With the release of the Ryzen AI chip, we’re seeing a slew of new laptops equipped with the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, and the ASUS Zenbook S16 (UM5606W) is no exception. But it comes with a new chassis, bigger screen, ultra-thin body, and promised “next-gen computing” with “unmatched AI capabilities.”
So when I was offered the chance to play with one for a few weeks, I jumped at the chance. So how did it go in a real world test?
First Impressions of the Asus Zenbook S16
The box of the Zenbox is plain brown cardboard with barely anything on it. It’s dull, understated and boring… until you open it up and extract a second box containing the laptop itself. Sleek, Grey and with a striped pattern matching the CeraluminiumTM (more on that below) exterior shell of the laptop, it looks good. More to the point, it is a very understated and clean design – something I very much love in my tech devices.
Opening this second box, one finds the device itself. Measuring 353.6 x 243mm, my first impression was that it looked good… with a sleek, metallic and catchy outer shell, impressive 1.1cm thickness, and super light-weight 1.5kgs (considering this is a 16 inch laptop) – thanks to ASUS utilizing CNC machining on its C part, and an integrated molding process for its all-metal design.
The Zenbook S16 boasts a 40% larger touchpad than previous models, and matches the display aspect, making navigating without a mouse more comfortable and easier. Smart Gestures – swiping along the edges of the trackpad can be enabled for additional functionality – for example, the left edge allows you to control volume, while the right edge controls the brightness of the display. When playing media, you can also swipe the top to control the timeline and jump forward or backwards. Despite the large size of the trackpad, I didn’t find myself accidentally triggering it like I usually do on laptops, thanks to great placement.
The keyboard mechanism is very quiet and soft. While I am used to a more tactile mechanical keyboard on my gaming desktop, I didn’t feel it was a jarring change to the Zenbook S16. And it came in very handy when doing some late night typing next to a sleeping partner.
Overall, the Zenbook S16 feels durable and portable, handy for those who take laptops with them daily.
But it also felt TOO slim and light weight to really handle any serious processing power… that is, until I started using it.
Ceraluminium
As previously mentioned, the Zenbook S16 is all metal. ASUS have named the material used in the construction ‘Ceraluminium.’ Researching this, I believe similar products are used in aeronautics. The device I received was coloured Zumaia Gray, but there is also a Scandinavian White option. Both are impressive, clean, and eye-catching.
The use of Ceraluminium also means the laptop is MIL-STD 810H certified, which, while it doesn’t necessarily mean that it will never get damaged, will protect it against unexpected knocks and bumps – helpful for use on public transport, or by your school aged children.
The coating itself is completely matte (with the exception of a few decorative lines on the cover) which means it does not pick up fingerprints easily. The result is that this continues to look brand new for a LONG period of use, and isn’t easy to scratch like some glossy offerings by competing products.
Inside the Box
Inside the box(es), you get the Asus Zenbook S16, a power cable and the warranty and other documentation. The product I was sent also included the ASUS Pen 2.0, a pressure sensitive Stylus with a number of different tip options, but I’m not sure if this is included by default. That said, I will still include some comments about this further in the review.
Getting started
The ASUS Zenbook S16 ships with Windows 11. It’s not my favourite version of windows (I’m disappointed Windows 10 is being phased out this year) but it was super quick and easy to set up, with updates being installed the moment I connected it to my home Wi-fi.
Following the updates, which didn’t take long – but still offered the option of playing simple online games during the process – it was a simple matter of logging into your Microsoft account, setting up your preferences, and clicking ‘skip’ on the default tutorials. (You might not want to do that, depending on your technological capability.)
It’s fast, it’s simple, and it allows you to start working very, very quickly after the unboxing.
A key point is that the Zenbook S16 contains an infrared sensor next to the webcam. This greatly improves the Zenbook’s ability to identify the user in low-light conditions. In testing, it wasn’t always as fast as that on my smart phone, but it still saved a few seconds over typing my password each time.
Battery Life and Charging
The ASUS Zenbook S16 has a 78Wh battery that provides enough juice for up to 18 hours without a charge. In my testing, I found it averaged 7 hours when doing a lot of gaming and streaming, but with ‘regular’ usage, exceeded 14 hours each time. This might not break any records (especially in comparison to offerings with an ARM chip), but for the performance is still extremely impressive, and certainly destroyed the HP Probook that I use for work on a daily basis.
