While Walmart continues to sell the 2020 M1 MacBook Air for $549, Best Buy is upping the ante for Cyber Monday with a sweet doorbuster deal on Apple’s 13-inch M2 MacBook Air that has twice the RAM (16GB vs. 8GB), not to mention a better design. Best Buy has marked it down to $599 ($200 off) for Cyber Monday.
The laptop was the first model to sport the MacBook Air’s current slate-like design, so it looks similar to the latest M4 edition that’s $749 right now. It has a 13.6-inch 2560 x 1664 display, a 1080p webcam, and a pair of Thunderbolt 3 ports. Its M2 processor has an eight-core CPU and eight-core GPU that’s getting a bit long in the tooth for demanding applications, but is sufficiently powerful for most tasks.
For example, the laptop had no trouble during our testing when editing and exporting high resolution images in Adobe Lightroom Classic, or quickly exporting a 4K video using Adobe Premiere. The MacBook Air’s fanless design means the CPU and GPU will get throttled when they’re under load for an extended period of time, but that’s to be expected.
One of the few setbacks with the M2 MacBook Air (fixed in newer versions) is that you can only connect it to one external monitor at a time. If that issue doesn’t apply to you, or if you’re willing to overlook it at this price, the M2 MacBook Air is a great purchase. Read our review.