MacBook Air 2020 fan

That is normal for this model. The heatsink on this particular model does not extend over to the fan so the fan does not actually move air over the heatpipe fins to cool the heatsink. I couldn't believe the design when I first saw it. In fact the fan on this particular model will run up to about 8,000 rpms to make up for this poor design choice. With most other Macs the maximum fan speed is about 6,500 rpms. It is an extremely poor design in my opinion.

I agree with HWTech. And when you contact Apple support about it, they pretend that they know nothing about a noisy fan and CPU heating issue in the Macbook air. And yet a search here or anywhere on the Internet will quickly reveal there is a big problem. Did Mac do this poor design in order to make their new Silicon M1 look even better? I don't know but in any case this is really shoddy work by Apple and my trust in their products has been destroyed. I am so very disappointed with my Macbook and really regret the purchase. Every time you try to run Skype, Zoom or any other video conferencing software, the fan goes nuts. Solution? I am going to install a thermal pad under the heatsink and on top of it. A lot of videos show how to do this and it apparently helps a lot. And of course, put your laptop on a stand that has good ventilation. Or, cut your losses and sell it now unless you want to just use it as if it were a non-tactile iPad with a keyboard...

I bought a 2020 MBA with the core i3 and it runs pretty warm, I can only imagine a quad i5 or i7 would run even warmer. The fan isn't cooling the small heatsink directly. It is only there to circulate air throughout the chassis to aid in reducing heat. Actually these CPU's are so low powered in many designs they probably don't need anything more than a good sized heatsink. I think the MacBook Air just didn't have the room to accommodate a bigger heatsink. Apple probably added the fan to address the potential heat issues. A fan was not used in the 12 inch MacBook which used a similar low powered CPU but was only a two core model. The small heatsink certainly can become overwhelmed with any intensive tasks that push CPU to max cycles. If this is happening a lot you're better off buying a MacBook Pro with a better cooling solution.

2012, that was their heyday! my macbook air from 2010 still works and I'm happy that i held on to that today.

hopefully the fan noise will be limited after an upgrade or something to Catalina to preserve these MacBook airs.

seems to me 5 new posts are about the fan noise here per day and th same tips are posted in return.

Yeah, it's really shameful what they are foisting on their customers. I've done a clean install of Catalina and although the rendering score is better, it runs at 100°C and and fan speed of 8046rpm! And it won't wake up from sleep or restarts because of error during sleep when cables are connected to the two thunderbolt ports. I'm going to call support again and keep doing it so that hopefully the message gets through. I wish they'd just admit it was a bad design.

this is normal for this version i have the same and i faces also when i open many tabs but when i abought i asked the guy it is suitable for me cause iam programming and i will open many tabs and use code he answered nothing will happen for my work but honestly doesn't happen many times it happen for 3 times in month

tasawk

Well, I've sent mine back to Apple to be repaired. Support doesn't think it is normal that it runs hot with a fan at high speed every time I launch Zoom or Skype or a lot of browser windows. Also it shuts down by itself or doesn't wake up from sleep. They don't think having things connected to the lightening ports should affect it adversely either.

At least I still have my Macbook Pro mid 2012. I upgraded it with a 1Tb SSD and a new battery. It runs much better than this Macbook Air.