Despite this solid build quality, the Pixelbook Go is featherlight. It weighs 2.3 pounds and measures 0.5 by 8.1 by 12.2 inches (HWD), extremely competitive dimensions for an ultraportable with a 13.3-inch display. Compare them with those of the MacBook Air (0.6 by 8.4 by 12 inches, 2.75 pounds) and the Pixelbook (0.4 by 11.4 by 8.7 inches, 2.46 pounds). First off, we’ll just say that it’s a damn shame that the Pixelbook Pen is excluded in the price of the Pixelbook, as it’s arguably crucial to the experience. However, we’re not about the say that the stylus isn’t worth the price of admission, because it 100% is worth it – if you can spare it.

This is a gorgeous laptop. It’s slim, light, very nicely put together, and it has a big, bright 13.3in screen. With a comfy keyboard and large touchpad it’s a great all-round machine. And it houses, not an Intel Celeron as so many of its Chromebook brethren do, but a full-fat Intel Core i5 CPU. This is a proper laptop, in other words, albeit one that runs ChromeOS. What you’ll likely notice the most is the screen’s aspect ratio: 16:9 on the Go and 3:2 on the Pixelbook. We tend to prefer the boxier shape of the Pixelbook, allowing for a taller view of your content. Arif Bacchus / Digital TrendsThe integrated Intel HD 615 graphics chip in the Pixelbook powered its smooth visuals on the WebGL Aquarium test, where it rendered 2,000 fish at a rate of 60 frames per second. That's better than the 48 fps from the Samsung Chromebook Pro (Intel HD Graphics 615) and the 50 fps from the Asus Chromebook Flip C302CA (Intel HD Graphics 515). The ultraportable-notebook average is a higher 269 fps. Lasting for more than 16 hours on our battery rundown test, the Pixelbook Go is an excellent choice for a laptop to accompany you on your next flight, or even just a day of meetings with no chance to visit a power outlet. One huge benefit of Chromebooks is that they normally all come with squeaky-clean installs of Chrome OS, and naturally the Google Pixelbook Go is the cleanest of them all. However, this also means that this laptop doesn’t really offer anything truly unique in terms of software or features that isn't already offered by other Chromebooks. Overall, with its different design and cheap build quality, the Pixelbook will remain the go-to for high-end Chromebooks, at least for now until the Pixelbook 2 arrives, while the Pixelbook Go seems better value in its cheaper configurations.

The Pixelbook Go not only sports a keyboard with comfortably spaced keys, but also top-firing speakers. Sure, they’re a bit small and, as a result, somewhat tinny in the high-end, but these speakers beat the vast majority of laptops of this size, normally found with bottom-firing speakers. The uncommon 3:2 12.3-inch display carries a native resolution of 2400 x 1600 pixels to be slightly less dense than the display of the Surface Pro tablet. Even so, images are still very sharp with contrast and brightness values comparable to the Microsoft tablet. The overlying glass layer is thin enough that colors appear vibrant and close to the surface. We can notice no graininess issues on the glossy display that can often occur on matte panels. The Pixelbook Go's scores were average for its category of high-end Chromebooks, which includes models like the Acer Chromebook 714 and Lenovo Yoga Chromebook C630 in addition to steeds from Google's own stable. Less-expensive Chromebooks perform far worse—around 200 on WebXPRT and around 100 on CrXPRT. Since our wider suite of benchmarking software doesn't work on Chrome OS, I evaluated the Pixelbook Go's performance on a casual basis during a few days of use. The system went through a firmware update when I first turned it on, taking just a few minutes as opposed to the hour or more that major Windows and macOS updates can last. Once updated, the Pixelbook Go proved exceptionally snappy at starting up (13 seconds from pressing the power button to the appearance of the login screen) and installing apps. However, one huge flaw in the Pixelbook Pen is that it doesn’t attach to the laptop in any way, not even via magnets, like the Surface Pro. This oversight makes it that much easier to lose this stylus that cost you so much money. Plus, it runs on AAAA batteries, whereas a rechargeable solution would’ve been much more worthy of the price tag.

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Powered by an 8th Gen Intel® Core™ (m3/i5/i7) processor for faster browsing, gaming, and seamless 4K output to an external monitor. Compare m3, i5, and i7 processors Emitting up to 421 nits, the Pixelbook offers tremendous brightness, which enables strong colors at up to 75 degrees to the left and right. That beats the 290-nit category average, the 284-nit Yoga 920, the 376-nit Samsung Chromebook Pro and the 292-nit Asus Chromebook Flip C302CA. The iPad Pro (555 nits) shines even brighter.