Razer's Blade family of gaming laptops is among our favorite notebook lines: not cheap, but elegant powerhouses for hardcore gamers. We've reviewed and applauded 13-, 15-, and 17-inch models, and the new Blade 14 (starts at $1,799; $2,199 as tested) hits the power and portability sweet spot. Its compact chassis is just 0.66 inch thick but packs in an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX processor and up to Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 graphics. (Our test model has an RTX 3070 and a 1440p panel.) That’s a head-turning proposition for gamers on the go, and our testing confirms it hits top-end frame rates at high settings. Its performance, premium build, long battery life, and high-refresh display make the Blade 14 a trailblazer as a 14-inch powerhouse, earning an Editors’ Choice award for its all-around excellence and unique positioning.
A Beloved Build, Now at 14 Inches
Outside of the new screen size, the Blade 14 looks and feels just like its 15.6-inch sibling and other relations. Unless you hate svelte metal and Razer's tangled-snakes logo, this is a good thing. The build is one of the best among elite laptops, especially gaming rigs.
First Look: The Razer Blade 14, Ryzen-Powered Gaming Laptop With Major Power
This style has been a trend-setter among vendors creating trimmer and classier gaming laptops, and it's nice to see it at this size. The all-black paint job, modern squared-off design, thin screen bezels, and RGB-backlit keyboard are all present, and in some ways even easier to appreciate in a more compact chassis.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
As with the Blade Stealth 13, you can really tuck this system under your arm and take it on the go, which feels extra-satisfying considering its full-fledged features and gaming power. (More on that in a moment.)
(Photo: Molly Flores)
To be specific, the Blade 14 measures 0.66 by 12.6 by 8.7 inches (HWD), an impressively compact volume in any laptop category. Our favorite 14-inch competitors are the Acer Predator Triton 300 SE and the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14, which are plenty thin at 0.7 inch each, but the Blade 14 has them beat in overall footprint. The margins are small—differences so minor really shouldn't sway your buying decision—but the dimensions are impressive and easy to appreciate.
Speaking of small margins, the Blade 14 is a touch heavier than the others, at 3.92 pounds, but by less than half a pound. All are still light for gaming machines.
Configuration Options: AMD and Nvidia Bring the Heat
Of course, it's not all about the size. Given the Blade 14's premium price, you'd hope for and expect a fast and feature-filled, as well as highly portable, laptop. Available components and features are tied to certain configurations, so before we discuss them, let's take a look at the models offered.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
Razer offers three configurations, priced at $1,799, $2,199, and $2,799. First, what they share in common: the same CPU, AMD's marquee "Zen 3" Ryzen 9 5900HX, an eight-core, 16-thread mobile processor with base and boost clocks of 3.3GHz and 4.6GHz respectively. All three models also come with 16GB of memory and 1TB of solid-state storage.
From there, the components vary. The base model nets you a 144Hz full HD (1080p) display and a GeForce RTX 3060 GPU. The $2,199 middle model bumps the screen up to a 165Hz panel with QHD (1440p) resolution backed by RTX 3070 graphics. Finally, the $2,799 flagship comes with the same QHD screen but upgrades the GPU to a GeForce RTX 3080. All of the displays feature support for AMD FreeSync Premium.
Our review unit here is the middle $2,199 model, with the RTX 3070. There’s a lot to unpack about both it and the processor, so let’s get into the details and implications.
The Component Deep Dive
For anyone who hasn't been paying attention to the processor world in recent years, the Ryzen 9 5900HX is a very exciting inclusion for two reasons. Ryzen chips have proven extremely fast and efficient (in both laptops and desktops), and this is a departure from the Intel-only solutions that Razer has previously employed.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
It should be said that gaming is one area where there isn't much of an AMD advantage, if any, but we've repeatedly seen Ryzen 5, 7, and 9 CPUs best their Core i5, i7, and i9 counterparts in multitasking and media editing. Expect this machine to be very snappy.
The graphics options deserve some focus as well. For a system this compact, you'd be forgiven for assuming Nvidia's most powerful GPUs aren't available, but Razer's offering of the RTX 3070 and 3080 is impressive. It's a big contrast with the 14-inch competition: The Zephyrus G14 maxed out at the previous-generation RTX 3060 (the version we reviewed used a 2060, but the newer model has been updated), and the Predator Triton 300 SE stops at the RTX 3060. The fact that you can go up to an RTX 3080 on the Blade 14—again, even smaller than these rivals—is a head-turner for mobile gamers.
