Daily driving the Asus Zenbook Duo with Intel Core Ultra X9 has ruined me for normal laptops — 3 things I love about it (and 1 I don’t)

The year of the laptop has its first big launch, and it’s the Asus Zenbook Duo cooly saying “allow me to reintroduce myself” with a fresh redesign and a monster of an engine lying under the hood.

And for sure, in terms of the laptop itself, there’s a lot to write home about here. The Zenbook Duo has gone through quite a glow up with the ceraluminum finish that feels great to the touch, and the new hinge mechanism that folds into itself and creates a more seamless transition between the two panels (no more lip here).

Speaking of those panels, the two OLED displays here are simply mesmerizing — brighter than last generation and more vivid with color to boot. Throw in better battery distribution between the two parts for a more even weighting, a sturdier kickstand and a keyboard deck with improved ergonomics and you’re well onto something special here.

But the real big feature here is that Intel Core Ultra X9 388H powering the system. In terms of what it can do, think the power of Dodge Charger with the efficiency of a Toyota Prius. In our benchmarking, the CPU side of things is certainly strong — especially in multi-threaded tasks like loading multiple tabs or encoding software.

Then you get to that integrated GPU packing 12 Xe3 cores and the performance while gaming or working on graphics-intensive tasks is a shocking step up over last year. I’m talking Cyberpunk 2077 flowing at nearly 70 FPS in 1080p.

And Intel did say this was the performance of Arrow Lake meeting the power efficiency of Lunar Lake…I think they undersold that as the battery life takes a massive leap here up to 14 hours in our testing. I called this chip Team Blue’s fightback moment — turns out they took it seriously.

It’s just a shame about that price. Not the biggest surprise it’s gone up, Asus did warn about this days before CES 2026, but at $2,299 ($500 over the price of the top-spec model last year) that’s quite a sting to the wallet that I can only guess is due to the RAM price crisis fallout.

Asus Zenbook Duo (2026): Cheat Sheet

• Who is it for? The Zenbook Duo is for those who don’t want to compromise too much on their multi-monitor setup when they’re out and about.
• What does it cost? You can pick one up for $2,299/£2,099. Pre-orders go live some time in Q1.
• What do we like? The design overhaul is a real sharpening up of the looks and feels here — looking a whole lot better and ergonomically feeling better to get stuff done on. The upgraded OLED displays are a joy and Intel Core Ultra X9 388H is the key that unlocks some shocking performance and power efficiency gains from Team Blue.
• What don’t we like? Shame about the big price increase — $500 more for this than the Zenbook Duo launched last year.

Asus Zenbook Duo (2026): Specs

Asus Zenbook Duo (2026): The ups

So let’s get into it. This is not just an important next-gen device for Asus, but it’s a big moment for Intel too. And as you can guess by the score I’ve given this device, the Zenbook Duo nails it by finding just the right balance.

Intel’s got its swagger back

Now, to the headline here. Intel Core Ultra Series 3 (codenamed Panther Lake) is Team Blue’s comeback moment, and based on what I’ve seen testing the Zenbook Duo, they nailed it. However, it’s worth putting this into context, as it can be easy to get wrapped up in the hype of it all.

The Core Ultra X9 388H has been quickly marketed in comparison to AMD’s Gorgon Point chipsets, which unsurprisingly, it beats handily. But its closest kin, performance and price-wise, is actually that Ryzen AI Max monster of a chip you find in the Asus ROG Flow Z13 (codenamed Strix Halo).

Through that lens, you can see these chips trading blows — especially on CPU speeds. But it’s clear that AMD’s setup is a little stronger on a silicon level. While we don’t have Snapdragon X2 Elite laptops yet, I do have my benchmarks from the testing event last year and added the M5 MacBook Pro in here to show how Arm manages to take a lead on single- and multi-threaded tasks.

Then we turn our attention to the GPU. Arm chips don’t really stand up to what x86 silicon is capable of, and while compatibility is being worked on for gaming on Snapdragon, Intel and AMD still have the lead. And Core Ultra X9 388H is a step behind Strix Halo, but well ahead of AMD’s mid-range.

Plus there’s XeSS tech courtesy of those 12 Xe3 cores on the integrated GPU. That unlocks some impressive AI trickery, and while we’re waiting for the new drivers to provide multi-frame generation to supported titles, the current model tears through AAA games with ease.

