ZDNET's key takeaways The Asus Zenbook A14 with 16GB of memory is on sale at Best Buy for $649 - the lowest price we've seen yet.
It's a fantastic balance of innovation and value with a brilliant OLED display, competitive hardware, and a satisfying physical form.
While its use case is clearly defined, the laptop has its limits when it comes to high-end performance. View now at Best Buy
When Asus officially announced the Zenbook A14 at CES this year, I wasn't the only one to be low-key enamored with it. It's a great laptop in its own right, but it stands out as a successful balancing act between performance and affordability while hitting all the right notes that consumers care about.
Made of Asus' proprietary ceraluminum material, the Zenbook A14 almost feels like a prototype model that's empty inside, as it's exceedingly light at just 2.1 pounds (for reference, the 13-inch MacBook Air is 2.7 pounds). When you set it down, the device opens easily with the lift of a single finger, revealing the brilliant OLED display.
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Asus committed to a neutral-forward aesthetic with the A14. The brand messaging features muted tones and quiet, sophisticated imagery punctuated by natural motifs, and, overall, it works to form a cohesive identity.
This aesthetic highlights Asus' determination to deliver a cohesive brand message while balancing innovation and cost. For example, the display on the Zenbook A14 looks good right out of the box. It's bright, crisp, and efficient. But closer inspection reveals that it's not as premium a display as you'd find on, say, Asus' ProArt P16.
The display is framed by plastic bezels carefully designed not to look cheap, but again… this isn't the ProArt. Additionally, the panel over the FHD display has some slight warping that can give a funhouse mirror effect when you catch your reflection on the glossy surface.
Kyle Kucharski/ZDNET
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