I've got the M1 Air with 16GB RAM and honestly, not being a fanboy or anything, it's the best computer I've ever owned. The battery lasts for days for me, it's very lightweight, zero noise (no fan on this model), not too warm, and has not yet struggled with any of the tasks I've thrown at it (I regularly keep open simultaneously Xcode, Slack, multiple browser tabs, PDF viewing, terminal scripts, etc). I also do some Logic Pro music projects, nothing really heavy, but it handles all the VSTs and stuff fine too.
Definitely recommend 16GB though. I have heard that the 8GB Air can be more problematic under these workloads.
Same for me. This thing is so awesome. I really hope it stays like that for a few years and doesn't slow down with future updates.
The only thing missing for me: Multiple Monitor support.
To add to this: I run a 32' 4k screen as my sole, external monitor. My M1 air runs it like a champ. I dislike the limit of 1 external monitor, but it does perform well regardless.
I was going to post my own reply to this topic, but @stoeckley said literally all the things I was going to.
My ONLY regret about getting an M1 Air was not being able to hold out for the M2 to get that sweet, sweet magsafe charger. Outside of that, I +100 everything @stoeckley said.
My daily test and benchmark suites are very cpu-heavy.
Between my gaming laptop’s 11th gen i7 (desktop cpu) with 16 virtual cores and my M1 Pro (16GB) from March this year, the M1 is silent and cool, while the gaming laptop splurts and hisses, and needs to be connected to power always. The performance is incredible, and the drawback is practically none.
Definitely recommend 16GB though. I have heard that the 8GB Air can be more problematic under these workloads.