Best 14-inch Laptop? - ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 (2024) Review

Back in 2020, ASUS ROG launched the very first Zephyrus G14 and it was like a dream laptop for me since I really prefer 14-inch notebooks and it turned out to be a fantastic device. This year, ROG first teased us a brand new design for the G14 back in CES 2024, and three months in, here we have in our studio, the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 (2024).

Design & Specification

This year's ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 got a total makeover, turning this 14-incher is shorter, slimmer and lighter. Compared to the original G14, the 2024 model is 100 grams less and roughly 20mm slimmer while offering a larger 16:10 3k ROG Nebula display. The AniMe Matrix also made its exit and instead it was replaced by the all-new Slash design. It is not RGB and customization is less as compared to the AniMe Matrix with only 15 pre-programmed animation. Personally I prefer the more subtle design of the previous G14 but it is still a welcome design change nonetheless. This year's model also has a huge quality upgrade and is now made out of aluminum alloy that is CNC-machined for extra rigidity, and positioning this device closer to those more premium laptops.

Specs wise, this year's G14 rocks AMD's newest CPU with the Ryzen 9 8945HS, an up to NVIDIA RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, 32GB of soldered LPDDR5X memory and a terabyte of Gen 4 storage. While the processor is under the 8000 series, the 8945HS is still based on last year's Zen 4 architecture and is almost identical with last year's 7940HS with the key difference of having an on-chip AI capabilities. You won't see much of a difference in gaming performance but this neural processing unit or NPU is a great addition to those who are keen on generative AI including stable diffusion or adobe products for example. As for pricing, the G14 here in the Philippines comes in two variant, The 4070 model is priced at 159,995 PHP and comes both in Eclipse Gray and Platinum White while the cheaper RTX 4060 variant comes at 129,995 PHP but you are only limited to the Eclipse Gray option.

Display & Speakers

Display got a huge upgrade, the G14 can now be used more than just gaming with its OLED panel. You can actually do serious creative editing as this is Pantone validated with a color measurement of 100% for sRGB, 95% AdobeRGB and 100% P3 with a peak brightness of 441 nits. Gaming has also not been skimped as this has an impressive response time of 0.2ms with GSync / VRR support which is uncommon for a laptop. The refresh rate is a step down from last year now maxing only at 120Hz but at the same time, it is a trade off that I would accept in exchange for VRR support and OLED's advantages. Speakers also got a sizeable upgrade from 4 speakers to 6 and ASUS claims that it should be around close to 3x louder as compared to previous model.

Keyboard & Trackpad

Typing experience on the G14 still feels great similar to my older G14, there are minor difference including longer travel distance, bigger keycaps but generally it is still fantastic to type on. It is also illuminated and customizable via Armoury Crate. Trackpad on the other hand is night and day and that is on a positive note. I am aware that the trackpad size has been increased in previous iterations already but given that all I have is the older G14, this fixes my biggest complaint. Size is almost 1.5x bigger both horizontally and vertically, and paired with the glass surface, the touchpad on this year's G14 is incredible.

Connectivity

Ports on this year's G14 are similar with key notable changes, since the exhaust vents are now exclusively at the back. All ports are pushed back and there are some that have been switched. over at the right side we have a Type-C Gen 2 with display support, a USB Type-A Gen 2 and a microSD card slot. over at the other side, we have ASUS' new proprietary reversible charger port, an HDMI 2.1, USB4 capable of PD up to 100w, another Type-A that is Gen 2 as well and lastly and audio jack. I do like the new charger port as barrel ports gets loose overtime but we'll see how this port holds up later down in the future.

Benchmark

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All of my testing are done under performance mode and we could see that the G14 doesn't have a stellar record, only beating the older 7735HS, which by the way is on an older architecture, by just 10-20% and is getting beaten by an i7 13650HX by the same percentage. I already expected this given that a Ryzen 9 chip is packed inside this slim laptop but do not take this negatively as these results are still among the fastest you can find on a laptop.
Gaming performance on the G14 is also a mixed bag, on one hand you can comfortably run a lot of triple A titles above 60 FPS on a 16:10 equivalent of 1080p gaming but if we run those games natively then a lot of these games would struggle unless you would opt to run it on lower visual fidelity or if the game can utilize super sampling technology such as DLSS or FSR. A very good example here is in Resident evil 4 wherein the frames are much better even with Ray Tracing turned on and visually the game still looks fantastic. Another good example is Witcher 3, while this game is a little bit dated already, you can still see that GPUs are still struggling to run this game on a good frame rate and with DLSS and Frame Gen, I was able to increase the game's average FPS by around 35% and again with Ray tracing on. Surprisingly if I compare this to the Strix G16 I reviewed last year, the difference is only small given that the Strix laptop only uses a 4060 GPU. Main reason for that is that the G14 is power limited both to the CPU and GPU given its form factor hence severely power throttling the GPU to 75W in most of the time. And if you don't mind the additional noise then you could always set the power profile to turbo for extra performance though unfortunately I was not able to test it out due to time constraints.

Temps & Battery Life

One of the weaker aspect of the G14 is in its thermal performance, we already saw that ASUS pretty much already limits the power but that does not stop it from reaching 92°C peak for the CPU and 85°C for the GPU when under load. And this is already with their updated tri-fan cooling, improved heat pipes and liquid metal application. Average temps is a bit more manageable ranging only from 89°C for the CPU and 81°C for the GPU.

Battery life is not bad but not great either given that lasted for almost 6 hours worth of YouTube playback with 50% sound and 50% brightness. This would not last you an entire work day but with PD charging, you can always charge it with a PD-enabled power bank. There are other reviews though wherein their G14 lasts longer and maybe there is just something wrong with my unit.

Verdict

And as for my take on this laptop, The ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 is actually one of the best laptop that I've tested and I would really love to upgrade my older G14 to this year's model. You get OLED display, premium build quality and latest generation of hardware on a thinner and lighter chassis. But if you are coming from the 2023 model, I would highly suggest to skip this one as you won't be getting much of a performance upgrade as internally it is pretty much the same. There are also other things that I can comment about, including the higher price tag, limited upgradeability and maybe better thermals. I'm kinda hoping ASUS would release a mid tier option maybe throw in a Ryzen 5 plus a 4060 similar to what I have with my older G14. With that said, I am giving this laptop the highest award that I can give which is the PC Market Top Pick Award!