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  Surface Laptop 7

  Operating System

  Windows 11

  CPU

  Up to Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite

  GPU

  Qualcomm Adreno

  RAM

  Up to 64GB LPDDR5x

  Storage

  Up to 1TB Gen 4 SSD

  Battery

  54-66Wh

  The Surface Laptop 7 didn't only get a modernized makeover on the outside. It got a new brain too, with the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus or X Elite chips. That makes it even better for productivity tasks, as the battery life will be insanely good, even under heavy workloads.

  Pros & Cons

  • 13-inch and 15-inch options
  • 3:2 ratio high-resolution screens for productivity
  • Powerful and efficient Qualcomm Snapdragon X chips

  • Some programs might have issues on Arm
  • No OLED option

  $1000 at Best Buy (13 inches) $1300 at Best Buy (15 inches)
• A worthy alternative

  HP OmniBook X

  Operating System

  Windows 11 Home or Pro

  CPU

  Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100 (up to 3.4 GHz, 12 cores)

  GPU

  Qualcomm Adreno

  RAM

  Up to 32GB LPDDR5X

  Storage

  Up to 2TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe TLC M.2 SSD

  Battery

  59 Whr

  The HP OmniBook X is the new premium laptop in HP's lineup, replacing the outgoing Spectre line. While it does come with the powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip, the 60Hz, non-OLED display feels like a downgrade from the Spectre devices we've used and loved, and it's not quite up to the overall polish of the Surface Laptop 7.

  Pros & Cons

  • Snapdragon X Elite chip is powerful and efficient
  • Great for AI tasks
  • Stylish design

  • No OLED display
  • Middling webcam

  $1200 at Best Buy $1150 at HP

The first wave of Qualcomm Snapdragon X-powered laptops has arrived, and based on our early hands-on experience, they're among the best laptops you can get. We're analyzing two of them today, one from Microsoft and the other from HP, both great brands. The Surface Laptop 7 is powered by Arm-based chips for the first time, and now has a 13.8-inch and 15-inch option. It has also received a glow-up, with slimmer bezels to give it a more modern feel. The HP OmniBook X is replacing our beloved HP Spectre x360 in the lineup, although it's no longer a 2-in-1 device but a standard clamshell design. Both of these premium laptops have touchscreens and similar internals, so which one is the better buy?

Price, specs, and availability

Both of these laptops were announced on May 20, 2024, at a special event with Microsoft, Qualcomm, and multiple other hardware partners who gathered to launch the Qualcomm Snapdragon X chips and the devices they're going into. The Surface Laptop 7 is currently available for pre-order, with release on June 18, 2024. MSRP starts from $1000 for the 13.8-inch model or $1300 for the 15-inch model, and climbs up from there depending on configuration options. You can get one from Microsoft and Best Buy, with other major retailers expected to have availability later on.

The 14-inch HP OmniBook X starts from $1150 from HP or Best Buy, and we expect other retailers to have availability at some point later this year. HP currently says it will start shipping on July 4, 2024, if pre-ordered now.

• 	Surface Laptop 7	HP OmniBook X
  CPU	Up to Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite	Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100 (up to 3.4 GHz, 12 cores)
  GPU	Qualcomm Adreno	Qualcomm Adreno
  Display (Size, Resolution)	13.8-inch, 2304x1536 or 15-inch, 2496x1664	14-inch 2.2K (2240 x 1400) IPS touchscreen, 60Hz refresh rate
  RAM	Up to 64GB LPDDR5x	Up to 32GB LPDDR5X
  Storage	Up to 1TB Gen 4 SSD	Up to 2TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe TLC M.2 SSD
  Battery	54-66Wh	59 Whr
  Ports	2x USB4, 1x USB Type-A, 1x Surface Connect	2x USB-C, 1x USB-A, 3.5mm combo audio jack
  Operating System	Windows 11	Windows 11 Home or Pro
  Webcam	1080p Surface Studio Camera	5MP IR camera
  Wi-Fi connectivity	Wi-Fi 7	Wi-Fi 6E or Wi-Fi 7
  Bluetooth	Bluetooth 5.4	Bluetooth 5.3 or 5.4
  Dimensions	11.85 x 8.67 x 0.69in; 15-inch: 12.96 x 9.41 x 0.72in	12.32 x 8.8 x 0.57 inches
  Weight	13-inch: 2.96 pounds; 15-inch: 3.67 pounds	2.97 pounds
  Speakers	Omnisonic speakers	Poly Studio, Dual Speakers
  Colors	Platinum, Graphite, Sapphire, Dune	Meteor Silver, Ceramic white
  Price	Starts at $1,000	Starts at $1,150

Design

Both are stylish notebooks

Overall, both of these devices are sleek, modern-looking clamshell laptops. The OmniBook X comes in two colors, Meteor Silver and Ceramic White; the Surface Laptop 7 comes in four colors, either Platinum, Graphite, Sapphire, or Dune. The Laptop 7 is more minimalist, with a design similar to the MacBook line. The OmniBook X comes with a screen size of 14 inches (2.97 pounds), while the Laptop 7 has 13.8-inch (2.96 pounds) and 15-inch models (3.67 pounds). None of these options are particularly heavy, and will be easy to carry with you while you go about your day.

