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Choosing an M1 MacBook | Deciding between the 2020 MacBook Air and MacBooks Pro with M1

6:34 video

Choosing between the MacBook Air M1 and MacBook Pro M1 is like The Bachelor: you have to interact with each to get to know them. I’ve spent a few days with both, and they’re both wonderful, with strengths and weaknesses and striking designs. But only one gets the proverbial rose. The laptop next door that provides everything I need, or the flashier one that can keep up with whatever I might do in the future?

What they share

Both come with the brand new M1 chip, the star of the show: benchmark scores that beat much more expensive computers in a compact package, sipping power. Both have the scissor-switch Magic Keyboard with backlighting, large Force Touch-style trackpads (they don’t actually move), and 13.3-inch Retina displays with P3 wide color and True Tone.

  • Air: a petite wedge, with keys that go all the way to the top. I sometimes eye the Pro’s slightly larger trackpad.
  • Pro: built a little more athletically, with a symmetrical shape and a Touch Bar.

Appeal of each

  • The Air is the price-to-feature ratio: 90% of everything the Pro gives you at 80% of the cost. It slides into your workflow and does tasks faster and longer than before.
  • The Pro can go a bit faster, a bit longer, with better thermals. You can use it in the brightest rooms or noisiest homes because of the brighter screen and louder speakers.

My decision

I love that I can get everything done with the Air: it does everything right without trying to be something it’s not, performs just as fast as the Pro for work or entertainment, and is the perfect overall package for most people for most things. It’s $300 less. But… the rose goes to the MacBook Pro M1. It’s the laptop I want to spend the next few months with. It has everything I need, and honestly the Air does too, but I like to buy devices for what I might do with them. I may not need the extra features, but I might, and I don’t want to regret it. For $300, I get:

  • A laptop I may use in bright rooms or outside.
  • Maximum speed for 4K video editing (and I want the space to do it on the device without an external drive), with 50 Safari tabs, a Zoom call and photo editing at once.
  • Louder speakers every time I use them and a battery that lasts longer every time I’m away from the charger.
  • The Touch Bar, which I’d probably pay more not to have, but I can live with.

RAM and SSD

They come in 8 GB and 16 GB of RAM and up to 2 TB of storage.

  • Casual use (YouTube, banking, photo viewing, occasional more): the base 8 GB and 256 GB will be fine.
  • Creative (video, Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, games one step above casual Apple Arcade): get the 16 GB model and as much storage as you can afford.
  • If your budget allows only a memory or storage upgrade, get the memory and hang an SSD off the side later.

What options are you choosing? (Spoiler from later videos: after three months, I came to recommend the Air as the better value; see my 3-month follow-up.) See my M1 playlist and my benchmark comparison.

In this video

Some links in this post are affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I may receive a small commission. See my ethics statement.

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