Acer Aspire AI 14" (2025)

The laptop market, especially those bordering on ultrabooks, has always been fierce, and with the introduction of AI, it hasn't exactly improved.

The Aspire AI 14 is Acer's take on what it should cost and how it should be done. And it's wrapped in a sleek aluminium shell, it's so light and thin that it doesn't feel that way, but in an everyday life where every gram has to be shaved off, it's helpful. In return, we're down to 1,400 grams.

Our review copy differs in one significant way from what you'll find at your local computer retailer - it had a boring IPS screen instead of OLED, and the IPS version is for some reason not available locally. But unless Acer uses a different supplier than everyone else, the screen should be a great colour and user experience.

Otherwise, the rest was pretty standard. Our version came with Intel's 258V CPU and a 140V GPU, 14" WUXGA display with touch, 32GB LPDDR5X, and 512GB NVMe. The closest model you can buy is an edition with a 1 TB hard drive and, as mentioned, OLED, which offers 100% DCI-P3, 1 ms response time and, not least, decent black and colour levels - costs around £850. But... 60 Hz in 2025, that's not okay in my opinion. Anything below 120 Hz should not be sold. The battery is 65 Wh, which doesn't sound like much, but when everything is optimised for low power consumption, it should be fine. Up to 22 hours of battery life is promised. We got 20 hours, but it depends a lot on what you do with it. As soon as it needs to properly work, the battery life goes down rapidly.

AI PCs are a funny thing, but in this case they are characterised by a dedicated AI assistant button and a bunch of little programmes that basically just stop you from going online and using other people's offers. An excellent example is Microsoft Cocreator, which makes generative AI art that you have a lot more control over, but it still reeks of AI. Even though there's now a nice OLED screen to display it on.

Anything with AI should be mentioned in TOPS (Tera Operations Per Second) - and it all sounds great: an NPU with 48 TOPS, plus a graphics card with 67 TOPS AI. Until you realise that the RTX 4090 graphics card, which is approaching three years old, offers 1,300 TOPS. These numbers are more comparable to a mobile chip on steroids. Of course, if you do a lot of AI work, it makes sense to go for something with a graphics card that has a TOPS rating of over 50, but perhaps you should consider a heavier but more powerful laptop.

We got some decent benchmarks on it - over 2,700 in Geekbench 6 at single core, and Steel Nomad Lite from 3D Benchmark - which is specifically made for this type of computer - hit just over 3,700. This is quite reasonable and roughly on par with similar computers. Multithreading, on the other hand, is less than optimal, so we don't need to talk about that, but with this type of computer it probably doesn't mean much either. And it was pretty much on par with other similar models.

One of the places where it makes sense is video calling. It offers effects, blurred backgrounds (better than many webcams), and auto-subtitles for English language. Unfortunately, I didn't get to talk to anyone with a thick local dialect even if that would have been fun. Both Microsoft and Acer are kind of competing for the same type of AI systems, which is both funny, but also a bit strange. They work very well together, and without being too negative, I can say that the webcam needs a little help. It surprised me a bit - especially if there's not a lot of ambient light - but the AI needs to be better.

The computer is designed to be online most of the time. Don't worry, it also has local AI, but there's plenty of connectivity too. But while that's been thought of, something more essential has been forgotten - the keyboard. There are two USB ports, but no Ethernet connection. There probably wasn't room, and space is probably the reason why the keyboard with a nice white background is, well, mediocre, if I'm being kind. It's on par with what you get for a tablet and the competition isn't much better, but I wish someone would actually spend money on the primary way you use the computer. The sound is so unimportant that you don't even bother putting it in the specs, which is probably a good thing as you should use the computer's Bluetooth 5.3 or plug in a headset instead, because the built-in speakers are rubbish.

But keep in mind that this type of computer isn't aimed at hardcore gaming. It's aimed at serious study and especially business use, where a lightweight, highly portable computer with productivity AI is essential. And despite the - for the class - rather hefty specs, the price is actually quite reasonable. All in all, a not bad, almost solid launch in a product class where there are a lot of options.