Malcolm Owen
Apple's late 2024 update to its Mac and MacBook ranges has brought M4 to the product line. Here's how to choose the best portable Mac for your budget for the 2024 holiday season.
Apple's fall product updates covered many areas, but for the Mac product category, it meant an update to M4. Following the introduction of the chip in the iPad Pro lineup earlier in the year, the MacBook Pro now uses the speedy chip.
Even better, Apple didn't stop at just M4, as it brought out M4 Pro and M4 Max variants as well. These additions offer a lot more performance options, and in the case of the M4 Max, more performance than an M2 Ultra in some benchmarks.
With Apple covering a wide range of price points with both its MacBook Pro and MacBook Air lines, there's still a lot of choice available for consumers, regardless of their budget. The addition of M4 makes it a little easier to work out what to get, but it's still a challenge to get it right.
This guide was last updated on December 5, 2024.
Best MacBook - Overall pricing
Apple's overall product catalog for portable Mac models starts from $999 for the cheapest model, rising to $3,499 for the most expensive base model.
If you wanted the most expensive based on main configuration options, that would be the 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M4 Max. At its highest, you could pay as much as $7,349, more than seven times the price of the cheapest model.
The overall price range of MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models as of November 2024The fall M4 MacBook influx doesn't make much of a difference in pricing versus the previous models. It does, however, tweak the price range a little bit higher, thanks to those MacBook Pro configuration changes.
We will be splitting the chart down to three broad groups: The busy $2,000 to $3,000 price range, and the spaces below and above.
Best MacBook - Storage and Configuration
It is no secret that Apple's configuration options can quickly bring an order to nosebleed prices. Adding on elements to a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro may seem like a good idea, until you see how much it actually costs.
For Apple's MacBook lines, there are a few configuration options to consider: The Apple Silicon itself, memory, storage, and now Nano-texture.
The first is obvious, as it determines how powerful the MacBook will be. Later generations will tend to be faster, as will higher tiers like the Max over the Pro and non-Pro editions.
You can also get variants of the same chip tier, with more cores provided.
Memory is also an important element, especially with the unified memory structure. Since all of the memory is usable across all chip components, including the CPU and GPU, adding more memory means you're adding more to all components at the same time.
Storage pricing tiers for the MacBook range, as of November 2024Storage is the big one when it comes to upgrades, with more cost applied to higher capacities. For example, going from a 256GB SSD to 512GB could cost $200 for one model, while another could charge you $1,200 to go from 4TB to 8TB.
Lastly, there's Nano-texture, an etched layer of the display that is used to eliminate glare from environmental lighting.
AppleInsider recommends to consider storage as the upgrade to reduce first from your potential order. It is the only upgrade that can be adjusted by using external drives, so it is better to preserve other upgrades before it.
In short, save money by using external drives instead of paying for higher-priced Apple storage upgrades.
Best MacBook - Under $2,000
The Under $2,000 range is arguably the easiest to consider of the three, as it's very much price-driven. At the start, you've got the base 13-inch MacBook Air with M2 as your only option at $999, with the 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU, 16GB of memory, and 256GB of storage.
Your first decision is at $1,099, as you could get the M2 with a 10-core GPU, or the M3 version. The latter is probably the better deal at this stage.
Apple MacBook Air and MacBook Pro price ranges under $2,000The best option on the M2 MacBook Air is to get the 512GB SSD upgrade, as you also get the M2 chip with the 10-core GPU thrown in. You could get the M3 with the chip upgrade to a 10-core GPU too, but at this level, the M2 upgrade may be more useful due to the double-whammy.
$1,299 brings the 15-inch MacBook Air M3 with 16GB of memory and the 8-core CPU and 10-core GPU into play, with 256GB of storage. However, the storage-and-chip upgrade on the 13-inch M3 is also available here, or the 24GB memory upgrade.
M3 MacBook Air
$1,499 offers you the first upgrade option for the 15-inch, with a choice of memory or storage. The same price gets you the M3 13-inch with the upgraded chip, 24GB of memory, and 512GB of storage, or the same on the M2 with a $100 saving.
When $1,599 comes into play, we have another option in the form of the 14-inch M4 MacBook Pro. Equipped with 16GB of memory, 512GB of storage, and the M4's performance improvement, it's a compelling package.
You're still stuck with one upgrade on the 15-inch as well as the upgraded forms of 13-inch, though the M2 can be set up with 1TB of storage and 24GB of memory.
At this point, the base 14-inch MacBook Pro is probably the best play. It's also arguably the best option going further up the scale until $1,999.
At the top end of the range, you have an extra option in the form of the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4 Pro in its base configuration. That means the M4 Pro with more cores, 16GB of memory and 512GB of storage.
The M4 Pro is very compelling, but the M2 MacBook Air is too. It's at the top end of its scale with 24GB of memory and 2TB of storage, as well as the better of the two M2 chips.
The M4 Pro 14-inch MacBook Pro is probably the best play.
Best MacBook - $2,000 to $3,000
Between $2,000 and $3,000 is where the most changes in what's available occurs. It's also a good ballpark figure for buying a portable Mac with decent performance.
