HP OmniBook 5 14

Pros

• Unbelievable battery life
• Sturdy, stylish and compact design
• OLED display delivers deep blacks, vivid colors
• Generous RAM and SSD for the price

Cons

• OLED display isn't the brightest
• Slow USB-C ports

HP is back on top. Only a few weeks after ceding the battery life throne to Lenovo in our tests, HP has snatched back the crown with the OmniBook 5 14. Last year's HP OmniBook X 14 was the first laptop CNET tested that ran for more hours than there are in a day, lasting more than 25 hours in battery testing. It held the record for more than a year until the Lenovo Yoga 9i 2-in-1 Aura Edition set the bar a bit higher earlier this month. The Yoga 9i's reign was a short one because the OmniBook 5 14 showed up and shattered the record by running for more than 28 hours (!) on a single charge. 

What this pair of OmniBooks has in common is a Qualcomm Snapdragon X series processor. These efficient, Arm-based CPUs have powered some of the best battery life laptops I've tested, including the 13-inch Microsoft Surface Laptop, Asus Zenbook A14 and Acer Swift Go 14 AI. 

In addition to record-setting battery life, the OmniBook 5 14 offers a simple, elegant design and easy-to-carry weight -- plus, an OLED display that delivers stellar contrast and vivid colors. These qualities earned the OmniBook 5 14 two awards. It won CNET's Editors' Choice for the overall package it provides for the price. In addition, its record-setting battery life won the laptop a CNET Lab Award for longest battery life. For students and others constantly on the go, the OmniBook 5 14 is a fantastic pick at a great price.

The OmniBook 5 series is HP's mainstream consumer laptop line. It replaces the longstanding Pavilion brand that HP retired last year. Here's where the OmniBook 5 slots in among the other OmniBook lines:

• OmniBook 3: entry-level models previously in the HP Laptop line
• OmniBook 5: mainstream models previously in the Pavilion line
• OmniBook 7: higher-end mainstream models previously in the Pavilion Plus line
• OmniBook X: premium models previously in the Envy line
• OmniBook Ultra: flagship series previously in the Spectre line

The OmniBook 5 series is wide-ranging. You have a choice of Intel, AMD and Qualcomm processors, with a mix of fixed configurations and those you're able to customize. You can get it with a 14-inch display or go bigger with a 16-inch screen, and each is available as a standard laptop or two-in-one convertible. (The convertible models have a "Flip" suffix in their name.)

My OmniBook 5 14 test system is customizable. Pricing starts at $480 (discounted from $900, but HP's sale pricing is nearly constant) for a Snapdragon X X1-26-100 processor, 16GB of RAM, integrated Qualcomm Adreno graphics and a 256GB SSD. My test system costs $850 (again, with HP's discount pricing) and features a Snapdragon X Plus X1P-42-100 chip, 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. My test system also includes a backlit keyboard, which is a $20 upgrade.

The lone display is a nontouch OLED panel with a standard 2K (1,920x1,200-pixel) resolution and 60Hz refresh rate. There is also a fixed configuration for $900 that is identical to my test system, except the OLED display has touch support.

My OmniBook 5 14 model is on sale for £699 in the UK. There are two similar models available in Australia. One that's on sale for AU$999 is a Snapdragon X X1-26-100, with 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. The other that's on sale for AU$1,399 is a Snapdragon X Plus X1P-42-100, with 32GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. Each features the same 2K OLED nontouch display that I tested.

HP OmniBook 5 14 performance

The OmniBook 5 14 delivered competitive multi- and single-core results on our application benchmarks, Geekbench 6 and Cinebench 6. Its scores were near those of similarly priced Windows laptops with either a Snapdragon X or Intel Core Ultra CPU. The trend continues, with Intel laptops such as the Acer Aspire 14 AI, Dell 14 Plus and Lenovo Yoga 9i 2-in-1 Aura Edition leading the way in single-core performance, while the Snapdragon X systems fare better in multicore testing. 

Still, the latest M4 MacBook Air was the clear winner in both multi- and single-core versions of these tests, maintaining a significant distance between it and the Windows pack, especially in single-core performance.

It wasn't too long ago that Apple's MacBooks also led the way in battery life, but that has changed since the first Snapdragon X laptops started showing up last year. Intel's Lunar Lake chips have also proved to be very efficient, leading to some lengthy laptop battery life, including the Lenovo Yoga 9i 2-in-1 Aura Edition that the OmniBook 5 14 just topped to reclaim the battery life crown for HP. 

