Apple’s latest M3 MacBook Air family retains the same exterior chassis and internal configurations as the previous models, but with ‘Right to Repair’ advocates breathing down the company’s neck, it was able to introduce one meaningful change to both the 13-inch and 15-inch models, and that is the effortless removal of the battery. Unfortunately, beyond that, the latest teardown of the portable Macs shows that Apple has yet to learn its lesson on making repairs and disassembly easier, but at least getting inside did not seem like an ordeal as it did with the Apple Vision Pro teardown.
No adhesive keeping the battery in place means that M3 MacBook Air owners can potentially perform their own replacements
Unlike other notebooks that use phillips screws of various sizes and lengths, Apple sticks with pentalobe screws, which is an uncommon design and can make repairs difficult. Thankfully, iFixit teardown experts always have a Pro Tech Toolkit on hand, which costs $74.95 on Amazon at the time of writing, allowing them to disassemble a number of consumer electronics, including the M3 MacBook Air. The pleasant surprise that greeted the host in the video below was that both the 13-inch and 15-inch models feature plastic pull tabs for the battery, and there is no adhesive to keep the cells in place.
However, every other part of the teardown can become a headache because there is a bevy of screws and brackets that have to be removed and placed back in the exact same spot that they were removed from, which can be challenging. It also does not help matters that these screws are not numbered and there are no labels on the inner parts of the M3 MacBook Air chassis, so iFixit decides to take a dig at Apple by mentioning that the Framework Laptop 16 follows this approach, and it is a company that is significantly smaller than the Cupertino firm.
Overall, iFixit gave the M3 MacBook Air a repairability score of 5 out of 10, which is not bad at all, considering Apple’s history of making its products impossible to repair, such as the AirPods Pro. If you think that the simple battery removal makes you want to upgrade to the latest 13-inch or 15-inch version, consider reading our detailed buying guide, in which we compare the M3 MacBook Pro with the M3 MacBook Air, concluding that Apple’s more pricey machine touts a better value proposition due to a number of reasons.
News Source: iFixit
About the author: Omar Sohail is a reporter and analyst for Wccftech's mobile section, specializing in the technology and business of the mobile industry. His expertise lies in the intricate hardware supply chain, covering developments in semiconductor manufacturing, chip lithography, and camera sensor technology.
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