Acer has a huge portfolio of laptops in every category. Recently I was trying my hands on the Acer Swift 3 to share its review with you all.
I used it as my primary laptop for awhile for the testing purpose and in this article, I am going to share my experience in detail and hands-on review of Acer Swift 3.
This review is divided in many different sections, considering pros and cons of the device in each of them.
You can also watch our video review of Acer Swift 3 below if interested.
The very first thing that you will notice about the Acer Swift 3 is its design. Considering its price and segment, the design of Swift 3 is very premium and so is the build quality. It comes with an aluminium body that looks very premium from every angle.
On the lid and around the screen, you will find the brushed metal finish that looks beautiful with shiny Acer logo in the middle of it. The edges of the lid are chamfered reflecting the light to show off the metal body.
There are two downward firing speakers provided at the bottom of the Swift 3 and it is bad design idea if the notebook is not a convertible one as the audio output will be reduced to great extent. I had to use earphones nearly every single time while watching movie on Swift 3 as it was hard to listen anything properly from its speakers.
The bezels around the screen are different in size. The side bezels are very thin but the bottom ones is really big with an Acer logo. The bezel above the screen is also a bit big but still acceptable. Just above the screen, there is a 720p HD camera provided. The hinge below the screen is a bit stiff and you will always have to use two hands to open the lid. But the good part is that the hinge can be moved 180-degrees to flatten the screen.
The body is slim and Swift 3 is pretty lightweight device, so you can easily carry it anywhere. The sides of the device are filled with lots of ports along with a Kensington laptop lock slot for the security.
The keyboard of the Acer Swift 3 is good but, like any other keyboard, it will take some time to get used to of its layout. The keys in the top row are very small and a bit hard to use. Also, the travel of the keys are a bit less. Still the typing experience will be good enough. There is no backlighting provided in the keyboard.
The touchpad is big and comes with matte finish. Its keys are integrated and because of that touchpad looks very minimalistic, elegant and premium. It is also compatible with Windows 10 gesture controls. There is a fingerprint sensor provided as well below the keyboard and next to touchpad.
Overall the design of Acer Swift 3 is beautiful and elegant. It is one of the most beautiful and premium looking notebook in its segment and price range.
Acer Swift 3 comes with 14-inch IPS screen with full HD resolution that you will not find in many laptops in this price segment with the kind of built quality and hardware Swift 3 is offering.
The display quality of the Swift 3 is nice but not great. The viewing angles are very good, thanks to the IPS display. And the full HD resolution provides sharp images with lots of details.
The brightness is average and good enough for indoor usage but you might feel issue while using it outdoors in bright sunlight. It comes with the matte finish that reduces reflection but also affect brightness negatively a bit. Also, the color saturation is a bit less punchy.
Overall the display of Acer Swift 3 can be considered as average because it excels in few things but also lacks in few things.
Just like any other laptop Acer Swift 3 also comes in various configurations. The one we got for the review featured an 8th generation Intel i5 processor, 4GB RAM, dedicated NVIDIA GeForce MX 150 graphics card and 1TB storage.
In benchmarking test the performance of our unit was nice and it scored good points. Also while playing the games, Swift 3 performed nicely and was capable of running games at 60fps without any issues, thanks to the dedicated NVIDIA GPU
But things get different when it comes to normal usage. Our unit performed average in daily usage and took lots of time in loading content, launching apps and switching between them. You can blame the low amount of RAM and HDD we got in our unit for that. Acer provides the option to upgrade the amount of RAM and storage to 512 GB SSD but it totally depends on the Swift 3 variant you are going to get.
The fingerprint scanner provided on Acer Swift 3 is a nice integration but you will have to be patient to use it as most of the time it was not able to detect my fingerprint and I had to enter the PIN to unlock the device.
For most users, the performance of Swift 3 will be good enough specially for the causal gaming and graphic sensitive works like video editing but if you are a multi-tasker or someone who uses heavy applications then you will feel lagging and slowness in app launching and loading speed.
