Question about Apple MacBook Air - 2024

The difference between the German (DE) and the Swiss (CH) keyboard on the MacBook lies mainly in the special characters and the arrangement of the keys. Here are the main differences:

1. umlaut keys:
- DE keyboard: the umlauts (ä, ö, ü) each have their own key.
- CH keyboard: Here there is only one umlaut key, which works with the accent character (¨). You must first press the umlaut keystroke and then type the vowel (a, o, u) to write ä, ö or ü.
2. special characters:
- DE keyboard: Special characters such as the at-sign (@), the hashtag (#), the dollar sign ($) and the percent sign (%) are in different positions than on the CH keyboard.
- CH keyboard: Special characters are arranged differently and are sometimes easier to access for the characters frequently used in Switzerland (such as French and Italian accents).
3. keys for accents and special characters:
- On the CH keyboard, there are additional keys for accents that are important in the Swiss national languages (German, French, Italian), such as the gravis (`) or the circumflex (^).
- The DE keyboard, on the other hand, is optimised for the German language and therefore contains more German special characters.
4. position of Z and Y:
- Both layouts (DE and CH) are QWERTY layouts, which means that the position of "Z" and "Y" is identical. This distinguishes them from the American QWERTY keyboard, for example.
5. enter/return key:
- On some versions of the DE keyboard, the Enter/Return key is vertical and larger, whereas on the CH keyboard it is often horizontal and smaller.
6. other special keys and symbol keys:
- The ß character (Eszett) is also only available on the DE keyboard, while it is missing on the CH keyboard. Instead, "ss" is used in Switzerland.

In summary, the CH keyboard is designed for multilingual use in Switzerland and offers more accents and special characters for French and Italian, while the DE keyboard is primarily optimised for the German language.