2020 MacBook Air With Quad-Core i5 is Up to 76% Faster Than 2018-2019 Model Based on Benchmarks

[Imory]

Something is off with his numbers on the 2013 Macbook Air with the i7. It has a single-core score of 723 instead of the 565 he posted.

MacBook Air (13-inch Mid 2013) Benchmarks - Geekbench

browser.geekbench.com

 

[SRLMJ23]

For those asking basically about “future-proofing,” I would recommend upgrading to at least the i5, and the 16GB RAM option.

Get the i7 if you truly need the best of the best, and once again the 16GB RAM. I wish they would have had a 32GB RAM option, but overall, I think this MBA is a really great machine, minus the base model with the i3, but for some people the i3 and 8GB RAM will be plenty!

On a side note: God bless everyone in these trying times, and listen to what your Federal/State/Local government’s are telling you.

 

[ksec]

View attachment 900115

Here is Geekbench for the 2019 MBP. Very close in single-core (1047/1034) with the MBP ahead in multi-core (2658/3988) by about 50%.

I do wonder how much multi-core scores even mater in low demand, day to day usage.

I have not seen anything comparing GPU scores though.

I just tested the Geekbench it took 2 min + to Finish on my MacBook Pro 2015. So this should rule out thermals limitation in most cases. The score is pretty damn good for this form factor.

Wondering about GPU as well.

 

[MakeAppleAwesomeAgain]

Has anyone investigate the throttling yet? How does it compare to the current MBP and how different are the i5 and i7 when it comes to throttling? I'd gladly pay for the i7 (even if it's just 5-7% faster) but if the throttling is worse, I see no reason to spend extra money on it.

 

[Prothis]

For those asking basically about “future-proofing,” I would recommend upgrading to at least the i5, and the 16GB RAM option.

Get the i7 if you truly need the best of the best, and once again the 16GB RAM. I wish they would have had a 32GB RAM option, but overall, I think this MBA is a really great machine, minus the base model with the i3, but for some people the i3 and 8GB RAM will be plenty!

On a side note: God bless everyone in these trying times, and listen to what your Federal/State/Local government’s are telling you.

I’m currently looking for my wife, I want her to get at least the i5 with 16gb of RAM. But what does this do to the battery life? I’m thinking of the MBP which now has the largest battery allowed by the TSA, would the base model of that be better than upgrading the MBA? She is not a power user but battery life is always a factor!

 

[now i see it]

yeah - but it has to run Catalina

 

[ksec]

I wish they would have had a 32GB RAM option, but overall,

Hopefully the next update will get that. Good enough to replace the MacBook Pro 2015. Along with WiFi 6.
[automerge]1584726241[/automerge]

Has anyone investigate the throttling yet? How does it compare to the current MBP and how different are the i5 and i7 when it comes to throttling? I'd gladly pay for the i7 (even if it's just 5-7% faster) but if the throttling is worse, I see no reason to spend extra money on it.

The Geekbench takes around 2min to complete. Which means those score should be a good enough indication of thermal throttling already in place.

 

[falainber]

And yet it's 25% slower than the iPhone 11, lol.

Geekbench is not a proper multi-platform benchmark so your comparison is pointless. To claim to be multi-platform, GB excludes use of certain features available on more advanced platforms (i.e. x86). As a result, one gets handicapped scores for Intel CPUs compared to ARM.

 

[QCassidy352]

very impressed with this update and happy with these numbers. problem is... my 2013 13" MBP just keeps going, no issues at all and still meets my needs... so I don't think I can justify this, even though it looks great.

 

[Evil Spoonman]

This is a good machine.

What isn't good is that they shipped the previous one at all. When Apple puts a product on sale, I expect it to be good. It is a bad look to ship a crippled, temporary computer, that you replace in a year. Highly unimpressed, some loss of trust.

 

[aajeevlin]

For those asking basically about “future-proofing,” I would recommend upgrading to at least the i5, and the 16GB RAM option.

Get the i7 if you truly need the best of the best, and once again the 16GB RAM. I wish they would have had a 32GB RAM option, but overall, I think this MBA is a really great machine, minus the base model with the i3, but for some people the i3 and 8GB RAM will be plenty!

On a side note: God bless everyone in these trying times, and listen to what your Federal/State/Local government’s are telling you.

Yea I’m trying to future proof this guys as much as I can. I have a 2011 MacBook to 13 base. Which I have upgraded the RAM and SSD. Think total amount spent on it is $1300-1400 and it has been my main machine (school days, daily stuff, personal project you name it). Only looking for a new one now because the OS is no longer supported which means any software I need going forward will probably lose their support as well. Hope this one can last another decade. Haha.

 

[lambertjohn]

proper cpu with proper thernals...not that joke of 2018 model without heat pipe and 7W cpu

I own that joke of a 2018 model and it's been a fabulous computer for me. Typing on it right now, actually pounding on it right now. Zero issues. Runs everything I throw at it perfectly. And I get an average of 15 hours of battery usage. I'm sure the 2020 Air is awesome, but so is the 2018 Air. I have no plans to upgrade.

