It seems reviewers with early access to the new Apple MacBook Air are busy evaluating the performance of its new M2 processor, as evidenced by the flood of Mac 14,2 scores on Geekbench.
Unsurprisingly, the M2 in the fanless MacBook Air scores in the same ballpark as the M2 inside the MacBook Pro 13, which has a single fan. Geekbench is a quick benchmark and it doesn’t stress the chipset and it, in turn, doesn’t generate enough heat to cause throttling.
However, some early M2 reviews showed that the new processor gets hotter than the M1 and that can lead to poorer sustained performance. Those tests are based on the single-fanned MacBook Pro 13 and they’ll likely lead to the same result on the fanless MacBook Air.
But we expect the MacBook Pro 14 and 16 laptops to be well equipped to deal with the new chip, once it comes to them.
The new MacBook Air on the left, the new MacBook Pro 13 on the right
The MacBook Air went on pre-order on July 8 and will ship from July 15, a few weeks after the old-look, M2-equipped MacBook Pro 13. In addition to the upgraded processor (which has an 18% faster CPU, and 35% faster GPU), the Air is slimmer, brings a new 13.6-inch 2560x1664px IPS LCD with 500 nits of brightness, MagSafe and two USB-C ports, and a new 1080p webcam.
