The first full reviews of the Asus ExpertBook A7 are out, and they agree on the main point: the case and screen belong to a premium laptop, and the processor does not.
What reviewers like
Notebookcheck rated the ExpertBook A7 84%. Its test unit had an aluminium unibody that is 11.8 mm thick and weighs 1.25 kg, and the reviewer called the chassis the highlight of the laptop. The 14-inch OLED has 2880 x 1800 pixels, a 120 Hz refresh rate and a matte finish, which is unusual for OLED. Notebookcheck measured 496 nits on average and 98.7% coverage of P3. Battery life and the speakers are also listed as strengths, and the battery is a 65 Wh unit.
What they criticise
- Processor. The Intel models use Wildcat Lake chips only. The Core 7 350 in the test unit scored 7,773 in Cinebench R23 multi-core, and performance dropped by about 35% on battery. Ultrabook Review calls it a low-power platform meant for budget laptops and says the A7 would have been far more competitive with Intel’s faster Panther Lake chips.
- Screen quirks. Notebookcheck found PWM flicker at 960 Hz and a grainy image from the matte layer.
- Ports. Two USB-C ports and one USB-A port, all USB 3.2, plus HDMI 2.1. There is no Thunderbolt or USB4, and wireless is Wi-Fi 6E.
- Memory and keyboard. The 16 GB of memory is soldered, and key travel is short.
Price
Ubergizmo reports a US starting price of $1,299.99. Notebookcheck’s review unit, with the Core 7 350, 16 GB and a 512 GB SSD, is priced at $1,399.
How it compares
The same Wildcat Lake family powers the HP OmniBook 5 14, which costs about half as much. At the A7’s price, the MacBook Air 13 (M5) is much faster, and business buyers with a bigger budget can look at the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14, which adds Thunderbolt 4 and a deeper keyboard. Our laptop comparison tool puts the reviewed models side by side.