We challenge each reviewed system’s graphics with a quartet of animations or gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark test suite. The first two, Wild Life (1440p) and Wild Life Extreme (4K), use the Vulkan graphics API to measure GPU speeds. The others, Steel Nomad’s regular (4K) and Light (1440p) subtests, focus on APIs more commonly used for game development, like Metal, DirectX 12, and Vulkan, to assess gaming geometry and particle effects. A fifth test, Solar Bay, emphasizes ray-tracing performance using Vulkan or Metal APIs at 1440p resolution. (The HP OmniBook X 14 could not complete the Solar Bay test, so that model’s not in that chart.)

Let’s be honest. Armed with integrated Intel Arc Graphics 130V, this system would never compete with gaming laptops with a dedicated GPU. But Intel’s built-in graphics have drastically improved recently, and the Acer Aspire 14 AI posted decent numbers.

The Dell XPS 13 (9350) led the pack, thanks to an extra Xe core (the Intel Arc Graphics 140V has eight Xe cores, while the 130V has seven), but the Acer Aspire 14 AI is neck-and-neck with the HP OmniBook and the Lenovo ThinkPad X9.

So long as you don’t need a game-ready graphics chip, the Acer Aspire 14 AI will handle all your visuals just fine, from browsing to media streaming.

Battery Life and Display Tests 

We test each laptop and tablet’s battery life by playing a locally stored 720p video file (the open-source Blender movie Tears of Steel) with display brightness at 50% and audio volume at 100%. We make sure the battery is fully charged before the test, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.

To gauge display performance, we also use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Windows software to measure a laptop screen’s color saturation—what percentage of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 color gamuts or palettes the display can show—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per square meter).

The Aspire 14 AI posted excellent battery life, stretching to more than 17 hours off the charger, landing solidly between the Dell XPS 13 and the Lenovo ThinkPad X9. However, they all paled compared with the HP OmniBook X 14, which blows the competition out of the water with all-day-plus battery life. Regardless, this is still a satisfactory result.

But I’ll definitely complain about the display. It’s readable and straightforward, but the color quality was disappointing in testing. The 45% Adobe RGB and DCI-P3 color coverage is a real bummer for anyone who wants vibrant color for everything from movie watching to photo editing. The brightness is also disappointing, though, as I said, you won’t notice that as much if you bump the screen brightness up to the max.