New MacBook Air Possible as Early as Next Week

Friday March 13, 2020 10:22 am PDT by Joe Rossignol

Last March, MacRumors received an anonymous tip claiming that Apple would announce new iPad, iMac, and iPod models with three consecutive days of press releases the following week, and that information proved to be two-thirds accurate with new iPad Air and iPad mini models announced on Monday, March 18 and an iMac refresh on Tuesday, March 19.

Apple did announce a new product on the Wednesday, but it was new AirPods, not a new iPod. Given both products have "Pod" in their name, perhaps there was some confusion there, but it is clear the tipster was relatively informed.

macbook air trio transparent
Now, the same anonymous tipster has informed MacRumors that Apple plans to announce new MacBook Air models next week. We have yet to confirm this information, but given the tipster now has an established track record, we have elected to share this rumor. The tipster did not provide any further details at this time.

A few days ago, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said Apple plans to launch updated MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models with scissor keyboards in the second quarter of 2020, following in the footsteps of the 16-inch MacBook Pro.

While the second quarter does not begin until April, an announcement next week would be just a few weeks earlier. Apple has announced new or refreshed products in March for the last five consecutive years, so there is precedence. In terms of covering all bases, however, we cannot rule out the possibility that the tipster received wrong information.

The current MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro are still equipped with butterfly keyboards that can suffer from issues such as sticky or unresponsive keys after prolonged use, which prompted Apple to initiate a free repair program worldwide in 2018. Apple finally solved this problem by reverting back to a scissor mechanism with the new Magic Keyboard on the 16-inch MacBook Pro, which has proven far more reliable.

Kuo has previously said that several other Apple products are planned for the first half of 2020, including the so-called iPhone 9, refreshed iPad Pro and MacBook Pro models, AirTags, a small wireless charging mat, and high-end over-ear headphones that may have AirPods branding, so it is possible Apple has more announcements in store next week.

Beyond receiving a True Tone display and a tweaked butterfly keyboard in July 2019, the MacBook Air was last updated in October 2018.

Related Roundup: MacBook Air

Buyer's Guide: MacBook Air (Caution)

Related Forum: MacBook Air

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Top Rated Comments

oneMadRssn

87 months ago

Remember when Apple did a week of announcements, a products per day? That was awesome. I hope to see that again.

Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)

bobtem

87 months ago

“We have yet to confirm this information”...

How do you confirm a rumor? Wouldn’t that just mean that Apple has made the announcement themselves?

Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)

BillyBobBongo

87 months ago

Came off my bike the other week, my trusty MacBook Air was in my bag at the time. It now looks like this:

Broke my collarbone too:

Although I've had that repaired:

Repairing the old MacBook Air didn't seem worth it...could do with a new one.

Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)

fhall1

87 months ago

I am still perplexed about an updated iPad Pro. I want to update, but I want an A14X, WiFi 6, and 5G. I don’t see that happening in the next few weeks. Better display, miniLED, etc. are nice, but not as essential. A triple camera iPad Pro has little interest for me, unless there is something amazing I would be missing.

I can't understand all the hype surrounding the triple camera. I've owned 4 different iPad models since 2010 (currently an iPad Pro 12.9") and can count the number of photos I've taken with all of them together on one hand. As far as I'm concerned any of the rear cameras are a waste of engineering time, space that could be used by a larger battery, and money spent on precision components.

Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)