Ultimately, that’s not a bad thing. We still located the sturdy recycled aluminum chassis (we tested it in the “midnight” color, a beautiful dark blue that tends to accumulate fingerprints) and a tone-on-tone Apple logo. It is scarce, but recognizable. A 15-inch MacBook Air is a no-brainer. Industry experts have told me time and time again that 15-inch computers are some of the most popular on the market, and yet Apple didn’t make a computer for this organization of big-screen enthusiasts that wasn’t prohibitively expensive or designed for a professional. The Air has been regarded as one of the most productive ultrabooks, but it was thirteen inches.
After years of clamoring for fans, that apparent computer is here. The 15-inch MacBook Air is precisely what Apple promised: a bigger MacBook Air for the maximum number of people. It’s familiar: the keyboard is the same, the notch is still there, and it’s still thin (though noticeably heavier). The screen is larger, at 15. 3 inches, and the six-speaker formula is a noticeable improvement.
But most importantly, it’s a bigger MacBook Air. It’s pretty familiar, but it’s aimed at the large organization of other people who prefer a bigger screen and don’t need to spend $2,000 on their laptop. It’s a way to pique the interest of other people who are contemplating a new machine. The familiarity continues when you lift the lid. While the 15. 3-inch display is a noticeable difference, the essence is the same. That includes the notch, which I find a little annoying (even on the MacBook Pro I have). Everything is a little bigger. The biggest visual upgrade is the amount of loose space on both sides of the keyboard. On MacBook Pro laptops, they have grilles for the top activation speakers, but here they are only metal.
Apple also used the exact same ports, and port slot, as on the 13-inch Air. Those two Thunderbolt 3/USB ports four on the left side, as well as MagSafe 3 for charging. On the right side, there is a 3. 5mm headphone jack.
For one thing, I get it: that means the basic design of a 15-inch and 13-inch MacBook Air is fundamentally the same. I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple used the same motherboard in either system. But it’s also a shame that with all the charging space, Apple couldn’t fit a USB-C charging port on the right side. The new Air weighs 3. 3 pounds and measures 13. 3 x 9. 35 x 0. 45 inches. That’s a noticeable difference, especially in terms of weight, compared to the 13-incher, which weighs 2. 7 pounds and measures 11. 97 x 8. 46 x 0. 44 inches. The slim profile doesn’t hide the fact that this computer is bigger. In reality, there is rarely a way to do it. Microsoft’s 15-inch Surface Laptop 5 is lighter at 2. 86 pounds but larger in each and every size (13. 5 x 9. 6 x 0. 58 inches). Another strike on the ultralight crown, the Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED is more of a competitor to the 13-inch Air at 2. 43 pounds and 0. 59 inches thick. Powered by Apple’s M2 processor (same 8-core processor in the 13-inch model), 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB SSD, the 15-inch Air is ready to power through the workplace, surf the web, stream videos, and other essential tasks. It really only experienced issues with long and strenuous workloads. Makes sense: Despite the name, the MacBook Air doesn’t have fans. Still, for the average person, that’s a lot.
We found that the functionality of the MacBook Air 15 was quite similar to that of the thirteen-inch. This is rarely a surprise, considering they use the same processor. We also compare it to the Microsoft Surface Laptop 5, which employs a 12th-gen Intel Core i7-1265U, the Asus Zenbook S thirteen OLED with a newer Intel Core i7-thirteen55U, and a Samsung Galaxy Book 3 Ultra, which has a discreet Intel Core i7-thirteen700H (The latter is a fairer comparison for the MacBook Pro, but let’s see how it goes). In Geekbench 5, the 15-inch Air achieved a single-core score of 1,902 and a multi-core score of 8,932. These were very similar to the thirteen-inch Air scores and outperformed the Intel Zenbook and Surface U-series chips (either actively cooled) in single core and multi-core. The H- of the Galaxy Book 3 Ultra The serial chip only won in multicore, and that chip has 14 cores (6 more than the M2).
It was amazing our record motion test. The 15-inch MacBook Air moved 25GB of files at a speed of 1,342. 38 Mbps, beating the thirteen-inch Air (958. 85 Mbps) by a wide margin. The Zenbook S thirteen OLED and Galaxy Book 3 Ultra were even faster.
