Microsoft Surface 10.8" 3 Silver

The Microsoft Surface 3 is a lightweight Windows tablet with a nice screen, but its Intel Atom chip and 4GB of RAM make it feel ancient. It scores just 29 out of 100 overall, with productivity at a rough 21. At the USD 188 refurb price it's a niche buy for ultra-light tasks. At USD 350, hard pass.

The Atom x7-Z8700 is a four-core, four-thread chip that tops out at 2.40 GHz. In our database, it sits in the 35th percentile for CPU performance. That's firmly in the 'falls behind' category. The integrated Intel HD Graphics land at the 36th percentile, so you can forget anything beyond basic video playback and 2D apps. The 64GB eMMC storage is a weak spot too, scoring at the 30th percentile, and eMMC is dramatically slower than even budget SATA SSDs. 4GB of RAM compounds the problem on Windows, because the OS alone wants a good chunk of that before you open anything. Basic web browsing, email, and Office-style typing are doable if you're patient. Having more than a handful of browser tabs open will make you regret your choices. The 10.8-inch 1920x1280 display is actually the nicest part of the package. It's crisp and has a 3:2 aspect ratio that's great for reading and documents, though its screen score only hits the 29th percentile overall.

Compared to the current tablet field, the Surface 3 is playing a very different game. The Apple iPad Air M3 absolutely embarrasses it in CPU, GPU, storage speed, and screen quality. The Lenovo Yoga Tab Plus and Xiaomi Pad 7 are similarly miles ahead on performance and modern connectivity. The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra is a monster by comparison, though it also costs way more. Even the Vekfulpc T60 Pro, which is not exactly a household name, runs circles around the Atom chip in the Surface 3. The Surface 3 only makes sense as a cheap Windows curiosity or a very light secondary device. If you need a tablet for anything remotely modern, spend your money elsewhere.

Price matters a lot here. Refurbished units on Newegg range from USD 188 to USD 350, and that spread is huge for what you get. At USD 188, this is a cheap way to get a Windows machine for email, light writing, or a kid's first laptop-like device. At USD 350, it's a genuinely bad buy when you could get a much newer budget Windows laptop or a solid Android tablet for the same money. The top-rated listing at the USD 188 end is the one to look for if you insist on this device. Going above that erases any value story this tablet has left.

The Microsoft Surface 3 is a 10.8-inch Windows tablet from 2015 that's still floating around refurbished. It runs on an Intel Atom x7-Z8700, has 4GB of RAM, and 64GB of eMMC storage. That's a very modest setup by today's standards, even for light work. The 1920x1280 screen is actually pretty sharp for a device this old, and the 620g weight is fine for a backpack or a work bag. But the Atom chip was slow when it launched, and a decade hasn't done it any favors. If you're buying this, you're buying it for very specific, very light tasks and nothing beyond that.

Skip this if you need to run more than a browser and a word processor at the same time. Skip it if you want to install modern apps or games. Skip it if you need all-day battery life. And definitely skip it if you're paying more than USD 200. A cheap Chromebook or Android tablet will almost certainly serve you better.

The Surface 3 is a relic. It was never fast, and time hasn't improved it. But if you need a genuinely cheap Windows tablet for note-taking, light web use, or as a dumb terminal for remote desktop, the low end of the refurb price range makes it almost justifiable. The screen is good, the build is fine, and Windows flexibility is real. The performance ceiling is the problem. Buy it only if you accept that it will frustrate you the moment you try to do anything ambitious.