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Surface Laptop vs. Surface Laptop 2: What's different?

Surface Laptop 2 offers a significant performance upgrade over its predecessor. Here we have a detailed specs comparison between Surface Laptop 2 versus the original Surface Laptop.

BY Evan Forrest November 10, 2023

Surface Laptop vs. Surface Laptop 2

The new Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 isn’t much different from the original Surface Laptop in terms of overall design and features. However, there is one improvement that makes the Surface Laptop 2 a clear successor to the device’s performance. With the latest 8th Generation Intel Quad Core processor, Microsoft claimed Surface Laptop 2 is 85 percent faster than the original Surface Laptop. Surface Laptop 2 now replaces the Graphite Gold option with the all-new matte Black that is much more appealing to most users and professionals.

If you wonder how the new Surface Laptop 2 compared to the original Surface Laptop, here we have a detailed spec comparison between both devices. It will help you to decide whether the Surface Laptop 2 is worth the upgrade or not.

Surface Laptop 1 vs Laptop 2: Specs Comparison

	Compare With Please enter device name or part of it Surface Laptop See at Amazon	Compare With Please enter device name or part of it Surface Laptop 2 See at Amazon
Key Features
What's new		Better performance It’s now 85 percent faster than the original Surface Laptop. New color Now available in Platinum, Burgundy, Cobalt Blue, and the new Matte Black. Better price $999 for quad-core Intel Core i5, 8GB of RAM, 128 GB SSD, and Windows 10 Home.
What's missing		Graphite Gold is no longer available Windows 10 Pro isn't available for consumers

Availability	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Released	2017	2018
Release Info	Introduced: May 2, 2017 Pre-ordered: May 2, 2017 Released: June 15, 2017	Introduced: October 2, 2018 Pre-ordered: October 2, 2018 Released: October 16 2018
Pricing	Platinum $799 - M3 \| 4GB \| 128GB $999 - i5 \| 4GB \| 128GB $1,299 - i5 \| 8GB \| 256GB Graphite Gold Burgundy Cobalt Blue $1,599 - i7 \| 8GB \| 256GB $2,199 - i7 \| 16GB \| 512GB $2,699 - i7 \| 16GB \| 1TB	Starting at 999$

Surface Laptop Price
	Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 (2022), 13.5" Touch Screen, Thin & Lightweight, Long Battery Life, Fast Intel i5 Processor for Multi-Tasking, 8GB RAM, 256GB Storage with Windows 11, Platinum By Microsoft $799.99 $999.00 20% OFF	See at Amazon
	Microsoft Surface Laptop Go 3 (2023) - 12.4" Touchscreen, Thin & Lightweight, Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD SSD, with Windows 11, Ice Blue Color Copilot By Microsoft $699.99 $799.99 13% OFF	See at Amazon
	Microsoft Surface Laptop 4 15” Touch-Screen – Intel Core i7 - 32GB - 1TB Solid State Drive - Matte Black By Microsoft $969.99	See at Amazon
Surface Laptop 2 Price
	Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 (Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM, 256GB) - Platinum (Renewed) By Microsoft $215.00 $304.99 30% OFF	See at Amazon
	Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 (Intel Core i7, 16GB RAM, 512GB) - Platinum (Renewed) By Microsoft $363.09 $434.00 16% OFF	See at Amazon
	Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 Tablet 13.5" (2256x1504) Touchscreen Laptop Intel Core i5-8350U 1.7GHz, 16GB DDR4 RAM, 256GB SSD, Backlit Keyboard, Wi-Fi, Camera, Silver, Windows 10 Pro (Renewed) By Microsoft $315.90 $331.00 5% OFF	See at Amazon

Display	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Size	13.5 Inches
Info	Display Resolution: 2256 x 1504 (3.4M Pixels) Display Density: 201 PPI PixelSense™ Display Aspect ratio: 3:2 Inking: designed together with Surface Pen Touch: 10 points multi-touch Corning® Gorilla® Glass 3 10nm Oleophobic Coating 100% sRGB color, individually calibrated

