New MacBook Air M5 Arrives With Wi-Fi 7, A Faster SSD And Twice The Storage
It's been a busy week for Apple, which has seen the launch of new M5 Pro and M5 Max silicon along refreshed MacBook Pro laptops that incorporate the latest M-series chips, an iPhone 17e, and a few other products. Yet one more to add to the pile is a retooled MacBook Air powered by Apple's regular M5 chip and the double the storage as the previous generation model.
Not to be overlooked, the upgrade from 256GB to 512GB of storage on the base model is a big deal, considering the industry at large is reeling from an AI-driven shortage of memory and storage chips. Notably, Apple also doubled the storage of its entry-level iPhone 17e SKU, which boasts 256GB versus 128GB on the iPhone 16e while sticking with the same $599 launch MSRP.
As for the MacBook Air, Apple increased the starting price from $999 (M4 model) to $1,099 (M5 model) for the 13.6-inch model, and from $1,199 (M4 model) to $1,299 (M5 model) 15.3-inch variant—a $100 difference for both size options. That's a bit of a bummer, but still reasonable for twice the storage in today's climate. Additionally, Apple says its newest MacBook Air models feature "faster SSD technology," configurable up to 4TB. In more measurable terms, Apple is claiming the SSD in the M5 MacBook Air offers twice the read and write performance of the previous generation.
The main upgrade, naturally, is the M5 chip that powers the latest-generation MacBook Air. It comprises a 10-core CPU and up to a 10-core GPU, along with Neural Accelerators to deliver what Apple touts is up to a 4x performance boost for AI tasks compared to the M4 MacBook, and up to 9.5x faster AI performance compared to the M1 model.
"With enhanced shader cores and a third-generation ray-tracing engine, M5 supercharges tasks like gaming and 3D rendering. M5 also features faster unified memory with 153GB/s of bandwidth— 28% improvement over M4 enabling even smoother multitasking and faster app launches," Apple says.
Apple also equipped its newest MacBook Air with its N1 wireless chip that supports Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 connectivity. It features dual Thunderbolt 4 ports as well, along with a 12MP Center Stage camera and up to 18 hours of rated battery life.
All in all, it's a solid generational upgrade. That said, we'll be curious to see where street pricing lands when the dust settles. The M4 MacBook Air is still a capable laptop and can be found for $999 at Amazon ($200 off).
Apple's new M5 MacBook Air is available to preorder now and will release next Wednesday, March 11.
