The M2 MacBook Air is here, and like the M1, Apple has two options to choose from, one with an 8-core GPU and one with a 10-core GPU. We’ve been testing both models here at Macworld, the step-up model that starts at $1,499 (the model we tested and reviewed here has 1TB of storage and 16GB of RAM for $1,899) and the entry-level model with 256 GB of storage. , which costs $1,199.
That’s a pretty big difference in price, leading us to wonder what exactly you’re getting for the extra money. It turns out that you are receiving strength.
With two fewer GPU cores, less RAM, and an SSD setup that seems sub-optimal for read and write speeds, the cheaper MacBook Air faces several obstacles trying to compete with its pricier sibling. In some cases we were surprised by the worst performance, but there were also some pleasant surprises.
Read on to find out how the high-end and entry-level versions of the M2 Air fared against our speed and performance benchmarks. Where possible, we’ve included equivalent scores for the 256GB version of the MacBook Air M1 released in 2020 and for the quad-core Intel i5 model that came out the same year.
M2 MacBook Air: raw processing power
We started by looking at processing power using the Geekbench 5 and Cinebench R23 CPU benchmarks. We didn’t expect a big difference here, given that our Airs 2022 have the same processor with the same number of CPU cores, although the high-end model we tested had twice the RAM (16GB vs 8GB).
A promising start, with the entry-level Air tracking close to its more expensive sibling in all four tests (never trailing more than 2.2 percent) and showing gains of up to 16 .5 percent on the 2020 M1 Air. In fact, the 256GB Air scored slightly higher than the 1TB model in Cinebench’s multi-core component, though that was less than the 1 percent and probably just an anomaly.
M2 MacBook Air: Real World Tasks
CPU benchmarks give you an idea of how fast a machine is on paper, but we want to know how these Macs will perform in the real world. We set them our usual battery of stabilization, export and encoding tasks in iMovie and HandBrake 1.5.
There was barely any difference in the speed of the M2 Airs when exporting a 4K file at high settings, but in all other tests we saw a significant loss of performance when using the cheaper model. Exporting to the ProRes setting took 27.6 percent longer. Meanwhile, stabilizing an iMovie clip took an alarming 43 percent longer; In fact, we had to wait longer than when we used the 2020 M1 model (which was also an entry-level unit and cost only $999).
In our HandBrake tests, the 256GB model was slower than the 1TB version by 27.2 and 20.4 percent, respectively. In both cases it was closer in speed to the M1 model than to its own sibling.
M2 MacBook Air: Disk Speeds
We test the read and write speeds of our review Macs using Blackmagic Disk Speed Test. We were particularly interested to see how the base Air fared in this test, after reports that its SSD is up to 50 percent slower at read speeds and 30 percent at write speeds. (The explanation, based on teardowns of the machine, is that Apple is using a single 256GB chip instead of two 128GB chips like last year.)
The 256GB Air couldn’t disprove those dire predictions. Read speeds were 47.9 percent slower than the 1TB model on average, while write speeds were 50.2 percent slower, much worse than expected. In both cases, the entry-level Air is considerably slower than the 2020 model. You probably won’t notice the slowdown in normal day-to-day use, but for $1,199, we’d expect much stronger SSD performance.
M2 MacBook Air: Gaming Performance
Finally, we analyzed the performance of both Airs with a couple of demanding games: Rise of the Tomb Raider and Civilization VI. Both games include a benchmark mode that allows you to measure frame rates without using any additional software.
This is proof that Apple’s public specifications for the two machines led us to expect a significant differential. Simply put, the 1TB Air has a 10-core GPU, while the 256GB model only has 8 cores, so expect a lower frame rate.
However, the test results were slightly confusing. Tomb Raider’s numbers were largely predictable, with the 8-core Air lagging 43 percent at high settings and 26 percent lagging at medium settings. (In both cases, framerates for the entry-level M2 were lower than the M1 as of 2020.) But the cheaper model punched well above its weight in Civilization, with a performance comparable to the 1TB M2 at high settings and slightly better at medium settings.
The higher-end Air is certainly a better gaming machine, but the loss of two GPU cores doesn’t seem to hurt the cheaper model as much as expected. However, performance is likely to vary from game to game, and we recommend that you exercise caution if you have a specific, graphically demanding title that you want to enjoy.
Conclusions
It’s no surprise to discover that this year’s $1,199 MacBook Air performs less impressively than the top-of-the-line model. What’s more concerning is how much slower it is when it comes to disk read and write speeds (around 50 percent each, according to our tests) and in real-world stabilization, export, and encoding tasks.
It’s always tempting to go for the cheapest configuration of a new Apple product in order to enjoy the new design and processor for as little expense as possible. As for the MacBook Air M2, though, we’d advise against it, as testing suggests you’ll be getting a machine that in some respects performs no better than a cheaper model from 2020, and in some cases worse. True, you’ll get a bigger and better screen, MagSafe and a new design, but the M2 performance boost just isn’t there.
If you decide to buy the new Air, and we recommend paying more for the upgraded configuration, be sure to find the lowest price by checking out our guide to the best MacBook Air deals. Or just pick up an M1 Air and save a few hundred bucks.