HP Stream Latest Stream 14" HD 2023, Core i5-1135G7, 4GB, 64GB eMMC, Silver

The HP Stream 14 has a Celeron N4120 that ranks at the 0th percentile for CPU performance, 4GB of RAM at the 1st percentile, and 64GB of eMMC storage at the 4th percentile. It's light at 1.47kg and customers rate it 4.2/5, but only because expectations are low. At USD 229 it's a passable basic machine. At USD 679 it's a trap.

Let's be blunt: the Celeron N4120 is one of the weakest CPUs we've tracked. It's a 4-core, 4-thread chip with a 1.1GHz base clock and 2.6GHz burst. That puts it dead last in our CPU rankings, the 0th percentile. For context, the top competitors in this category are running Apple M-series chips and modern Intel Core i5s. This isn't a gap, it's a canyon.

The 4GB of DDR4 RAM is the 1st percentile. Windows 11 in S mode helps a bit by limiting what you can install, but even basic multitasking gets tight fast. Open a few browser tabs and a document, and you'll feel the swap file grinding against that 64GB eMMC drive. And that storage is the 4th percentile. 64GB sounds like a number from 2015, and it fills up shockingly fast. Windows alone eats a big chunk. The integrated Intel UHD Graphics 600 is fine for video playback, but gaming scores 9.6 out of 100, which is about as close to zero as a laptop can get without being a typewriter.

Against the Apple MacBook Pro MVVK2LL/A, this isn't even a fair fight. The MacBook Pro has a CPU that's roughly in a different universe, and its screen quality is night and day versus the 220-nit TN panel here. The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon 21KC00A8US is also in a completely different class, with better build quality, a brighter display, and actual storage. The Samsung Galaxy Book4 Edge NP960XMA-KB1US brings an ARM chip with far better efficiency and a much nicer screen. Even the ASUS Vivobook X1407QA-V14.X116512, which is also a budget machine, typically ships with more RAM and an SSD. The HP Stream 14's only real advantage is weight and price at the low end. If you need a laptop that does actual work, every one of those competitors beats it. If you need something cheap and light for basic tasks, the Stream 14 is fine, but only at the bottom of its price range.

Pricing is all over the place. US listings range from USD 229 to USD 679, a USD 450 spread for the same machine. At USD 229, this is a defensible purchase for a kid's first laptop or a travel beater. At USD 679, it's a bad joke. You can get a used ThinkPad or a new Chromebook with better specs for less than the high end of that range. The Office 365 subscription adds some real value, about USD 70 worth of software if you'd buy it anyway. But the hardware underneath is so limited that the software bundle feels like putting nice tires on a go-kart. If you're shopping, don't pay more than the low end of that spread. Anything above USD 300 and you should be looking elsewhere.

The HP Stream 14 is a budget laptop that gets one thing right: it's cheap and light. At 1.47kg and with a 14-inch screen, it's a compact machine that sits in the 77th percentile for portability in our database. But the specs tell a rougher story. The Intel Celeron N4120 lands at the 0th percentile for CPU performance, 4GB of RAM sits at the 1st percentile, and the 64GB eMMC storage is at the 4th percentile. This is a machine built for a very narrow job: light web browsing, document editing, and not much else.

Customer ratings sit at 4.2 out of 5 across 201 reviews, which lands in the 93rd percentile for social proof. That's a weird gap between specs and satisfaction. The people who like this laptop really like it, mostly because they knew what they were buying. The people who hate it expected a real computer. We'll dig into both sides.

If you plan to do anything beyond light web browsing and document editing, skip this. The Celeron N4120 at the 0th percentile for CPU performance will frustrate you the moment you open more than a few tabs. The 4GB of RAM means multitasking is painful. The 64GB eMMC drive will fill up before you know it, and the 1366x768 TN panel at 220 nits is one of the worst screens we've tracked, sitting at the 1st percentile. If you need to run anything heavier than a browser, edit photos, or even store a reasonable amount of files locally, this laptop will fight you every step of the way. And if you're seeing it priced anywhere near USD 679, run.

The HP Stream 14 is a laptop for people who know exactly what they're getting into. At USD 229, it's a lightweight machine for email, web browsing, and document editing. The 4.2/5 customer rating suggests that people who buy it with those expectations are mostly happy. But the 0th percentile CPU, 1st percentile RAM, and 4th percentile storage mean this thing has a very short runway. Windows 11 in S mode helps keep it usable, but the moment you switch to full Windows and start installing apps, the 64GB drive will choke. If you need a cheap, light machine for basic tasks and you can find it at the low end of the price range, it works. If you need anything more, spend your money elsewhere.