Both Airs were more in line with Handbrake, transcoding 15-inch video from 4K to 1080p in 7 minutes and 46 seconds. The thirteen-inch took 7:52. Both were faster than the Zenbook S 13 (8:16) and Surface Laptop 5 (8:53), but obviously more cores helped the Samsung Galaxy Book 3 Ultra at 5:26. The 15-inch Air compiled a code base in 122 seconds. You’ll see the lag between the M2 Pro, M2 Max, and M2 Ultra on the graph, but switching to the MacBook Pro can also save you around 40 seconds. Part of the difference would have possibly been the cooling. The 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro have active fans, allowing the M2 Pro and M2 Max to run at higher speeds for longer. Additionally, we used our Cinebench R23 stress test to see what happens when the MacBook Air 15 is loaded under a constant heavy load. We usually run this to see if the chips are throttling, but in the case of the Air, which doesn’t have an active fan, we’d expect it to throttle. This is also the case with the Air thirteen, and it followed a similar functionality code. Although the MacBook Air 15 didn’t fall quite as far, perhaps the 15-inch chassis would serve as a bigger heat sink.
The Air 15-inch started with a score of 8675 and slowly descended through the 8000s and then the 7000s, ending in the low 7000s (the lowest test score was 7187, in the last of 20 races). We can’t record clock speeds from the M2 (Cinebench estimates 3. 5 GHz single-core and 3. 2 GHz multi-core, but take that with a grain of salt), but we can record temperatures with the TG Pro. The 4 power cores ran at an average of 91. 82 degrees Celsius, while the functionality cores hit 91. 2 degrees Celsius. The MacBook Air is also fit for some basic games. I played No Man’s Sky, which uses Apple’s local Metal renderer, on the computer at 1920 x 1200 on the top preset. While exploring for minerals and other resources, the game would sometimes run between 70 and 80 fps, occasionally briefly dropping below 60 fps. It’s the largest demo ever on a MacBook Air, even if the webcam notch cuts right through it (the extra 64 pixels of height means it doesn’t waste any usable space).
I locate the notch a bit boring (I say that as an owner of a 14-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Pro). On the plus side, it disappears when you watch a video, which doesn’t take up the entire screen. Some loose apps like TopNotch hide the menu bar in an attempt to hide it. I highly recommend dark mode.
That said, the panel itself is pretty impressive. It’s very bright and looks pretty good, but it can’t compete with Windows-based competition with OLED presentations when it comes to color.
I used the MacBook Air 15 to watch the Oppenheimer trailer. This trailer includes many dark shots of a bomb, as well as high-contrast black and white scenes. Both looked perfect on the Air, which has a very bright panel. I-P3 range. That’s roughly on par with the thirteen-inch MacBook Air and right ahead of Microsoft’s “PixelSense” demo on the Surface Laptop 5. The Asus Zenbook S thirteen OLED and the Samsung Galaxy Book 3 Ultra, either with OLED panels, covered more of each range.
Anyway, if I had to enter, I wouldn’t be able to arrange much. Apple’s M2 is a system-on-a-chip, with RAM in the package. Apple solders its SSDs to the motherboard, so setting up the computer on acquisition is what you have forever. No matter what specs you buy the MacBook Air with, you’ll be stuck until it’s time to upgrade.
As of this writing, the 15-inch MacBook Air is rarely found on the self-repair site, but as you read this, that might change as other Apple Silicon Macs have made their way there. I think most people will move to Genius Bar for any hardware issue. The power of the M2 chip is on full display when it comes to battery life. In our test, the 15-inch MacBook Air lasted 14 hours and 48 minutes while streaming video, browsing websites, and running OpenGL undeniable tests. the larger Air beats Windows PCs in the rankings. The closest was the Zenbook S 13 OLED at 11:02, while the Surface Laptop 5 and Galaxy Book 3 Ultra lasted just over nine hours. The MacBook Air 15 did get quite warm by the end of this test, but not too hot. This computer is a good candidate for this test because it doesn’t actively cool like the MacBook Pro line (or most Windows computers). During review, the middle of the keyboard, between the G and H keys, reached 41. 9 degrees Celsius (107. 42 degrees Fahrenheit), which is remarkably toasty. The touchpad, however, was much cooler. At the back of the computer, the temperature reached 47. 9 degrees Celsius (118. 22 F). While it might not get as hot if you’re just listening to music or checking email, if you’re pushing your MacBook Air around, you may need to use it on a desk. The main advantage of Apple’s notch is that it houses a very clever 1080p webcam. At my desk, my eyes glowed the best shade of blue, contrasting with the military blouse I was wearing. I can also see all the hair on my head, and the camera wasn’t focused through fluorescent lights in our office, or some nearby open windows. What Apple isn’t offering in its camera is facial recognition. Many high-end Windows PCs use infrared cameras to let you log in with your face. And while Apple has Face ID on its phones, it hasn’t made it to computers yet, despite the notch. The computer will be eligible for an upgrade to macOS Sonoma in the fall.
