MacBook Airs aren’t designed to be gaming machines. And yet, many of you reading this are likely carrying some model of the Air with you at all times as a dedicated work/movie streaming machine. I know I am, which made me wonder whether I could also sneak in some gaming time on this device in a pinch. Turns out I absolutely can, so long as I really pick my battles.

A big caveat before we start: even if you are using the new M4 MacBook Air, you’re not going to be able to play any brand-new, ultra-graphics-intensive game releases. One key culprit here is one of the reasons I love a MacBook Air: there’s no fan. That means the device is completely silent, regardless of the strain put upon it. And fancy graphics cause strain, which means added heat.

To ensure that the MacBook Air doesn’t reach heat death, once the device reaches a certain temperature, the performance will start to be throttled to the point where your framerates are going to dip massively. So yeah, while you can play some of the games below at 60 frames per second, within 20 minutes, the heat of the device will cause things to plummet significantly. Unless you’re planning a very short gaming session, I would recommend sticking to 30 fps and 1080p whenever possible.

With the sequel fast approaching, you might be interested in catching up on the........

© Polygon