I cannot believe I am saying this out loud, but the $100 more expensive 13-inch MacBook Air M5 is wonderful news, not because I like paying more, but because the base model promises to solve my biggest pain point: lack of storage.
For months now, I have been struggling with low storage space messages and functional roadblocks on the MacBook Air 13-inch M4.
Finding space
This is my problem. Why is my Mac’s system data 162GB?! pic.twitter.com/myfscyHLtCJanuary 20, 2026
Where did all my space go? It was largely hidden in a giant 162GB system file on the MacBook’s drive, and looking inside it is almost impossible. I tried all sorts of ways to search for large files, but nothing showed me exactly what was eating all the space. What I did find were usually inscrutable files that, if I did trash them, would likely trash the system.
I got a lot of online advice about what to do. None of them worked, including trying sketchy third-party utilities to clean up the drive.
So I kept my downloads folder empty, looked for screenshots to delete, and regularly emptied the digital trash. I also did what I could to find large files in my email accounts.
I also tried to minimize the number of installed apps, but when your OS takes up another almost 35GB, leaving me 50GB to play with for files, images, videos, and, yes, almost 10GB for Apple Intelligence, it’s no wonder I kept running out of space on the 256GB SSD.
Working this way began to feel like I was wearing a digital straitjacket that was slowly squeezing the air out of me. Free-floating anxiety propelled my workdays as I wondered how long my scant gigabytes would last. Every time I ran out, it was like when, after just so many turns, the jack-in-the-box popped up on Buddy the Elf.
Starting over or a fresh start?
A week ago, I took the nuclear option with my 13-inch MacBook Air M4 and reset it. This didn’t necessarily solve my storage issues, but let me take stock of how I set it up (maybe I’d leave out the optional, not all that useful Apple Intelligence this time) and of the impact of my Cloud-based files on local storage. One of my theories is that my OneDrive was duplicating itself locally and, perhaps, eating up 40 to 50GB. Apple does tend to hide file storage information in that big “System” area.
What if, however, I didn’t have to worry about how many files were stored locally or in the cloud? What if I could stop thinking about the larger videos I had in my Photos library?
That’s the exciting prospect of the new MacBook Air M5. Yes, it’s $100 more than the last model, but with double the storage (512GB). I always loved that storage works this way; you can’t simply add a few GBs. Hard drives always grow exponentially, doubling or nothing.
A potentially faster 13-inch MacBook Air M5 with double the storage space will instantly solve my storage issues.
So now I sit here literally celebrating a price hike because I know that it comes with the one thing I asked for: more base storage
Of course, I would’ve liked to see the price hold firm, but given what’s going on with RAM prices, it’s shocking that the MacBook Air M5, which still starts at 16GB of RAM, didn’t get even more expensive. Adding storage space with a relatively minor price hike should be considered something of an accomplishment.
So now I sit here literally celebrating a price hike because I know that it comes with the one thing I asked for: more base storage. I’m so excited I don’t even care about the M5 chip. I know it’ll be faster, but the M4 is plenty fast and easily handles every Photoshop task I throw at it. So a faster piece of Apple Silicon is just icing on the cake.
I can’t wait to try out the 13-inch MacBook Air M5 and perhaps retire the MacBook Air M4 and its too tiny 256GB drive.
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lance.ulanoff@futurenet.com (Lance Ulanoff)
