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The best macOS version for Air M1

S

sonyablueberry

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 6, 2022
10
1
Hi all! I will be reinstalling the system on my MacBook Air M1, and I would like to know which version of macOS is better to install - Big Sur, Monterey, or Ventura? For me, the main thing is battery life, as well as speed. I'm not worried about new features availabale in Monterey and Ventura, so if Big Sur is better in performance, I would prefer it. Thanks in advance for reply :)
 
Yep, I'm on Monterey and it's good. I had a small issue that got fixed with the 12.4 update last year. Since then no issues. I may jump to Ventura after at least 13.4 comes out.
 
Would like to know what macos is still the best for MBA 13” in terms of performance, less heatness and battery life?

I’m on Macbook Air M1 16/512gb 8 GPU
With latest Monterey 12.7.3

Is Ventura in it’s current state would be better?
 
chrfr said:
Sonoma works fine. None of the available OSes have performance issues on Apple Silicon Macs.
Click to expand...
I heard about crazy battery drain on Sonoma. Many ppl confirmed that in their reviews around internet. It’s very critical for laptop.
 
chrfr said:
Sonoma works fine. None of the available OSes have performance issues on Apple Silicon Macs.
Click to expand...
you were right, thank you! 🙏
everything is fine with Sonoma, 3rd day of the flight and everything is OK 👍
even officialy unsupported Parallel Desktop 17 with old virtual machines working good for me 💪
 
Last edited:
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I'm on Sonoma and notice no difference from Ventura.

I think it's fine since Sonoma supports older 2018 Intel Airs so the M1 would be absolutely fine. Perhaps when the M1 Air is getting near its end of life I'll think about sticking to the current OS rather than the latest.
 
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I tend to believe that the best OS has to be the one that comes pre-installed with the machines the first day they're launched. My M1 Air still runs best on Big Sur despite trying all on OSes to date, with the worst being Monterey. The same goes with my old mid-2010 MBP, best on Snow Leopard, worse on Mavericks. Ancients G5 iMac and first Intel Mac Pro runss best on Tiger, worse on Leopard etc...
 
My MBAir M1 was great all the way up and including Ventura. And then with Sonoma, it started crashing - sometimes 4 or 5 times a day initially. Now, after multiple updates, it seems mostly restricted to when it comes out of sleep, especially if I close the laptop and disconnect from a basic dock. It was rock solid before Sonoma, and I might have experienced a problem once every 3 to 4 months at most; now, it's hit or miss. I probably have to do a clean install.
 
ozone said:
My MBAir M1 was great all the way up and including Ventura. And then with Sonoma, it started crashing - sometimes 4 or 5 times a day initially. Now, after multiple updates, it seems mostly restricted to when it comes out of sleep, especially if I close the laptop and disconnect from a basic dock. It was rock solid before Sonoma, and I might have experienced a problem once every 3 to 4 months at most; now, it's hit or miss. I probably have to do a clean install.
Click to expand...
It's definitely worth looking into that further- this is not typical operation in Sonoma on any Mac.
 
I used to go for the .1 or .2 of whatever the current OS is, but for the last few years I've been staying one OS behind, or at least waiting for the .4 or .5. Venture 13.6.5 for now and it's totally rock solid.

I was tempted to go to Sonoma 14.4, but then this:

www.macrumors.com

macOS Sonoma 14.4: Reasons Not to Upgrade [Updated]

Update: Apple has released macOS 14.4.1, which fixes three bugs mentioned in this article. Click the link to learn what they are. Since Apple...
www.macrumors.com www.macrumors.com

I can wait.
 
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