There is a caveat to that, however. As we've seen with numerous laptops with RTX 30 Series GPUs we've tested so far, there can be a lot of variation in performance even between, say, two RTX 3070 notebooks. The reason is that Nvidia allows manufacturers to set the GPU wattage that best fits their laptop, dictating the power that a given GPU can push.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
This is a handy way to obtain as much power as a laptop can take without going beyond its thermal restrictions, but unraveling the real-world results can be confusing. For example, a lower-wattage RTX 3080 may perform like (or even lose to) a higher-wattage RTX 3070. It's important to pay attention to wattage when studying laptop specs and to look carefully at the results of hands-on testing like ours.
In the testing section below, we’ll see exactly how potent the GPU in this laptop is. It's a fair bet that, say, a GeForce RTX 3080 in the compact Blade 14 won't outrun the same GPU in larger laptops, and that also applies to our RTX 3070. With less space for heat-dissipating hardware, these GPUs are not configured at maximum wattage as they would be in a big laptop. All three GPU options in the Blade 14 come in at 100-watt TGP.
In contrast, the RTX 3070 in the larger Alienware m15, for example, comes in at a 140-watt TGP. This is even setting aside the fact that we've seen some diminishing returns the higher you go up Nvidia's mobile GPU stack (with RTX 3080s often behaving more like 3070s, even in 15-inch systems). All in all, the exact performance of this model is important to look at, and we’ll get to that in the testing section a bit later.
QHD FTW: Display, Keyboard, and Ports
The good news is that any of these GPUs will make good use of the Razer's high-refresh-rate display. To reiterate, our model comes with the QHD (2,560-by-1,440-pixel) 165Hz display. For the base model, competitive multiplayer games will run at high frame rates, and even the RTX 3060 should be capable of AAA gaming at 60fps. The base RTX 3060 GPU might be a bit underpowered for 1440p resolution, but Razer wisely paired it up with the 1080p screen option, so that won't be an issue.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
The combination in our review unit, meanwhile, is pretty mouth-watering for enthusiasts, and we’ll see how far it can push frame rates in the testing section. The screen looks bright, sharp, and vibrant. A 14-inch display, of course, could be small for some, especially if you're used to playing on a big monitor. If you've read this far, though, you're likely at least considering it, and smaller screens are a necessity for portability. Once you're playing, as long as you're in a comfortable setup, the difference between it and a 15-inch screen isn't too noticeable.
As with the other Blade laptops, the Blade 14's keyboard and, especially, its touchpad are superior to those of your average Windows laptop. The keys can be individually, colorfully backlit and deliver a nice typing experience. They don't break new ground (unlike the mechanical keys on Alienware's Cherry MX laptop keyboard) and don't offer a ton of tactile feedback, but the keyboard still earns a thumbs up overall.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
The power button has also been moved to a key in line with the function row, rather than the small button of other Blade laptops. The touchpad is extremely responsive, smooth, and roomy. It feels great to use, which is crucial for a system you'll often take on the road without a mouse (even if you'll probably use a mouse for gaming).
The ports round out the build, a respectable number on this smaller system. The left flank holds a USB 3.1 Type-A port and a USB-C port, while the right side offers one more of each plus a full-size HDMI connection. Given the AMD processor, the USB-C ports don't support Thunderbolt 3 or 4 (largely tied to Intel platforms), but they do offer power delivery.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
(Photo: Molly Flores)
The laptop also includes a 720p webcam (with Windows Hello face recognition), plus support for Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2.
Now Testing: The 14-Inch Blade
We ran the Blade 14 through our usual suite of benchmark tests, and to get a sense of how it performs, we compared it against a host of other, similar laptops mentioned earlier. Their names and specs are below, representing a mix of sizes, components, and brands. (See more about how we test laptops.)
Productivity, Storage, and Media Tests
PCMark 10 and 8 are holistic performance suites developed by the PC benchmark specialists at UL (formerly Futuremark). The PCMark 10 test we run simulates different real-world productivity and content creation workflows. We use it to assess overall system performance for office-centric tasks such as word processing, spreadsheet jockeying, web browsing, and videoconferencing. PCMark 8, meanwhile, has a storage subtest that we use to assess the speed of the system's boot drive. Both tests yield a proprietary numeric score; higher numbers are better.
PCMark 10 isn’t the most strenuous processor test, but you can glean the general aptitude of each system for everyday tasks, and the bar is high in this group. These scores are well over the acceptable baseline, and the small but mighty Blade 14 tops the pack. Its 6,805 score is especially impressive given that a higher native resolution (here, 1440p on the Blade 14) tends to suppress scores on this test. Before any deeper conclusions on the CPUs, let’s check the more intensive media tests.
