Dell XPS 13 has had our top spot on laptops for, well, a few years now, but there’s always been this other model kind of hanging around in its shadow. The Asus ZenBook 13 300-series. It’s not as flawless as the XPS 13, sure, but ZenBook 13 keeps showing up with strong performance and practical portability too. The only real hitch is that work-like, serious look it has.
Now the new Asus ZenBook 13 UX333 pretty much fixes that. It’s slimmer, more compact, and it’s wearing that pretty blue-and-gold design Asus first showed on pricier machines, like the ZenBook 3.
Even inside, the vibe is impressive. You get a Core i5-8265U chip, 8GB of RAM, and a 256GB SSD, all for $850. So, is this actually the last laptop that’s going to make Dell’s XPS 13 feel like it’s losing value?
Luxurious trick-down
As mentioned, the ZenBook 13 UX333 lands in this unique blue and gold color setup that debuted on the Asus ZenBook 3, which was a flagship line Asus launched back in 2017. It definitely stands out from the usual sea of laptops, but it’s not screaming about it. You could, honestly, be a little reserved and still pull it off in a meeting. There is also a darker Slate Gray model out there, though the more common Royal Blue one is what we’d pick.
That said, this ZenBook 13 also looks like a very current machine. It’s thin, around 0.55 inches thick, and it tips the scales at roughly 2.7 pounds total. The display uses thin bezels, something some earlier models were oddly short on, and the body is made from durable metal that feels genuinely luxurious when you pick it up. We also like that “concentric” circle engraved on the lid. It’s subtle, but it adds texture to what would otherwise be just a flat matte sheet of metal, kinda smooth and plain.
The Asus ZenBook 13 sort of stands out, but it’s not flashy or anything. Kinda just quietly there, you know?
So, does it beat the XPS 13? Not really, no. Dell’s laptops still feel and look better, mainly because the inside uses soft carbon fiber textile vibes and details. But the brand new Zenbook 13 is way closer than the older model, and it even pulls ahead of some cheaper crowd favorites like the Huawei MateBook X.
The ports situation isn’t bad either. You get two USB-A sockets, one 2.0 and one 3.1, plus one USB-C 3.1. For video there’s HDMI, and for sound you’ve got a single combo jack for headphones/microphone. There aren’t tons of choices, but honestly for a 13-inch laptop it fits the idea.
For wireless stuff, it includes 802.11ac and Bluetooth 5.0. Pretty standard, but it works.
Now here’s the one connectivity piece that’s noticeably missing: Thunderbolt 3. Is that a bummer? Sure, a little. But considering the Zenbook 13’s more modest price, it’s acceptable. Even pricey laptops sometimes ignore it, and budget machines almost never bother.
And honestly, the keyboard makes a few weird choices.
Let’s begin with the good news. Asus’ ZenBook 13 UX333FA doesn’t kill keyboard travel just to stay slim. Typing feels really nice, and it’s easily on par with the Dell XPS 13. Compared to that, Apple’s MacBook Air feels like a plain block of wood, no joke.
That’s the first impression, but then comes the catch. Asus decided to squeeze (almost) full-sized arrow keys into the bottom-right corner. Which means the right Shift and Control keys have to shrink. It looked clever on paper, but in real use it just wasn’t that pleasant.
It got weirder. The power button is on the keyboard, right next to the Delete key and above Backspace. We spent the first three hours putting the ZenBook 13 UX333FA to sleep . then turning it back on. Eventually we learned the layout and stopped doing that thing, but still it feels like a strange decision, and it can cause trouble if you often bounce between other computers with more conventional layouts.
The trackpad works well enough, but it’s cramped. The Dell XPS 13, Apple’s MacBook Air, Huawei’s MateBook X, the Razer Blade Stealth, and a few others have more space, you know, more breathing room. The ZenBook, however, has a party trick. Tapping in the upper-right corner wakes the virtual keyboard, so you get a chance to catch up with your accountant. It’s handy for flipping through numbers, but we’ve triggered it by accident several times, so honestly we’re not sure it’s worth the hassle .
ASUS ZenBook 13 Ultra-Slim Laptop 13.3” FHD WideView, 8th-Gen Intel Core i7-8565U Processor, 8GB LPDDR3, 512GB PCIe SSD, Backlit KB, NumberPad, Military-Grade, Windows 10 – UX333FA-AB77 Royal Blue: Buy it now
ASUS ZenBook UX333FA-DH51 Laptop (Windows 10, Intel Core i5-8265u 1.6GHz, 13.3″ LCD Screen, Storage: 256 GB, RAM: 8 GB) Dark Royal Blue: Buy it now
This screen is pretty amazing, kind of wild really.
