Laptops | The Verge

Microsoft refreshes its smaller Surface Pro and Laptop with Qualcomm’s X2 Plus

2026-09-23T16:25:29-04:00

The Surface Pro 12-inch Second Edition comes in black, silver, or violet. | Image: Microsoft

Microsoft is refreshing its Surface Pro 12-inch and Surface Laptop 13-inch devices with Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon X2 Plus chips. The smaller Surface devices retain the same design and hardware features from last year, with faster and more capable chips inside and higher price tags (thanks RAMageddon!).

While the 12-inch Surface Pro started at $799.99 last year, it's debuting on October 13th at a starting price of $1,149.99. Likewise, the 13-inch Surface Laptop was originally priced at $899.99, but it's up to $1,199.99 this time around. There's no base 8GB model this time, causing some of the price increase, as both devices launch with a …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Score free Pixel Buds 2A when you preorder a Googlebook at Best Buy

2026-09-22T15:28:55-04:00

An early look at the first set of Googlebooks

The Android-powered Googlebooks are coming soon, with familiar brands and specs that rival Windows Copilot machines. For anyone eager to get their hands on any the new laptops, there’s a preorder perk you may want to know about lasting until October 25th, 2026.

When you add a Googlebook to your cart at Best Buy, a pair of Pixel Buds 2A in hazel will be added for free. You can preorder now, with some systems shipping as early as October 5th, 2026. If you’re curious about the new machines, my colleague Antonio G. Di Benedetto got to spend some time with the laptops and shared his thoughts.

There are a number of qualifying Googlebooks available at the retailer, including options from Acer, Lenovo, Asus, HP, and Dell. There’s a dedicated category page for the new genre of laptop in case you want to peruse the lineup. The least expensive model is the Acer Googlebook 14, which starts at $899 and features an Intel Core 5 Ultra, 16GB of LPDDR5X memory, and 512GB of storage. We also compared the specifications and features for each machine, in case you’re having trouble deciding.

Read our Googlebook hands-on.

It’s time for the Mac Neo

2026-09-22T08:04:43-04:00

Come on, how adorable would this be? | Image: The Verge, Apple

The Mac Mini is a great little desktop computer, and back when it cost $599, it was easy to recommend to anyone who wanted something speedy, simple, and cheap. The new M6 model is even better, but it starts at $899, and its 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU might actually be overkill for someone who just wants macOS and mostly does web stuff.

That's why we need a Mac Neo. The MacBook Neo proves Apple can get good-enough laptop performance from an iPhone chip for $699. And you get a great screen, keyboard, trackpad, and battery with that money. Throwing a smartphone chip, a power supply, some basic speakers, and a few ports in a small box shouldn' …

Read the full story at The Verge.

These are the first five Googlebook laptops

2026-09-21T13:12:20-04:00

Google and partners are finally announcing the first laptops under the new Googlebook banner. There are five models from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo to kick things off. They're available for preorder starting today and arrive in stores on October 4th.

Starting prices range from $899 to $1,299, putting the Googlebooks in the same territory as the MacBook Air and a plethora of Windows laptops. Each Googlebook also comes with 12 months of Google AI Pro with 5TB of cloud storage, along with three-month trials of YouTube Premium, Adobe Photoshop, and CapCut. Google's also promising up to 10 years of updates.

Here's a look at the hardwar …

Read the full story at The Verge.

The long dream of the Googlebook

2026-09-21T07:34:52-04:00

Dell’s XPS Googlebook is just one of the devices Google needs to be great.

In late 2010, an up-and-coming Google executive named Sundar Pichai took the stage in front of a bunch of reporters and explained that Google had a big new idea about laptops. In the future, he said, the only thing you'd need on your computer was a web browser - that was where all your apps, data, and connections would live going forward. Your computer didn't need much storage, Pichai explained, or any fancy hardware, because the cloud would do the work. The software designed for these new laptops, Chrome OS, was an enormous bet that the web would eventually overtake everything.

Chrome OS (which eventually became ChromeOS) has been, in many …

Read the full story at The Verge.

I got to see Google’s wild ideas about the future of laptops

2026-09-21T15:38:05-04:00

Googlebooks look like fancy Chromebooks at first, but there are interesting software ideas. | Photo: Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

There are a few things about using a Googlebook that immediately feel just right. The hardware is polished (since it's based on current laptops). The OS is familiar (if you've ever used a Chromebook). But most impressive, it integrates your Android phone with your PC so they feel more like one device. It's the culmination of a series of new ideas that blur the two devices together. After my first look, I went from doubtful to excited by the prospect of Google pulling it all off.

After an initial bare-bones announcement in May, Google is finally launching Googlebooks - its new line of Android-based laptops. The initial five Googlebook models …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Googlebooks feel like the first laptops built for Android owners

2026-09-21T08:28:55-04:00

Googlebook OS is a little bit like ChromeOS and a whole lot like Android.

There's a good chance that my next laptop will be a Googlebook. If you're an Android user like me, then yours might be too, because Google is making a compelling pitch: The Googlebook does for the Android phone what the MacBook does for the iPhone (and then some).

John Maletis, Google's head of laptops and tablets, said at my press briefing that the Googlebooks were designed to "work seamlessly with your Android phone." You can start using an app on your phone then pick it up on the laptop, navigate your phone's files from the laptop, run any phone app from the computer, and manage all your notifications in one place.

It's a good pitch. A …

Read the full story at The Verge.

The Dell XPS 13 is the first real competitor to the MacBook Neo

2026-09-14T12:54:11-04:00

Welcome back. | Photo: Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

Dell's last XPS 13 was meant to be a farewell before the company sunset the entire XPS brand. But it was a bitter ending, and an overpriced one as well. Earlier this year, Dell resurrected the XPS name with the excellent (and very expensive) XPS 14 and 16. And now, it's reinvented the XPS 13 as a much more affordable thin-and-light to take on the MacBook Neo.

Call it another comeback.

The 2026 XPS 13 has the nicest hardware you'll find in a new $700 laptop outside of Apple's Neo. The core components - the screen, keyboard, trackpad, and speakers - are all great or excellent. It's an exquisite package in a sleek and very thin ultra-portable.

…

Read the full story at The Verge.

The incomplete history of Duo devices

2026-09-09T18:23:35-04:00

Apple announced the company's first device with a folding screen today, the iPhone Duo, but that's where the firsts end. The Duo is not only far from the first foldable on the market thanks to the efforts of Samsung and Google, but it's also not the first product to be called the Duo.

Former Apple CEO Steve Jobs popularized the saying "good artists copy, great artists steal," but will the iPhone Duo's folding screen, which features a custom nano-texture display material to help minimize the visibility of its crease, be enough to make us forget these other Duos that have come before it? Only time, or how aggressively Apple plans to market i …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Framework is giving some customers a RAM refund

2026-09-09T11:36:37-04:00

In a "rare, positive update" amid the ongoing component shortage, Framework is lowering its RAM prices for some buyers of the Laptop 13 Pro - at least, for now. After increasing the laptop's memory pricing in July, Framework says it "secured a limited quantity of Micron 32GB and 64GB LPCAMM2 memory modules at lower cost," and plans to share the savings:

We are committed to passing on savings whenever we can and keeping computers as accessible as possible in the current environment, so we are rolling out price reductions across both already shipped and a subset of currently pending pre-orders. While these new costs remain above our origina …

Read the full story at The Verge.