Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) Review
The best sub-£800 Chromebook
Verdict
The Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) is a marvellous Chromebook. With some sleek design and a decent port selection, it offers a solid all-round package for the price. It offers some nippy performance for a Chromebook, as well as some excellent battery life, too. The only limiting factor is its high price tag, and for creatives, a Windows laptop will be better.
Pros
- Sleek design
- Powerful for a Chromebook
- Responsive display
Cons
- Expensive
- Skittish trackpad
Key Features
- 14-inch FHD touchscreen display:Features a 14-inch IPS display, complete with a Full HD resolution, that’s also a touchscreen.
- Speedy processor:Powered by an 12th Gen Intel Core i5 processor which offers excellent relative performance with 10 cores and 12 threads.
- Convertible design:It weighs 1.4kg, which is on the heavier side for a laptop this size, but should be fine for those on the go.
Availability
- UKRRP: £799
- USARRP: $729
Introduction
The Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) has a lot to live up to for a modest Chromebook.
Acer’s Spin models of Chromebooks have regularly been featured on our list of the best Chromebooks money can buy today, and for good reason, too. In the past, they’ve offered a sleek design with the benefits of tablet-style functionality, as well as good displays, solid performance and excellent battery life.
Will all this continue into the latest iteration that I’ve got here for testing? Well, let’s find out.
Design and Keyboard
- Stylish looks
- Decent port selection
- Tactile keyboard, but skittish trackpad
Right from the off, the Spin 714 (2023) doesn’t offer much in the way of changes compared to some of the older Spin models. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though, as it offers a sleek and classy look to it that makes it look a bit more expensive than the £799 price tag would suggest. In addition, the extra thin bezels around the 14-inch display help along its modern and rather premium looks
A weight of 1.4kg makes this wonderfully light for a 14-inch laptop, and the Spin 714 is going to be a fantastic choice for those on the go, especially with its slim construction making it easy to chuck into a bag along with all the other things you need.
As much as the Spin 714 (2023)’s slender frame helps it offer modern looks, it means its port selection isn’t the best it could be. You get a pair of Thunderbolt 4-capable USB-C ports, one of which is used for charging, as well as a singular USB-A, an HDMI out and a headphone jack. It’s a nice blend of connectivity, and the Thunderbolt powers are appreciated, although having an SD card slot, or a second USB-A wouldn’t have gone amiss.
The port selection could do with a little bit of work, but the same is definitely not true with the Spin 714 (2023)’s keyboard. It provides a compact 65% layout and keys that offer some excellent tactility over a decent length of travel. Typing on it to write articles for a couple of weeks was solid, and I’ve got no qualms about it. On that note, while I’m grateful there is some white backlighting for after-dark working, it isn’t the most even. The trackpad offers some good real estate for your fingers, although feels a little skittish, being a Gorilla Glass trackpad and all.
Display and Sound
- FHD resolution provides decent detail
- Marvellous colours with solid brightness
- Responsive touchscreen
On some Chromebooks and more affordable laptops, it’s on the front of the display where things are skimped out on. Compared to last year’s smaller 13-inch model, the Spin 714 has actually skimped out on its resolution, opting for a Full HD panel, as opposed to a QHD one.
With this in mind though, the images presented such as during a session of the latest Grand Tour special and some rewatching of James May: Our Man In Italy on Prime Video, the Spin 714 provided some decent detail, with some superb colours afforded by it being an IPS display. Acer’s quoted 100% coverage of the sRGB colour space means it will display all mainstream colours for day-to-day working, too.
A quoted brightness of 300 nits hits our target for laptops and means the Spin 714 (2023) provides generally vibrant images. The addition of a 16:10 aspect ratio is a step up from some other Chromebooks, with more vertical real estate aiding in making the display of the Spin 714 display a solid pairing with more modern workloads.
As a 2-in-1 device, this panel is also a touchscreen and offers a responsive experience when in tablet mode, too. The addition of a stylus in the box is handy, and the one provided also offers an accurate experience.