Even when watching movies, it doesn’t seem to cost much in the way in battery life (I went from 100% charge to 90% watching a movie on Netflix) so you won’t be stressed if you accidentally leave your charger at home in a rush out the door.
The power supply has an output of 65W, which takes the Zenbook to 60% in 49 minutes, and to full charge in about two hours. However, what I loved about the charger was the size of the brick – it didn’t take over multiple power points, allowing you to plug other devices into your powerboard. And I personally didn’t notice it getting hot to the point of concern.
Ports
A major issue with a lot of laptops, especially those that are ‘ultra-thin’ is that they don’t offer a large set of USB (or other) ports. Connect a wireless dongle for a mouse, and a headset, and in some cases you’re already out of space to connect a USB thumbdrive.
Thankfully, the ASUS Zenbook S16 provides, on the left, a classic 3.5mm jack, two USB-C 4.0 ports (either of which can be used for charging) and an HDMI 2.1. The right side then contains a USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, and an SD Card reader.
In total, three external monitors can be connected – helpful for those that work from an office and home and need that extra screen space.
Audio & Visuals
An extremely nice feature on the ASUS Zenbook S16 is the Lumina OLED display. ASUS advertises their Lumina OLED displays as being more accurate, more adaptive, and more reliable than other OLED displays – making them the ultimate choice for professionals, gamers, or entertainment enthusiasts.
The Zenbook S16 has a 16-inch screen with a 16:10 aspect ratio, with a native 2880 x 1800 pixel resolution, and a minimal bezel around the screen itself. It also has a very wide angle of view, meaning the positioning and height of your desk isn’t going to be as problematic viewing what is on-screen, compared to some of the competition.
It also features a response time of 0.2ms, a refresh rate of 120Hz, and a peak brightness of up to 500 nits (according to the ASUS website). Coupled with Pantone® Validated colour rendering, VESA DisplayHDRTM True Black Certification and Delta E <1 colour accuracy, it certainly presents some impressive visuals, regardless of whether you’re gaming, watching a movie, or simply typing a review. I actually preferred the display on the Zenbook S16 to that of my desktop gaming PC’s monitor.
Of note, the display is also low blue light certified by both TÜV Rheinland, and SGS, boasting lower harmful blue-light levels, and flicker-free dimming, ensuring better eye care and sleep quality when used at night before bed.
Of course, as suggested by the inclusion in my test kit of the ASUS Pen 2.0, the screen is a touch-screen, featuring Corning® Gorilla® Glass NBTTM to ensure it’s more resistant to scratching from swipes, taps and stylus use.
Several tools have also been implemented to assist in preventing pixel burn-in, but in the case of pixel burnout, the warranty provides for replacement.
So, the design is nice, the display is nice, but how’s the sound?
Well, ASUS has recently been paying a lot of attention to this aspect in various lines. The Zenbook S16 boats 6 speakers (two tweeters and four subwoofers) in an attempt to boost the bass, amplify the accuracy, and provide a true theatre experience. There is also Harman Kardon certification, along with Dolby Atmos support. But given the Zenbook S16’s ultra-slim design, it still suffers from the same handicap all such devices do – and so won’t replicate sound as well as a full home theatre system. But then, I wasn’t really expecting it to.
It’s functional, producing distortion free, and clear sound in all of my testing – even when the movie conversations were whispered or covered with other pieces of the soundtrack.
Webcam & Microphone
The full HD webcam provides a good image quality, with AI support to help rid the image of unnecessary ‘noise’ – especially useful in lower light conditions. The camera also supports Windows Studio Lights, which help with cropping, and background blurring. I was actually impressed by the camera, especially when directly compared to the HP Probook.
The microphone has a few impressive features (with the help of AI) that meant conversations I had didn’t include background noise from the environment, the keyboard, and my fidgeting with boredom during a meeting or three. The input itself clearly picked up my voice, and possessed very few artifacts.
