New M1 Air hotter than it should be?

[AidenG]

I've just bought an M1 Air which seems to idle at around 35 degrees celsius (the room is around 20) while the CPU usage is 3% or less, no apps running and nothing unusual happening in the activity monitor. It easily goes into the 40's with light use.
It has usually been on my lap with the area between the hinges unobstructed. I first became concerned when it became uncomfortably warm while downloading an OS update and transferring some files. From what I can gather online an MBA 1 should idle in the 20's (up to 5 degrees more than room temperature) and reach the 40's with fairly heavy use.

Testing out a demo of Hitman took it up to 90 but I figure it's harder to make a comparison with intensive tasks, I've heard of people gaming with temperatures in the 70's.

Is it possible my MBA is defective in some way?

 

[headlessmike]

Sounds pretty normal to me. My M1 mini idles at around 27-30 °C, but it has a fan that's always spinning. The Air has no active cooling and will experience larger jumps in temperature during use. To achieve the lowest temperatures you should always use the computer on a flat surface where are can circulate around the entire case. But your not gonna hurt anything either by using it on your lap, it'll throttle or shut down before any damage was done if it ever got too hot.

 

[ChedNasad]

That's pretty close to what my M1 Pro idles at. Sometimes cooler, sometimes a bit warmer. Idk if that is exactly comparable though as the M1 Pro does pull a bit more juice but likewise also has alot better capacity to pull heat away.

 

[1BadManVan]

my m2 air idles at 29-30c and under light usage is mid 30's

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

you're fine . also if you just bought it it's still probably indexing

 

[AidenG]

I tested it out on a flat surface, no change in the temperatures, not indexing either but perhaps that played a part the first time it got hot. I'm not concerned about it getting damaged by the heat, but I assume if it's always hotter than it should be I'll be hitting the throttling threshold sooner than others and so performance will suffer. Also, I just want to be sure there's no defect of any sort, otherwise I need to try return it asap.

Feeling partly more at ease by the posts so far, but still suspicious... Some say their m1 airs are barely ever noticeably warm and the numbers I see in the few posts/videos I find are always lower than mine.

 

[MBAir2010]

Can someone recommend a nice and subtle software program for these MacBook Airs m1?
I use one program that can turn the fan "Full Blast" on my other 2 intel MacBooks,
since our does not have a fan, would that softwares till function?

thanks in advance!

 

[maflynn]

Testing out a demo of Hitman took it up to 90 but I figure it's harder to make a comparison with intensive tasks, I've heard of people gaming with temperatures in the 70's.

That makes sense simply because the MBA has no fan, and is not designed for sustained loads. Gaming is not really the ideal use case for MBAs

Is it possible my MBA is defective in some way?

Nope, everything seems normal to me.

Can someone recommend a nice and subtle software program for these MacBook Airs m1?

Maybe I'm confused - happens quite often, but the M1 MBAs are passively cooled, there is no app to control the cooling/fan speed

 

[MBAir2010]

Maybe I'm confused - happens quite often, but the M1 MBAs are passively cooled, there is no app to control the cooling/fan speed

im always confused too, born that way!

anyways does my MacBook Air M1 need a "Temp Setting" program incase it does get hot?
and what is a good one?

 

[maflynn]

im always confused too, born that way!

anyways does my MacBook Air M1 need a "Temp Setting" program incase it does get hot?
and what is a good one?

LOL, yeah I have a recessive gene that offers increased confusion - especially when I try to communicate

Anyways, a temp app is a nice to have, especially if you're concerned. For my usage, I had one running, for months and once I felt comfortable I stopped using it. Mostly because it just say in memory not being accessed by me. I like iStat Menus as its fairly light weight, and offers a large assortment of options.

 

[ignatius345]

I like to run CoconutBattery in the menu bar, and enable "current watt usage." I find that's a really great readout of how hard my MacBook Air is running. For the M1 Air, I generally see about 3-5 watts with the screen brightness around 50%. If it spikes up toward 10 watts, something heavy is happening and I can investigate if I don't already know. (For context, my 2020 Intel i5 Air would pull closer to 10 watts just sitting there, and spike well up toward 15 watts if I did anything at all.)

anyways does my MacBook Air M1 need a "Temp Setting" program incase it does get hot?
and what is a good one?

If you're worried about the thing overheating, the processor will throttle itself back before that happens. I wouldn't worry about temperature. The only reason I watch power consumption (as above) is to increase my battery run time.

 

[DouglasCarroll]

Should be fine

 

[Alpha Centauri]

anyways does my MacBook Air M1 need a "Temp Setting" program incase it does get hot?
and what is a good one?

I concur that iStat Menus is a quite affordable, low resourced monitoring App that offers wicked customization and a plethora of information, more than one needs lol. There's a fully functioning trial, so no surprises if/ when you do purchase it afterwards.

 

[wilberforce]

People have this misguided notion that a temperature that is hot for humans is also "hot" for a device, as though that is a bad thing. Boiling temperatures (100C) are damaging to humans, but not damaging to chips, which are manufactured at temperatures that are much higher. 100C is not hot for a computer, just because it is hot for us.

Another example is car engines (the combustion kind). People sometime try to use a lower temperature thermostat because they misguidedly think the normal operating temperature (often over the normal boiling point of water), is too "hot" and cooler would be be better, and land up as a result damaging the engine.