As much as the display is excellent, the same isn’t entirely true for the Spin 714 (2023)’s speakers. The fact they’re upwards firing is handy for ensuring that sound isn’t muffled on softer surfaces such as a bed. However, they lack a lot in terms of their low-end, lending audio to become a little tinny and thin. This became apparent in my day-to-day testing when listening to music on Spotify.
Performance
- Powerful processor for a ChromeOS device
- Solid RAM and storage combo
- ChromeOS can be a bit limiting
The Spin 714 (2023) offered up some solid performance for the money here, too. It’s powered by a 12th gen Intel Core i5-1235U, bringing with it a total of 10 cores and 12 threads, as well as a boost clock of up to 4.4GHz. This is perhaps overkill for a Chromebook, given that the OS it’s running on is designed more for casual computing than intensive workloads.
The addition of such a powerful processor for the task at hand allowed the Spin 714 to offer some high-riding scores in the likes of Geekbench 5 where this particular Chromebook offers performance that’s comparable more to mid-range Windows-based laptops than other Chromebooks. It’s a marked improvement also over last year’s Spin 713, with its 10th gen processor.
It performed especially well in day-to-day tasks of web browsing and playing some music on Spotify, too. The 8GB of RAM does come in handy when having multiple windows open in Google Chrome, and the Spin 714 wasn’t noticeably sluggish at all during my time with it. What’s more, a 512GB SSD provides oodles of storage space and is also a major improvement over the smaller and stingier eMMC storage that I’ve experienced in Chromebooks past.
If you’re wanting to spend on a convertible laptop such as this, the Spin 714 is a great performer – but it’s also limited by the fact it runs ChromeOS. There are plenty of apps available in the Google Play Store, but a Windows laptop will offer a greater degree of flexibility when it comes to software downloads with similar performance levels.
Battery Life
- Lasted for 11 hours and 6 minutes in our battery test
- Capable of lasting for 1-2 working days
The Spin 714 also proved to offer some excellent battery life in my testing, too. In running a video loop test and dialling the brightness down to halfway, this particular Chromebook lasted for just over 11 hours.
This makes it suitable to use for a working day without needing to reach for the charger, and that was the case with my time with the Spin 714. It also continues the trend Acer has set with its Chromebooks offering solid battery life, especially these Spin models, which have, in a general sense, become some of my favourites that I’ve tested.
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Should you buy it?
You want a powerful Chromebook
If it’s an especially nippy ChromeOS-based experience you’re after, the Spin 714 (2023) offers it in spades with its 10-core and 12-thread Intel Core i5-1235U processor.
You want the powers of Windows
The Spin 714 (2023) is a fantastic Chromebook, but the fact it runs ChromeOS may be limiting for some users.
Final Thoughts
I’ve always found the idea of high-end Chromebooks difficult to understand. Fundamentally, you’re well on your way to spending nearly four figures in this instance for a device that generally is a fantastic laptop that’s inherently limited by its light operating system.
With this in mind, however, the Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) is a brilliant Chromebook. It provides some sleek looks, with some great build quality, as well as a comfortable keyboard and decent port selection. Its display may not be as good as the Spin 713 (2022), but Acer still provides this year’s option with a solid Full HD panel that’s also a responsive touchscreen. What’s more, it provides a lot of power for such a light OS, blitzing day-to-day tasks, with no real signs of slowdown. The battery life on offer here is also exemplary.
What this really comes down to is your preparedness for spending £800 or so on a Chromebook. It’s an awful lot of money for what it is, but the Spin 714 (2023) is more than worth the money for those who may not need the functionality of Windows but don’t want to compromise on the performance of the laptop itself. Still not sold? Consider some cheaper, or pricier, picks in our best Chromebooks guide.
How we test
Every laptop we review goes through a series of uniform checks designed to gauge key things including build quality, performance, screen quality and battery life.
These include formal synthetic benchmarks and scripted tests, plus a series of real-world checks, such as how well it runs popular apps.
We used as our main laptop for at least a week.
Tested the performance via both benchmark tests and real-world use.
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FAQs
Yes, the Acer Chromebook Spin 714 comes with a stylus to work with the touchscreen.
The Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) does come with a touchscreen. All devices that sport a 360-hinge feature a touchscreen to take advantage of tablet-like capabilities and utilise styli.
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Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
