Apple’s M4 MacBook Air elevates the ultraportable game with boosted memory, improved external display support, and a surprisingly competitive price.
Apple’s MacBook Air M4 (13-inch) is on sale at Amazon for $850, a competitive price for Apple’s latest ultraportable.
The M4 Air supports up to two external monitors with the lid open, and scales up to 32GB of unified memory.
There are still only two USB-C ports on the left side, and I wish there were a nano-texture display option.
The MacBook Air M4 (13-inch) is on sale at Amazon, starting at $850 for the 16GB version.
Before Apple announced the MacBook Air M4 in early 2025, rumors abounded on what new features the ultraportable would come with.
Partly because it was the last of Apple’s core line of devices to get the M4 chip, and partly because, well, last year’s MacBook Air M3 was (and still is) one of the best laptops we’ve tested — a future-proofed « AI computer for the masses » that could be seen as a successful culmination of Apple’s design.
At no point can the Apple machine stop producing, however, so with the MacBook Air M4, it was apparent it would be an incremental upgrade, refining what made last year’s version great while offering a little bit more for less cost to the consumer. Apple MacBook Air M4
The MacBook Air M4 comes with a bump up in hardware for a more affordable price.
The MacBook Air M4, for example, starts at $999 for the 13-inch configuration with 16GB of memory — $100 less than last year’s M3. At the same time, the hardware expands on both the low and high end, with the lowest-tier configuration of the M4 equipped with a 10-core CPU and 8-core GPU, in contrast to the 8-core M3 chip from last year.
On the other hand, the high-end configuration offers 32GB of unified memory, which was previously capped out at 24GB on last year’s M3. This combination of improvements for base components and a lower starting cost is strategic positioning on Apple’s part to incentivize the new devices and stay competitive in an increasingly crowded market.
The MacBook Air M4 is a fantastic device, but it’s also a natural continuation of the product line, which some might see as a « boring » update. Depending on who you ask, that could be a good or a not-so-good thing. You can’t fix what isn’t broken, but I think there is some room here for a few more bold design choices.
One of the most obvious is the MacBook Air M4’s new colorway, Sky Blue, which is a very subtle blue; a very cautious decision when I was expecting something a little closer to Microsoft’s Surface Laptop. All that being said, there are certainly some features on the M4 MacBook Air that set this year’s ultraportable apart. Let’s break them down. Triple-screen threat
One of the most anticipated and sought-after features of the MacBook Air M4 is its ability to support two external monitors while the lid is open. This alone opens up new possibilities for work, productivity, and creative tasks and makes the MacBook Air more competitive with three working displays.
