Huawei's new ultra-light laptop is genuinely ridiculously slim and slender at just 798g - but Western fans might never get their hands on one | Tech Radar
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Huawei's new ultra-light laptop is genuinely ridiculously slim and slender at just 798g - but Western fans might never get their hands on one
Huawei's 798g Mate Book Pro S is a genuine engineering feat, even if Huawei's claims of a 'breakthrough' are exaggerated
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Huawei Mate Book Pro S weighs 798g at 11.9mm, with a 14.2-inch 3.1K 120 Hz flexible OLED touchscreen and a 54 Wh battery
The laptop runs Harmony OS 6.1 rather than Windows and uses a Kirin XE90 So C, a Hi Silicon ARM design on SMIC's 7nm node, capped at 20W
It currently sells only in China, where it starts at 7,999 yuan, with no plans announced for wider availability
Huawei has launched the Mate Book Pro S, a 14.2-inch laptop that weighs 798 grams and measures 11.9mm at its thickest point.
The device runs Harmony OS 6.1 rather than Windows, uses Huawei's custom Kirin XE90 processor, and went on sale in China on 14 August, with prices starting at 7,999 yuan, roughly just under $1,200 when converted.
There seem to be no documented plans to offer the same laptop officially in the West, but third-party suppliers have already emerged offering to ship to countries worldwide, albeit at a significant premium.
Thin, but not the thinnest, with a CPU that is relatively untested
At 798 grams, the Mate Book Pro S is noticeably lighter than most of its competition, but thinner alternatives from Japanese manufacturers exist, shaving off an additional 164 grams.
Although it isn't one of the lightest in the business, it is considerably slimmer than laptops that compete in the same performance segments. Huawei achieves this with a magnesium-lithium alloy bottom cover, magnesium-aluminum A and C covers, a three-section motherboard, a thin dual-fan cooling assembly with what Huawei calls Shark Fin blades, and a high-silicon-anode battery.
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With a 3.1k flexible OLED touchscreen offering 1000 nits of full-screen brightness and a peak of 1600 nits, plus a 120 Hz refresh rate, it has one of the best displays on paper.
What stands out even more than the capable display, however, is the processor: the Kirin XE90, as Huawei claims 23% higher single-core performance, 25 percent better energy efficiency, and 40% higher NPU throughput than the standard Kirin X90, with the cooling system supporting up to 20W of sustained output.
More interestingly, it may use the same SMIC 7nm N+2 node Tech Insights found when it physically analyzed the Kirin X90 in the Mate Book Fold, rather than the 5nm process Chinese television claimed. The XE90 essentially is a refinement of the same design, and there is no indication it has moved nodes since the finding was reported.
This matters because it affects not only Huawei's laptop performance, but also efficiency in a class where performance per watt is a key determinant. The laptop is also only 798 grams in its lightest configuration; its lineup splits into Standard, Soft Light, Privacy, and Collector's Edition, and the weights differ considerably. The standard and privacy models weigh 798g, the Soft Light version 805g, and the Collector's Edition 825g, with a thickness of 12.2mm.
Huawei also claims 18 hours of video playback, a stable Wi Fi 7+ connection up to 1000 meters away in open, unobstructed areas, and a six-microphone array that can clearly capture audio from up to 10 meters away.
For those looking for a solution that isn't Windows- or Linux-based, the Mate Book Pro S is an intriguing buy — if you're willing to pay the premium.
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Having built hundreds of gaming PCs and being an avid gamer in his spare time, Rahim tends to have stronger opinions about hardware than most. This is particularly on display when he gets his way with powerful, but minimalistic RGB builds even as Small Form Factor (SFF) PCs come a close second.
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