Acer Swift 5 (2022) review: A solid all-rounder

Note: This review was first published on 29 November 2022.

Much welcomed updates

The Swift 5 is Acer’s fanciest ultraportable notebook that purports to blend style, performance, and portability. The newest edition gets Intel’s latest Alder Lake processors, a new display, and some design tweaks and other updates. And on paper, it looks like the ultraportable notebook to have. Let’s investigate deeper and see if it’s true.

The TL;DR version:



An ultraportable notebook with very solid qualities and few flaws. It's also priced reasonably. Should be high on your shortlist if you are looking to buy a new notebook.

One of the big updates is the display. The last generation Swift 5 had an anachronistic Full-HD display so this new version fixes that by having a more contemporary resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels. It’s also protected by antimicrobial Corning Gorilla Glass.

The display size remains the same at 14 inches but the bezels are thinner (particularly the bottom bezel) which gives it a screen-to-body ratio of 92.22%. And although it isn’t an OLED display, Acer claims it supports 100% of the sRGB colour space and, overall, the display looks sharp and punchy. My only complaints would be that it’s glossy and prone to glare and reflections, plus its refresh rate is limited to 60Hz. 

Aesthetically, the new Swift 5 looks a lot like its predecessor. I won’t say it’s the sleekest-looking notebook but I like the copper accents on the sides. What’s more important is that it feels well made and, at 1.2kg heavy and 14.95mm thick, is relatively light and thin.

Acer also improved the port selection. The last model only had a single USB-C Thunderbolt 4 port, this new model has two and they both support Thunderbolt 4. It also has two USB-A ports supporting USB 3.2 Gen 2, an HDMI 2.1 port, and a 3.5mm audio combo jack. The only thing missing is a memory card reader.

The other big change is under the proverbial hood. Powering this new model is Intel’s 12th Gen Alder Lake Core processor. Acer currently offers two options, one with the Core i5-1240P and the other with the Core i7-1260P. The one I’m testing has the latter and is paired with 16GB of LPDDR5 memory and a 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD.

The keyboard is mostly nice to use. It could do with a little more travel but the overall key feel is positive and there’s a well-judged amount of tactility. The layout is mostly conventional but Acer slightly tweaked the configuration of the arrow keys. The left and arrow keys are now full-sized and they removed the Pg Up and Pg Dn keys. I prefer the older arrangement. Also, the fingerprint scanner has been integrated into the power button. 

The trackpad is a little small by today’s standards but feels accurate and responsive enough. What’s interesting about it is that it’s made out of OceanGlass, which is recycled sea/ocean plastic. There’s also a copper accent around it which matches the legends on the keycaps. Speaking of the keycaps, there are quite prone to smudges.

Other things worth mentioning? The notebook supports the latest Wi-Fi 6E standard, and the 1080p webcam is surprisingly decent, but the speakers are unimpressive. There’s also a surprising and annoying amount of bloatware. The notebook came preloaded with Norton Security Ultra, Firefox, Spotify, and shortcuts to Agoda and Forge of Empires. There will probably be some readers who will find these useful, but I’d bet most would rather their notebooks come with a clean installation of Windows 11.

Performance analysis

To recap, the version of the Swift 5 I’m testing has a Core i7-1260P processor with 16GB of LPDDR5 memory and a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD. Here’s how it stacks up against other ultraportable notebooks that I tested recently.

An interesting thing about the Swift 5 is its cooling system. Most notebooks of this size will typically have a single fan, but Acer employs two and they are connected by twin heat pipes. According to Acer, this improves thermal efficiency by over 65%. What's remarkable about the two fans is that they remain relatively quiet even when taxed. Furthermore, the notebook stays cool even when it was running games.

The Swift 5’s CPU performance was good, particularly in multi-core workloads. It recorded the highest numbers we’ve yet seen for a Core i7-1260P processor on both Cinebench’s and Geekbench’s multi-core workload – outperforming even the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Carbon which is powered by a Ryzen 7 5800U processor. Its scores on PCMark 10 and WebXPRT were class-leading too. Graphics performance was very decent even if it wasn’t quite as impressive as its CPU numbers. It was just as fast as Lenovo’s Yoga 9i. 

Battery life

Note: Battery tests were conducted using PCMark 10's battery benchmark with the display set to 100% brightness.

Battery life was quite good too because despite having a smaller 56Wh battery, it lasted almost just as long as the ASUS ZenBook 14 OLED and Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Carbon which have larger 75Wh and 61Wh batteries respectively. Its power consumption, particularly on the Modern Office workload, was impressively low, which explains how it managed to last this long despite the small battery. Battery life on the more intensive gaming workload, however, was poor. Again, this can be explained by its power consumption figure, which was the highest.

The best Swift 5 yet

By improving the display and port selection, Acer has made the Swift 5 a very complete notebook. Sure one could nitpick the display and say that it isn’t OLED, but it’s sharp and vibrant enough that I think most buyers won’t care. The port selection is now one of the best. It has two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, two USB-A ports, and even a full-size HDMI 2.1 port. And on the wireless side of things, it supports the newer Wi-Fi 6E standard. 

CPU performance was class-leading and it runs quieter and cooler than its rivals. Battery life was also good despite the smaller capacity battery. Apart from its somewhat bland design and slightly small trackpad, there’s little that is wrong with this notebook.

And at S$2,398, it’s also reasonably priced. One could make the case for the ASUS ZenBook 14 UX3402 and say that at S$1,899 it’s even more affordable. However, the ASUS doesn’t perform quite as well, runs noisier and warmer, and has a smaller 512GB SSD. It’s also chunkier and heavier. The ZenBook is great if you are on a tight budget, but the Swift 5's premium is well justified. Furthermore, Acer offers a more affordable variant that comes with a Core i5-1240P processor but still with 16GB of memory and 1TB SSD for S$2,198.

Ultimately, however, both the Acer and ASUS are excellent notebooks that cater to slightly different users. That said, this is easily the best Swift 5 that Acer has made yet and one of the most bang for buck ultraportable notebooks you can buy.

You can find  the Acer Swift 5 on the Acer Online Store, Acer Flagship Store on Lazada or the Acer Official Store on Shopee.

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