The 15-inch MacBook Air could be released as early as spring 2023, based on information from display market analyst Ross Young, who cites knowledge of the panels that will be used in Apple’s next laptop.
This laptop would be the largest Air to date. If Apple’s ultralight has moved to date in sizes of 12 and 13 inches, the new model would use a 15.5-inch diagonal panel and -at the screen size level- it would be between the 14 and 16 MacBook inches.
Apple is expected to maintain the general design of the last Air presented at WWDC 2022, although it will have to “fatten” its chassis a bit unibody Given the increase in size over the 13 mm thick and 1.24 kg in weight of the 13-inch version. In any case, it will be one of the lightest on the market and a reference in ultraportables.
Your panel will continue with the technology Liquid Retina Display (IPS) with native resolution above 2K. We don’t think Apple offers the option of mini-LED screens or the ProMotion technology of the MacBook Pro to keep production costs as low as possible.
As for the main engine, we believe that with the Apple M2 SoC Given its performance in the Air 13, it will be enough, although the company could also offer the Pro version of its chipset in the highest configuration. Once the transition from Intel to ARM has been consolidated in record time and with total success, Apple will have no problem continuing to develop increasingly powerful engines.
In connectivity, Apple can take advantage of the larger size to offer some additional ports on the two Thunderbolt / USB 4 of the Air 13 and, incidentally, place them on the other side of the laptop for greater user comfort. It could also increase the size of the Magic Keyboard and the Force Touch Trackpad. Apple will maintain the audio system with four speakers and Dolby Atmos support, as well as the 3.5mm headphone jack and support for Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5. It would not be bad if Apple took advantage of the larger size to include a port Ethernet, though not likely.
It will keep the MagSafe connector for power recharging and the improved fast charging system, while it remains to be seen if it can offer the stratospheric autonomy of 18 hours (in video playback) of the smaller model. There will be a notch in the upper central part to house the FaceTime camera. Apple would offer several configurations depending on installed RAM memory (up to 24 Gbytes) and solid state drives from 256 to 2 Tbytes for internal storage. We hope that Apple will respond to the drop in performance of the basic SSDs of the Air 13, the only “but” of the current model.
Does a 15-inch MacBook Air appeal to you? Personally to me yes. It would offer a significant increase in display capacity compared to smaller models, while maintaining the enormous lightness and autonomy, and without having to jump to the much more expensive 16-inch MacBook Pro. We’ll tell you.
