# Dell's XPS 13 finally has a real answer to the MacBook Neo > A $700 Windows ultraportable that looks and feels like a $1,500 one, with two catches you should know about. - Title: Dell's XPS 13 finally has a real answer to the MacBook Neo - Summary: A $700 Windows ultraportable that looks and feels like a $1,500 one, with two catches you should know about. The 2026 XPS 13 is the best-built cheap Windows… - Keywords: laptops, dell, windows, macbook, hardware review, technology, culture, Dell's, XPS, finally, real, answer - Source: The Verge — https://theverge.com/tech/994636/dell-xps-13-2026-intel-wildcat-lake-8gb-16gb-review - Author: Antonio G. Di Benedetto - Published: 2026-09-14T17:00:00+00:00 - Read time: 3 min - Topics: laptops, dell, windows, macbook, hardware review, technology, culture ## The XPS name comes back Dell's last XPS 13 was supposed to be a goodbye, and an overpriced one. After reviving the brand with the pricey XPS 14 and 16, Dell rebuilt the 13 as an affordable thin-and-light. > Call it another comeback. ## Aimed straight at the Neo At $699.99 to start, it lands in the same bracket Apple's MacBook Neo created. Dell pitches it as a student laptop, the same way Apple pitches the Neo. ## Best hardware under $1,000 Screen, keyboard, trackpad and speakers all land between great and excellent. Outside of Apple's Neo, nothing else at $700 is put together this well. > It's an exquisite package in a sleek and very thin ultra-portable. ## Two grand for two grams It weighs 2.2 pounds and measures half an inch thick, lighter than a MacBook Air and nearly as thin. Pick it up and it practically vanishes into a bag. ## The screen beats the Neo's A 13.4-inch 2560x1600 panel with much thinner bezels, 500 nits, and an anti-glare finish. It runs at 120Hz with touch, while the Neo is stuck at 60Hz with no touch. ## A keyboard worth copying The tactile chiclet keys are the best thing on the laptop. The reviewer wants Dell to drop the latticeless design on its pricier XPS models and use this one everywhere. > Somebody tell Dell's designers to put this nice tactile chiclet-style keyboard on everything. ## No headphone jack, anywhere You get two 10Gbps USB-C ports, one per side, both handling charge and video-out. No configuration has a 3.5mm jack, which drags port selection down to a D. > Even if you rarely use 3.5mm audio it's nice to have as a fallback option. ## Battery is fine, not great Seven hours of heavy mixed use, up to 10 on a light day from the 52Wh cell. The Neo runs several hours longer on a smaller battery. ## It warms your lap The hottest spot on the bottom chassis hits 104F / 40C during normal work. The keyboard deck itself stays cool. ## Slower than Apple silicon Both configs trail the Neo's A18 Pro in Geekbench, though the 16GB model closes the gap in a Premiere 4K export. The SSD is the bright spot, reading nearly four times faster than the Neo's. ## Six cores beat five The Wildcat Lake chip is night and day better than the five-core version in the Chuwi UniBook, which needed over an hour for the same export. One extra performance core and one extra GPU core do real work. ## 8GB actually survives Unlike the Chuwi and the 13-inch Surface Laptop, the base model handles everyday web work without crashing out. For a 2026 Windows machine with 8GB, that alone is an achievement. ## Until you open Photoshop With a couple dozen Chrome tabs and Slack running, tabs used minutes earlier got dumped and had to reload. Simple Photoshop crops turned a two-minute job into an ordeal. > I suddenly regretted life itself. ## The $300 RAM tax The 16GB model removes every one of those pain points, but it now costs $999.99. That upgrade was $200 just weeks ago, before Dell shuffled its base configs and raised prices. > Sadly these kinds of pricing shenanigans are commonplace in our ongoing RAMageddon nightmare. ## The one to beat, for now Cheaper machines like the $500 HP OmniBook 3 give you more RAM, ports and battery, but nothing near this build quality. More Neo rivals are coming, and this is the frontrunner. > You should still get the 16GB model if you can swing it. ## Key takeaway The 2026 XPS 13 is the best-built cheap Windows laptop right now, but pay for the 16GB model if you can.