So impressive gains, but AMD is still ahead. That’s only half the story, though. Where it really comes into its own is how it’s able to do all of this with power efficiency unlike anything I’ve seen in x86 laptops — making this dual-screen laptop stretch out much further by being much more economical with the wattage than a single-screen AMD system.

On the sliding scale between performance and power efficiency, the ROG Flow Z13’s Strix Halo chip showed what happens when you start to move that dial back towards efficiency, but it’s still a hungry chip for the battery juice. You can see that in the thermals, as the Flow reaches 95 degrees under some pressure, and the Zenbook Duo is a whole 10 degrees less.

Intel’s Core Ultra X9 388H makes the choice to further move that dial, compromise a little on raw performance, and make up for some of those gaming performance losses with AI. And to me daily-driving these laptops, that’s a better balance — still matching something like an RTX 4050 gaming laptop, while offering more worry-free stamina and just enough horsepower under the hood.

Redesign brings dual-screen to the mainstream(ish)

Over the past couple of years, the Asus Zenbook Duo has been one redesign away from being something that really takes the idea of a dual-screen laptop into the mainstream. And low and behold, it’s happened!

The new ceraluminum finish feels premium to the touch and is impressively finger-print resistant, but the main win here comes with that new hideaway hinge design.

On Zenbook Duos of old, the upper display would fold down behind the other screen, which made it a little wobbly and created an awkward-looking chin.

Now, the hinge folds back on itself and stows away to make the fully extended form a fully flat panel. Pair it with a sturdier hinge and you’ve got a far more seamless experience with much thinner bezels around that gorgeous display too (more on that later).

Of course, a dual screen laptop is always going to add extra thickness to the whole thing, but this is still easily stashed into a backpack.

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And finally, that keyboard deck feels a lot better under the fingers. The touchpad is larger and smoother with edge gestures to control brightness, volume and scrub videos, while the keys themselves have a much nicer tactile depth (and the Bluetooth connection lasts much longer on the battery).

Though it is worth noting that dual screen laptops are still quite an unknown thing in small towns like mine. I’m sure in big cities with more tech-savvy people you’d go unnoticed, but you will get some odd looks pulling this out in the local pub.

A feast for the eyes (and surprisingly, the ears)

Now onto the star (well…stars) of the show. Those OLED displays are bright, vibrant and commanding of your attention. Flowing at a buttery smooth 120Hz and touting solid color accuracy for getting the creative pro work done, while also having a nice immersive HDR-ey depth for gaming.

But low key, the most surprising upgrade for me has to be the speakers. In past generations, the speaker system was just…there. Perfectly fine for Windows dings and some casual watching of YouTube clips, but really light on bass.

And while these aren’t MacBook Pro levels of loud and bassy, Asus has made some significant strides forward here with some nicer levels of warmth alongside good definition of the highs and mids.

Asus Zenbook Duo (2026): The downs

Asus has fixed just about all of my previous gripes with the Zenbook Duo, but with that comes quite the price tag.

RAMageddon comes for us all

In my time talking to Intel, it seemed clear that most laptop makers were sitting on “around 9-12 months of inventory.” That made me pretty optimistic that maybe (at least for the next chunk of the year) laptops won’t be hit as significantly by the RAM price crisis.

However, Asus did say price increases were coming. I just didn’t expect the price rise to be so sharp. In the tech reviewing space, companies always want to put their best foot forward with the best spec. This spec is $500 more than last year’s top spec… Do you feel the $500 more?

That Intel Core Ultra X9 is a bit of a breakthrough for Team Blue and for Asus, but if you’re already on a model from last year, I’d want to make sure you don’t waste your money. The improvements here are great, but not worth paying the additional uplift in getting in.

As for everybody else reading this, that comes down to whether you’ve dragged out the life cycle of your laptop and are in the market for an upgrade. Looking for that balance between performance and power efficiency after years on the same notebook? This could be the dark horse choice for you.

Asus Zenbook Duo (2026): Verdict

I don’t want the Intel Core Ultra X9 388H to overshadow that this is a great dual-screen notebook that brings the idea of two panels on the go much more into the mainstream.

The Zenbook Duo has gone through a thoughtful glow up, given two glorious OLED panels and ergonomic uplifts that make it a thoroughbred of a productivity machine.

But Panther Lake is the key that brings all of this together nicely with a chip that provides both the horsepower and stamina to bring this back in line with what you’d expect from single-screen systems. Price aside, this is a belter.