Dell Pro 15 Essential 0WR3Y 2025, Core i7-1355U, 16GB, 512GB SSD, Carbon Black

The Dell Pro 15 Essential is a basic business laptop with a decent CPU and RAM combo but a dim, washed-out screen. It's fine for office work if you find it at the low end of the price range. Skip it if you care about display quality or battery life.

The Core i7-1355U is a 10-core chip that can boost to 5GHz, and in our database it lands at the 43rd percentile for CPUs. That's fine for office work, browser tabs, and light multitasking. The 16GB of DDR5 helps keep things snappy, though the RAM itself sits at the 55th percentile, so it's not exactly bleeding edge. The integrated Iris Xe graphics are dead average at the 50th percentile, which means video playback and basic tasks are smooth, but don't expect to game on this thing. The 512GB SSD is on the smaller side at the 37th percentile, and the 54Wh battery won't win any endurance awards either.

Stacked against the competition, this Dell is a tough sell. The Apple MacBook Pro M4 Pro absolutely crushes it in screen quality, battery life, and raw performance, though it costs way more. The Lenovo Legion 5i and ASUS ROG Flow Z13 are gaming machines that trade portability for power, and the HP OMEN Transcend 14 is a better all-rounder if you want a nicer display. The MSI Raider is in a different league entirely. The Dell's only real advantage is price, and even that depends on which listing you find.

Pricing is all over the place. In the US, listings range from USD 923 to USD 1,610 across five vendors, which is a massive spread for the same machine. Staples has the best deal at the low end, and that's where this laptop makes sense. At CAD 1,272 to CAD 2,060 in Canada, the same story applies. Pay more than the low end and you're getting fleeced.

The Dell Pro 15 Essential is a straightforward work laptop. It packs a 13th Gen Core i7, 16GB of DDR5, and a 512GB SSD into a 1.9kg chassis. Nothing flashy, just the basics done competently.

But the basics here are a mixed bag. The 120Hz IPS panel sounds nice until you see the 250 nits brightness and 45% NTSC color coverage. This is a machine built for spreadsheets and email, not Netflix marathons or photo editing.

Skip this if you need a bright, color-accurate screen for design work or photo editing. The 250 nits and 45% NTSC coverage will drive you nuts. Also skip it if you want to game, since the integrated graphics are one of the weakest we've seen for that use case. And if you're buying for yourself rather than a company, there are better value picks out there.

This is a fleet laptop. If you're an IT manager buying 50 of these for an office, the Windows 11 Pro license, Ethernet port, and no-nonsense design make sense. For an individual buyer, it's harder to justify. The screen is dim, the storage is tight, and there are better options at the same price point.