One of the most important factors when looking for a new laptop is battery life. With power and performance improving with each generation, this is perhaps the most important. At the premium end of the market, high-end devices can be extremely versatile and powerful, but this usually comes at the expense of battery life, which can be a real inhibitor in the hybrid working age.
Enter the Surface Laptop Studio 2, announced at the recent Microsoft Surface Event 2023, which marks a turning point for Windows machines. It looks real from every angle. A 13th generation Intel Core CPU is paired with an 80W Nvidia GeForce RTX4060 GPU, with the machine also featuring up to 64GB of RAM and 2TB SSD.
Starting at $1,999.99, this device is not only on par with the best laptops out there, but could even give Apple’s MacBook Pro a run for its money – based on the manufacturer’s claims.
Are the claims surrounding the Surface Laptop Studio 2 really true?
Few Windows devices can surpass the MacBook Pro in performance, let alone match or exceed battery life. Thanks to internal M-series CPUs like the M2 Ultra, Apple fits in.
But not only does the Surface Laptop Studio 2 claim to outpace the latest MacBook Pro, it also has a stunning maximum battery life of 18 hours, which Microsoft achieved in controlled demos.
For comparison: the MacBook Pro 14 inches (2023) lasts more than 19 hours on a single battery charge.
This is a game changer: finally a powerful high-end, possibly MacBook Pro killer, that can deliver high-end performance for almost a full day of use. Or at least that’s what I thought until I read the find print.
Digging deeper, it seems that these “controlled demos” are more akin to light jogging than the strenuous, typical daily activity that any user would naturally put the Surface Laptop Studio 2 under.
Microsoft achieved this battery life by employing a few tricks, including running the device on low brightness and “using the device with inactive applications for a portion of the time.”
We can’t confidently claim that the Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio 2 has 18 hours of battery life, or anywhere close, without putting the machine to the test ourselves.
Microsoft’s “controlled” conditions do not reflect typical day-to-day usage, but we will be sure to verify this as soon as possible. Because the Surface Laptop Studio 2, at least on paper, could be a major entry into the premium market. Whether this will actually work out this way in practice remains to be seen.