The Surface Laptop 7 has two USB-C ports with USB4, and one Surface Connect port. The OmniBook X has two USB-C, one USB-A, and a 3.5mm combination audio jack. It's nice to see that the audio jack isn't completely dead, although I tend to reach for Bluetooth headphones when I'm working, and that's probably more common in general so that wires don't get in the way.

It's worth noting that while both of these laptops only have USB4 ports, they will still work with your favorite Thunderbolt accessories. That's because the Thunderbolt branding is limited to devices from Apple or Intel, even though USB4 can do the same functions such as fast charging, fast data transfer, and video over DisplayPort 2.1.

Winner: Tie

Display

The Surface has two screen sizes

The Surface Laptop 7 has slimmer bezels this generation, which effectively enables an additional 0.3-inches of diagonal space for the screen, used to good effect on the smaller laptop. 13.8 inches is almost 14, and gets you a 2,304 x 1,536 resolution display with a 3:2 aspect ratio, and 120Hz dynamic refresh rate. The 15-inch model doesn't change the screen size, but has a 2,496 x 1,664 resolution, with the same aspect ratio and refresh rate as the smaller device. These are IPS touchscreens, with Microsoft putting an anti-reflective coating on so that the glass isn't super reflective. We've been fans of the displays on Surface devices, and this laptop does nothing to change our views. It also has a 1080p webcam for the first time in the line, with the Surface Studio Camera bringing AI enhancements to ensure you look your best.

The OmniBook X has a more traditional 16:10 aspect ratio for its IPS touchscreen, with a 2.2K (2,240 x 1,400) resolution that's not far behind the Surface's display. However, it's capped at a refresh rate of 60Hz, which is sub-par for any laptop in 2024, let alone a premium device like this. It's also not very bright, and the touchscreen will be reflective, so it'll be difficult to use in any brightly lit space. The 5MP IR camera has Poly Camera Pro for things like background blur, auto framing, and more, but it's hard to forget that the device it's replacing (Spectre) had a 9MP webcam and was one of the best on the market.

Winner: Surface Laptop 7

Performance and battery life

Both will outlast your stamina

Performance on both of these laptops will be roughly similar, depending on whether you opt for the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite or X Plus for the Surface Laptop 7. The OmniBook X uses the more performant Snapdragon X Elite exclusively, making it a better value if performance is all you care about. We tested the Snapdragon X Elite against the new Core Ultra 7 155H, and it smoked it in every single test, which is impressive when you consider the Core Ultra chips aren't slow by any measure. The Snapdragon chips also have more neural processing power, so they are able to take advantage of the full breadth of Microsoft's Copilot+ AI features.

Whichever of these two laptops you choose, you won't be disappointed with the performance, whether flicking between apps or using power-hungry programs like video editing. The Snapdragon X chips are up for whatever task you throw at them, assuming there's a native Arm version of the apps you want to use. Windows on Arm doesn't quite have the translation layer that Apple silicon devices have to enable x86 apps to work seamlessly, although app selection is getting better.

The only place these two laptops might differentiate enough to matter is in battery life. The Surface Laptop 7 has a 55 watt-hour battery in the 13.8-inch version, and a 66 watt-hour battery in the 15-inch version. The OmniBook X has a 59 watt-hour battery, so it's somewhere in-between the two Surface devices. In real-world usage, that battery difference might not be as much as it seems, so the two laptops are pretty evenly matched.

Winner: Tie

Which Snapdragon X Elite ultraportable wins your heart?

Microsoft's Surface Laptop 7 is a better overall package here, with an AI enhanced Surface Studio camera for video calls, more colorways, and a modern, slimmer design. The 3:2 ratio display is slightly higher-resolution than the HP has, and has double the refresh rate for smoother scrolling through documents. The only thing that could make it better is an OLED display option, but maybe that will come next generation.

That said, if you prefer HP or want a white laptop, the HP OmniBook X is worth checking out. As it uses the same Snapdragon X Elite as the Surface Laptop 7 offers, it's significantly cheaper to pick up, since selecting the Elite chip on the Surface adds $400 to the base price (at the time of writing). The only thing is that the cost saving gets you a worse display and middling webcam on the HP, so it's up to you if those are compromises you can live with.