Were Charles Darwin here today, once he’d finished screaming at us for tinkering with necromancy and demanding to know what the heck a Lexus was, I think he’d want to see the new MacBook Air.

Apple M1 is astonishingly fast; Excellent battery life; Compatibility with non-native apps is impressive

720p webcam is still underwhelming; Lack of an embedded 4G/5G option is frustrating

With the 13-inch MacBook Pro already upping the ante, the new M1-based MacBook Air really throws down the gauntlet for rival ultraportable laptops. It might seem expensive for an entry-level offering, but the performance of the M1 chip gives the late 2020 MacBook Air a new lease of life.

Speedy M1 SoC; Outstanding battery life; Rosetta 2 emulation works well with Intel-native apps; Slimline; lightweight design

Design is looking a bit dated; No CPU upgrade options; Expensive RAM and storage upgrades; Only two Thunderbolt ports

“The MacBook Air M1 finally fulfills the promise of a small laptop without performance restraints.”

Apple's M1 blows Intel away; Phenomenal battery life; Excellent keyboard and touchpad; Rock-solid build quality; Simple good looks

Supports only one external display

It's difficult to recommend against the M1-based MacBook Air. Apple Silicon support still needs a little work, but rivals all have compromises versus the Air in terms of performance, price or portability.

Crisp display; Performance is super-fast; Fanless design; Brilliant keyboard; Not a bank-breaker; Apple Silicon transition is going well; 256GB minimum storage welcome

Maximum memory of 16GB; Large bezels beginning to look dated; No Face ID login; Some key apps don't run on Apple Silicon natively yet

The MacBook Air (M1) takes everything that was great about the previous generation and brings it to a new level....

Apple M1 Processor Iconic design Build quality Impressive battery life Large trackpad Good audio for a laptop

Lack of ports 720p camera Possible app incompatibly during the transition phase

Have you ever seen a bird sitting contently on a tree and wondered whether it will be afraid of the branch breaking? The bird in all likelihood doesn’t have that fear because fundamentally it’s trust doesn’t lie in the branch — it lies in its wings.

Sleek design, Impressive performance, Great battery life

The more expensive MacBook Air 2020 M1 basically shares the same pros and cons we found during the review of the entry-level model. The MacBook Air benefits a lot from the M1 processor.

stays cool despite the lack of a fan; workmanship and iconic design; speakers; performance of native apps

Thunderbolt with limitations; large display bezels; 720p webcam; stability in Rosetta emulated apps; CPU throttling under longer load; relatively slow WiFi 6 at only 80 MHz

The MacBook Air (M1, 2020) is easily one of the most exciting Apple laptops of recent years. Its M1 chip is a real game-changer, and the ability to run both legacy apps, new M1-optimized apps and iOS apps is very impressive. Battery life is also great, and performance is excellent as well.

macOS Big Sur is fast and responsive; Battery life is great; Silent in use; Keyboard remains very good

No new design; Fanless design could impact performance

There’s an old saying in tech that you should never buy the first generation of any new product – you’re paying to be an early adopter and to iron out the kinks. The thing is, I cannot find any kinks for your average consumer with the new M1 MacBook Air.

super-fast; super cool; extremely long battery life; fanless; great screen; great keyboard; best-in-class trackpad; good speakers; good mics; recycled materials; Touch ID.

poor webcam; only two USB-C ports; can only drive one external display; expensive; some niche apps may have issues running until updated; no BootCamp/Windows.

I was fortunate enough to receive my built-to-order M1 MacBook Air (16GB RAM, 512GB SSD, 8-core GPU) last Tuesday, and I’ve had a week to truly experience it. We’ve all read the early reviews ( Snell , Gruber , and Bohn are the highlights), and they’ve focused on the specs and the highlights, so I...