Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 13.5" 2019, Core i5-1035G7, 8GB, 128GB SSD, Platinum

The Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 is a lightweight 13.5 inch Windows laptop with a beautiful touchscreen and premium build, but its 10th Gen Core i5, 8GB RAM, and 128GB SSD are showing their age. It's fine for basic tasks like browsing and writing, but storage and performance are serious limitations. Only worth buying if you find it very cheap and need a portable secondary machine.

The Core i5-1035G7 is a quad-core chip from Intel's Ice Lake family. It's fine for web browsing, email, and document work, but it's not going to impress anyone in 2025. Our database puts it in the 18th percentile for CPU performance among all laptops. That means most machines you can buy today, even cheap ones, will outrun it. The 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM doesn't help. It's enough for a handful of browser tabs and a couple of light apps, but photo editing or heavy multitasking will choke it fast.

The Intel Iris Plus integrated graphics are about what you'd expect. GPU performance lands in the 42nd percentile, which sounds okay until you remember this is a laptop with a gaming score of 5.7 out of 100. Casual games and video streaming are fine. Anything 3D or modern will struggle. The 128GB SSD is the real bottleneck. It's fast for what it is, but it fills up almost immediately. Windows 10 alone eats a big chunk of that space, and you'll be juggling files before you know it.

Stacked against the Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 7, the Surface Laptop 3 wins on looks and weight but loses on practically everything else. The ThinkPad offers more ports, better upgrade options, and typically more RAM and storage at a similar used price. The Apple MacBook Pro Core i7 2.6GHz from a similar era will outrun the Surface in CPU tasks and has a better track record for longevity, though you'll pay more for it. The HP OmniBook X Flip and ASUS Zenbook UX3405CA are newer machines with far better performance and battery life, but they cost significantly more. The Samsung Galaxy Book4 Edge is in another league entirely for performance and display quality, though it's also much pricier. If you're cross-shopping, the Surface Laptop 3 only wins if you find it very cheap and care mostly about the design.

At around $350 USD used, the Surface Laptop 3 is cheap for a machine that still looks this good. But cheap doesn't always mean good value. The 128GB SSD and 8GB RAM are hard limits you can't easily upgrade, and the processor is already struggling with modern Windows updates. For the same money you can often find a used Lenovo ThinkPad with more storage and RAM, or a newer budget laptop with a weaker build but better internals. The Surface Laptop 3 makes sense only if you prioritize portability and screen quality over everything else, and you're okay living with a very small storage drive.

The Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 sits in that weird middle ground between premium ultrabook and aging budget option. It launched as a flagship Windows machine, but in our database it now shows up around $350 USD used, which tells you a lot about where it lands in 2025. The 13.5 inch touchscreen, aluminum build, and Alcantara keyboard deck still look sharp, but the internals are showing their age. You get a 10th Gen Intel Core i5-1035G7, 8GB of RAM, and a 128GB SSD. That's a tight fit for Windows 10, let alone anything heavier.

People searching for a Surface Laptop 3 usually want to know if it's still worth buying for school, light office work, or as a cheap portable. The short answer is maybe, if you find one cheap and know exactly what you're getting into. The screen is still lovely, the keyboard is comfortable, and the whole thing weighs just 1.27kg. But the storage is tiny, the port selection is sparse, and the processor is firmly in the past.

We pulled the scores and the picture is mixed. Compactness is a genuine strength, landing in the 92nd percentile. Reliability holds up well too. But CPU performance sits in the 18th percentile, RAM in the 14th, and storage in the 8th. This is a laptop that feels premium on the outside and budget on the inside.

Skip the Surface Laptop 3 if you need to store a lot of files locally, run demanding software, or do any kind of gaming. The 128GB SSD is a dealbreaker for anyone with a large photo library, video projects, or a big game collection. Creative professionals who edit photos or videos should look elsewhere, as the 8GB RAM and aging CPU will make those tasks painful. If you need reliable performance for work every day, a used Lenovo ThinkPad or a newer budget ultrabook will serve you much better. This laptop is for light users only, and even then, only at a low price.

Should you buy a Surface Laptop 3 in 2025? Only if you find one for a low price, you need something light for basic tasks, and you can live with 128GB of storage. It's a beautiful laptop with a great screen and keyboard, but the internals are a constant reminder that this is a five-year-old machine. For students or office workers who just need a portable machine for writing, browsing, and streaming, it can work. For anyone who needs to store files locally, run demanding apps, or play games, this is not the laptop for you.

We'd recommend it as a secondary machine or a very light-use primary laptop. If you can stretch your budget even a little, a used ThinkPad or a newer budget ultrabook will serve you better in the long run. The Surface Laptop 3 is a pretty face with an aging heart.