Apple's CHEAPEST Large MacBook: 2023 M2 15in MacBook Air Review

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Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
0:18 Physical Features
2:55 Differences Between 13in and 15in
3:16 Personal Experience
5:00 The Bigger Screen Makes a Difference
6:54 Why Did They Make This Laptop?
7:59 Conclusion

The 15in MacBook Air, physically is the 13in Macbook Air but bigger. It still has the same design, it has the same MagSafe port and the same 2 Thunderbolt ports. It has the same keyboard, the same webcam, and the same color options. But, there are some differences between them too. You can narrow it down on one hand. The screen is bigger, the battery is bigger to account for that bigger screen, it has better speakers, it comes with the 35W dual port power brick, and it comes with a 10-core GPU standard compared to the 13-inch' 8-core GPU.

But if that’s it, how is it in day-to-day life? Performance-wise, it’s nearly identical to the 13in air. It’s snappy at your standard tasks, web browsing, watching videos, writing documents, viewing PDFs, you name it. It can handle some light video editing in FCPX and I can edit photos just fine in Affinity with no noticeable stuttering. Overall, it’s been pretty solid. It behaves like how M2 chips behave. Good. But let’s talk about the 15-inch screen size and the speakers. The larger screen size makes it so much easier to multi-task with just the laptop’s display. On the 13in air, I felt like it was harder to consistently have 2 apps open, but with the 15in I had multiple apps open more often. It was also nicer for watching videos, and the speakers sounded really good. I’ve been spoiled by good MacBook speakers and it makes it hard to listen to other laptops. This one is no exception. The speakers sound great, even better than the 13in. Battery life feels super similar to the 13in. The port situation is also exactly like the 13-inch MacBook Air, it’s all on the left side except for the lonely headphone jack on the right. This laptop also only supports one external monitor in conjunction with the laptop’s display. But, because the screen is big, it makes a perfect single external monitor companion, with plenty of usable space on that 15-inch display to use as a secondary monitor.

So, there are quite a few ways that this laptop is better. But at the trade-off of size. But is the size really a negative? I have with me the 3 laptops people might be comparing this 15 in-air to. The 13in Air,14in Macbook Pro, and 16in Macbook Pro for that screen size. My main machine is actually the 14-inch MacBook Pro. And despite having a smaller screen, it weighs more than the 15in MacBook Air. And you can really feel it in your hand. Especially with how dense the 14in pro is. The 15-inch air is really thin and light for a 15-inch laptop. The 16in Pro is heavy, at around 4.5lbs but because the 15in Air isn’t using the beefier processors, chunky battery, and fancier features of the higher-end “Pro” Macs, This thing has very little fat. So, despite being large, it just feels like an oversized tablet in the hand and doesn’t feel heavy in my backpack. Because the 14in and 16in pros weigh more and are denser, you can definitely feel their weight when you pull them out or use them. When compared to the 13in the air, it feels slightly heavier. But you do notice the extra width. It feels like a giant tablet rather than a big computer. The 15-inch air feels like the best of both worlds, it's big but relatively light. Also, it’s just so much nicer to chill on the couch with this lightweight big-screen laptop, vs. a smaller laptop. It makes it easy to get some on-the-go multi-tasking in. The only complaint I can think of for this size is cramped spaces like airplane seats, where you might not have enough space for this bigger laptop.

So should you get the 15-inch MacBook Air? The larger display is better for multi-taskers, and media consumption, and makes the one external monitor limitation more bearable and a better on-the-go machine. If I were looking for a Macbook right now. I think I’d personally look at the 15in first since I can see myself using all that extra screen real estate, so if you’re the type of person who constantly multi-tasks on the go, instead of focusing on a single task at a time. Then start with this 15-inch MacBook Air. I think this 15-inch MacBook Air is a great addition to Apple’s lineup and it’s going to be super popular for non-heavy video editing, coding, photo editing, and more productivity-based users.