We just benchmarked the first 5 Googlebooks — and Intel should be worried

We’ve just benchmarked the first five Googlebooks. While my team and I will still need to use these laptops to assess their real-world performance, our lab results give us a clear picture of what they can do.

In case you didn’t know, Googlebooks are designed to give Android users seamless interoperability between their phones and laptops, just as iPhone owners have with MacBooks. These laptops aren’t just Chromebooks by another name. They all run the brand-new Googlebook OS, which combines aspects of Android and ChromeOS. And since these are Google laptops, Gemini is built right in and delivers unique features you won’t find elsewhere.

The Googlebooks we benchmarked are from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo. Each has 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. Acer, Asus, and Lenovo’s machines run on an Intel Core Ultra 5 325 Panther Lake, while Dell and HP’s notebooks use a Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite chip. These are the starting configurations, though you can upgrade memory and storage at checkout for some of them.

Now that you know what Googlebooks are about and the specs of the laptops we benchmarked, it’s time to look at the numbers — both against each other and against some of their competitors. Let’s dive in!

Quick links

• Acer Googlebook 14: $899 @ Best Buy
• Dell XPS Googlebook: $999 @ Best Buy
• Lenovo Googlebook 15: $1,099 @ Best Buy
• Asus Googlebook 14: $1,299 @ Best Buy
• HP Googlebook 14: $1,299 @ Best Buy

Geekbench 6.7

On Geekbench 6, which tests general CPU performance, the Acer, Asus, and Lenovo Googlebooks generally scored similarly in the single- and multi-core tests. All of these laptops run on the same Panther Lake processor.

The XPS Googlebook 14 and HP Googlebook 14 had comparable single-core performance to those three laptops, but both notebooks scored much higher on multi-core performance. These results clearly show that Qualcomm’s chip performs better on Google’s new platform, with about 50% better overall performance.

Google’s machines held their own against competitors like the Dell XPS 13, which also has the same Panther Lake chip as the Acer, Asus, and Lenovo Googlebooks. Single-core results are roughly the same, but the XPS 13’s multi-core results weren’t close.

The same is true for the Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14 Gen 10, which packs a MediaTek Kompanio U910 chip, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. This last one also proves that a “high-end” Chromebook can’t match the power of a Googlebook.

Of course, the 13- and 15-inch MacBook Air models with their M5 chips crush every laptop in both Geekbench tests for raw performance. That said, Dell and HP’s Googlebooks aren’t too far behind, which shows the capability of the Snapdragon X Elite.

CrossMark

Next, let’s see how Googlebooks did in the CrossMark benchmark, which evaluates performance across three main scenarios: Productivity (document and spreadsheet editing, web browsing), Creativity (photo editing, photo organization, video editing), and Responsiveness (application launching and file opening).

This benchmark generates scores for each category, along with an overall aggregate score that weights productivity and creativity more heavily than responsiveness. Higher scores indicate superior performance.

The results here are interesting. The Intel-driven Acer, Asus, and Lenovo laptops scored better for productivity and responsiveness, while the Qualcomm-powered Dell and HP did better for creativity. Their overall scores are generally the same, however. The Dell XPS 13 and MacBook Air scored far lower in every single CrossMark test.

3DMark Wild Life Extreme

On the 3DMark Wild Life Extreme GPU performance benchmark, Googlebooks with Snapdragon X Elite outperformed their Intel-powered cousins, both in overall scores and frames per second. That said, even the XPS Googlebook, which did the best in our testing, still couldn’t hit 60 frames per second.

To get the obvious out of the way — the MacBook Air M5 is the best machine for gaming. And that’s not just based on numbers, as games like Resident Evil 4 run like a dream every time I’ve tested it on MacBooks. As for the XPS 13 and Chromebook Plus 14 Gen, I wouldn’t bother trying to play games on either.

I’ll need to play various Android games on Googlebooks to see what the real-world experience is like, but I expect they’ll run noticeably better on the Snapdragon machines. As with the Geekbench benchmark, performance is generally 50% better overall.

Battery life

Lastly, let’s look at battery life, which Google claims is generally around 14 hours for Googlebooks. Google details how it determines battery life for its laptops here. But in short, the device screen brightness is kept at a minimum of 100 nits, with Dark theme and Battery Saver mode enabled. Wi-Fi is connected and used for browsing data.

Our Googlebook battery test is the same as the one we've used on Chromebooks in the past, which is much more demanding than Google's testing. Unlike our custom in-house macOS and Windows battery test, this test uses the live internet and is powered by a Chrome extension. It browses through a list of 30 live websites every 30 seconds until the battery drains. We set the screen to 150 nits of brightness and turn off Bluetooth and location services with the device's default theme.

Admittedly, Google's testing gives Googlebooks an advantage, which accounts for their 14-hour claims. However, our testing is vastly different, as I've detailed above.

So how did Googlebooks perform under these conditions? As you can see above, we didn’t see anything close to the advertised 14 to 16 hours of battery life. The Asus Googlebook 14 barely managed to reach 6 and a half hours. The big winner here is the HP Googlebook 14, with its nearly 12-hour battery life. As you can see, all the other competitors I’m comparing Googlebooks to lasted far longer on our usual battery test.

There are a few caveats to keep in mind. We usually run three battery tests, but so far we’ve only run one. Though unlikely, we could see different results once we’ve averaged the three. We also ran the battery tests with the display at 120Hz, which is on by default. It’s very possible that battery life will also improve when we run our tests with the display set to 60Hz.

Lastly, all the Googlebooks we tested have OLED panels, which tend to be a greater drain on battery life. Although Google has mandated certain hardware standards, such as touch displays and metal chassis, manufacturers are not required to include OLED panels in Googlebooks. That being the case, I suspect we could see even better endurance on models with LCD screens.

Outlook

Again, I’ll need more time with Googlebooks, but based on our benchmark results, they’re impressive yet not mind-blowing. Battery life is my biggest concern, since we now live in a world where laptops can last over 20 hours, as we’ve seen with MacBooks and certain Snapdragon X notebooks. Qualcomm’s chip also seems better suited to Googlebooks, as the Intel models can’t match that level of performance.

If you’re an Android user looking for a laptop that works seamlessly with your phone, Googlebooks could be a great fit. If you decide to take the plunge, I recommend the Snapdragon X Elite-powered Dell XPS Googlebook 14 and HP Googlebook 14, which start at $999 and $1,149, respectively.

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