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Microsoft Surface Pro 11 Review: Worth Upgrading To?

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Surface Pro 11 Frontside with keyboard

We tested the Surface Pro 11 in a range of apps, games and also in daily use and found many meaningful improvements over the Surface Pro 10, but we also experienced problems that any other Windows laptop for a fifth of the price wouldn’t have. In this review, we hope to help make clear whether you should invest in the Surface Pro 11 or rather skip this generation.

Featuring the Snapdragon X Elite processor, 32GB of RAM and up to a 1tb SSD, the Surface Pro 11 promises great efficiency and good performance. The integrated NPU also enables the Microsoft Copilot+ features, which have yet to show much use. Naturally, the Surface has a beautiful OLED touchscreen with great pen support. To be very clear; the Surface Pro 11 is one of, if not the best high-end office device out at the moment.

But for some users, the Surface Pro 11 might just be near unusable. Let’s get into it.

Context: Why the push into Windows on ARM? 

In 2020, Microsoft released the Surface Pro X right before the introduction of Apple’s groundbreaking M1 MacBooks. Apple’s M1 series marked the first truly successful push of the ARM architecture onto PCs.  

The Surface Pro X saw very limited interest, as it used the very unpolished Windows on ARM operating system and had limited app support. This meant that almost all applications had to be emulated, simultaneously throwing efficiency and performance out the window. But this was an early sign for Microsoft’s interest in pushing ARM as an architecture for future Windows devices.  

Microsoft Surface Pro

The Surface Pro 11 impresses with its great battery life, premium OLED display, amazing speakers and great build. It's great for light office tasks and entertainment, but falls short in professional workloads due to compatibility issues. The pricing is also not competitive with other Windows devices and new MacBooks.

Pros:
  • Great OLED display
  • Long battery-life
  • Top-of-the-line speakers
  • Good keyboard and pen support
  • Above average webcam
Cons:
  • Too expensive
  • Compatibility issues
  • Inefficiency due to emulation
  • Underwhelming perfomance
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In June of 2024, Microsoft tried again, this time with the far more refined Surface Pro 11. This device benefits from the gradual increase in support for Windows on ARM, as well as having a far more powerful processor than its predecessor (the Surface Pro X). But can the Windows on ARM champion challenge Apple’s own refined M4 MacBooks? From our testing, it appears that the gap has definitely closed significantly.  

Hardware and performance: 

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips have finally found their way into Windows laptops again. Featuring either the Snapdragon X Plus or X Elite chips, up to 32 GB of DDR5 RAM and a removable m.2 SSD, Microsoft claims that the Surface Pro 11 will have record-breaking battery life and flagship performance to go with it. Let’s see how their claims hold up in testing. 

We have the top specced Snapdragon X Elite model with 32 GB of RAM for testing, so these results won’t apply to the X Plus edition of the Surface.  

In Geekbench, we spot a CPU single-core score of 2290 and 13182 in multi-core. The GPU scores an impressive 19444 points in Geekbench as well. These scores trail behind the new Intel Core Ultra 7 258v, by ~15% in CPU single core and 10% in GPU scores respectively. We also tested the Qualcomm Adreno iGPU in 3D-Mark, which can hopefully give us an idea of how this laptop performs in games. In Solar-Bay, we see a score of 10153, which is again lower than the Core Ultra 7 258v’s 15000, and the Adreno iGPU gets 16000 points in 3D-Mark Wildlife and 5924 points in Wild-Life Extreme respectively.  

microsoft surface pro 11 geekbench
microsoft surface pro 11 3d mark

The MacBook Air M3 reaches scores of ~3000 in Geekbench CPU single-core and 30000 in Geekbench GPU testing, for reference.  

Generally, these scores are quite good for a modern laptop but aren’t groundbreaking by any means. It should, in theory, be more than enough to handle demanding tasks like video editing and light gaming. And here’s the catch:  

As of writing this Article, there is still no way to natively run many programs on the Surface 11. Premiere Pro for example runs on an emulation layer, which naturally hurts the performance and power efficiency of the Snapdragon chip. Plenty of games refuse to boot, or become stuttery and run worse due to lack of support. The battery life during gaming on this device is commendable, but games like Civilisations VI, Fortnite and League of Legends simply refused to launch. We also found some strange stuttering issues in Counter Strike 2, probably due to the emulation layer. We would not recommend this laptop for gaming. 

