New MacBook Air Coming Friday With These 5 New Features

By Joe Rossignol

Apple updated the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air this week with several new features and changes. Laptops can be ordered now, they will be available in stores and deliveries to customers will begin on Friday, March 8.

Below we outline the key new features added to MacBook Air, including the M3 chip, Wi-Fi 6E, expanded external display support, and more.

M3 chip

Both the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Air are now available with Apple's latest M3 chip, delivering faster performance and improved energy efficiency.

As expected, early test results found the M3 chip to be 20 % faster than the M2 chip in previous MacBook Air models in terms of processor performance. These results match the 14-inch MacBook Pro with the M3 chip.

With the M3 chip, the MacBook Air also features hardware-accelerated ray tracing for improved graphics rendering in games, as well as AV1 video. decoding.

Dual external displays

While previous MacBook Air models with Apple Silicon officially only support one external display, the new models support two external displays. However, the second display can only be used when the MacBook Air lid is closed.

When the lid is open, the new models support a single external display with up to 6K resolution and 60Hz. According to Apple technical specifications, when the lid is closed, you can connect a second display with up to 5K resolution and 60 Hz.

You can connect even more displays to MacBook Air using DisplayLink adapters.

Wi-Fi 6E

The new MacBook Air supports Wi-Fi 6E, delivering “twice as fast” wireless download speeds as previous Wi-Fi models . Fi 6, according to Apple.

Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi 6 to the 6 GHz band, delivering faster wireless speeds and reducing signal interference from your compatible device and router. The entire current-generation Mac lineup now supports Wi-Fi 6E.

Microphone update

Apple says the microphones in the new MacBook Air models provide “increased voice clarity for audio and video calls” compared to previous models. The microphones also gain support for Voice Isolation and Wide Spectrum modes.