The Asus ProArt PZ13: A Premium 2-in-1 Without the Premium Price Tag? Tired of overpriced 2-in-1 laptops that compromise on performance or features? The Asus ProArt PZ13 aims to disrupt this market with its compelling combination of a vibrant OLED display, long battery life, and a surprisingly competitive price point. But does it truly deliver on its promises, or does it fall short of expectations? This detailed review dives deep into the ProArt PZ13’s design, performance, and overall user experience to determine if it’s worth your hard-earned money.
Asus ProArt PZ13 Design: Industrial Elegance Meets Rugged Durability
The ProArt PZ13 boasts a striking industrial design, featuring an aluminum unibody with chamfered edges and a slim 9mm profile. Its Nano Black finish exudes a premium feel, while the subtly patterned bevel around the screen adds a touch of visual flair. While the design is undeniably sleek, the absence of a built-in kickstand is a noticeable omission. Instead, Asus provides a separate case, which unfortunately adds to the overall thickness and bulk when the tablet is not in use. The dimensions are 297.5 x 202.9 x 9 mm, and the weight is a manageable 0.85kg (without keyboard), 1.2kg (with keyboard).
Robust Build and Connectivity
Adding to its appeal is the device’s impressive durability. The ProArt PZ13 carries an IP52 rating for dust and water resistance, and it has supposedly passed stringent MIL-STD-810H military-grade durability tests. This suggests it can withstand a reasonable amount of wear and tear during travel or everyday use. The rear panel houses a discreet air intake and a flush-mounted camera; surprisingly, the device is relatively resistant to fingerprints and smudges. In terms of ports, you’ll find a power button on the top edge, exhaust vents for the single fan, volume controls on the right, and a single exposed USB Type-C port, another hidden under a rubber flap, and a full-size SD card slot on the left. A magnetic Pogo connector at the bottom allows seamless connection to the included keyboard. The tablet also incorporates dual speakers positioned on either side.
Asus ProArt PZ13 Display: A Visual Masterpiece
The ProArt PZ13 features a stunning 13.3-inch OLED touchscreen display with a remarkable 2,880 x 1,800 pixel resolution. The 16:10 aspect ratio is perfectly suited for productivity tasks and content creation. The display’s 500 nits of brightness and 0.2ms response time ensure crisp visuals and smooth motion. While the vibrant colors and sharp details are impressive, the glossy coating can make the screen challenging to use outdoors under direct sunlight. Nevertheless, Gorilla Glass NBT protection offers peace of mind against scratches and minor damage.
Color Accuracy and Features
The display boasts several noteworthy features, including Dolby Vision HDR support and Pantone validation, indicating accurate color reproduction. It offers 100 percent DCI-P3 color gamut coverage. While videos look excellent, photos might appear slightly oversaturated in the standard color profile; switching to the DCI-P3 or sRGB profiles (accessible via the ProArt Creator Hub app) provides more accurate color representation for photo and video editing. Viewing angles are excellent, and the touch response is highly responsive. The display also supports Asus Pen 2.0, allowing for natural and precise pen input for sketching, writing, and note-taking.
Asus ProArt PZ13 Keyboard, Touchpad, Speakers, and Cameras: A Well-Rounded Package
The included detachable keyboard connects securely via pogo pins and magnets, offering a solid and stable typing experience. The keys are well-spaced, backlit for use in low-light conditions, and provide approximately 1.35mm of key travel. The typing experience is comfortable and efficient, even for extended periods. A clicky touchpad below supports multi-touch gestures and precise cursor control.
Audio and Imaging Capabilities
Audio output is handled by dual side-firing speakers with Dolby Atmos support. While the sound quality is acceptable for a tablet, it may not rival dedicated laptop speakers; it delivers a full sound even at maximum volume, despite limited loudness due to the limited space for the speakers. The ProArt PZ13 features a 5-megapixel front-facing camera with an IR sensor for Windows Hello facial recognition, along with a 3-microphone array for clear audio recording, which is particularly useful for video calls. Additionally, a 13-megapixel rear camera (suitable for capturing decent photos in daylight) is included, although its practical uses might be limited for most users.
Asus ProArt PZ13 Performance: A Balanced Approach
The ProArt PZ13 is powered by the Snapdragon X Plus Gen 1, although this is a lower-tier chip compared to the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 chip showcased in other devices. While this isn’t top-tier performance, the chipset is sufficient for many daily tasks. The device is responsive for web browsing, basic content creation, and other everyday applications. However, demanding tasks or resource-intensive applications might lead to noticeable performance drops and the device’s heating up. The available 16GB LPDDR5x RAM (non-upgradeable) and 1TB M.2 NVMe storage (non-upgradeable) are decent enough for the typical user and tasks handled by this chip and device.
Benchmark Results & Gaming Performance
Benchmark tests reveal that the ProArt PZ13’s performance is not on par with devices featuring the higher-end X Elite chipset. Multi-core scores from Geekbench, Cinebench, and 3DMark reflect a lower performance output compared to chipsets with more cores. Nevertheless, AI performance is relatively comparable to devices with the superior chip. The benchmarks underscore a performance difference, especially in multi-core tasks, between the octa-core Snapdragon X Plus that’s in the ProArt PZ13 and other chips that have more cores, for instance, the 12-core Snapdragon X Elite. Here’s a summary of the benchmark results:
| Benchmark | Asus ProArt PZ13 |
|---|---|
| Geekbench 6 Single | 2,410 |
| Geekbench 6 Multi | 11,209 |
| Geekbench AI (Quantized) | 20,439 |
| 3DMark Steel Nomad Light (GPU) | 1,141 |
| 3DMark CPU Profile | 6,237 |
| 3DMark Night Raid (GPU) | 16,068 |
| Cinebench 2024 Single | 107 |
| Cinebench 2024 Multi | 551 |
Gaming performance is limited, with many modern titles proving difficult or impossible to run. Older games or those optimized for ARM architecture should run better, but heavy 3D or graphically demanding games are an unwelcome endeavor.
The connectivity options are solid though, featuring tri-band WiFi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4, both functioning reliably during testing
Asus ProArt PZ13 Battery Life: Exceptional Endurance
Despite the focus on efficient lower-tier parts, the ProArt PZ13 shines in terms of battery life. Its 70Wh battery is a key element in its remarkable power sustainability. While battery life heavily depends upon the users’ usage pattern, the device often lasts days on a single charge for casual, light-duty usage and easily provides a full workday’s worth of power. This is incredibly impressive for a device in this category.
Charging Capabilities
The provided 65W charger offers reasonably fast charging capabilities. Testing showed a full charge from 10 percent to 100 percent took approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes.
Asus ProArt PZ13 Verdict: A Strong Contender
The Asus ProArt PZ13 is a compelling 2-in-1 that delivers excellent value for money. Its brilliant OLED display, exceptional battery life, and decent performance (given its price point) combine to offer a well-rounded user experience. While the lack of a built-in kickstand and some compromises on performance compared to higher-end devices are notable, these shortfalls are easily offset by that great combination of quality, features, and price.
The device is an excellent choice for creative professionals or anyone seeking a portable (and reasonably durable) device for on-the-go work, note-taking, basic photo/video editing, and basic content creativity. However, users who need top-tier processing power for demanding applications such as heavy graphic design or video production might find its capabilities to be slightly limiting.
For those seeking a portable device with a phenomenal screen at a price less than many other competitors, the Asus ProArt PZ13 is a truly competitive offering that has many features to recommend it. It’s a strong mid-range contender in a market often dominated by premium, high-priced options that don’t always justify their cost.
