The new MacBook Air with M2 chip is now available to order, with first units shipping to customers from Friday, July 15. The base model MacBook Air with M2 chip is priced at $1199, or $1099 for education buyers.
The new MacBook Air features the most significant design change to the MacBook Air line in a decade, with a uniformly flat enclosure, larger display and thinner screen bezels. Like the 2021 MacBook Pros, the front camera is now housed inside a display notch. The M2 chip powers improved CPU and GPU performance, approximately 20% faster than the already-fast M1 MacBook Air.
The M2 chip debuted first in the 2022 13-inch MacBook Pro, but that machine was otherwise unchanged apart from the chip upgrade. In contrast, the new Air offers many improvements.
The redesigned chassis takes cues from the 2021 MacBook Pro, with a boxier rounded-edge design — leaving behind the classic MacBook Air taper. Of course, the new Air is much thinner than the Pros, measuring in at just 11.3 millimetres.
The new MacBook Air is available in a choice of four finishes; silver, space gray, starlight, and a striking midnight blue. MagSafe is back as the default charging option, and each Air comes with a colour-matched MagSafe cable. (You can still charge through the USB-C ports if you prefer.) Speaking of charging options, Apple is also selling new dual-port USB-C power adapters.
Redesigned MacBook Air features
The new Air design also features thinner display borders, allowing for a larger 13.6-inch display. However, some of that display space is used up by the notch, which houses the front camera. Display quality is also improved, with 25% more brightness and support for 1 billion colors for the first time on the MacBook Air line. The webcam is now upgraded to sport 1080p resolution, and should appear similar in quality to the camera found in the MacBook Pro.
The new MacBook Air also sports an upgraded sound experience with an integrated four-speaker array, with support for a wide Spatial Audio soundstage.
The new M2 chip enables up to 20% faster single-core CPU performance, and up to 50% faster GPU, based on M2 MacBook Pro real-world testing. You can also now configure the MacBook Air with up to 24 GB RAM.
Apple says complex workloads like editing video in Final Cut, or applying filters in Photoshop, are 20-40% faster than the M1 MacBook Air, and order of magnitudes faster for customers upgrading from the older Intel-based Airs. And all this power should not come at the expense of battery life; Apple says customers should be able to get up to 18 hours of continuous video playback on a single charge.
MacBook Air price
MacBook Air with M2 starts at $1199, or $1099 for education customers.
The $1199 configuration includes an 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU, 8 GB RAM, and a 256 GB SSD.
The standard upgrade option is priced at $1499 and offers an 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, 512 GB storage and includes the dual compact power adapter.
At the high-end, you can max out the build-to-order specs with 24 GB RAM and 2 TB of SSD storage for a total cost of $2499.
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