English
We put the Microsoft Surface Laptop 13-inch through our rigorous DXOMARK Laptop test suite to measure its performance in sound, camera and display. In this review, we will break down how it fared in a variety of tests and several common use cases.
Overview
Scoring
Use-case and feature subscores included in the calculations of the global score
Microsoft Surface Laptop 13-inch
Pros
- Dynamic range is generally wide in all tested conditions.
- Level of details is fairly high in bright light conditions.
- Color rendering is generally pleasant.
Cons
- Level of contrast is sometimes too high.
- Noise is visible in most tested conditions.
- Target exposure is somtimes low on challenging HDR conditions.
Test summary
About DXOMARK Laptop tests: For scoring and analysis in our laptop reviews, DXOMARK engineers perform a variety of objective tests and undertake more than 20 hours of perceptual evaluations under controlled lab conditions and real-life scenarios. (For more details about the Laptop protocol, click here.)
The following section gathers key elements of our exhaustive tests and analyses performed in DXOMARK laboratories. Detailed performance evaluations under the form of reports are available upon request. Do not hesitate to contact us.
Camera
Microsoft Surface Laptop 13-inch
136
DXOMARK evaluates the image quality of the built in camera during video calls, whether with a single person or with multiple people, in a variety of lighting conditions. Our camera evaluation particularly assesses the ability of the built-in camera to clearly render human faces during video calls. Other intrinsic camera quality aspects are also evaluated, like color reproduction, texture and noise, as well as artefacts.
In our comprehensive evaluation of laptop cameras, the Microsoft Surface Laptop 13″ stands out with exceptional performance, marking a significant milestone for Windows laptops.
For the first time, a Windows effectively challenges the long lead of Apple in terms of camera quality, delivering top-tier results across various scenarios.
One of the key aspects delivered by the Microsoft Surface Laptop 13’’ is its impressively wide dynamic range in all tested lighting conditions, capturing both highlights and shadows with balance.
In bright environments, the camera is able to retain a high level of detail, while color rendering remains consistently pleasant. In more complex scenarios such as HDR scenes, the Microsoft Surface Laptop 13’’ preserves both illuminated backgrounds and shadowed foregrounds, offering an image quality that rivals to of the Macbook Pro 14’’ (M4, 2024).
Where devices get close is particularly in standard video conferencing situations where face exposure and skin tones appear well-balanced and natural. In more challenging scenarios however, such as strong backlit scenes or in presence of multiple subjects, the camera struggles to maintain a proper face exposure on deeper skin tones without compromising contrast and brightness.
Despite embarking a modest camera sensor, the Microsoft Surface Laptop 13’’ achieves a remarkable detail score of 135, coming very close to the score of the Macbook Pro 14’’ (M4, 2024). This is mainly due to its effort in tuning and effective combination of the advanced ISP as well as AI-driven optimizations.
The following chart presents the camera subscores for the video call use case: