13 inch MacBook Air vs. 15 inch - Which Should You Buy? — Transcript

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1. 0:00I've spent well over 6 months using a 13-inch and  15-inch MacBook Air, and I'm going to take you
2. 0:06through which size I'd recommend getting. First,  let me walk you through some questions to consider
3. 0:11that should make this easier. First up, what  situations do you plan to use your MacBook Air
4. 0:16in? Are you mainly using it at and around home, or  are you more likely to be on the college campus,
5. 0:23traveling for work, or just generally on the go?  The 13-inch is more portable and lighter weight,
6. 0:29and in my experience, is generally  easier to carry around because of
7. 0:34its slightly smaller size. Most backpacks  and bags can accommodate a 13-inch laptop,
8. 0:40while that's not always the case for the  15-inch size. And speaking of carry bags,
9. 0:45another question to consider is how much weight  matters to you. The 13-inch weighs 2.7 lb or 1.24
10. 0:53kg, while the 15-inch weighs 3.3 lb or 1.51  kg. That's a difference of about 270 g, which
11. 1:02isn't nothing. That's just a bit heavier than  the weight of the largest iPhone, but probably
12. 1:07not enough to break your back. Now, another  question to ask yourself is in the situations
13. 1:13you'll be using your MacBook Air, will you have  access to an external monitor? If so, that could
14. 1:19make the case to get the smaller MacBook Air  since when you want to use it for long periods
15. 1:24of time. You'll be able to use it with a larger  display like Apple's excellent Studio Display,
16. 1:29which is hands down the best monitor I've ever  owned. And because it's a 5K display, it scales
17. 1:35macOS perfectly to its 27-inch size. Though,  yes, it is a bit pricey. But in this instance,
18. 1:41you do really get excellent top-of-the-line  quality for what you pay for. Now, related
19. 1:47to the if you have a monitor question, another  one you should consider is how long per session
20. 1:53do you plan to use your MacBook. If you're only  using it for quick spurts while you're on the go,
21. 1:58the screen real estate may not matter as much to  you as the portability. However, if you don't have
22. 2:04access to an external monitor most of the time  when you do plan to use your MacBook Air, that's
23. 2:10when I'd seriously consider looking at the 15-inch  model, especially if you plan to do a lot of work
24. 2:16from your computer. Because while 2 inches may  not sound like a lot, 6 months later, that added
25. 2:22screen real estate is actually really useful,  especially when using split screen between two
26. 2:27windows. So, those are some questions I think you  should consider when looking at which size MacBook
27. 2:33Air to get. But what about downsides? If you opt  for the 15-inch, the main downsides are that it's
28. 2:39heavier and larger in size. And if you go for  the 13-inch, the main downside is the smaller
29. 2:45display. But there are more differences between  these two laptops that might not be as obvious.
30. 2:51Take battery life for example. Actually, that's a  bad example. It's the same between both of them.
31. 2:56While the 15-inch has a larger battery, the  display that battery is powering is also larger,
32. 3:02so the gains there are offset by the display's  increased power draw. Both models are officially
33. 3:08rated for up to 18 hours of video playback and  15 hours of wireless web browsing. But one area
34. 3:15where these two laptops do diverge from each other  is with their speakers. At the time of recording,
35. 3:21the 13-inch has a four-speaker sound system, while  the 15-inch has a six-speaker sound system with
36. 3:27force-cancelling woofers. Can you really tell that  much of a difference, though? Yes. The 15-inch is
37. 3:33not only louder than the 13-inch by maybe around  10 or 20%, I'd say, but it does noticeably have a
38. 3:40fuller sound than the 13-inch. Now, when you see  these two force-cancelling woofers in the spec
39. 3:46sheet, those aren't really there for deep bass,  but they absolutely help create that fuller,
40. 3:52more punchy sound that pretty much everybody  is going to prefer when listening to these
41. 3:58two computers side by side. The 13-inch  sounds fine, but way more tiny compared
42. 4:04to the 15-inch. Here's an example of what I'm  talking about. If you're wearing good headphones.
43. 4:27For dorm room listening sessions or just using the  speakers in general, the 15-inch is definitely the
44. 4:32way to go. Another difference is the palm rest  area is slightly larger on the 15-inch model,
45. 4:38and 6 months later, I found I slightly prefer  it to the experience I had with the 13-inch.
