Yes, the MacBook Air throttles under sustained load.

Yes. It’s fanless, so once the chassis heats up—typically after a few minutes of video editing or gaming—the CPU has to dial back to keep from melting itself. You’ll see frame rates drop and export times stretch.

This isn’t a flaw for 95% of what people do. Browsing, writing, coding, even occasional photo editing? Fine. But if you’re regularly pushing sustained workloads, the Air is the wrong tool. The MacBook Pro (even the base model) has a fan and can keep performance up for hours.

That’s the trade-off: silence and thinness for bursty work, fan noise and thickness for steady power. Pick your priority.

If you need sustained performance, get the Pro.