Exterior	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Size Comparison
Dimensions	12.13” x 8.79” x 0.39-0.57” (308.02 mm x 223.2 mm x 9.93 mm-14.47 mm) Width: 12.13” (308.02 mm) Depth: 8.79” (223.2 mm) Height: 0.39 - 0.57” (9.93 - 14.47 mm)
Weight	Intel Core i5 › 2.76 lbs (1.26 kg) Intel Core i7 › 2.83 lbs (1.28 kg)
Colors	Graphite Gold Platinum Burgundy Cobalt Blue	Black Platinum Burgundy Cobalt Blue
Keyboard and Trackpad	Keyboard: Full-size backlit keyboard with the soft-touch feel and full 1.5mm travel. Large palm rest with premium Alcantara® material for maximized typing comfort. Trackpad: Larger size 105 mm x 70 mm, glass. Supports up to Five-finger multitouch gesture.
Ports	1 x Full-size USB 3.0 1 x Surface Connect™ Supports charging and docking station. 1 x Mini DisplayPort 1 x Headset jack

Internal Specs	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Processor	7th Gen Intel® Core™ m3-7Y30 2 cores, 4 threads, 1.00 → 2.60 GHz, 4MB SmartCache, 4.5W 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-7300U 2 cores, 4 threads, 2.60 → 3.50 GHz, 3MB SmartCache, 15W 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7660U 2 cores, 4 threads, 2.50 → 4.00 GHz, 4MB SmartCache, 15W	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8250U 4 cores, 8 threads, 1.60 → 3.40 GHz, 6MB SmartCache, 15W 8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8350U 4 cores, 8 threads, 1.70 → 3.60 GHz, 6MB SmartCache, 15W 8th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-8650U 4 cores, 8 threads, 1.90 → 4.20 GHz, 8MB SmartCache, 15W
Integrated Graphics	7th Gen Intel® Core™ m3-7Y30 Intel® HD Graphics 615 24 Execution Units, 300 → 900 MHz 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-7300U Intel® HD Graphics 620 24 Execution Units, 300 → 1100 MHz 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7660U Intel® Iris® Plus Graphics 640 48 Execution Units with 64 MB eDRAM side cache, 300 → 1100 MHz	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8250U Intel® UHD Graphics 620 24 Execution Units, 300 → 1100 MHz 8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8350U Intel® UHD Graphics 620 24 Execution Units, 300 → 1100 MHz 8th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-8650U Intel® UHD Graphics 620 24 Execution Units, 300 → 1150 MHz
Memory	4GB 8GB 16GB 1866 MHz LPDDR3 RAM	8GB 16GB 1866 MHz LPDDR3 RAM
Storage	128 GB 256 GB 512 GB 1 TB SSD 1 TB of OneDrive cloud storage with 1-year subscription of Office 365	128 GB 256 GB 512 GB 1 TB Soldered BGA PCIe SSD

Connectivity	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Wi-Fi	Wi-Fi 5: IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac compatible.
Bluetooth	Bluetooth Wireless 4.0 technology	Bluetooth Wireless 4.1 technology

Battery	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Size	45.2 Wh
Battery Life	Up to 14.5 hours of typical device usage
Power Supply	44W proprietary power supply USB-A output: 5W Surface Connect output: 39W

Software	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
OS	Windows 10 S	For Consumer: Windows 10 Home For Commercial: Windows 10 Pro Free upgrade to Windows 11
Built-in Apps	1 year of Microsoft Office 365 personal	Microsoft Office 365 30-days trial

Camera & Audio	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Camera	Windows Hello face authentication camera (front-facing) 720p HD front-facing video camera
Audio	Dual microphones OmniSonic stereo speakers with Dolby® Audio™ Premium