Laptop displays have come a long way over the last few years but we honestly didn’t think we’d see the Asus ZenBook 13’s screen going this hard.
A contrast ratio is one of those numbers that matters. It lands at 1350:1, which is excellent for a laptop, and it also beats anything we’ve ran into since the Asus ZenBook 13 UX331UA. And that includes the new Apple MacBook Air, Lenovo Yoga C930, Surface Pro 6, even the ThinkPad X1 Extreme with a 4K display.
But okay, that’s not the whole story. The machine also delivers an average color mistake of just 1.68. Here lower is better. The ZenBook 13 UX333FA isn’t sitting at the very top; for comparison the MacBook Air averages around 0.98, sure. Still, it’s pretty good, and you get 77 percent of the Adobe RGB color range, which kind of matches the top crowd like the MacBook Air and Dell XPS 13.
Visually it looks great. You get deep inky shadows and vivid colors, no weird washed vibe.
All this basically means one thing; The screen looks great, it provides deep, inky shadows with vibrant colors. Even if 1080p isn’t exactly what it was back in 2018, it still feels like the best bet for a 13-inch laptop. It’s sharp enough to look crisp without the battery hit you’d normally see with 4K.
Now, there is a weakness though, and it’s brightness. The max luminance of 265 nits is below all the competitors, but the panel is still glossy. Glare can become a thing, and you may end up swapping your view angle or screen position to deal with it. We’ve noticed something similar on earlier more budget Zenbook setups, though most of them have an anti-glare coating, so their low brightness doesn’t feel as noticeable.
It’s fast
ASUS has basically packed the newest Intel hardware into the ZenBook 13 UX333FA , kinda straightforward. The main thing here is Intel’s Core i5-8265U. It’s a quad-core chip, rated up to 3.9GHz, and on paper it looks really capable. In practice, the results are pretty consistently strong, and honestly pretty much what you’d expect from this class of CPU.
Let’s dig in a sec. On Geekbench 4, the single core score hit 4,129 and the multi core score landed at 13,903 . These figures aren’t wildly different from the prior Core i5-8250U , but they still feel right in the ball park for what you get from a 13 inch laptop .
The Handbrake test is where things look a bit more favorable. Using Handbrake software, it transcodes a 4K trailer from h.264 to h.265 , and the ZenBook 13 UX333FA finishes it in four minutes and 20 seconds. That’s around 10 seconds quicker than the XPS 13 with the Core i5-8250U, and about 30 seconds ahead of the Acer Aspire 5.
Also, there’s good news with the storage. You get an NVMe solid-state drive, and in a sequential test it pulls off read speeds of 1,094 megabytes per second, and write speeds of 963 MB/s. It won’t win any records, but it’s solid , and close to the high end of what we usually see in the more affordable price tier. A lot of laptops around $800, including the earlier Zenbook 13 UX331, still ship with SATA-based drives. Those setups often have trouble pushing much past 500 MB/s on reads or writes.
Now, the graphics story doesn’t really budge. The new Intel processors don’t magically change the GPU situation. You’re still dealing with Intel UHD 620 graphics, so performance stays in that familiar lane where older 3D titles are about the best match , even when you dial settings down.
If anything, the ZenBook 13 looks slightly less nimble than you’d assume with UHD 620 graphics. Even the Razer Blade Stealth hasn’t managed to pull much real gaming strength into a 13-inch chassis anyway.
This laptop is pretty well set up to take advantage of it, honestly. You might be surprised by how long you can keep the charger out of the picture.
Even the Basemark benchmark, the most taxing battery loop we put it through, ran for nearly five hours on the Asus ZenBook 13 UX333FA. For softer routines, like binge watching 1080p videos, the runtime stretches out by another 13 hours. That is a solid outcome, it even puts pressure on the Apple MacBook Air, and the Dell XPS 13 too, even if the latter is right on the edge.
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Tech Reviewer & Product Analyst
Định Bia has spent over 10 years testing consumer electronics with a focus on smart technology. He work as a product advisor at Biareview where he helped customers find the right devices for their needs. He personally tests every product featured on this site using a consistent evaluation framework covering quality, durability, and value. All reviews are based on experience, not influenced by the manufacturer.