Surface Pro 11 Counter-Strike 2

Design and build:  

To be absolutely clear, the Surface Pro 11 is one of the best built Windows devices you can get your hands on. The design is elegant, hardware is improved over previous Surface generations and the overall feeling of the device is excellent. The Pro 11 uses the tried and tested Surface design formula. In fact, we could hardly find any visual differences between the Surface Pro 10 and the newer model, save a few more colour options. Coming in at 11.3’ by 8.2’, the Surface is on the small side for a laptop. 

Surface Pro 11 Front

On the front side, there is a screen with relatively thick bezels. The webcam and an IR scanner can be found on the centre top of the frontside, alongside a dual microphone setup. On the left side, we find 2 USB 4.0 type C ports which can be used for charging, as well as a dedicated Surface Connect port which is meant for charging and docking.

The surface has very smooth edges and is generally pleasant to hold with the keyboard detached. Two speakers are visible on the front side, each on the very edge of the display sides.  

Surface Pro 11 Ports Left

The backside features the classic surface stand and a simple Microsoft logo. However, despite its simple design, Microsoft doesn’t fail to communicate that the Pro 11 is a premium product. The entire back is coated with anodized aluminium and comes in either platinum, black, sapphire or dune colourways. Underneath the kickstand, there is a removable metal plate that reveals the user replaceable M.2 SSD.  

Surface Pro 11 Backside with keyboard

How good is the battery life?  

Perhaps the biggest improvement over the Surface Pro 10 is the far superior battery life. Featuring the a slightly larger 53 watt-hour battery over the previous 46.5 watt-hour one and a far more efficient chipset, it comes to nobody’s surprise that the Surface Pro 11 passes our battery test with flying colours. 

In continuous YouTube video playback at 720p with peak brightness, the Surface Pro 11 reaches an impressive 11.4 hours of runtime. This score devastates last year’s Surface Pro 10 Business, which only managed 4.75 hours in the same test.  

microsoft surface pro 11 battery life

The Acer Swift 14 AI with a traditional Intel chip managed 12 hours in the same testing environment, although it has a marginally larger battery as well. This indicates that Microsoft’s decision to push Snapdragon chips into the Surface 11 instead of the usual Intel ones seems to have paid off in terms of power efficiency.  

Compatibility

Currently, Adobe has already released ARM 64 versions of their Photoshop and Lightroom softwares. We are quite relieved to find that Photoshop runs smoothly and without issues, even when editing large RAW images. Drawing with the Surface Pen in Photoshop also has almost no lag.

Surface Pro 11 Ableton compatibility issues

However, not every company is able to crunch out a native ARM version of their Windows application so soon. Take the popular music production app Ableton Live 12, for example. Upon trying to launch the app, all we get is a message stating that our processor isn’t supported by the software. Great. Other production apps like FL Studio also currently lack support on the Surface.

If your workflow involves any software that isn’t supported, we advise you to stay clear of ARM systems for now- it wouldn’t surprise us if more compatibility issues surface during extended use.

Brilliant display and speakers:  

The Surface Pro has a display befitting its price; At 13 inches, 2880x1920p and with a pixel density of 267 PPI, this display is sure to bless your eyes with crystal clear fidelity.  You can choose between an OLED or LCD display option, depending on your budget. The display gets up to 120 Hz of dynamic refresh rate, ensuring that animations are fluid without wasting too much battery with the refresh rate always set at 120Hz.  

Our model has the OLED display variant, which does exactly what you would expect an OLED panel to do. Blacks are deep, whites are bright and video content looks great. We noticed that the display has a slight yellow tint compared to other OLED displays like the one on the Acer Swift 14 AI, but this comes from the inbuilt adaptive-colour setting which can be switched off if you prefer a whiter image.  

Surface Pro 11 Display comparison ipad pro

(Left: Surface Pro 11; Right: Ipad Pro M4)
 
Overall display brightness leaves a bit to be desired. At a peak of 600 nits in SDR and 900 nits in HDR, the screen can appear a little dim when used under direct sunlight or otherwise bright environments. Still, this is an excellent display by all means. 

