Apple on Monday introduced a completely redesigned MacBook Air and an updated 13-inch MacBook Pro, both powered by the new M2 chip.
Unveiled at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), this new MacBook Air features a strikingly thin design, a larger 13.6-inch Liquid Retina display, a 1080p FaceTime HD camera, four-speaker sound system, up to 18 hours of battery life, and MagSafe charging.
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The company showcased the updated laptop at the 2022 WWDC, an event that’s otherwise focused on software updates for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and other devices. The new Air adds yet another machine to the company’s lucrative lineup of computers, which has seen revenue jump since a switch away from Intel Corp. chips in 2020, a Bloomberg report adds.
Measuring just 11.3 mm thin, the new MacBook Air is available in four different finishes — silver, starlight, space gray, and midnight. In a detailed press release, Apple also said that the M2 is coming to the 13-inch MacBook Pro, delivering incredible performance, up to 24GB of unified memory, ProRes acceleration, and up to 20 hours of battery life. All this in a compact design.
The new MacBook Air and updated 13-inch MacBook Pro join the even more powerful 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pro with M1 Pro and M1 Max to round out the strongest lineup of Mac notebooks ever offered. Both laptops will be available next month, the press release added.
The new Air model will start at $1,199 (approximately INR 119,900), while the Pro price begins at $1,299 (around INR 129,900), the Bloomberg report said.
The Mac lineup generates a fraction of the sales that Apple’s iPhone does, but it’s been a solid performer in recent years. It accounted for nearly 11% of revenue in the last quarter, more than the iPad and Apple’s wearables and home products. The last major MacBook Air overhaul was in 2018 when the company added a Retina display, but the device looked similar overall to the 2010 model -- previously considered the most significant redesign in the laptop’s history. The MacBook Air was first launched in 2008 by Steve Jobs, when the Apple co-founder pulled the ultrathin laptop out of a manila envelope, the report added.
Apart from MagSafe – which Apple says will give users a dedicated charging port that is easy to connect, while protecting MacBook Air when it is plugged in by quickly releasing if the charging cable is accidentally pulled – the new Air will also features two Thunderbolt ports, and a 3.5 mm audio jack with support for high-impedance headphones. Additionally, the Magic Keyboard features a full-height function row with Touch ID, and a spacious, industry-leading Force Touch trackpad.
There's also a 13.6-inch Liquid Retina display, which has been expanded closer to the sides and up around the camera to make room for the menu bar. Apart from that, the new MacBook Air also includes a new 1080p FaceTime HD camera with a larger image sensor and more efficient pixels that deliver twice the resolution and low-light performance of the previous generation. Combined with the processing power of the advanced image signal processor on M2, users will look great on video calls, the press release explains.
Apart from the MacBook Air, Apple also showcased the latest operating system for its iPhones – iOS16. The company also unveiled “a buy now pay later” service and a new WatchOS 9, which will bring new watch faces, new metrics for workouts and heart rate zones for exercises, a Reuters report said.
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(With inputs from agencies)
