After using a MacBook Neo for weeks, it was refreshing to switch to the Air

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Apple’s MacBook Air is no longer the baby of the family. In fact, it’s looking quite big these days. Last year, the MacBook Air got a free upgrade to the baseline 16GB RAM. this year’s macbook air m5 This is followed by an increase to 512GB of standard storage. The SSD is also twice as fast as the M4 – an impressive increase in read and write speeds for just one generation.

With major hardware improvements, form factor maturity, and the addition of the Neo to Apple’s lineup, the Air Pro is less the little brother and more a “laptop for everyone,” with enough horsepower to compete with the Pro across many tasks. There’s an even stronger case to be made that it’s a scarier competitor to Windows than the Neo because of its price-to-performance ratio compared to other $1,000 laptops.

Also: MacBook Neo review: My biggest concerns with Apple’s near-perfect budget laptop

In the same order, macbook air m5 also includes a $100 price increase, starting with $1,099 for base 13 inches and $1,299 For the 15-inch with 16GB of memory and 512GB of storage. To be honest, I’m not mad at the slightly higher price, as it’s justified, especially with future-proof support for Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 from its N1 networking chip.

All this is to say that the MacBook Air is no longer an entry-level laptop, but is better thought of as a “Goldilocks” model – and is still the Mac I would recommend to most people.

Impressive isn’t always sexy

These key improvements aren’t the most attractive features to the average consumer, but when considered together, they add up to value that not only keeps the Air relevant but also solidifies its performance as one of the best ultraportables on the market.

Additionally, now that the Neo can attract consumers looking for real value, Apple will likely continue to push the Air with hardware upgrades that will bring it closer to the Pro.

Even without the physical design changes and incremental upgrades from last year’s Air M4, the M5 looks a lot more attractive when you zoom out and look back four or five years. If you’re still on the M1 and feeling lackluster, the M5 is a seriously worthwhile upgrade. For all that, the recommendation comes with a little more confidence than last year’s M4.

I tested the M5 MacBook Air with 16GB of integrated memory and 1TB of storage and found it to be very fast for file transfers, multitasking, and everyday tasks. The base M5 chip has a 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU, with four “super cores” and six efficiency cores, and the M5 also offers higher memory bandwidth, up to 153GB/s compared to 120GB/s on the M4.

Also: Is the M5 MacBook Pro worth upgrading from the M1 model? what the numbers tell us

The result is a seamless, capable user experience across the board, even at lower-end configurations. However, consider how prices increase with upgrades: if you want 32GB of memory (max), the starting price jumps to $1,699 – rising to $1,899 if you go with a 1TB SSD.

still light as air

Physically, the M5 Air lives up to its name at 2.7 pounds for the 13-inch and 3.3 pounds for the 15-inch. Is this the lightest laptop on the market? No, but I think obsessing over numbers isn’t always helpful. The Air is incredibly portable, and its solid aluminum construction with its distinctive rounded corners is the ultimate backpack companion, and durable enough to lug around.

It still has two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports on the left side, with data transfer speeds of up to 40Gbps. Both ports support charging and DisplayPort video output for either two displays at 6K and 60Hz refresh, or one display at 8K and 60Hz refresh.

It also features a proprietary charging port so you don’t have to give up USB-C to stay plugged in. There’s a 3.5mm audio jack on the right side, and the power button supports fingerprint recognition, but that’s about it for the Air’s minimal connectivity.

Also: The new MacBook Air M5 costs $100 more – here’s what you get

It comes in four colors: Silver, Starlight, Sky Blue (a very light blue silver), and Midnight, a deep, matte blue. The laptop I got a chance to review was in Midnight color, and while it looks great when clean, the dark surface is like a fingerprint magnet. This may or may not be a consideration for you.

Other than that, the physical appearance is the same as last year, with no real changes to the keyboard and Apple’s top-tier haptic trackpad. The display also remains unchanged. Apple’s Liquid Retina display displays at 500 nits brightness and 60Hz return at a time when very affordable laptops are getting OLED and faster refresh rates.

Don’t get me wrong, the Air M5’s display looks great, but more affordable laptops with competing displays are certainly becoming popular. Even high-end Chromebook devices like the Lenovo Chromebook Plus – which is a direct competitor to the Neo – have vivid OLED panels that have a little more pop.

That being said, Apple continues to upgrade components in the segment, and if the base memory, storage, and read/write speeds come to market in the M4 and M5, we may eventually see an OLED in the next generation, especially if it’s paired with the long-awaited touchscreen option.

Performance and usability

As I mentioned above, if you have an M2, M1, or older Mac, the M5 is an attractive upgrade. However, it may be hard to justify the performance relative to the price of an M3 or later. This isn’t unique to the MacBook Air M5, but is the new reality of the upgrade cycle now that we’ve reached the fifth generation of Apple’s chips.

This is reflected in our benchmarking, which confirms that you’ll need about five years between generations for the biggest performance upgrades.

The Air M5 makes multitasking easy with countless browser tabs, messaging, and iPhone Continuity features. With the 12MP center stage webcam, FaceTime is crisp, clear and seamless. I believe the video call experience on the Mac is the best of any laptop on the market, and although it’s very similar to its predecessor here, that’s a good thing.

And it’s not just for everyday performance. The MacBook Air M5 isn’t a gaming laptop, but it doesn’t have to be No A gaming laptop. The M5’s third-generation ray tracing delivers solid performance in games that are already optimized for Mac. If you haven’t played a game on a Mac in a while, you might be surprised by how good it feels. Obviously, though, the thin and light form factor isn’t ideal for competitive triple-A gaming.

The 10-core GPU in the M5 chip improves competitive performance compared to earlier models. I’ve already broken down the numbers extensively, but Apple claims 3.2x faster frame rates than the MacBook Air M1 when gaming, 6.8x faster 3D rendering in Blender, and 7.7x faster AI video-enhancement performance in Topaz Video.

This makes it a solid choice for creators and artists who don’t need the top-tier hardware of the MacBook Pro.

In terms of battery life, the MacBook Air M5 offers impressive longevity, but I wouldn’t say we’re seeing huge steps forward compared to previous generations. I got about 12 hours of regular use from the Air M5, with about 18 hours in optimal video playback conditions.

Also: MacBook Neo vs. Mac Mini: I’ve tested Apple’s $599 computer, and my preference is clear

If you’re in the office, browsing the Internet, and tackling everyday tasks, this translates to all-day battery life, but with more demanding workloads expect it to be closer to 9 or 10 hours. That’s certainly enough for most Air users, but, like display technology, this is an area in which Windows PCs are making rapid advances.

ZDNET’s shopping advice

Apple MacBook Air M5 It marks an incremental upgrade over its predecessor, but it comes highly recommended for anyone with an M1 or older machine. The prices are particularly favorable for anyone entering the MacBook ecosystem from a Windows PC, but it’s not really worth it if you already have an M3 or M4.

With the introduction of the MacBook Neo, the MacBook Air M5 is the “Goldilocks” model, well-equipped to do just about everything, but still powerful enough to outperform many of its competitors at a similar price. The core hardware improvements move it to Pro, as opposed to the other way around, and the modest price increase justifies it.

If you’re looking to upgrade your old Mac, the Air M5 is an easy choice.