Performance
The ASUS Zenbook S16 I used possessed the 12-core Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 (4 Zen 5 cores up to 5.1GHz, 8 Zen 5c cores up to 3.3GHz, 24 threads) with 32GB of LPDDR5X ram, and an integrated Radeon 890M graphics processor. My testbed had a 1TB PCIEG4 SSD for storage.
The testbed was also equipped with support for Wi-Fi 7, and Bluetooth 5.4.
The integrated graphics were capable of delivering over 30fps in games like GTAV with mostly ‘high’ settings. It’s not a lot – especially when compared to my desktop gaming PC – but that’s in the native display resolution, and in an extremely power miserly, thin, and light-weight form factor that is easily portable. And realistically, those sorts of games are unlikely to be routinely played on this sort of laptop anyway.
When compared to previous ASUS models (like the Vivobook) the performance just feels smoother on the Zenbook. So ASUS are definitely doing something right.
Surprisingly, the Zenbook S16 didn’t suffer from a big loss of performance when running solely on battery power – even after switching the device to power saving mode, and reducing the cooling to ‘Whisper.’
Speaking of cooling, this is provided by a pair of small and relatively quiet fans, which are assisted by an evaporation chamber. The geometric grille design includes 3522 CNC machined cooling vents. Even under full load, the processor didn’t seem to exceed 80°C. That said, it WAS a noticeable heat when touching the laptop, so would have been uncomfortable for use on the lap. But not many people will have usage requirements that keep the Zenbook S16 under full load for long periods of time.
The Zenbook S16 also features the ASUS Copilot+ (which commenced rollout in late 2024, and is continuing into 2025 for some regions), to present what ASUS calls ‘a next-level AI experience.’ With integrated AI engines to accelerate AI computing, and a suite of ASUS AI applications, and backed by a claimed 50 TOPs (tera operations per second,) it allows you to do a wide-range of tasks from Live captions – translating audio and video content into English Subtitles from 44 languages; to Recall – allowing you to find content you have viewed on your device.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to test all of these AI features, so can’t provide comment upon them at this time.
The ASUS Pen 2.0
As this was included in the box for my test device, I thought I’d include a few paragraphs about it. The ASUS Pen 2.0 is a USB powered stylus that provides over 140 hours of use from a quick 30-minute charge. The charging port is accessed by pulling up the top of the stylus to expose the USB-C port.
The ASUS Pen 2.0 features 4096-level pressure sensitivity, and 5-350 gram pen tip force to create the finest lines and broadest brush strokes based on the amount of pressure exerted by the user. And it comes with four interchangeable pen tips – 2H, H, HB and B.
The ASUS Pen 2.0 contains several functional buttons. One top button for shortcuts, and two side buttons for mouse click and erase. With built-in Microsoft Pen Protocol (MPP) 2.0 technology, which offers an ultra-low latency and fast response, ensuring accurate and effortless brush strokes on screen.
In usage, I found that it was comfortable to hold and use, with differing frictional properties and hardness across each of the four included pen tips. This made it easy to select one that suited by writing style, and – after doing so – made it feel no different than writing on paper with a pen.
Having used a multitude of different stylus offerings over the years (including the basic one on my Samsung S22 Ultra) the ASUS Pen 2.0 has become my favourite.
Final thoughts
When it comes to laptops, there generally are strengths, and then the compromises to achieve those strengths. However, the ASUS Zenbook S16 really didn’t have any noticeable compromises that affected my experience.
The sleek, metallic body, high-quality display, sufficient performance for all normal daily tasks, and a lot of non-standard tasks, and a respectable battery life result in a genuinely good product.
It’s not perfect – and the cost is something that might set some people off. However, I would be hard-pressed to say this isn’t justified, given the overall quality of the laptop, and general ‘nice’ feel during use. The Ceraluminium build is a delight. The RRP for the Asus Zenbook S16 is $3,499 but at time of publish there seems to be deals to bring it down to $2,899 and EoFY isn’t far off if you are looking for a tax deduction.
If I was allowed to keep the Zenbook S16, it would definitely become my daily go-to for work. (Hint, hint ASUS?)
DRN would like to thank ASUS for the loan of the Zenbook S16, and the ASUS Pen 2.0.
