APPLE
MACBOOK AIR 2019
- The refreshed MacBook Air (2019) is here after a tumultuous few years for Apple’s thin and light MacBook. The MacBook Air used to be the most affordable way to get a MacBook, but then it seemed to fall out of favor when Apple positioned the 12-inch MacBook as both the slimmest and cheapest of its laptops.
- But then, in a rather unexpected move, Apple abandoned its 12-inch MacBook line while rolling out a refreshed MacBook Air for 2019 at the same time.
- With the MacBook Air back in what many people believe is its rightful place as the most affordable Apple laptop, will this year’s model triumph in bringing Apple’s vaunted design and build quality to a new audience who are put off by the MacBook Pro’s hefty price?
Price
and availability
- Apple’s announcement of a new MacBook Air (2019) was great for several reasons. First of all, we weren’t really anticipating a refresh. And second, the entry-level MacBook Air (2019) not only got that refresh, but also a price cut to $1,099 (£1,099, AU$1,699).
- Undeniably, it’s still far from budget territory. Nonetheless, this move makes the MacBook Air more affordable than ever, and seeing prices go down with updates – rather than up – is always a nice welcome. For comparison’s sake, the MacBook Air (2018) started at $1,199 (£1,199, AU$1,849) when it was released.
- The base model of the MacBook Air (2019) is equipped with a 1.6GHz dual-core 8th-generation Intel Core i5 processor with Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz, 8GB of LPDDR3 RAM, 128GB storage and Intel UHD Graphics 617.
- You can also get a model with the same specs, but with twice the storage at 256GB, which will cost you $1,299 (£1,299, AU$1,999).
- That basically means you’re getting 128GB more for $200/£200/AU$300, a pretty costly upgrade. It’s a bit frustrating that Apple has kept that large leap in price for a fairly small amount of additional storage space. Meanwhile, you can double your iPhone XR storage for another $50/£50.
- It makes much more financial sense to get the 128GB version, and then either buy an external hard drive (check out our pick of the best external hard drives for Macs for options), or use cloud storage like iCloud to save your files.
- As is unfortunately standard with Apple’s hardware, there’s no easy way to open up the MacBook Air yourself and upgrade the SSD.
- Therefore, while we’re happy to see the price drop for the MacBook Air, shipping a premium – and while the Air is the most affordable MacBook, at this price it’s still premium – laptop with just 128GB of storage seems pretty mean in 2019 – particularly when Apple charges so much for a storage upgrade.
- One of the main threats to the MacBook Air (2019) is that Windows laptops are now even slimmer and more powerful than ever. Apple no longer has the monopoly on thin and light laptops, and there are a number of Windows-based Ultrabooks that come with similar (or even better) specifications for the same price. And, you can guarantee that they all have bigger hard drives than 128GB. For example, the HP Spectre x360 (2019) is around the same price, but with 256GB storage and a much faster processor.
- The lower entry price of the MacBook Air (2019) is definitely welcome if you’re set on getting a MacBook. However, some of Apple’s not so attractive habits are still evident, and with increased competition from Windows laptops, there are better value alternatives available.
Design
- Like with the new MacBook Pro (2019), Apple didn’t change the external look of the MacBook Air (2019) from last year’s model.
- This is great news if you’re already in love with the design of the MacBook Air, but not so if you craved a more substantial update.
- This also means that you end up with the same thin laptop with dimensions of 11.97 x 8.36 x 0.61 inches (30.41 x 21.24 x 1.56cm) and a weight of 2.75 pounds (1.25kg). It remains astonishingly lightweight, and while it’s not as mind-blowingly light as competitors like the Acer Swift 7, the Apple MacBook Air (2019) is a device you can easily carry around in a bag or backpack.
- Despite being thin and lightweight, it does feel solid and durable, so you don’t have to worry about bends and dents. This is thanks to the MacBook Air being made out of an aluminum alloy that looks great and feels robust. By keeping the same design as last year’s model, the new MacBook Air (2019) is once again made out of 100% recycled aluminum, which means that no new metal has been mined to build this device.
- That’s a brilliant selling point for anyone who is environmentally-conscious, and something we commend Apple for.
- However, by keeping the same design, it means this year’s model still has the same elements as the 2018 model which fall short of our expectations.
- The fact that the MacBook Air only comes with two Thunderbolt 3 ports is disappointing though understandable, considering the slim design of the laptop. However, Apple’s choice to put both ports on the left-hand side puzzled and frustrated us – and it continues to do so in the 2019 model.
- If one port had been put on each side, it would have allowed people a bit more flexibility when charging the MacBook Air. Instead, you always need to sit in a certain position with the power adapter plugged into the left of the laptop.
- It also makes the MacBook Air seem a little cluttered – and slightly lopsided – if you plug in two (or more if you have an adapter) devices into the Thunderbolt 3 ports.
