Huawei Matebook X Pro 2020 review - Stay the same - Android

When Huawei released the original MateBook X Pro in 2018, it was one of the best high-end ultrabooks you could buy. Its nearly bezel-less display and premium construction made it stand out among both its Windows and Apple competitors.

Two years and three revisions later, the competition has gotten better. Apple’s MacBook lineup is in a better place in 2020 than at any point since 2016. And on the Windows side of things, you can’t go wrong with an ultrabook from Dell, HP, or Asus. The question then becomes, is a minor refresh enough to keep the MateBook X Pro at the top?

This is Android Authority’s review of the 2020 MateBook X Pro.

What is the MateBook X Pro?

The 2020 MateBook X Pro is the third iteration of Huawei’s high-end ultrabook. New to this year’s model is the inclusion of Intel’s 10th-generation Comet Lake U-series processors.

You can configure the MateBook X Pro with either a Core i7-10510U or i5-10210U chip. Neither is a significant upgrade on the 9th-gen processors that came with the 2019 MateBook X Pro — or, for that matter, a reason to upgrade from an older laptop.

Related: The best laptops you can buy

Also new this year is the addition of an “Emerald Green” color variant. I haven’t seen this model in person, but judging from photos, it’s the lineup’s standout. And that’s the extent of the changes Huawei made to the MateBook X Pro for 2020. For better and worse, the company didn’t tweak the underlying design of the MateBook X Pro.

Who is the MateBook X Pro for?

While almost anyone who sets their eyes on the MateBook X will fall in love with its display, the specific characteristics of that screen make it better suited for some use cases over others. In particular, its 3:2 aspect ratio makes the most of Windows 10’s snapping function. Add 100% sRGB coverage and a 3,000 by 2,000 resolution, and you have a display that’s perfect for productivity tasks like writing and photo editing, as well as watching video content.

However, those same display traits make the MateBook X Pro less suited for gaming. Playing any modern game at the MateBook X Pro’s native resolution requires more processor and GPU horsepower than the ultrabook has to offer. Moreover, with the display capped at a 60Hz refresh rate, even older titles don’t feel particularly smooth. I bring this up not as a knock against the MateBook X Pro, but to point out that it’s not a jack of all trades. Those who want a computer that is suited for both productivity and gaming should look elsewhere.

What’s it like to use the MateBook X Pro?

From the moment you first remove the MateBook X Pro from its packaging, two things stand out. At approximately 1.33kg, there’s a surprising amount of weight to the computer. Thanks to its 2:3 display, the MateBook X Pro also has a more square footprint than the usual 16:9 laptop. Together these things help make the MateBook X Pro feel solid. Add its brushed aluminum exterior to that, and you have a machine that feels premium.

The MateBook X Pro has one of the better keyboards I’ve used on a Windows laptop, but it's not perfect.

Overall, the MateBook X Pro has one of the better keyboards I’ve used on a Windows laptop, but it’s not perfect. Key travel is on the shallow side, and the spacebar didn’t feel great. At least on my unit, the left stabilizer has more give than its right-hand counterpart, so no two taps of the key feel consistent with one another. Comparing it to what Apple offers, what’s here is, unsurprisingly, better than the Cupertino company’s old Butterfly keyboard, but not quite as good as its new Magic Keyboard.

The trackpad is one of the more generous ones you’ll find on a Windows laptop, but it has a similar issue to the spacebar where the left side of the pad has more give than the right. Neither of these are deal-breakers, but I found the MateBook X Pro doesn’t quite live up to its reputation as the MacBook of Windows laptops.

What’s the software situation like on the MateBook X Pro?

The MateBook X Pro comes with Windows 10 pre-installed. Normally that wouldn’t be worth a separate section, but then Huawei finds itself in an unusual position. At least for the moment, it doesn’t seem like the company will lose access to Windows in the same way that it did Android thanks to US trade sanctions. I don’t know if any of us can say for sure what the future holds for Huawei, so I think it’s reasonable to avoid the MateBook X Pro if you don’t want to deal with the uncertainty surrounding the company.

As for the software experience itself, there’s little to complain about here. The MateBook X Pro comes with two main apps pre-installed: PC Manager and Huawei Share. The former is a hub you can use to check the health of your system and manage drivers. The latter allows you to share files and the screen from your Huawei phone.

The best thing I can say about all the additional software that comes with the MateBook X Pro is that it’s easy to ignore. None of it is intrusive and there’s no actual bloatware to speak of.

What’s performance like?

The MateBook X Pro unit I tested featured the four-core, eight-thread Core i7-10510U processor, 16GB of RAM, and a 1TB NVMe drive. As mentioned above, the jump to a 10th-gen chip from Intel is not as significant of an upgrade as you might think. The i7-10510U is part of Intel’s Comet Lake family, not its new 10nm Ice Lake series. With the latter, Intel is claiming significant improvements in single-threaded and multi-threaded performance. By contrast, Comet Lake promises more modest gains over its previous generation chips.

What’s more, the MateBook X Pro’s thermal design prevents it from taking full advantage of the new silicon. Both the i5-10210U and i7-10510U are 15W TDP chips, but