Acer Swift 14 AI Intel Review

The Swift 14 AI is currently the best professional laptop with an OLED screen in the under $1,000 segment, with 3K 90Hz resolution and up to 13 hours of battery life. However, to achieve the above strengths, Acer had to compromise on the performance of the AI ​​processor on this device, particularly in tasks that require heavy processing power. So, whether this compromise will be beneficial, let’s look at this Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Asus has Expertbook and Zenbook, Lenovo has Yoga Slim, and Acer is following the two giants this year by launching the Swift lightweight laptop with the new Intel Core Ultra series 2 processor. Although the Acer Swift 14 AI has the power of the ‘youngest’ in the Ultra 2 family this year, the 3K resolution and 90Hz OLED screen are factors worth the trade-off for performance, especially compared to other laptops in the same price range.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel Review

Design

Suppose the popular Platinum Silver Ultrabooks are used to increase the glossiness and luxury, and the Black color is used to be more quiet and powerful. In that case, the Navy Blue color of Swift 14 AI Intel is to create a very different personality for the user.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

It is not just a unique color tone that rarely appears on the market but also a combination of all the most premium appearance elements that a powerful Ultrabook needs.

An equally powerful and engaging Ultrabook I recently had the opportunity to experience using is the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED 2024, which also has the same Navy Blue color tone as the Acer Swift 14 AI. And I have never stopped loving laptops with this color tone. Firstly, it creates a difference and a highlight that attracts attention when sitting and working anywhere, and secondly, it is not dull to look at every day.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

It has a seemingly simple A-side but special meaning, with a unique dotted pattern. Two pairs of linked dots symbolize the new generation AI logo exclusive to Acer. In addition, the right corner of the screen’s upper bezel retains the traditional Acer logo, ensuring clear brand recognition.

Not only is it beautiful, but the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel is only 1.6cm thin and 1.26kg light, a standard number that all Copilot+ PCs need to have not to burden the user’s shoulders when carrying them to work daily. Acer has not changed the language of the chassis design too much; the square and mechanical lines are still there but are softer and more delicate.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Going against the majority, the Acer uses a 2-axis hinge, not the 1-axis type that is gradually becoming popular. The quality of these two types of hinges is the same; the problem is that each device will bring a unique beauty and quality to its appearance. For the Acer Swift 14 AI, the 2-axis hinge will add a sturdy, modern highlight and premium build quality.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

The feeling of opening the laptop is relatively light because I still have to hold the device’s body with one hand and open the lid with the other hand. I do not see this as a disadvantage, although sometimes I want to open the device with one hand but cannot. However, the durability, sturdiness, and screen shaking when using and typing are eliminated.

Flipping the bottom over, you can see the Navy Blue color that makes this area as modern and beautiful as the abovementioned parts. A grille strip with spacious heat dissipation slots is on the left hinge edge. Below are ten more grille columns with equally spacious slots and two speaker grille strips on the lower edges.

The highlight of the bottom surface I have always loved is the thick silicone base strip, which helps protect the bottom surface from rubbing and scratching when placed on the table. At the same time, it also helps create a spacious space between the laptop and the table surface, allowing the hot air blown by the fan to circulate more optimally, keeping the machine cool.

Connectivity

The left and right sides of the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel have connection ports neatly placed in separate areas. This arrangement is similar to the Asus Expertbook B1 2023, which has dedicated areas for connection ports entirely stylized with the body. This arrangement is beautiful, not boring, and creates a highlight when looking at this laptop from any angle.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

With Type-C ThunderBolt 4 ports placed side by side, looking “luxurious” like a MacBook, the Swift 14 AI helps users feel more neat and convenient when using any charger and separate Type-C cable. As long as the minimum capacity is 65W to recharge the device, it also fully supports USB4 and DisplayPort connection and output standards.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Note that 65W is the minimum input power required to recharge the Swift 14 AI using the ThunderBolt 4 port. If you charge external devices using this Type-C port, the output power is only 5V – 3A (15W).

OLED Display

Let’s continue our Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review by discussing its OLED panel with 3K resolution. Its refresh rate of up to 90Hz surpasses all other Ultrabooks in the $1,000 and below price range. Laptops with high-quality OLED screens, like the Zenbook 14 OLED, Ideapad Slim 5, or even the new Yoga Slim 7, only have a refresh rate of 60Hz.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Although the difference between 60Hz and 90Hz is not significant, when moving the mouse cursor, I can see that the smoothness between the two OLED screens is entirely different. If the resolution is the same as 3K, but with a 90Hz OLED screen, the effects of reading newspapers, such as turning and scrolling, will be faster.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Thanks to the high refresh rate, the mouse pointer moves faster and smoother when working, processing data with Office software, editing, or creating image design. This makes for a much more comfortable and quicker working experience. Especially when playing games that require a lot of mouse clicks, like League of Legends, you can also clearly see the smoother performance.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Watching 4K resolution video clips, movies, programs, and music shows is perfect when the Swift 14 AI’s OLED panel has a 100% DCI-P3 color gamut and 100% Adobe RGB. Therefore, it provides a top-notch entertainment experience that is clear, fresh, and vivid and supports graphics tasks and image editing very well.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

The 3K 90Hz OLED display helps with entertainment and multitasking, and the superior, ultra-sharp 2K resolution webcam also gives business people and office workers who regularly hold online meetings a considerable advantage.

Windows Studio Effects beauty tools can be used directly or further customized for brightness, sharpness, contrast, and color saturation in Bluetooth settings.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

In addition, the Acer Sense software includes a Personal Setting section to enhance the visual experience and customize display settings to suit user needs. Here, I can turn on and off the blue light protection layer, set automatic brightness, set the software’s dark mode, set the screen protector, and automatically hide the taskbar conveniently.