Misc	Surface Laptop	Surface Laptop 2
Inking	Supports Surface Pen with 1024 levels of pressure	Supports Surface Pen 4096 levels of pressure Tilt sensing Best in class latency
Sensors	Ambient light sensor
Security	HW TPM 2.0 chip for enterprise security Enterprise-grade protection with Windows Hello face sign-in
In the box	Surface Laptop Power supply Quick Start Guide Safety and warranty documents	Surface Laptop 2 Power supply Quick Start Guide Safety and warranty documents
Warranty	One-year limited hardware warranty	One-year limited hardware warranty Commercial: Advanced Exchange warranty service with expedited device replacement
More	Supports Surface Dial Supports off-screen interaction only

Upon comparing the specifications, we can notice a few differences between the original Surface Laptop and the Microsoft Surface Laptop 2. To begin with, the Surface Laptop 2 now comes with Windows 10 Home instead of Windows 10 S.

Additionally, the base model of Surface Laptop 2 comes with a minimum of 8GB of RAM, which is twice the amount that the base model of the original Surface Laptop had, and it is offered at the same price as the 4GB model. However, unlike the original Surface Laptop, the Surface Laptop 2 does not include a free 1-year Office 365 personal subscription.

Processors (CPU) Comparison

The latest 8th generation Intel Quad Core processor provides a significant performance boost compared to its previous version. The 8th Gen Intel Core i5 offers a 10 percent improvement in single-core performance and a 70 percent increase in multi-core performance. Similarly, the 8th Gen Intel Core i7 delivers comparable performance for single-core and a 45 percent performance increase for multi-core tasks.

	Surface Laptop 2		Surface Laptop
Processor	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8250U	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-8650U	7th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-7200U	7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7660U

Launch Date	Q3'2017		Q1'2017
Base Frequency	1.80 GHz	2.10 GHz	2.70 GHz	2.50 GHz
Max Turbo Frequency	3.40 GHz	4.20 GHz	3.10 GHz	4.00 GHz
TDP	15 watt
Level 1 Cache	256 KB		128 KB
Level 2 Cache	1 MB		512 KB
Level 3 Cache	6 MB SmartCache	8 MB SmartCache	3 MB SmartCache	4 MB SmartCache
# of Cores	4		2
# of Threads	8		4
Bus Speed	4 GT/s OPI
Max Memory Support	32 GB
Max Memory Bandwidth	34.1 GB/s
GEEKBENCH 4
Single-Core Score	3,648	4,243	3,335	4,236
Multi-Core Score	11,157	12,450	6,510	8,489
More detail	See at Geekbench	See at Geekbench	See at Geekbench	See at Geekbench

Integrated Graphics (GPU) Comparison

The 8th Gen Intel Core i7 model of Surface Laptop 2 no longer has the Iris Plus Graphics that were present in the Intel Core i7 model of the original Surface Laptop. However, the Surface Laptop 2 still shows an improvement in overall graphics performance compared to its predecessor.

	Surface Laptop 2		Surface Laptop
Processor	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-8250U	8th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-8650U	7th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-7200U	7th Gen Intel® Core™ i5-7660U

Graphics	Intel® UHD Graphics 620		Intel® HD Graphics 620	Intel Iris™ Plus Graphics 640
Geekbench 4 OpenCL Compute Score	33,325	37,190	21,823	31,850
Base Frequency	300 MHz	300 MHz	300 MHz	300 MHz
Max Dynamic Frequency	1.10 GHz	1.15 GHz	1.00 GHz	1.10 GHz
eDRAM	N/A			64 MB
Graphics Max Memory	32 GB
Graphics 4K Support	Yes, at 60Hz
Graphics DirectX	12
Graphics OpenGL	4.4
# Display Supported	3

Conclusion

If you are looking for a high-performing laptop, the new Surface Laptop 2 is a great choice. It offers 85% faster performance compared to the original Surface Laptop. However, if you have a limited budget, the original Surface Laptop is still a great option, especially with its current discounted price and features.

Here are the most frequently requested comparisons for Surface Laptop: