M4 MacBook Air vs. M5 MacBook Pro Buyer's Guide

Apple has refreshed some tiers of its MacBook lineup successful 2025, archetypal updating the MacBook Air with the M4 spot and present introducing the MacBook Pro with the caller M5 chip, truthful however bash the latest models compare?


While the 13- and 15-inch ‌MacBook Air‌ proceed to commencement astatine $999 and $1,199 respectively, moving to the 14-inch ‌MacBook Pro‌ requires spending astatine slightest $400 more. For immoderate buyers, the other outgo is unnecessary; for others, the Pro's hardware advantages meaningfully alteration the acquisition successful ways the Air cannot lucifer adjacent with higher configurations. Our usher helps to reply the question of however to determine which of these 2 fashionable laptops is champion for you. Beyond their chips, the cardinal differences are arsenic follows:



‌MacBook Air‌
‌MacBook Pro‌

13.6- oregon 15.3-inch display	14.2-inch display
	Slimmer borders astir the display
LCD Liquid Retina display	Mini-LED Liquid Retina XDR display
60hz refresh rate	ProMotion for refresh rates up to 120Hz
Up to 500 nits brightness	Up to 1,000 nits brightness and 1,600 nits highest HDR brightness
	Nano-texture show option
Passive cooling	Active cooling
Two Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) ports	Three Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) ports
	HDMI 2.1 larboard with enactment for multichannel audio output
	SDXC paper slot
13-Inch: Four-speaker dependable system 15-Inch: Six-speaker dependable strategy with force-canceling woofers	High-fidelity six-speaker dependable strategy with force-cancelling woofers
Three-mic array with directional beamforming	Studio-quality three-mic array with precocious signal-to-noise ratio and directional beamforming
256GB, 512GB, 1TB, oregon 2TB of storage	512GB, 1TB, 2TB, oregon 4TB storage
13-Inch: 53.8-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery 15-Inch: 66.5-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery	14-Inch: 72.4-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery
18-hour artillery life	24-hour artillery life
30W, 35W, oregon 70W USB-C Power Adapter	70W oregon 96W USB-C Power Adapter
Silver, Sky Blue, Starlight, oregon Midnight colour options	Silver oregon Space Black colour options
13-Inch: Starts astatine $999 15-Inch: Starts astatine $1,199	Starts astatine $1,599

Dimensions are besides a cardinal country of quality betwixt the ‌MacBook Air‌ and ‌MacBook Pro‌. The ‌MacBook Pro‌ is noticeably thicker and heavier than some ‌MacBook Air‌ models:




‌MacBook Air‌ (13-Inch)
‌MacBook Air‌ (15-Inch)
‌MacBook Pro‌ (14-Inch)


Height





Width





Depth





Weight

0.44 inches (1.13 cm)	0.45 inch (1.15 cm)	0.61 inches (1.55 cm)
11.97 inches (30.41 cm)	13.40 inches (34.04 cm)	12.31 inches (31.26 cm)
8.46 inches (21.5 cm)	9.35 inches (23.76 cm)	8.71 inches (22.12 cm)
2.7 pounds (1.24 kg)	3.3 pounds (1.51 kg)	3.4 pounds (1.55 kg)

With the latest mentation of the ‌MacBook Pro‌, Apple is touting the powerfulness of the M5 chip. Compared to the M4, it says the M5 is:

• Up to 15% faster multithreaded CPU performance


• Up to 30% faster wide graphics performance


• Up to 45% faster ray tracing performance


• 27.5% higher unified representation bandwidth

In summation to wide show claims, Apple published a acceptable of circumstantial real-world workload results showing measurable gains successful AI-driven applications:

• 4×+ highest GPU compute show for AI


• 3.6× faster clip to archetypal token (LLM)


• 1.8× faster Topaz Video Enhance AI processing


• 1.7× faster Blender ray-traced rendering


• 2.9× faster AI code enhancement successful Premiere Pro

Other notable changes compared to the M4 spot successful the ‌MacBook Air‌ include:



M4 Chip
M5 Chip

Made with TSMC's second-generation 3nm process (N3E)	Made TSMC's third-generation ‌3nm‌ process (N3P)
Based connected A18 Pro spot from iPhone 16 Pro	Based connected A19 Pro spot from iPhone 17 Pro
No integrated Neural Accelerators	Integrated Neural Accelerator successful each GPU core
Metal 3 developer APIs	Metal 4 developer APIs with Tensor APIs to programme GPU Neural Accelerators
Second-generation ray tracing engine	Third-generation ray tracing engine
First-generation dynamic caching	Second-generation dynamic caching
Shader cores	Enhanced shader cores
120 GB/s unified representation bandwidth	153 GB/s unified representation bandwidth

Taken arsenic a whole, the M4 ‌MacBook Air‌ continues to correspond the astir suitable prime for users whose workloads are airy to mean and who worth portability and an affordable terms implicit sustained performance. Its starting terms of $999, which is often reduced further done Apple acquisition pricing and third-party promotions, places it wrong scope for the bulk of buyers. For regular tasks similar email, airy productivity, browsing, and media consumption, it delivers show that is efficaciously indistinguishable from much costly models. Its thinner chassis, little weight, and enactment of colour options besides stay important advantages for many.

• M4 vs. M5 Chip Buyer's Guide: How Much Better Really Is M5?

By contrast, the M5 ‌MacBook Pro‌ exists for those whose enactment oregon expected longevity justifies the premium. The operation of a much precocious chip, mini-LED XDR show with ProMotion, progressive cooling for sustained show headroom, a dedicated HDMI larboard with multichannel audio support, an SDXC paper slot, a 3rd Thunderbolt port, higher representation ceilings, larger retention options, improved speakers and microphones, and materially longer artillery beingness produces a instrumentality with materially antithetic capabilities. If you expect to execute extended tasks successful video editing, 3D workloads, bundle development, oregon AI-driven tasks, the ‌MacBook Pro‌ is designed to debar the thermal and bandwidth constraints that the Air volition encounter.

A notable objection arises astatine the precocious extremity of the Air's pricing. The 15-inch ‌MacBook Air‌ astatine $1,299, and particularly erstwhile configured to 512GB of retention astatine $1,399, approaches the 14-inch ‌MacBook Pro‌'s $1,599 introduction constituent intimately capable that the trade-off changes. For an increment of $200–300, the Pro substitutes a importantly much precocious display, progressive cooling, six further hours of artillery life, superior speakers and microphones, an further Thunderbolt port, and integrated HDMI and SDXC. In that circumstantial pricing band, the Pro volition apt represent the stronger semipermanent acquisition for the bulk of buyers unless surface size oregon minimal value are the overriding priorities.
This article, "M4 MacBook Air vs. M5 MacBook Pro Buyer's Guide" archetypal appeared connected MacRumors.com

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