HP Spectre x360 14 2024 review

All-in-One (or two-in-one) laptops are the best kind of laptops out there. They dial up the versatility factor of these machines to 11, allowing you to benefit from the perks of a touchscreen laptop and a tablet all at once. HP’s Envy x360 and Spectre x360 series laptops have been some of the best in the game when it comes to these convertible laptops. So how exactly does HP raise the bar higher in 2024? Of course it’s with on-device AI. 

The new HP Spectre x360 14 2024 features everything we loved about its predecessor and throws in the new Intel Core Ultra 7 155H chipset making this laptop even more powerful. We put this laptop through its paces over the past month, and here’s our full review, covering what’s great, what’s not, and who should buy this laptop. 

HP Spectre x360 14: Design

Let’s begin with the first thing you will notice about this laptop, and that’s the design. The new HP Spectre is a thin and light machine, and it comes with some design choices that we totally love. This includes a very good 360-degree hinge, this sleek colour and top-facing speakers.  

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However, things aren’t exactly perfect just yet. Unlike many laptops in this segment, the Spectre x360 14 cannot easily be opened up with one finger, and you will often find yourself using two hands to get that initial separation between with the lid. These small ridges under the arrow keys below the left Ctrl button and the arrow keys could be smoother.  

While these aren’t exactly deal-breakers, you will need some time to get used to these things before you grow ignorant of them. The HP Spectre x360 14 is also surprisingly rugged, with pretty much no keyboard flex and a strong hinge design. Some other elements we loved were the diagonal placement of some ports like the combo headphone port and one of the two USB-C ports. 

HP Spectre x360 14: Display

The Spectre x360 14’s display is one of the highlights of this machine. This 14-inch 2K display is one of the best I have used in its class. Being an OLED panel, colours are vibrant, blacks are punchy, and everything rich in contrast – to the point of us having a hard time switching back to our regular office laptops.  

This makes the HP Spectre x360 great for everything from movies to work use-cases like photo-editing or designing. With an IMAX Enhanced certification (something very few laptops and TVs have), you can also rest assured about having the best picture quality when watching IMAX-certified movies.  

The screen also has 120Hz refresh rate, bringing it on par with most flagship smartphones of today, and Windows 11 feels even faster and smoother thanks to this. While you can lock the laptop to 60Hz or 120Hz to save battery or go all out, we chose to set to the dynamic setting, allowing us to get the best of both worlds.  

Other great features here are a taller 16:10 aspect ratio, which lets you have more elements on the screen at once when working, and a 10-point multitouch panel, which is awesome for everything from editing and note-taking, to exploring the world on Google Earth.  

HP Spectre x360 14: Performance and battery

The HP Spectre x360 14 comes with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H, and that is one of its biggest upgrades over last year’s model. While you may not notice a lot of difference upfront, the new chip makes the laptop faster when it comes to everyday tasks and work.  

The new architecture of the Core Ultra chipsets means the laptops can balance power and efficiency like never before, allowing laptops powered by these chips to be faster while saving battery at the same time.  

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Coming back to the Spectre, the Core Ultra 7 155H is powerful enough to browse with many tabs open in Chrome, or do some quick photo or even video editing. Coupled with the Intel Arc GPU onboard, graphic intensive tasks perform even better. While this isn’t a gaming laptop, we reckon some casual games will not be a problem for this machine.  

The built-in NPU (neural processing unit) is something that also helps the performance from the back-end. While it doesn’t exactly give you a full-fledged AI tool to play with (you have Windows Copilot for that), what it does do is work in the background on smaller, repetitive Windows tasks that make the machine faster over time.  

You also benefit when it comes basic AI-powered tasks. For instance, camera effects like blurring the background will work better with more accurate edge detection. AI-upscaling for lower resolution content streaming will also be better. This is also happening at the system level, so the benefits are not tied to a specific app or service.  

The Spectre also comes with few ports to make up for its small size. However, the laptop does come with a USB hub bundled in the box that allows you to throw in some more ports including an HDMI port. Without any external hubs, the laptop comes with two USB-C ports on the right, one of which is a Thunderbolt 4 port, along with a Type-A port and a combo headphone port on the right. 

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The HP Spectre x360 14 also lasted about 9-10 hours on a single charge in our moderate to heavy testing, where it was largely connected to Wi-Fi at all times. These are great numbers for a 66Whr battery on a compact laptop like this, and we’re sure not many will find much to complain about the battery life of this laptop.

HP Spectre x360 14: Keyboard and trackpad

There’s a nice keyboard on board, which has more travel than most laptops in this segment. This means, you get a more clicky feedback for each keystroke, ideal if you type out long pieces like us. You also have quick shortcuts to controls like locking the camera and microphone as well as a multi-level white backlight.  

The trackpad, on the other hand, is quite large for a 14-inch laptop, which is great. Since you can also use the touchscreen for navigation, HP didn’t need to add a very large trackpad in here, but it did, and we’re grateful. The trackpad makes everything from navigation to multi-finger Windows gestures much easier to use. 

Unboxed Take: Who should buy the HP Spectre x360 14?

The HP Spectre x360 14 is a great laptop for the price, and the best part is, it isn’t just a good recommendation for a particular set of users. There are at least a few features of this laptop that benefit everyone from light surfers and content consumers to editors and designers who are on the move.  

Unless you’re a gamer, the HP Spectre x360 14 is a great all-round laptop to invest in if you’re looking for something to carry for work, be it at the college, office, or pretty much anywhere else.   

At the price of Rs 1,59,990, this all-round machine is dangerously close to M2 MacBook Pro prices. But add in the convenience of a touchscreen and a 360-form factor, along with the flexibility of a Windows machine, and this will quickly shape up to be a great deal.