46. 4:44And of course, another thing to consider with  laptops is the webcam. If you're someone who
47. 4:48spends a lot of time on video calls, streaming, or  creating content, one thing that can dramatically
48. 4:54improve your setup is upgrading your webcam  to something like the Tiny2 Light from OBSBOT,
49. 5:00who sponsored this video. What makes this webcam  special is its half-inch CMOS sensor that delivers
50. 5:06true 4K quality with better low light performance.  A significant step up from most built-in laptop
51. 5:12cameras. But the real standout feature is the AI  powered auto tracking with its two axis gimbal
52. 5:18that's able to physically follow you around. It  has multiple tracking modes too. Another cool
53. 5:24thing is their Gesture Control 2.0. So I can  simply hold my hand up and now the camera will
54. 5:32start tracking me using AI and moving around. Or  you can do other gestures like you can hold up an
55. 5:37L shape to zoom in and out. The preset modes  are also incredibly useful for a variety of
56. 5:44workloads. You can save different PTZ positions  and settings for different types of videos. The
57. 5:50dual omnidirectional microphones with noise  cancellation and automatic gain control mean
58. 5:55you don't always need a separate mic setup. And at  just $179, OBSBOT thinks the Tiny 2 Light delivers
59. 6:03professional features at a budget friendly price  and is compatible with most devices on the market.
60. 6:10So get your OBSBOT Tiny 2 Light webcam today  using the link in the description below. There
61. 6:15are also differences in the charging brick that  come with each model. The barebones 13-inch,
62. 6:20which has an 8 core GPU versus 10 core GPU,  comes with a 30W USB-C power adapter. The 35
63. 6:28watt dual USB-C port compact power adapter comes  with the rest of the configurations by default.
64. 6:35This is something a lot of people probably breeze  by when ordering a MacBook Air, but it's actually
65. 6:40really important and I strongly recommend that you  almost always opt for the 70 watt charger. This
66. 6:46is going to charge your MacBook Air much faster  than the 35 watt dual USB-C charger. While it's
67. 6:53missing an extra USB-C port, you can always plug  your phone into your MacBook Air if you need to
68. 6:58charge it. Or opt for a gallium nitride charger  from Anker like the one they sent me that I used
69. 7:04to test the power draw from different devices. It  can charge my MacBook Air, iPhone, and Apple Watch
70. 7:10all from one charging brick. And they didn't  sponsor this video, by the way. That's just my
71. 7:14personal favorite charger to use. And I have their  previous version I bought as well, and I use it
72. 7:20all the time when I travel. I'll leave a link to  it in our products link down in the description
73. 7:24and pinned comment if you want to learn more about  it. So, those are all of the differences between
74. 7:29the two size laptops. So, which one in general do  I think you should buy? 6 Months Later, my default
75. 7:36recommendation is to get the 15-inch model if you  plan to do a lot of work from this MacBook Air.
76. 7:43Generally, I've just found I benefited quite a bit  from the extra screen real estate you get with it.
77. 7:48Plus, it has better speakers, a larger area to  rest your palms. Now, when do I think it doesn't
78. 7:54make sense to go for the 15-inch option? Two main  scenarios. First is you really need to prioritize
79. 8:01portability. So, you might have a smaller bag it  needs to fit in or you plan to use it in short
80. 8:06spurts where the larger screen real estate won't  matter as much. Or if you have a larger display
81. 8:11to use with it, in those cases, I think it makes  sense to just go with the 13-inch version. Now,
82. 8:17of course, the last thing to consider is if there  are any current sales going on with one size,
83. 8:23and I've left links to both sizes, so you can  check their current prices across multiple
84. 8:27retailers. You can find the products link  in the description and pinned comment. So,
85. 8:32those are my thoughts on which sized MacBook Air  to get, but now it's your turn. Let me know what
86. 8:37you think. And if you have a MacBook Air, why did  you get the certain size that you did? And which
87. 8:42size would you recommend getting? And if you  want to see my review of the M4 MacBook Air or
88. 8:47my previous reviews of Apple computers, you can  get to those by clicking here or click here for
89. 8:53more of my popular 6 Months Later reviews. And to  see all of the products I recommend at any time,
90. 8:59you can do that by visiting 6month.net/shop. For 6  Months Later, I'm Josh Teder. Thanks for watching.