The $1,999 from the previous range is where we start from, with the next change being at $2,099, when the M3 MacBook Air reaches its own highest configuration. Unless you need all that storage and memory, the M4 models are still the way to go if you need performance.
Apple MacBook Air and MacBook Pro price ranges between $2,000 and $3,000Just $200 more at $2,299, the 15-inch MacBook Air hits its maximum configuration with 24GB of memory and 2TB of storage. For $100 less, there's the M4 14-inch MacBook Pro with 16GB of memory and 2TB of storage, or for $100 more, 24GB of memory, which is the better option.
Until we reach $2,499, the choices are whether you want the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4 and one more upgrade or the M4 Pro version with more performance. The 16-inch MacBook Pro with M4 Pro comes in at that price point, bringing all the benefits of the 14-inch with M4 Pro, but effectively with one less upgrade than you'd get with the smaller screen model.
The full-fat 14-inch MacBook Pro with M4 bows out with 2TB of storage, 32GB of memory, and Nano-texture at $2,749. For $50 more, the M4 Pro 14-inch model with the 14-core CPU is there, with 48GB of memory and 1TB of storage, or the 16-inch version with 24GB of memory for $50 less. Either M4 Pro is good here.
Until the end of the range, you're going to be choosing between the 14-inch and 16-inch M4 Pro models, with the latter being roughly one upgrade behind. That upgrade could easily be Nano-texture, making it quite flexible for massaging the price.
14" MacBook Pro M4
Best MacBook - Over $3,000
While the $3,000-plus period starts with the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro with M4 Pro, that doesn't last for long. The 14-inch M4 Max MacBook Pro slips in with its superior performance, 14-core CPU, 32-core GPU, 36GB of memory, and a 1TB drive for $3,199.
Unless you need the extra memory or storage in the 14-inch M4 Pro version, or the larger screen of the 16-inch, go for the 14-inch M4 Max model.
Apple MacBook Air and MacBook Pro price ranges over $3,000When it turns to $3,499 the last major configuration option appears in the form of the 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M4 Max. At this point, you could have a 14-inch Pro model with 4TB of storage, 24GB of memory, and the upper-tier chip for $100 less, or the 16-inch M4 Pro with 2TB of storage and 48GB of memory.
16" MacBook Pro M4
Since the M4 Max models all start with 36GB of memory and 1TB of storage, the configurations are manageable at the low-end. This makes them the better option from here on out, beyond the top-spec exits for the M4 Pro models
Going upward, each price point will give you the choice of fairly similar configurations of the 14-inch M4 Max and 16-inch M4 Max configurations as the best possible options.
With that in mind, the only real difference to consider is whether you would prefer the 16-inch model or the 14-inch with one more upgrade.
In the earlier stages, these upgrades will be for important elements while they're still reasonably cheap. Think the lower levels of memory and storage, and even the chip upgrade.
Later on, as the memory capacities grow, the upgrade costs grow too. At that point, it could easily be for M4 Max models with the same configuration, except you're choosing between the 14-inch model with Nano-texture versus the 16-inch without.
As we have previously said, the storage is also something that you should upgrade to a reasonable level. At the top end of the scale, we're basically looking at MacBooks that have the maximum configurations for everything bar storage.
That last $1,200 jump from 4TB to 8TB of storage is a considerable one. But so is the $800 between 64GB and 128GB of memory.
At this level, seriously consider whether you need either of these upgrades. You could have a good reason for either, but for the storage at least, saving money with an external drive is always an option.
Where to buy a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro at a discount
AppleInsider's Mac Price Guide is home to hundreds of deals across the MacBook lineup, with even the M4 MacBook Pros eligible for up to $300 in savings.
You can jump straight to the individual Price Guides below:
MacBook Air
MacBook Pro
- 14-inch MacBook Air M4 prices
- 14-inch MacBook Air M4 Pro/M4 Max prices
- 16-inch MacBook Air M4 Pro/M4 Max prices
Adorama, in particular, has aggressive deals on the M4 MacBook Pro models using exclusive promo code APINSIDER. Shoppers can save up to $300 on every configuration on top of bonus savings on three years of AppleCare.
Those open to closeout models can save up to $500 on the M3 MacBook Pro lineup at Best Buy while supplies last. And at press time, Amazon has stellar deals in effect on M2 and M3 MacBook Air models, with prices as low as $749.99.
Marko Zivkovic
Wesley Hilliard
Christine McKee
William Gallagher
Andrew O'Hara
1 Comment
I don’t think AppleInsider understands the entry-level market.
Using an external drive is a non-starter for most people; they will pay a cloud storage subscription through. So buying a laptop with less storage only makes sense if you’re using Cloud for storage (or you have low needs to start with).
Same thing for the processor, if you buy entry level what do you care about benchmark scores? What you care about is future-proofing. How long will the computer receive updates? Will it still run new software in 5, 8 years?
From that perspective you want the M3 MacBook Air over the higher-specced M2.