Microsoft's Surface Laptop Studio 2 improves upon the original without sacrificing the unique versatility of its sliding hinged display. This Windows

Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio 2 review: No MacBook Pro moves like this

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2025-01-23 00:00:15

Microsoft's Surface Laptop Studio 2 improves upon the original without sacrificing the unique versatility of its sliding hinged display. This Windows 11 2-in-1 can't outperform Apple's MacBooks, but it's beefy enough to function as a gaming laptop or portable video editing machine. Now if only Microsoft would throw the Surface Slim Pen 2 stylus in for free.

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The Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio 2 ($1,999 to start) is an attempt to ship a Windows 11 flagship that can compete toe-to-toe with the MacBook Pro.

That's a match-up Microsoft itself set up when it unveiled the Surface Laptop Studio 2 during a September 2023 event and put it through some head-to-head performance tests against a MacBook Pro. And since this is the most powerful Surface laptop yet, it was an appropriate comparison.

It was a compelling one too, but now that I've had a chance to test and review a Surface Laptop Studio 2 I can tell you it can't match Apple's MacBook Pro with M2 Max in nearly any regard. However, it's still one of the best 2-in-1 laptops that's well-suited to transitioning between office work, creative projects and gaming thanks to its expanded port array, unique sliding hinged display and optional Nvidia GeForce RTX 40-series GPUs.