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I just bought the base variant of the MacBook Air M1 a month ago. It's everything I could have asked for. I usually use it for app, web development with occasional machine learning.

The laptop is cool almost all of the time. But when I open a game, it starts to heat up instantly. Like it becomes really really hot. I downloaded Among Us which I consider to be a light weight game compared to others, but within the first 5 minutes of playing the laptop starts heating up. I wouldn't be concerned about this, cause I don't play games anyway. But I see videos in youtube, and I see people playing Minecraft see here for two hours and the temperature is still okay.

Is this normal or am I just not used to my laptop getting to that temperature?

I am playing Asphalt Legends for about 30 minutes now, and this is the screenshot of the activity monitor. From what I understand, the CPU usage if fairly low. Why is the laptop heating up then? enter image description here

Nike Lepz
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  • The load might be on the GPU, you won’t see this in Activity Monitor. – nohillside Jul 24 '23 at 06:36
  • Apple silicon will get hot when running Intel code which is likely for a game. – Kamil.S Jul 24 '23 at 06:44
  • @Kamil.S The screenshot shows it is a native app. In any case, AS doesn't run Intel code. Rosetta translates it to ARM instructions. The idea that it gets hotter when it's running code that has been translated is dubious, IMO. Have you got a source for that? – benwiggy Jul 24 '23 at 11:36
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    @benwiggy I resolved this issue. The issue was that I was using my laptop on lap or on top of a polymer carpet, which for most part of my workflow wouldn't cause heating. So right after I posted this question, I was like 'screw it' and was determined to see how hot it would get if I played it for like 20 minutes. Then I remembered seeing on the apple website to always place macbook on a flat surface, not on lap or blanket or bed. At that time, I dismissed it because I never thought that would have affect of this magnitude. So then I placed it on my floor. And played for over an hour and it – Nike Lepz Jul 24 '23 at 15:00
  • did not heat at all. Only got a tad bit warmer (almost unnoticeable) when I played it fullscreen. The game Im talking about playing is Asphalt Legends btw. – Nike Lepz Jul 24 '23 at 15:09
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    And why did people flag the question as duplicate immediately. All the threads which apparently had the answer I am looking for are centuries old. Like even the latest one is 4 years old, all others are either 8 years or 11 years old. Apple silicon weren't even a thing back then. Don't you think I did my research before I resorted to post my own question and wait for an answer hoping that someone could potentially have the solution. Nowhere in the internet does it suggest that improperly placing your macbook can cause heat build up. – Nike Lepz Jul 24 '23 at 15:17
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    This thread could have helped people like me who are desperately looking for a solution. But no, mark it as duplicate. The main reason why don't like posting questions in forums. – Nike Lepz Jul 24 '23 at 15:17
  • Questions are marked as duplicate if, based on the written question, existing answers already give an explanation. Of course this is not always accurate, so adding details to the question (and explaining why the existing answers don’t help) usually helps to have it reopened. – nohillside Jul 25 '23 at 14:36
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    also, https://apple.stackexchange.com/a/9816/9058 seems to fit here quite well. – nohillside Jul 25 '23 at 14:39

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