Speakers:  

While they might not seem like much on the surface, the Surface Pro 11 has extremely impressive speakers; They have Dolby Atmos support and can even rival a MacBook Pro or iPad pro in quality and volume. We noticed that the bass is especially audible in lower volumes but seems to taper off when cranking the volume beyond 60%, at which point the speakers are loud enough anyways.

Combined with the OLED display and a 3:2 aspect ratio, the Surface is perfect for viewing video content.  

Software features:  


Microsoft launched the Surface with big claims about exclusive software features. The key selling point, of course, was AI. New Windows devices were to launch with Copilot+, an AI assistant that includes a suite of useful AI software like live captions in videos, camera tracking and a ChatGPT based assistant. The headline feature was to be called Windows recall, but it was ironically recalled due to privacy concerns from users.  

So far, there isn’t much that can be said about these features. They can be useful occasionally, but we would not recommend buying this laptop purely for these AI features. 


Surface Slim Pen:  

Surface Pro 11 Multitasking

This might be a controversial opinion, but in our testing, we found the Surface Slim Pen 2 to be a downgrade in ergonomics compared to the original Surface Pen.

Sure, wireless charging and haptic feedback are substantial improvements, but the more rectangular shape of the slim pen feels strange to use for us. The haptic feedback also hardly feels like natural writing on paper, which is what Microsoft wants us to believe it emulates. Overall, it’s a pretty disappointing experience; we would recommend sticking to the original Surface pen if you own one already.  

See our article about the best Surface pen apps for a more in depth review and recommendations for things you can do with the Surface Pen.

Surface flex keyboard and Trackpad:  

 
Microsoft launched the Surface Flex keyboard together with the Surface Pro 11. This keyboard comes thicker, better and also sells for a $400 premium, although street prices now sit around $300. The typing experience definitely feels more refined and satisfying than it’s predecessor. There is also an optional included wirelessly charging pen dock for the Surface Slim Pen. The trackpad is slightly bigger and has some nice haptic feedback on clicks.  

Surface Pro 11 Flex Keyboard from above

Maybe the more interesting new feature is the integrated battery in the keyboard, which allows it to function while disconnected over Bluetooth for up to 41 hours. This function can definitely be useful when you’re limited on space, for example during a flight. We’re not sure if this gimmick alone justifies the near $200 markup over the standard keyboard cover.

This keyboard is also backwards compatible with other Surface Pros released after the Surface Pro 8.  
 

Webcam:  
 

Surface Pro 11 Webcam Test


The webcam on the Surface Pro 11 is great. There is a comfortably wide viewing angle with support for AI face tracking during videocalls. The pictures it produces are clean, sharp and have a natural tone.

The Surface Pro 11: are the sacrifices worth the gain?  

We think that the Surface Pro 11 is a great laptop with one big weakness. Obviously, the incredible improvement in battery life alone makes this Surface stand out compared to the rest of the lineup. However, Microsoft’s decision to pack a Snapdragon X Elite chip into this device also comes at the cost of software compatibility and performance loss in emulation.

Battery life is also not significantly better than laptops with current generation Intel chips and MacBooks, which perform better and can be found at a lower price. 

Surface Pro 11 comparison ipad pro

On one hand, the Surface Pro 11 has a great display, speakers and comes with support for a good keyboard. This windows tablet is great for office work, browsing and media consumption. The drawing experience is as good as usual, and having support for all older Surface accessories is nice. For office users and photographers who want THE high end windows tablet of this generation, the Surface Pro 11 might be just the pick.

On the other hand, $1500 is way too high of a price tag for a device that lacks support for some professional work and many games. This Surface is great when it works and equally frustrating when it doesn’t .

So, if you want a premium Office tablet, go for it. But if you’re budget conscious and don’t explicitly need a Windows device with pen support, you can also get a cheaper Windows laptop for work plus a mid-range Android tablet for entertainment.


7.5

Surface Pro 11 Frontside with keyboard
Review: The Surface Pro 11 impresses with its great battery life, premium OLED display, amazing speakers and great build. It's great for light office tasks and entertainment, but falls short in professional workloads due to compatibility issues. The pricing is also not competitive with other Windows devices and new MacBooks.
Positive
  • Great OLED display
  • Long battery-life
  • Top-of-the-line speakers
  • Good keyboard and pen support
  • Above average webcam
Negative
  • Too expensive
  • Compatibility issues
  • Inefficiency due to emulation
  • Underwhelming perfomance
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