Next is Maxon's CPU-crunching Cinebench R15 test, which is fully threaded to make use of all available processor cores and threads. Cinebench stresses the CPU rather than the GPU to render a complex image. The result is a proprietary score indicating a PC's suitability for processor-intensive workloads.
Cinebench is often a good predictor of our Handbrake video editing trial, another tough, threaded workout that's highly CPU-dependent and scales well with cores and threads. In it, we put a stopwatch on test systems as they transcode a standard 12-minute clip of 4K video (the open-source Blender demo movie Tears of Steel) to a 1080p MP4 file. It's a timed test, and lower results are better.
We also run a custom Adobe Photoshop image-editing benchmark. Using an early 2018 release of the Creative Cloud version of Photoshop, we apply a series of 10 complex filters and effects to a standard JPEG test image, timing each operation and adding up the total. As with Handbrake, lower times are better here.
There’s a nice spread of CPU types in this group, and these tests show what the performance range looks like. The Blade 14 still performs very well for its size, but these also show why it was smart to look at these tests and not just PCMark: The Blade 14 doesn’t dominate on these tests, even though it did well. Even the G14’s Ryzen 7 was superior on a couple of tests here, showing the importance of thermals and design.
Either way, the AMD chips are a step above the Intel options on the two sustained-workload tests, and about even in the more "bursty" workload test, Photoshop. That makes the Blade 14 an above-average media editing laptop that won’t leave you waiting forever for edits. Plus, you can leverage its GPU when needed, even if it’s not quite a specialist machine. If it’s your editing system for the road, supplementing a more stationary PC, it can do the job.
Graphics Tests
3DMark measures relative graphics muscle by rendering sequences of highly detailed, gaming-style 3D graphics that emphasize particles and lighting. We run two different 3DMark subtests, Sky Diver and Fire Strike, which are suited to different types of systems. Both are DirectX 11 benchmarks, but Sky Diver is more suited to midrange PCs with integrated graphics, while Fire Strike is more demanding and lets high-end and gaming PCs strut their stuff. The results are proprietary scores.
Next up is another synthetic test or gaming simulation, this time from Unigine Corp. Like 3DMark, the Superposition test renders and pans through a detailed 3D scene and measures how the system copes. In this case, it's rendered in the eponymous Unigine engine, offering a different 3D workload for a second opinion on each laptop's graphical prowess.
Not bad for such a compact laptop! It’s head-and-shoulders above the Predator Triton 300 SE and ROG Zephyrus G14 (it should be better, given its superior GPU), beats the Blade 15’s RTX 3080 on Fire Strike, and hangs close to it on Superposition (at the 1080p High setting). As mentioned earlier, the Alienware m15’s RTX 3070 is configured at higher wattage, and you can see the result of that clearly here. It’s comfortably above the rest on Superposition, though I think the Blade 14 earns some props on average here. Before making more conclusions, let’s check out the real game tests.
Real-World Gaming Tests
Synthetic tests are helpful for measuring general 3D aptitude, but it's hard to beat full retail video games for judging gaming performance. Far Cry 5 and Rise of the Tomb Raider are both modern, high-fidelity titles with built-in benchmarks that illustrate how a system handles real-world AAA gameplay at various settings. We run them at 1080p resolution at the games' medium and best image-quality presets (Normal and Ultra for Far Cry 5 under DirectX 11, Medium and Very High for Rise of the Tomb Raider under DirectX 12). We also tried them at the new Razer's native 1440p resolution; those results are in the following text rather than the charts.
The hierarchy from the previous tests remains here, but a few things to note. First, these tests charted above were run at 1080p despite the Blade 14’s native 1440p resolution, since that’s our default testing resolution and makes it so that we can compare the results to other laptops fairly (more on 1440p results in a moment).
Second, the two less powerful machines drew a little closer, and the more potent options flex their muscle, but the Blade 14 is still in a really good spot. This is an expensive laptop, of course, so I’m not going to be totally floored or surprised by top-end performance—this would be a big spend for most shoppers. It’s important to remember the Triton 300 SE ($1,399.99) and the Zephyrus G14 ($1,449.99) are priced in the midrange. (Also, again, this G14 model was an older generation, and newer versions offer newer parts, like an RTX 3060.)
