Best Prime Day Apple MacBook deals: Save $200 on MacBook Pro M1, $150 on MacBook Air M1 and more – CNET [CNET]
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Amazon Prime Day officially kicks off tonight at midnight PT, but you can start taking advantage of Prime Day Deals right now, especially on MacBooks.
That’s right, if you’re in the market for a new MacBook, now is the time to strike. You can save $199 on the new M1 MacBook Pro and up to $150 on the M1 MacBook Air on Amazon. Apple made a significant move last fall away from Intel chips toward its own Apple Silicon M1 design, and we’re seeing some big discounts on the new M1-powered machines. With their current price breaks, the baseline and step-up MacBook Pro models are at their lowest prices ever. And there are even deeper discounts available on the older Intel-based MacBooks.
The MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro lines received the M1 update, but the big 16-inch MacBook Pro still uses an Intel Core i7 or i9 chip. Apple still sells two higher-end configurations of the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Intel parts and has stated that it will support all the Intel-powered Macs for years to come.
While you might be tempted by a discount on an Intel-based MacBook, it had better be significant to convince you to get that instead of a new M1 MacBook. Our tests of the M1 machines show a significant performance increase over their predecessors. Plus, the M1 MacBook Air boasts a fanless design for silent operation.
Read more: A pro photographer tests Apple’s M1 MacBook
Pricing for new M1 MacBooks
The new MacBooks maintain the pricing of the models they replaced: the new MacBook Air starts at $999; the new MacBook Pro starts at $1,299. There are a couple of ways to grab either at a discount.
Want to go the refurb route? You can now find refurbished M1 MacBooks on Apple’s Certified Refurbished Mac page. Refurb inventory changes rapidly so you may not always see an M1 MacBook Air or Pro listed. It’s worth keeping an eye out, however, because you can lock in substantial savings of up to $200. CNET’s resident Cheapskate, Rick Broida, is a big fan of refurbs, particularly Apple’s — which are often as good as new.
Want to buy new? The baseline M1 MacBook Air model has a $49 discount and the step-up model with a 512GB solid-state drive has a $100 discount on Amazon. There are bigger savings on Amazon for the M1 MacBook Pro; the baseline model is discounted by $150 and the step-up model with a 512GB SSD is $199 off — $150 up front and an additional $49 at checkout. One benefit of paying full price and buying from Apple, however, is you can customize the machine and add more RAM or a higher capacity SSD, whereas the models sold on Amazon and other retailers are fixed configurations.
It’s also worth noting that the Apple Store offers students an educational discount, which can trim hundreds of dollars from the price of a new laptop or tablet.
Keep reading to see the best prices currently available for Apple’s current and previous-generation MacBooks. We update this list periodically.
Read more: Testing out the entire new Apple Mac M1 lineup
MacBook discounts, compared
| Model w/ CPU (and storage capacity) | List price | Best price (current) | Best price (all-time) |
|---|---|---|---|
| New MacBook Air w/ M1 chip (256GB) | $999 | $949 | $899 |
| New MacBook Air w/ M1 chip (512GB) | $1,249 | $1,149 | $1,100 |
| New MacBook Pro w/ M1 chip (256GB) | $1,299 | $1,150 | $1,149 |
| New MacBook Pro w/ M1 chip (512GB) | $1,499 | $1,300 | $1,300 |
| 16-inch MacBook Pro w/ 9th-gen Core i7 (512GB) | $2,399 | $2,219 | $2,079 |
*Note that “all-time” means the best price that we’ve seen at an Apple-authorized retailer in the product’s lifetime.
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