Could the MacBook Air M4 be Apple's best laptop yet? The reviews are in, and the verdict is positive, but the latest MacBook isn't without a few flaws.
If you're in the market for a new laptop, the MacBook Air M4 is probably on your shortlist. Before you go hunting for deals on the new MacBook Air, though, you should probably know a few pros and cons, according to reviewers.
Here's a look at what the experts are saying about the MacBook Air M4 so far, from the good to the bad to the frustrating.
The MacBook Air M4 pairs stellar battery life with a lower price
There's a lot to love about the MacBook Air M4 and reviewers across the internet are in agreement about at least a few top features.
For starters, the MacBook Air M4 has a lower starting price than last year's model. It's back down to $999 for the base 13-inch model with 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. That's an even better deal than the previous M-series MacBooks because the base RAM on the M4 model is 16GB rather than just 8GB, meaning you're effectively getting a free RAM upgrade.
Laptop Mag's Sean Riley praised the MacBook Air M4's excellent battery life, as well, explaining in his review, "While the competition is stronger than ever for the laptops with the best battery life, the Air is still holding up exceptionally well, particularly when considering performance."
In our tests, the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air M4 models both boasted over 15 hours of battery life. That's not enough to break our battery life record of 21 hours and 3 minutes, set by the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6. However, 15+ hours is still way more than enough for a full day of work or school.
The MacBook Air M4 also manages to pair its long battery life with excellent performance. In our tests, the M4 Air outperformed not only last year's MacBook Air M3 but also a few of its closest rivals, all by a margin of over 2,000 points. As Wired's Brenda Stolyar points out, the M4 chip also boasts much stronger graphics performance than previous MacBooks along with support for Apple Intelligence.
Where the MacBook Air M4 falls short
The MacBook Air M4 is a great laptop, but no laptop is perfect. There are still a few drawbacks that, while they may not be deal breakers, are frustrating or mildly inconvenient.
For instance, by far the most common drawback in reviews so far is the limited number of ports. The 15-inch and 13-inch models both include just two USB Type-C ports, a headphone jack, and the MagSafe charging port. That's it. It's easier to excuse that on the smaller 13-inch MacBook Air M4, but it would have been nice to get at least one extra port on the larger 15-inch model.
The pricing isn't all sunshine and rainbows, either. As Andrew E. Freedman at Tom's Hardware points out in his review, storage and RAM upgrades are still quite expensive. This is especially difficult to overlook since the "affordable" base MacBook Air M4 only includes 256GB of storage. As a general rule, Laptop Mag recommends at least 512GB of storage, especially if you plan to use your MacBook for things like video or photo editing.
There's also the matter of the new "Sky Blue" color. Marques Brownlee showed off the new colorway in his MacBook Air M4 review, but highlighted that this shade of blue isn't very... blue. As Brownlee said, "If I could rename it, I'd rename it 'Barely Blue'."
Of course, the color is up to personal preference, but it's hard to tell the "Sky Blue" isn't just silver and it would be nice to see some more colorful MacBooks like the iBooks of old again.
These issues may be a bit frustrating, but they don't outweigh the MacBook Air M4's strengths. It has been met with shining reviews so far, including a rare 5-star rating from Laptop Mag and an Editor's Choice award. Its few flaws aside, the MacBook Air M4 might just be the best laptop you can buy right now.
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