That said, though, I have to acknowledge the size and design when considering this performance showing. Much of the system’s price goes into the build quality, the storage capacity, the advanced screen, and packing the parts into a chassis this small. So the calculus is not just around dollars-for-frame-rates here. In that context, you’re getting all of those features, plus performance that can hang with larger, much less portable laptops.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
Separate from these head-to-head comparisons, the Blade 14 is fully ready to tackle AAA games. You should see frame rates comfortably above 60fps on these and other cutting-edge games, though ray-tracing and other bells and whistles will challenge that. In those games, you may want to turn the resolution down to 1080p, as I did for the above results, since 1440p is strenuous.
To demonstrate the jump to 1440p, let’s look at the 1440p results I gathered for Far Cry 5 and Rise of the Tomb Raider. On the same high-settings presets used above, but switched to 1440p resolution, the Blade 14 averaged 84fps on Far Cry 5 and 87fps on Rise of the Tomb Raider. That’s a noteworthy decline from the 95fps and 110fps on those tests, and if you were pushing just above 60fps on 1080p in games that are harder to run, 1440p would have you under that target number.
As far as making use of the 165Hz aspect of the display, clearly some AAA games will benefit, even if they don’t hit the panel's refresh ceiling. Frame rates as high as 165fps, though, aren’t usually expected for these AAA titles, but rather from competitive multiplayer games. Based on our testing of the 30-Series GPUs, games like Rainbow Six Siege, Fortnite, Valorant, and League of Legends will hit or go beyond the 165fps limit. (See our explainer Does Your Gaming Laptop Need a High-Refresh-Rate Screen?)
Battery Rundown Test
Finally, we come to the all-important battery life. After fully recharging the laptop, we set up the machine in power-save mode (as opposed to balanced or high-performance mode) where available and make a few other battery-conserving tweaks in preparation for our unplugged video rundown test. (We also turn Wi-Fi off, putting the laptop in airplane mode.) In this test, we loop a video—a locally stored 720p file of the same Tears of Steel short we use in our Handbrake test—with screen brightness set at 50% and volume at 100% until the system quits.
As we’ve come to expect from Razer laptops, the battery life is quite good despite the power on display. This 14-inch system surpasses the Blade 15 and most of the rest, save for the Triton 300 SE. This isn’t quite the 20-hour battery life we see on some ultraportables, but that wouldn’t be too reasonable to expect from this category, and the Blade 14 has far more endurance than many gaming laptops.
This supplements its physical portability, actually letting you use it away from your desk and on the road when not gaming. It can more easily be your general-use laptop this way, versus gaming machines that are cumbersome to carry and have you running for the outlet after a couple of hours.
The New Blade: Still Killer
Overall, the Blade 14 makes a powerful "Buy!" case for Razer's new design. The same high-quality engineering we’ve become used to in other Blade laptops is present here, but it marries the portability of the Blade Stealth 13 build with full-size gaming power. It’s a pricey laptop versus midrange 14-inch options from the likes of Acer and Asus, but that’s always been the field the Blade family occupies, and the base model's price is a bit more palatable than our unit's.
(Photo: Molly Flores)
Still, that doesn’t mean it’s overpriced for what you’re getting, and there’s a lot to like. After spending time with the system, we can say the build feels premium, and it’s extremely portable, comfortable to use, long-lasting, and plenty powerful for gaming. It’s not the first 14-inch gaming laptop, by far, but it is the first we’ve tested with top-tier power and little compromise. Many larger gaming laptops at the same price will provide more power, but this is a fantastic combination of portability and performance for those who don’t have a static setup or want to take their primary gaming machine on the road.
That said, you can find a lot of good gaming machines out there these days. If you’d like a breakdown of the market's options here in 2021, we can say this: The Alienware m15 is our top pick for prioritizing power; the Razer Blade 15 is our favorite still-portable 15-inch laptop; and the Acer Predator Triton 300 SE is the best budget-friendly 14-inch system. And now, the Razer Blade 14 is our favorite portability-first powerhouse. It doesn’t seize any of those niche crowns away from the other three but establishes its own kingdom, earning an Editors’ Choice award on terms it defines.
razor blade fortnite
Pros
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Super-slim 14-inch metal build
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Potent AMD Ryzen 9 CPU and up to Nvidia RTX 3080 graphics
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RTX 3070 and 165Hz 1440p display in test model enable high-end gaming
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All models include HDMI, USB-C, and 1TB of SSD storage
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Per-key RGB lighting and superior touchpad
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Cons
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Steep starting price
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14-inch screen may be small for some gaming enthusiasts
The Bottom Line
The Blade 14 is an all-new gaming-laptop design for Razer, bringing the trademark premium build (and AMD CPU power!) to a size and component sweet spot between the Blade Stealth 13 and Blade 15.
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