Apple is planning a new line of MacBook Air laptops that will bring more power and higher specs to its consumer-focused macOS portables. These will sit alongside the current entry-level Apple Silicon laptops that were launched last year.
Detail of a 2020 Apple MacBook Air laptop computer, taken on April 14, 2020. (Photo by Neil … [+] Godwin/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
T3 Magazine
This split will sound familiar to those watching the MacBook Pro portfolio. Although the macOS laptop line-up is in flux with the move away from Intel processors to Apples own silicon, there has been a clear delineation between low MacBook Pro and high MacBook Pro laptops evident in the catalogue.
You can see this in the last Intel-powered MacBook Pro 13-inch models released early last year. You had the machines with the lower specs both in terms of the processor choice and in the I/O option priced around the $1200 mark; while the higher specced machines – arguably the machines that felt the most Pro-like created their own tier around the $1700 mark,
While the M1 processor is seen as more capable than the Intel chip, its notable that the pricing on the M1 MacBook Pro machines puts them squarely in the low MacBook Pro range, and the M1X MacBook Pros that many are expecting later this year will take their place as the high MacBook Pro machines.
Now it looks as if Apple is set to offer a high tier of MacBook Air laptops as well.
What we have here is a case of jigsaw identification, with various parts of the puzzle coming from the likes of Mark Gurman, Jon Prosser, and Ming-Chi Kuo. You have the promise of the new M1X processor that will deliver the increased power over the current M1-equipped MacBook Air; you have the new design of the MacBook Air alongside that of the MacBook Pro that will (temporarily) create a significant point of differentiation between low and high, and you have various specs coming out, including the I/O choices of 2 USB-C ports, various colors, and the keyboard redesign for full size function keys with a smaller track-pad.
In short we are looking at the biggest re-imagining of the MacBook Air since the introduction of the tapered MacBook Air back in 2010 (with an honourable nod to the introduction of the Retina Screen in 2019).
Not only that, but Tim Cooks Apple is quietly working through all its product lines and offering Low and High variants. On the mobile side you have the iPhone and iPhone Pro, and the iPad and iPad Pro. The naming conventions on the Mac side of things may not be as clear cut – after all you can’t go MacBook Air, MacBook Air Pro, MacBook Pro, and MacBook Pro Pro – but Apple is set to give us an uprated MacBook Air by the end of the year.
Now read the latest Mac and iPhone headlines in Apple Loop…
