> the best portable laptop Apple made since the 11" Air before it was discontinued
I used to have an 11" Air as a daily driver. The portability was nice but I'd never go back to a computer that small. Too cramped, too little screen real estate, too small a battery. It doesn't surprise me that 11" laptops are rare these days.
I've gone back and forth over the years. Part of me would like a smaller system for travel but 1.) I always end up wondering if the tradeoff is worth it given how relatively small and light 13" laptops can be and 2.) I probably will never again travel to the degree I was doing it at peak. So I probably wouldn't actually buy an 11" MacBook Air even if I could.
A modern 13" laptop with narrow bezels is pretty much the same size as the old 11" laptops with huge bezels. I have a Dell XPS 13 9310 (2021 model), and I absolutely love how small it is.
This; the 11" had massive bezels, comparatively. That was the only real downside IMO. But the compact footprint was amazing for travel. I plugged it into my dock if I was at the desk.
I used four generations of the MBA, including the 11" 2015. That was definitely the pinnacle of value / performance in Apple's laptop line until the M1.
