Microsoft unveils the Surface Laptop 3 in 13- and 15in flavours

After months of speculation, it’s finally been confirmed: not only will the Surface Laptop 3 come in a new, larger 15in form factor, but for the first time, you’re now able to buy one that’s powered by an AMD chip.

What’s more, it’s ta-ra, Alcantara: the fussy fabric has had its chips, and has been replaced by a more conventional aluminium covering as you get in nearly every other laptop in the world. As somebody who’s had to cover an obnoxious, unmovable curry stain on his, I can only assure you that this is a very good move indeed.

The top of the line 15in Surface Laptop 3 features a custom-made AMD Ryzen ‘Surface edition’ processor, which Panos Panay described as having “the fastest graphics performance of any laptop in its class.”

Despite its new screen size, it feels light, Panay says. “This is a product that feels almost weightless relative to its size”, adding that the trackpad size has grown by 20% and the keys have just 1.3mm of travel.

Microsoft has also finally joined 2019 by adding USB Type-C ports into the mix, and it also has a new fast-charging system, which can top up the battery to 80% in less than an hour. Perhaps most excitingly, Microsoft says this is the first Surface Laptop that will let you repair and upgrade it yourself, with removable hard drives – that’s quite a big improvement, considering that iFixIt gave the last two generations of Surface Laptop a repairability score of 1/10.

The 13.5in version hasn’t been abandoned, and this version sticks with Intel: 10th-generation quad-core Ice Lake processors, to be precise. Panay claims that these are two times faster than the Surface Laptop 2, and three times more powerful than the MacBook Air.

Here are the key specs, as stated by Microsoft: