Joining the top-notch keyboard is arguably the best touchpad on any laptop, which shouldn’t be news to any past MacBook user. Some shoppers will consider this a plus the Touch Bar is polarizing. There’s no Touch Bar option on the MacBook Air as there is on the MacBook Pro, which means you get a physical escape button on the top left corner of the keyboard. In addition, the Touch ID sensor in the top right corner of the keyboard allows you to power on the laptop and sign in with your fingerprint, putting the need for passwords on the back burner. Since it’s not new to this laptop, it doesn’t stand out as a major pro of this model in particular, but it’s still a positive inclusion. On the Magic Keyboard, each key has a rubber dome and scissor switch (an older, but time-proven mechanism) that make for a bouncier typing experience with more key travel. The latter is of course back again here, providing a much better typing experience than the butterfly keyboard and avoiding the malfunctions that plagued the butterfly mechanism. Apple finally replaced its much-maligned butterfly keyboard, prone to issues with dust and broken keys, with its new Magic Keyboard. We focused heavily on the keyboard for the previous MacBook Air review, and for good reason. The all-metal design is sturdy and high-quality, still delivering that envy-inspiring MacBook feeling so many years after its debut. It still comes in three color options: Space Gray, Gold, and Silver. Not much has changed since the previous version on the outside, and you'd be hard-pressed to tell the two apart from the shell. Unsurprisingly for one of the world’s most popular computers, the design of the new MacBook Air is very familiar. Eclipsing its predecessors, the M1-based MacBook is our top-pick Apple laptop for 2020. At $999 (as tested), it's the best value among Mac laptops, especially when combined with its nearly 30-hour battery life and premium super-slim build. All are impressive, but the improvement to the MacBook Air impresses most. The MacBook Air launches alongside a new 13-inch MacBook Pro and Mac mini, also running on the M1 system-on-a-chip (SoC). Alongside its new 'Big Sur' OS update, Apple dropped its long-running use of Intel processors for this homegrown silicon solution, and in doing so, infused the MacBook Air with new life (while maintaining its fanless design). The MacBook Air's performance has always remained secondary to its price and size, but that paradigm has shifted with the introduction of Apple’s own M1 processor. We liked the model updated in early 2020, but its keyboard improvements aside, it was not a transformative edition. Best Hosted Endpoint Protection and Security SoftwareĪpple's MacBook Air has been a known quantity for years, a favorite among super-thin ultraportables, but one that received only occasional, modest updates.

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