If the whispers are true, Apple will soon bring its MacBook Air up to speed. It’s been nearly a year since we got our last MacBook Air update when Apple released the M3 Air in early March 2024, so a spring refresh has been expected for some time. And we could be getting close to an M4 MacBook Air as the calendar turns to March. If you are thinking about buying a MacBook Air, I’d hold off on that purchase if you can and give it another week or so to see if the M4 Air materializes in that time.
The MacBook Air has trailed the MacBook Pro in terms of Apple silicon since last fall when the Pro models received an M4 update. And the MacBook Pro wasn’t the first Apple device to get the M4. That was the iPad Pro in May 2024 when Apple first unveiled its M4 processor. So the arrival of the M4 MacBook Air won’t surprise anyone. We’ve all been waiting.
Soon, both the MacBook Air and iPad Pro will feature Apple’s M4 chip.
M4 MacBook Air coming soon
Right now, the cheapest M4 MacBook you can buy is the 14-inch Pro at $1,599. If Apple keeps pricing the same for the 13-inch Air, an M4 MacBook becomes much more affordable at $1,099. You can expect better performance from the M4 than the M3, but keep your expectations in check. Think incremental gains in CPU and GPU performance but nothing revolutionary.
Read more: MacBook Air vs. MacBook Pro
The M3 chip in the current 13-inch MacBook Air has 8 CPU cores and 8 GPU cores, and the M4 chip in the baseline 14-inch MacBook Pro has 10 CPU cores and 10 GPU cores. The M3 and M4 chips feature a 16-core neural engine that supports Apple Intelligence features, but Apple says the M4 is twice as fast as the M3 with AI workloads.
Both the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Air models are expected to get the M4 update, but so far we’ve heard no rumors of design tweaks. This appears to be an internal update only.