment than many of its rivals.
Display
- 15.3-inch Liquid Retina display
- 500 nits
- Supports up to 1 billion colors
Obviously, one of the main selling points of new MacBook Air is the 15.3-inch Liquid Retina display. This marks the largest MacBook Air we’ve seen so far, and with over 500 nits of brightness and support for up to 1 billion colors, it should deliver a very pleasing experience for users.
Using the same mystery PC as with its dimension claims, Apple states that the panel is twice the resolution and 25% brighter than the Windows-based device.
Apple
Performance
- M2 chip
- Up to 24GB fast unified memory
- 18 hour battery life
At the heart of the new Air is Apple’s M2 chip, which boasts an 8-core CPU (4x performance, 4x efficiency), plus a 10-core GPU and 16-core Neural Engine for blazing fast speeds that have already impressed us on the 13-inch MacBook Air M2. There’s support for up to 24GB of fast unified memory, with the M2 capable of delivering 100GB/s of memory bandwidth so you’ll get the most out of those GBs.
If you’ve been holding onto an older Air and are considering upgrading, then the fact that Apple says its new model is 12x faster than the fastest Intel-based MacBook Air might be the thing that tips the balance.
There’s also the fact that Apple says the M2 chip allows for better energy efficiency, with the new 15-inch MacBook Air having a battery life of up to 18 hours, even with that bright, large and crisp display.
Apple
Sound and vision
- 1080p FaceTIme HD camera
- Six-speaker array
- Dolby Atmos and Spatial Audio
The Air gets the upgraded 1080p FaceTime HD camera that appeared on the 13-inch MacBook Air M2 and 16-inch MacBook Pro, as well as the six-speaker array (two tweeters and two pairs of force-cancelling woofers) that also appeared on the latter.
There’s support for Dolby Atmos and Spatial Audio, so while the device might be thin, the sound should have a bit more body on offer.
Price and availability
Apple made the 15-inch MacBook Air available immediately after the announcement, with prices starting at $1,299/£1,389, plus it also adjusted the other Air models so that the 13-inch MacBook Air M2 now starts at $1,099/£1,149 and the M1 model stays in the lineup at $999/£999.