In our YouTube streaming battery drain test, the OmniBook 5 14 lasted an astonishing 28 hours and 19 minutes. And that truly amazing number is all the more remarkable when you consider that the OmniBook 5 14 has an OLED display, which usually shortens battery life compared with an LCD panel. The OmniBook 5 14 is able to run for so long on a single charge that you might be in danger of forgetting where you left the charger.

One note on the charger itself: it is one of the smallest laptop power bricks I've ever seen, making the long-running and compact OmniBook 5 14 all the more portable.

Mostly made of metal with an OLED for the masses

The OmniBook 5 14 comes decked out in a light gray color that looks almost white, which HP calls Glacier Silver. Set against the dark gray keys of the keyboard, it gives the laptop a friendly, almost cheerful appearance that's a nice break from the usual dull gray. The edges and corners are gently rounded, making the OmniBook 5 14 comfortable to carry -- even the two long rubber feet on the bottom panel have soft edges.

The OmniBook 5 14 resembles its higher-end stablemate, the OmniBook X 14, but there are a couple of important differences in their respective designs. The OmniBook X has an all-metal design, and the OmniBook 5 has aluminum top and bottom panels, but the keyboard deck is made of plastic. The OmniBook X also features a display with edge-to-edge glass, while the OmniBook 5 has plastic display bezels, giving it a more budget-friendly look. Still, the bezels are thin, particularly on each side, so the display doesn't look clunky. The plastic keyboard deck feels solid, with hardly any flex.

The two OmniBooks weigh nearly the same, and the plastic keyboard deck might actually help the OmniBook 5 save a little weight. It weighs 2.95 pounds, and the OmniBook X 14 weighs 2.94 pounds. Both are average for a 14-inch laptop, which typically weighs around 3 pounds. The outliers are the exceptionally light Asus Zenbook A14, which weighs only 2.2 pounds, and the hefty Dell 14 Plus, which tips the scales at 3.3 pounds. On the Apple side of things, the 13-inch MacBook Air is a little lighter at 2.7 pounds, but it has a slightly smaller 13.6-inch display.

I felt immediately comfortable typing on the keyboard. The keys offer a good amount of travel and have springy feedback. The touchpad is a standard mechanical click response, but it's firm and responsive with minimal diving board effect -- clicks feel nearly the same at the top edge of the touchpad as on the bottom. It's not like you get a haptic touchpad with the higher-end OmniBook X 14 -- it has a standard mechanical touchpad, too.

One area where the OmniBook 5 14 actually has an edge on the OmniBook X 14 is with display technology. The OmniBook 5 14 serves up an OLED panel, while the OmniBook X 14 uses a pedestrian IPS panel. Granted, the X's panel has a slightly higher 2.2K resolution, but I'd rather have a 2K panel if it means I get it in an OLED. A 2K resolution suffices for a 14-inch display; text and images looked sharp enough to my eyes. Only when I crept up unnaturally close to the display could I see evidence of pixelation where letters looked a little fuzzy. But seated at a normal distance in front of the laptop, things looked clean and crisp.

And with the OLED, black levels are deep and perfect, and colors are vivid and accurate. It's not the brightest panel, and I found I had the brightness slider all the way up most of the time. But with a glossy screen coating that's not overly reflective, I never struggled to see what was on the screen in any indoor scenario. The panel is rated for 300 nits of brightness, and my tests confirmed that figure. It hit a peak of 299 nits while also exhibiting strong color coverage. It managed to cover 100% of the sRGB and P3 gamuts and a respectable 90% of AdobeRGB. 

Other nice surprises you get with this sub-$1,000 laptop include a sturdy display hinge and impressively loud audio output. The hinge felt stronger than the OmniBook X 14's, which I thought was a bit weak and wobbly. The OmniBook 5 14 features only a standard pair of speakers, but they emit fuller sound than a typical laptop's, especially at its price. It helps that both speakers are located near the front edge of the underside of the laptop rather than further back on the bottom panel.

A 1080p webcam sits above the display, delivering three features I appreciate in a laptop webcam: a clean, well-balanced picture; an IR sensor for Windows Hello logins; and a physical shutter to cover the webcam, allowing you to protect your privacy when it's not in use.

The port selection is a bit of a bummer. You get both types of USB ports, so you don't need to carry around an adapter, but the USB-C ports are only of the 10Gbps variety, which is a far cry from the 40Gbps transfer speed you get from Thunderbolt 4 or USB4.

Is the HP OmniBook 5 14 a good laptop?

Even if you remove the incredible battery life from the equation, the OmniBook 5 14 is a fantastic laptop at a great price. You don't usually find an OLED display, 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD in a laptop that costs less than $1,000. And it comes wrapped in a nice-looking, mostly metal design with a sub-3-pound weight.