Keyboard and AI touchpad

I will discuss the touchpad first because, compared to the keyboard cluster, this year’s Acer touchpad has created an additional visual and subconscious highlight for users.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

The Acer Swift 14 AI Intel touchpad is spacious and provides a smooth touch experience. It is quick and responsive and responds to all standard operations. In particular, Acer cleverly integrates the company’s unique AI icon in the touchpad’s upper right corner.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Every time I launch Acer Sense applications that use AI features such as Cameras, Microphones, or photo editing, this icon glows with a prominent white “Breathing” effect, creating a lovely highlight.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

The keyboard has a neat layout and button arrangement without any extra space. The buttons seem farther apart than other Ultrabooks, but the typing experience is smooth. I did not encounter any accidental pressing or unfamiliarity. The typing feeling is as smooth as usual, with a soft enough sound and smooth travel.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review test

This year’s Intel Core Ultra 5 series 2 was launched in four versions: 226V, 228V, 236V, and 238V. Our Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review model is powered by the Intel Core Ultra 5 226V processor, the “youngest” version in the Intel Evo family this year. It has 8 cores, 8 threads, a maximum clock speed of 4.5Ghz, 8MB cache, and 16GB DDR5 onboard, and it comes with the new Intel Arc 130V integrated iGPU.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

This is an ideal configuration for essential work with Office software in the office and tasks that require speed and power to process images and mixed software fast enough when on the go.

Benchmark Scores

Using Cinebench R23, Cinebench R24, and Geekbench 6 software to measure graphics processing capabilities and advanced mixed tasks, benchmark and review the scores below. The performance is enough to reach the mid-range threshold, slightly improved.

PCMark10 software benchmark was added to measure the ability to handle office tasks simultaneously with a series of software windows open. The final score is 6328 points. This threshold proves Swift 14 AI Intel is an essential professional laptop with familiar and slightly advanced tasks.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

To help readers quickly determine the performance of Intel Evo-certified Core Ultra 5 226V, I have two comparisons as follows:

First, let’s compare the single-core and multi-core CPU performance of the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel with the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Aura Edition (Ultra 7 258V) and ASUS Vivobook S 14 OLED (Ultra 5 125H) in Cinebench R23.

As a result, Acer is falling behind Lenovo and Asus. Intel’s new Ultra 5 series 2 chip line has not yet shown its full power. Acer has sacrificed performance to have a beautiful OLED screen and optimized the price range for easy user access.

When comparing Geekbench 6 with Intel Core Ultra 7 258V, the performance of 258V is optimized too well. It is still suitable for office use but can handle more heavy graphics tasks. However, Intel Core Ultra 5 226V is not too “backward” because it still brings absolute stability and a terrific display advantage with an OLED screen.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

I used PugetBench software to further test the graphics editing processing capabilities because the 3K 90Hz OLED screen without graphics is a waste. However, running an editing test and exporting a test video on Adobe Premier Pro 2025, I found that 15GB of RAM out of a total of 16GB was used up by this task. The video export time was also quite long. Although the video export was still possible, the laptop was weak.

The PugetBench scores are also at a standard level to meet the needs of photo editing with Photoshop and video editing with Premier Pro. However, I still don’t feel that the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel was born for graphics tasks. Despite having a gorgeous OLED screen, it is only reaching the threshold of perfect performance for popular office software.

Gaming Benchmark

Check out the Swift 14 AI’s gaming capabilities. The Intel Core Ultra 5 226V integrates a new iGPU, the Intel Arc 130V, which experts evaluate as promising excellent mid-range to high-end gaming performance. I have the scores and reviews below using 3DMark Time Spy, Night Raid, and Steel Nomad.

The Steel Nomad score shows that the Swift 14 AI can still play Battlefield V at Full HD resolution with the highest settings while maintaining an FPS above 55. Night Raid, with a score of over 20,000, further strengthens its ability to “smash” Esport games exceptionally easily, as well as previous-generation AAA games.

Time Spy score also gives results of more than 3000 points, which is not too high but enough to meet office workers’ not-too-strict gaming needs comfortably.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

Proving my gaming ability, I had moments of sublimation with League of Legends. Playing at the highest settings delivers impeccable smoothness, with FPS consistently fluctuating around 100. The OLED screen further increases the excitement when watching movements. The virtual combat phases are wonderful.

Battery life

According to Acer, the Swift 14 AI Intel has a 65Wh battery with a continuous usage time of 14 hours. I used PCMark10 software to measure the battery life; the result was 13 hours and 16 minutes. The new Intel Core Ultra 5 226V CPU, which consumes 30% less power than previous generations, is responsible for achieving a battery life that is not much different from the original announcement.

Acer Swift 14 AI Intel review the best professional laptop

13 hours is a lot of time for me, a pure office user who also uses Adobe editing software during the day to complete all work without constantly charging the machine. Acer Swift 14 AI is almost perfect in both its appearance and practicality.

Final line

The Acer Swift 14 AI Intel combines a premium build quality, a stunning 3K OLED display, and impressive battery life, making it the best professional laptop. While it sacrifices some processing power for an affordable price point under $1,000, it excels in office tasks, casual gaming, and light creative work.

Its sleek Navy Blue finish, excellent connectivity options, and long-lasting battery ensure practicality and style for daily use. If you’re seeking a professional laptop that balances elegance and functionality, the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel is worth considering.

Also see: Asus Zenbook S14 UX5406 Review

The Intel Core Ultra 7 258V model of the Acer Swift 14 AI Intel costs $1,099.99 on Amazon US, while the Intel Core Ultra 5 226V model is available for £1,099.99 on Amazon UK.

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