Also you need to keep in mind that my review unit was the low-end model and if you get the better variant of Swift 3 with i7 processor, 8GB RAM etc. then you will get much better performance compared to mine. Still the performance of my unit was better compared to other device sin the same segment.
Acer Swift 3 comes with a great set of connectivity features, legacy ports and options. You will find nearly everything you need in its slim body for connectivity purpose.
There is a USB Type-C port, HDMI port, two USB 3.0 ports and another USB 2.0 port on the right side. There is a 3.5 mm audio port provided and you will also find a full sized SD card slot. One of the USB 3.0 port can be used for charging devices even when the laptop is off.
The only drawback is that there is no RJ-45 port provided for the LAN connectivity and considering the slim body and amount of other ports Swift 3 provides, it is justified and compensated. So if you are forced to use a LAN at your workplace or institution then you will have to use an adapter to connect an RJ-45 to your Swift 3.
This is one of the best thing about the Acer Swift 3. Acer claims that the Swift 3 provides 12 hours of battery life but in my test, I get around 10 hours of battery life while continuously playing a full HD resolution video on 50% brightness.
Testing on a regular workday that includes listening a bit music, watching YouTube videos, lots of documents and email works etc Swift 3 was able to provide nearly 8 hours of battery life and this is quite impressive for sure.
Acer Swift 3 is one of the most beautiful and premium looking laptop in its segment and price category. The build quality is great and design is elegant. It comes with lots of connectivity options and battery life is amazing. The display quality is mixed bag with good clarity but low brightness and color saturation.
The performance of the Swift 3 is good when it comes to gaming and other graphics related work due to inclusion of a dedicated NVIDIA GPU but the app loading and launching time is bit too much sometimes.
Overall, Acer Swift 3 is one of the best deal in its price segment specially if you are looking for a notebook with premium design, great battery life and above average performance.
I used it as my primary laptop for awhile for the testing purpose and in this article, I am going to share my experience in detail and hands-on review of Acer Swift 3.
This review is divided in many different sections, considering pros and cons of the device in each of them.
You can also watch our video review of Acer Swift 3 below if interested.
Acer Swift 3 - Detailed Hands-on Review
Design
The very first thing that you will notice about the Acer Swift 3 is its design. Considering its price and segment, the design of Swift 3 is very premium and so is the build quality. It comes with an aluminium body that looks very premium from every angle.
On the lid and around the screen, you will find the brushed metal finish that looks beautiful with shiny Acer logo in the middle of it. The edges of the lid are chamfered reflecting the light to show off the metal body.
There are two downward firing speakers provided at the bottom of the Swift 3 and it is bad design idea if the notebook is not a convertible one as the audio output will be reduced to great extent. I had to use earphones nearly every single time while watching movie on Swift 3 as it was hard to listen anything properly from its speakers.
The bezels around the screen are different in size. The side bezels are very thin but the bottom ones is really big with an Acer logo. The bezel above the screen is also a bit big but still acceptable. Just above the screen, there is a 720p HD camera provided. The hinge below the screen is a bit stiff and you will always have to use two hands to open the lid. But the good part is that the hinge can be moved 180-degrees to flatten the screen.
The body is slim and Swift 3 is pretty lightweight device, so you can easily carry it anywhere. The sides of the device are filled with lots of ports along with a Kensington laptop lock slot for the security.
The keyboard of the Acer Swift 3 is good but, like any other keyboard, it will take some time to get used to of its layout. The keys in the top row are very small and a bit hard to use. Also, the travel of the keys are a bit less. Still the typing experience will be good enough. There is no backlighting provided in the keyboard.
The touchpad is big and comes with matte finish. Its keys are integrated and because of that touchpad looks very minimalistic, elegant and premium. It is also compatible with Windows 10 gesture controls. There is a fingerprint sensor provided as well below the keyboard and next to touchpad.