 

[CIA]

Looking at the Geekbench 5 webpage I'm trying to sort out how ~2600 is good. Are they actually using Geekbench 4?
A single core speed of ~1,000 is pretty good, but the multicore should be around double what is listed in the article.

Mac Benchmarks - Geekbench

browser.geekbench.com

 

[CheesePuff]

Convinced my girlfriend to finally upgrade her MacBook Pro mid-2011! She's on board to get the i5, but would upgrading to the i7 for an extra $150 be worthwhile? Or a splurge to 16gb ram? Currently toward an i5 8gb model, and weighing what could be worthwhile for longevity. She is not a power user, but as you can see, she tries to keep her device for as long as possible. Thanks.

If she doesn't need 512 GB storage, then I would take the base model and upgrade the CPU to the quad-core i5 and 16 GB RAM to future proof it. Comes out to the same price as the $1299 (US) model.

 

[Kevin2055]

Apple should try their A chip on MBA.

 

[honestone33]

Not sure if a Core i5 2020 model would be that much "faster" than my 2017 Core i5 model, as it has a 1.8 Ghz processor, a 256 (actually 252) gig SSD, and 8 gig of Ram.. As it is, and especially since we will not be doing much, if any, traveling, I am not using my MacBook Air much at all. Since just about all of my computing "activities' are being done at home, it's my recently purchased late 2018 Mac Mini that gets just about all the attention. Also, at least my model still has 2 USB 3 ports, which is perfect for the various peripherals I have.

 

[mi7chy]

Convinced my girlfriend to finally upgrade her MacBook Pro mid-2011! She's on board to get the i5, but would upgrading to the i7 for an extra $150 be worthwhile? Or a splurge to 16gb ram? Currently toward an i5 8gb model, and weighing what could be worthwhile for longevity. She is not a power user, but as you can see, she tries to keep her device for as long as possible. Thanks.

Definitely 16GB DRAM. Wait for real life sustained workload tests to see if i7 throttles not useless short synthetic benchmarks. If you can't wait i5 + 16GB is the safer bet.

 

[AlifTheUnseen]

I have a mid-2011 MBA and ordered the i7-16GB... i'm excited, especially looking forward to working 'z' and '9' keys... lol, and a much better display. It looks like a very worthwhile upgrade... we got few of those in the last 10+ years or so...

 

[Mr. Awesome]

Convinced my girlfriend to finally upgrade her MacBook Pro mid-2011! She's on board to get the i5, but would upgrading to the i7 for an extra $150 be worthwhile? Or a splurge to 16gb ram? Currently toward an i5 8gb model, and weighing what could be worthwhile for longevity. She is not a power user, but as you can see, she tries to keep her device for as long as possible. Thanks.

If you’re upgrading something, upgrade the memory.

 

[poormatt]

RAM over CPU if you can't upgrade both.
The i5 is only 50 more than the i3, but I'd spend the extra budget for 16GB of RAM before upgrading to the i7.
If I had to buy it for myself I'd go for 16GB and 512GB of storage, and at least the i5.

With so many free or nearly free online storage options and external being so inexpensive, I tend to lean towards processing power + RAM to squeeze longevity out of devices. An i7 with 16GB RAM and a 256GB SSD for $1,500 is probably going to be the best deal we see out of the MB line for a while.

 

[nylon]

These benchmarks indicate that new MBA in the i5 quad core config is faster than my 2016 15" MBP TB in the single core by ~30% and slower in the multicore by about ~25%. That's pretty impressive.

 

[Jury]

I need to cancel the order due to Wifi 6 error on the MBA!

 

[gnasher729]

1200€ for the dual core
1500€ for the quad core. Wtf.

Please learn reading. One price is dual core + 256 GB SSD, the other price is quad core + 512 GB SSD. If you want to compare prices for dual and quad core, make the rest of the machine the same.

 

[Jury]

proper cpu with proper thernals...not that joke of 2018 model without heat pipe and 7W cpu

Since it's a low watt intel CPU, it shouldn't exceed 50C temperature. However, it's unacceptable that the 9w CPU hit over 90C on the MBA!

 

[Macyourdayy]

I have a mid-2011 MBA and ordered the i7-16GB... i'm excited, especially looking forward to working 'z' and '9' keys... lol, and a much better display. It looks like a very worthwhile upgrade... we got few of those in the last 10+ years or so...

Yes, but you can only run Crapalina and only have “2” ports because if you plug an external drive in, it your battery will be quickly drained. Pre TB3 models had 5-7 ports. Also, no MagSafe means any accidents and the best you can hope for is a damaged cable. Which are stupidly expensive.
I wish I ignored the wife’s cheapness and ordered a 2017 i7 with 16GB as non retina is not an issue for her, but the base 8GB on the 2013 i7 is a major problem with resource sucking web pages and mail. Storage is not an issue pre 2018 as the drives were replaceable.