It’s official now! After Tim Cook’s teaser, Apple officially refreshed the MacBook Air with the M4 chip and brought several nice improvements beyond the chip upgrade. The MacBook Air comes in both 13-inch and 15-inch sizes, and for the first time, the MacBook Air comes in an all-new sky blue color, which joins midnight, silver, and starlight, and it replaces space gray that the MacBook Air offered for several years. This new color also makes its way to the included MagSafe cable when customers choose that finish.
Just like the Studio Display, iMac, and MacBook Pro, MacBook Air with M4 also brings the 12MP Center Stage camera that customers enjoy using for video conferencing apps, and it also brings Desk View support. The biggest limitation that the MacBook Air had since the M1 model is that it can support just one external display; however, just like the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4, that problem is now remedied with this update as the MacBook Air can now drive up to two external displays for both variants of the M4 chip, even the binned chip with the 8-core CPU.
The M4 chip brings even more power to the MacBook Air, and it’s been ready for Apple Intelligence with a Neural Engine that’s up to 3x faster than on the original M1 chip. Both 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air now features two Thunderbolt 4 ports for faster connectivity with thousands of accessories, and they still feature many of the same features that customers love about the MacBook Air, including the Magic Keyboard, Force Touch trackpad, four- or six-speaker system (depending on size), all-day battery life with up to 18 hours of video streaming, and the incredible thin-and-light design to take with your everywhere.
Even more remarkable, the MacBook Air (M4) now starts at just $999, and it replaces both the M2 and M3 MacBook Air models in the lineup. When Apple introduced the first M4 Macs back in October, Apple bumped the default memory to 16GB on both the M2 and M3 models, so the M4 MacBook Air models also start with 16GB of memory.
Here are the starting configurations of the MacBook Air:
- 13-inch MacBook Air: M4 with 10-core CPU and 8-core GPU (configurable to 10-core GPU), 16GB memory, and 256GB SSD for $999
- 15-inch MacBook Air: M4 with 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU, 16GB memory, and 256GB SSD for $1,199
The new MacBook Air is available to order today, and it will launch on March 12. Overall, it’s a very solid update for the MacBook Air, and a great time to buy for those coming from an M1 model.