Overall the design of Acer Swift 3 is beautiful and elegant. It is one of the most beautiful and premium looking notebook in its segment and price range.
Display
Acer Swift 3 comes with 14-inch IPS screen with full HD resolution that you will not find in many laptops in this price segment with the kind of built quality and hardware Swift 3 is offering.
The display quality of the Swift 3 is nice but not great. The viewing angles are very good, thanks to the IPS display. And the full HD resolution provides sharp images with lots of details.
The brightness is average and good enough for indoor usage but you might feel issue while using it outdoors in bright sunlight. It comes with the matte finish that reduces reflection but also affect brightness negatively a bit. Also, the color saturation is a bit less punchy.
Overall the display of Acer Swift 3 can be considered as average because it excels in few things but also lacks in few things.
Hardware and Performance
Just like any other laptop Acer Swift 3 also comes in various configurations. The one we got for the review featured an 8th generation Intel i5 processor, 4GB RAM, dedicated NVIDIA GeForce MX 150 graphics card and 1TB storage.
In benchmarking test the performance of our unit was nice and it scored good points. Also while playing the games, Swift 3 performed nicely and was capable of running games at 60fps without any issues, thanks to the dedicated NVIDIA GPU
But things get different when it comes to normal usage. Our unit performed average in daily usage and took lots of time in loading content, launching apps and switching between them. You can blame the low amount of RAM and HDD we got in our unit for that. Acer provides the option to upgrade the amount of RAM and storage to 512 GB SSD but it totally depends on the Swift 3 variant you are going to get.
The fingerprint scanner provided on Acer Swift 3 is a nice integration but you will have to be patient to use it as most of the time it was not able to detect my fingerprint and I had to enter the PIN to unlock the device.
For most users, the performance of Swift 3 will be good enough specially for the causal gaming and graphic sensitive works like video editing but if you are a multi-tasker or someone who uses heavy applications then you will feel lagging and slowness in app launching and loading speed.
Also you need to keep in mind that my review unit was the low-end model and if you get the better variant of Swift 3 with i7 processor, 8GB RAM etc. then you will get much better performance compared to mine. Still the performance of my unit was better compared to other device sin the same segment.
Connectivity
Acer Swift 3 comes with a great set of connectivity features, legacy ports and options. You will find nearly everything you need in its slim body for connectivity purpose.
There is a USB Type-C port, HDMI port, two USB 3.0 ports and another USB 2.0 port on the right side. There is a 3.5 mm audio port provided and you will also find a full sized SD card slot. One of the USB 3.0 port can be used for charging devices even when the laptop is off.
The only drawback is that there is no RJ-45 port provided for the LAN connectivity and considering the slim body and amount of other ports Swift 3 provides, it is justified and compensated. So if you are forced to use a LAN at your workplace or institution then you will have to use an adapter to connect an RJ-45 to your Swift 3.
Battery Life
This is one of the best thing about the Acer Swift 3. Acer claims that the Swift 3 provides 12 hours of battery life but in my test, I get around 10 hours of battery life while continuously playing a full HD resolution video on 50% brightness.
Testing on a regular workday that includes listening a bit music, watching YouTube videos, lots of documents and email works etc Swift 3 was able to provide nearly 8 hours of battery life and this is quite impressive for sure.
Conclusion
Acer Swift 3 is one of the most beautiful and premium looking laptop in its segment and price category. The build quality is great and design is elegant. It comes with lots of connectivity options and battery life is amazing. The display quality is mixed bag with good clarity but low brightness and color saturation.
The performance of the Swift 3 is good when it comes to gaming and other graphics related work due to inclusion of a dedicated NVIDIA GPU but the app loading and launching time is bit too much sometimes.
Overall, Acer Swift 3 is one of the best deal in its price segment specially if you are looking for a notebook with premium design, great battery life and above average performance.