Keyboard
and trackpad
- Apple, that creature of habitual mystery, has been coy about the changes it's made to the 2019 Air's keyboard, and about whether or not it's different from the keyboard in the 2019 Pro - the firm refers to it only as "the latest-generation keyboard". This has left prospective buyers wondering if Apple has managed to fix the numerous problems that have bedevilled the keyboards on all three MacBook models in recent years.
- The trackpad is immense - 8.2 x 12cm - and offers the additional benefits of Force Touch, meaning you can do deep presses to trigger secondary functions such as dictionary lookups on words. It should also be more reliable than a conventional trackpad because it has fewer moving parts: it doesn't actually click downwards, instead simulating a click with a small haptic buzz.
Touch
ID
- Finally, the Touch Bar still hasn't made its way across from the MacBook Pro but there is a Touch ID fingerprint sensor next to the F12 key (again, this is not a new feature for the Air line). This is terrifically useful for login, as ever, with one extra benefit that you wouldn't experience with Touch ID on iOS devices: you are automatically logged in to the correct user account when you tap down a finger.
- However, we haven't yet been able to replicate an additional neat feature that we observed on the 2018 Air and, previously, on the 2016 Pro. On those devices, if you tried to tap in straight after startup, or at any other time when a password rather than a fingerprint was required, Touch ID would do the next best thing - it would bump you to the password-entry field for the correct account. That doesn't appear to work on our 2019 Air.
- We've dropped Apple a line to see if something's up, and will update this review once we know more.
- The company has confirmed that the 2019 keyboards contain "new materials", but this is a tweak to the butterfly mechanism rather than the wholesale return to the old scissor switch style that has been predicted for the near future. The scissor keys take up more space but have deeper travel and better feedback when typing.
- The irritating tappy noisiness of past generations has been noticeably toned down, and (presumably linked to this) the keys feel softer to type on. Whether the modifications will translate into a cure for the ddouble-lletter inaccuracies that users reported with previous generations remains to be seen, but our sample at least has shown no signs of the issue during our time with it. And it's reassuring to note that Apple has extended its keyboard repair program to include the 2019 MacBook Pro and, now, the 2019 Air.
- On the down side, we will note that the arrow keys are still squeezed into a tiny space, with almost no space between the keys to guide the fingers (and literally none between the up and down keys!). We sorely miss the more spaced-out arrows on our 2015 MacBook Pro. The keyboard in general is quite cramped and typing accuracy is poorer than on a more expansively laid-out keyboard, although this gets a little better with practice.
Screen
- At last! We've found a substantive and quantifiable difference from the previous generation. The 2019 MacBook Air gets Apple's adaptive True Tone technology, which adjust the screen's intensity and colour output to account for ambient lighting conditions and should mean your subjective experience is consistent regardless of daylight, electric lighting and so on.
- We're big fans of True Tone in general, having grown particularly fond of it on the iPad and iPhone range - although it may be worth pointing out that the the more portable a device is, the more likely it is to be used in a wide variety of lighting conditions. The Air is more portable than most computers, of course, but will still be toted about less than a phone.
- And funnily enough we didn't totally love the True Tone experience on this machine. Sitting in front of the 2019 Air and a 2017 12in MacBook in the gathering dusk, it occurred to us that the orangey tint of the machine with True Tone might be more restful than the stark white one without, but it's also a bit, well, sleepy. That stark whiteness feels a lot clearer to use... although it's probably saturating our brains with sleep-ruining blue light, and that will serve us right.
True
Tone screen
- Perhaps the most notable change in the MacBook Air (2019) is the screen, which now boasts Apple’s True Tone technology.
- The True Tone feature automatically adjusts the color temperature – usually whites – shown on the display, depending on the ambient light you’re MacBook Air is in. It can have a pleasing effect, especially on your eyes – when you first start the MacBook Air (2019), you can toggle the setting on and off to experience the difference. And, while this setting may not be for everyone, we have found it does quite an effective job of making colors look more natural.
- True Tone has been included in MacBook Pros for a while now, and we’ve often thought that it wasn’t for everyone. MacBook Pros are often used by photographers, video editors and digital creatives who need accurate colors – something that True Tone messes with. However, with the MacBook Air, which is aimed at more casual laptop users who aren’t as worried about color accuracy, using this feature makes much more sense.
- It’s a nice addition, but probably not one that would make you want to swap your 2018 model for this year’s.
- Elsewhere, the screen is the same – a 13.3-inch Retina display with 2,560 x 1,600 resolution that delivers crisp and rich colors. Last year’s model introduced remarkably thin bezels around the display, making the screen span almost the entire width of the MacBook Air. The display has long been one of the MacBook Air’s best qualities, so we’re delighted that – True Tone aside – Apple stuck with that winning formula.
