In a time when almost everything is getting more expensive, this deal on the M5 MacBook Air has me hopeful about how laptop pricing will play out the rest of the year. The M5 MacBook Air has dropped back down to $949, which is $150 off its retail price. It's only been at this price one other time since the product launched in early March and has more consistently sold for $1,049. As someone who's reviewed every available MacBook and their strongest competitors, I can unequivocally say that this MacBook Air is one of the very best laptop deals right now.

Take the Surface Laptop 7th Edition, for example, which has been one of my favorite alternatives to the MacBook Air through all of 2025. It had been at competitive prices with the M4 MacBook Air all along, with both laptops sometimes dropping to as low as $799 during sales events like Prime Day throughout the year. But now, the Surface Laptop has gotten an official price hike due to the RAM shortage and is currently sitting at $1,200. It's still a laptop I like quite a lot, but at $350 more than a similarly-configured M5 MacBook Air, it's very difficult to recommend.

Or consider the MacBook Neo, Apple's new budget laptop that also launched in March. While it's much cheaper overall, it's only ever been sold for $10 off its full price. At this reduced price for the M5 MacBook Air of $949, that leaves only a dangerously small $260 gap between the Neo and the Air. It's almost embarrassing how much better than the Air is by comparison—in every way imaginable. If you're curious how these two laptops stack up, I've done a comprehensive comparison between them that's worth checking out. But to put it simply, despite all the excitement (and controversy) around the much cheaper MacBook Neo, the MacBook Air still has the most price flexibility in terms of deals.

That starting price is for the configuration with 512 GB of storage, but you also get the same amount off if you opt for the 1 TB model—or even the version with 24 GB of RAM. For the first time ever, Apple stopped selling a 256-GB configuration of the MacBook Air, which is why prices are higher overall than with last year's M4 MacBook Air. Other than the bump to the M5 and the additional storage, the M5 MacBook Air is otherwise identical to the previous iteration.

The combination of the introduction of the MacBook Neo, the removal of the 256-GB version, and the ongoing RAM shortage convinced me that we'd never see a $799 MacBook Air again. I still don't know for sure we'll see discounts that low, especially if Apple is determined to more tightly control the price of the MacBook Neo. It puts budget-minded Windows laptops in a tough spot, but they'll need to find a way to reduce prices if they hope to compete.