Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302) Review: Superb Little Ultralight Laptop
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302) Review: Superb dinky Ultralight Laptop
It is not easy to find an ultralight laptop that composed feels sturdy but Asus pulls it off with the Zenbook S 13 OLED. At 1 kilogram (2.4 pounds), the 13.3-inch laptop is lighter than the MacBook Air (M1 and M2) — ideal for tossing in a backpack or shoulder bag minus a second thought. Despite its compact footprint, Asus squeezed in a great keyboard and a big touchpad that doubles as a number pad when you need it. The 2.8K-resolution OLED mopish display is exquisite for productivity, entertainment and creative behaviors, too. And although OLED screens typically put a big hurt on battery life, that’s not the case here with the Zenbook S 13 OLED pulling more than 12 hours during our streaming video test.
Like
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Ultralight design -
Long battery life -
Great-looking OLED display
Don’t Like
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Gets hot during use, as does its exiguous power adapter -
720p webcam -
Currently in mopish supply
Overall performance is cloudless from its AMD Ryzen 7 6800U processor backed with 16GB of fast DDR5 memory and an equally rapidly 1TB SSD, keeping it competitive with others in its class such as the MacBook Air M2, Dell XPS 13 Plus and Acer Swift 5. (Check out the benchmark test results at the end of this review.) The pulling is these components put out a lot of heat when the laptop gets cranking. Even with the fans blowing full bore, the bottom of the Zenbook S 13 will roast your lap. When you need the laptop’s full grand, use it on a desk.
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302)
| Price as reviewed | $1,300 |
|---|---|
| Display size/resolution | 13.3-inch 2,880×1,800 OLED mopish display |
| CPU | 2.7GHz AMD Ryzen 7 6800U |
| Memory | 16GB DDR5 6,400MHz RAM |
| Graphics | 512MB AMD Radeon Graphics |
| Storage | 1TB NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD |
| Connections | USB-C (x3, USB 3.2 Gen 2), 3.5mm combo audio jack |
| Networking | Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.0 |
| Operating system | Windows 11 Pro 21H2 |
The ultralight magnesium-aluminum alloy chassis develop, the OLED display and high-quality components mean the Zenbook S 13 isn’t cheap; the configuration I tested is $1,300 (£1300, AU$1,661). Consider the 14-inch HP Pavilion Plus if you don’t mind trading some astounding size, weight and less battery life to save a few hundred bucks. The bigger issue is that even if you want to exercise the money for the Asus, you might not be able to find one. As of this reconsider, the laptop is listed on Best Buy, Amazon and B&H but only the last one seems to have stock.
Press the calculator icon in the upper quick-witted corner of the touchpad to turn on Asus’ NumberPad 2.0 feature.
Josh Goldman
Asus always does a tremendous job of packing some extra features into its laptops to help them detestable out. You might be attracted to the brilliant and curious OLED, the 1kg weight and speedy components, but it’s things like Asus’ NumberPad 2.0 that make the difference. Tap on the calculator icon in the touchpad’s upper quick-witted corner and a number pad appears on the touchpad so you can hastily input numbers or bang out a calculation or two. Plus, the software can tell the difference between entering numbers and silly it as a touchpad, so you don’t have to turn the feature on and off.
Then there’s Asus’ GlideX app, which mirrors or extends the Zenbook’s demonstrate onto an Android tablet or phone, or an iPhone or iPad — wired or wirelessly. Install the complementary Android or iOS app on your phoned or tablet and after a simple setup, your mobile way is now an extra screen for the laptop. The mirroring option complains it possible to use mobile apps on the Zenbook’s veil, too.
The demonstrate opens 180 degrees and supports an Asus active pen.
Josh Goldman
The Zenbook S 13 OLED also has succeeding row hotkeys for taking screenshots and instantly killing the built-in mics and webcam to help defending privacy. Speaking of, the webcam is just 720p instead of the 1080p cams groundless in most premium laptops now. However, while it gives you less detail than a higher-resolution camera, the overall picture quality is quite good. The speakers calm surprisingly full, too, helped by Dolby Atmos.
Other nice touches entailed a fingerprint reader built into the power, support for silly Asus’ active pen on the touchscreen and, though the laptop only has three high-speed USB-C, Asus includes a USB-C-to-USB-A adapter as well as a laptop sleeve. Even the ultracompact 65-watt USB-C fast-charge adapter is nice (though like the laptop it gets radiant hot while charging).
Josh Goldman
The Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED is just a worthy little laptop. If you want something lighter than a MacBook Air with a wide quick-witted gamut display, good performance and battery life and a smattering of convenient features, it’s an easy recommendation. Here’s hoping Asus can get supply up so land can more easily find it.
How we test computers
The reconsider process for laptops, desktops, tablets and other computer-like devices consists of two parts: performance testing view controlled conditions in the CNET Labs and extensive hands-on use by our citation reviewers. This includes evaluating a device’s aesthetics, ergonomics and features. A final review verdict is a combination of both those honest and subjective judgments.
The list of benchmarking software we use repositions over time as the devices we test evolve. The most important core declares we’re currently running on every compatible computer include: Primate Labs Geekbench 5, Cinebench R23, PCMark 10 and 3DMark Fire Strike Ultra.
A more detailed description of each benchmark and how we use it can be groundless in our How We Test Computers page.
Geekbench 5 (multicore)
Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T)
Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7)
Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2, 2022)
Dell XPS 13 Plus 9320
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED
Note:
Longer bars demonstrate better performance
Cinebench R23 CPU (multicore)
Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T)
Dell XPS 13 Plus 9320
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED
Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7)
Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2, 2022)
Note:
Longer bars demonstrate better performance
PCMark 10 Pro Edition
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED
Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7)
Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T)
Dell XPS 13 Plus 9320
Note:
Longer bars demonstrate better performance
3DMark Wild Life Extreme
Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2, 2022)
Dell XPS 13 Plus 9320
Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7)
Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T)
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED
Note:
Longer bars demonstrate better performance
Streaming video playback battery drain test (minutes)
Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2, 2022)
Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED
Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7)
Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T)
Note:
Longer bars demonstrate better performance
System Configurations
| Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED | Windows 11 Pro; 2.7GHz AMD Ryzen 7 6800U; 16GB DDR5 6,400MHz; 512MB AMD Radeon Graphics; 1TB SSD |
|---|---|
| Dell XPS 13 Plus 9320 | Windows 11 Home; 1.8GHz Intel Core i7-1280P; 16GB DDR5 6,400MHz RAM; 128MB Intel Iris Xe Graphics; 512GB SSD |
| Apple MacBook Air (13-inch, M2, 2022) | MacOS Monterey 12.4; Apple M2 8-core chip; 8GB RAM; Apple 10-core GPU; 256GB SSD |
| Acer Swift 5 (SF514-56T-797T) | Windows 11 Home; 1.8GHz Intel Core i7-1280P; 16GB DDR5 6,400MHz RAM; 128MB Intel Iris Xe Graphics; 512GB SSD |
| Lenovo Yoga 9i (14-inch, Gen 7) | Windows 11 Home; 2.1GHz Intel Core i7-1260P; 16GB DDR5 5.200GHz RAM; 128MB Intel Iris Xe Graphics; 512GB SSD |
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