2 reviews of this exact model; 1 of a sibling configuration (same chassis; a different chip or size, or the review does not state this Mac’s base chip with its CPU and GPU core counts), used for design topics only. Quotes are short, word for word, and each links to the article it came from. Every one was checked against that article on . MacIQ gives no score and no stars, and averages nothing.
Articles read Specifications and sources for the MacBook Air M1 (2020)
A count of the reviews we quote on this page that have a quote on each topic, from the findings shown below. A review may say more on a topic than we quote, so it counts what is quoted here, not everything each review covers, and it says how often a topic is quoted, not what was said about it. Battery, performance and heat are counted over the 2 reviews of this exact model.
A reviewer’s own figure beside Apple’s claim, each as its author printed it. Where the tests are of the same kind (web browsing, or the movie playback or streaming test Apple names, and only where the reviewer says so) that is said; where they are not, the two are shown and not compared. A video loop that the reviewer does not describe as Apple’s test, or ran from a stored or downloaded file, is shown, not compared. Figures are never ranked, subtracted or pooled across methods.
Different tests: shown, not compared
Apple’s claim
18 h, Apple TV app movie playback. Apple Support (UK) — MacBook Air (M1, 2020) - Tech Specs, read 15 September 2026
TechRadar’s measurement
11 hours and 15 minutes, from “we run a looped 1080p video at 50% brightness until the battery dies”. TechRadar
Different tests: shown, not compared
Apple’s claim
18 h, Apple TV app movie playback. Apple Support (UK) — MacBook Air (M1, 2020) - Tech Specs, read 15 September 2026
Trusted Reviews’s measurement
12 hours, from “looped 1080p video with the brightness set to 50%”. Trusted Reviews
Newest first, in the order of the date each article prints (which may be an update date, not a first-publication date). Each quote links to its article; the date is the one the article prints, labelled as the article labels it. “Published” and “Updated” appear only where the article prints that word beside the date; “Dated” means the article prints that date with no label, so the date itself does not say whether it is the first publication or an update. A later update that an article mentions only in an editor’s note is not used as its date.
Henry T. Casey
Reviewed: 13-inch MacBook Air, M1, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD
This is a different configuration of the same chassis. Only its comments on design are quoted here; its battery, performance and heat findings belong to the chip it tested.
the MacBook Air's stereo speakers get loud enough to fill my pretty-large living room with sweet sound
Matt Hanson
Tested: 13-inch MacBook Air, M1 (8-core CPU, 7-core GPU), 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD
Battery Life (TechRadar movie test): 11 hours and 15 minutes
The reviewer’s own figure: 11 hours and 15 minutes, from “we run a looped 1080p video at 50% brightness until the battery dies” (a looped-video battery test; the reviewer does not say it is the movie-playback or streaming test Apple names).
the fanless design is nice, as it means the laptop runs silently; we do have our concerns about how it manages heat, however.
Max Parker
Tested: 13-inch MacBook Air, M1, the base model: 8-core CPU, 7-core GPU, 8GB unified memory (storage not stated)
I ran a looped 1080p video with the brightness set to 50% and the MacBook Air lasted for 12 hours.
The reviewer’s own figure: 12 hours, from “looped 1080p video with the brightness set to 50%” (a looped-video battery test; the reviewer does not say it is the movie-playback or streaming test Apple names).
Both the keyboard and large glass trackpad are excellent.
More ports would have been welcome, and it would have been even better had they not been bunched together on the same side.