Apple’s macOS comes with a ton of software, but little bloat. You get an email client, Messages (great for sharing your texts and iMessages with a phone or iPad), Safari web browser, Maps, FaceTime, Notes, Reminders, and more. Apple has its own pre-installed facilities, with apps for Apple TV, Apple News, Apple Music, and podcasts. An essential productivity suite, which adds Numbers, Keynote, iMovie, and Pages, is also free. At this point in the Apple Silicon lifecycle, a significant number of programs now offer local builds for the M1 and M2 chips, or use universal binaries to run on Apple Silicon and Intel processors. If you try to run anything that doesn’t use one of those two solutions, you’ll be prompted to install Rosetta 2, which can translate Intel x86 instructions. The MacBook Air comes with a one-year warranty. AppleCare+ is $79. 99 per year until cancelled, or $229 for a 3-year plan. Our 15-inch MacBook Air review unit comes with an M2 formula on a chip with 8 CPU cores and 10 GPU cores, 16GB of unified memory, a 512GB SSD, and the dark “midnight” blue color. These settings are obtained by customizing the Mac on the Apple website.
The base model has the same M2 chip (Apple doesn’t reduce CPU or GPU cores on the base 15-inch model), with 256GB of SSD storage and 8GB of memory for $1299. The other retail model costs $1499 with 512GB of storage and 8GB of RAM.
The MacBook Air is capped at 24GB of memory ($400 at the most sensitive base value) and 2TB of storage ($600 at the most sensitive base value, which is high with the value of SSDs these days).
By default, Apple ships the MacBook Air with a dual-port 35W USB-C Power Adapter. However, if you use either port, the devices split the power, so your Mac will run slower. For example, with a Mac and an iPhone or iPad connected, either device gets up to 17. 5 watts. With a Mac and AirPods, the Mac will go up to 27. 5W, while headphones will go up to 7. 5W. In the configurator you can opt for a 70W USB-C adapter with a port that will allow you to temporarily power up your Mac. If you want a MacBook Air, want a larger device than its classic 13-inch offering, and don’t want the muscle of a MacBook Pro, Apple is aiming squarely at you with the 15-inch MacBook Air. It’s like using the smallest device, unless you have a bigger screen, a bit more weight, and bigger speakers. I wish Apple would take a bit more advantage of the charging area and bump up a charging port or two. It’s like a missed opportunity. And while you wish the larger battery charged even more than it does, it’s hard to complain when your device runs for 14+ hours on a fee. Many 15-inch Windows laptops in this price range tend to load up on discrete GPUs, like the Dell XPS 15 or Samsung Galaxy Book 3 Ultra. This makes for a thicker chassis than what Apple offers here. And those instruments are indeed not fanless. For the same price, you can get a 13-inch MacBook Pro with the M2 and put it under a fan, but you might not get the made-for-Apple-Silicon design.
So for those who need something simple, quiet, and with a big screen, the 15-inch MacBook Air is just what Apple promised: the MacBook Air, only bigger. It’s unlikely to win over many new converts, but it will most likely make many former Air owners very happy. It also helps to keep up with the latest news. A lover of all things gaming and technology, his previous work has been featured in Tom’s Guide, Laptop Mag, Kotaku, PCMag, and Complex, among others. Follow him on Twitter: @FreedmanAERaspberry Pi Pico Hero Handheld Emulates Sega Mega DriveAssassin’s Creed Haptic Shirt Wants You to Feel Every. . . Stab?WD May Spin Off Flash Business and Merge It With Kioxia: ReportBy Shane Downing Jul 09, 2023By Christian Eberle Jul 08, 2023By Shane Downing Jul 07, 2023By Paul Alcorn Jul 06, 2023By Denise BertacchiJuly 5, 2023By Brandon HillJuly 4, 2023By Joe ShieldsJuly 3, 2023By Shane DowningJuly 2, 2023By Les PounderJuly 1, 2023By Shane DowningJune 30, 2023By Shane DowningJune 29, 2023Tom’s hardware is a component of Fu ture US Inc, a leading foreign media organization and virtual publisher. Visit our corporate site. © Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.