The HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 (starts at $2,599; $4,019 as configured) is a compact 14-inch workstation laptop with a wild twist: It has no discrete graphics processor (dGPU) inside. Instead of the usual Nvidia chip, this little workstation uses AMD's top Ryzen AI Max+ Pro processor and its integrated graphics processor (IGP) with as much as 128GB of unified memory. The result is a surprisingly capable workstation that excels at everything but particularly intense visual demands, but this, combined with lagging battery life, keeps this laptop from winning any awards. Regardless, the HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is still a compelling new option in the workstation category and possibly a glimpse of what tomorrow's pro-power laptops will look like. Our go-to compact mobile workstation remains the Editors’ Choice award-winning Dell Precision 5490 for weighing less and lasting longer on a charge despite its dedicated GPU.

Configurations: Priced for Professionals

The HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is a highly configurable machine for pros. Its starting price is $2,599, but it was on sale for $1,889 at the time of publishing. That entry-level model gives you a healthy foundation, with an AMD Ryzen AI Max Pro 380 processor with integrated graphics, 32GB of memory, 512GB of storage, and an FHD IPS display. But to unlock the machine's true power, you’ll want to consider some of the premium options.

Our review unit sells for $4,019 as a balanced configuration optimized for serious workloads. It's built with an AMD Ryzen AI Max+ Pro 395 processor (with 16 cores and 32 threads) and a massive 128GB of LPDDR5X-8533 RAM. It also comes with an impressive 14-inch, 2.8K (2,880 by 1,800) OLED touch display, but I’ll get into more of the specifics later.

If you really want to maximize your machine, you can bump the storage up to 4TB. Remember that the ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is a "configure-to-order" machine, so you can't upgrade components later on—the memory, for instance, is soldered to the motherboard. You can choose LPDDR5X RAM from 16GB to 128GB and an SSD from 512GB to 4TB. You can also choose between a vibrant OLED touch display and a high-quality FHD IPS panel.

Graphics: Nothing Discrete About It

When you hear “mobile workstation,” you probably picture a hefty, thick laptop with a loud fan and a separate graphics chip. That's because professional applications like CAD, video rendering, and complex data analysis have always needed the muscle of a dedicated GPU to perform well. But the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ Pro 395 inside the ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is a game-changer. This chip, built on AMD's new Zen 5 "Strix Halo" architecture, puts a massive 16-core, 32-thread processor and a potent AMD Radeon 8060S IGP on a single die.

It's a unique combination for a Windows machine that gives you desktop-class performance in a chassis thin and light enough to be truly mobile. Still, it's not entirely unprecedented. For a few years now, Apple has been delivering workstation-grade performance in the MacBook Pro models. In many ways, AMD's shared memory and IGP approach is an example of a new computing paradigm we may see more of in the near future.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

What makes this particularly unusual for a workstation is that this IGP can eliminate the need for a separate power-hungry graphics card for many professional tasks. The Radeon 8060S IGP is so powerful that it rivals or exceeds the speed of many entry-level discrete GPUs, thanks to its 40 Compute Units and its ability to dynamically scale its power draw up to 120W when plugged in. This IGP allows for a much thinner laptop and provides class-leading memory bandwidth and advanced AI acceleration, uniquely suited for the next generation of creative and data-driven workloads. Speaking of workloads, despite the lack of a discrete GPU, the ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is ISV-certified for leading creative and engineering applications—including common platforms like Adobe (Creative Suite), Microsoft, AutoCAD, and SolidWorks.

While this beefed-up IGP unlocks so much more to reasonably work on for thin-and-light systems, you'll see in our benchmark testing that this implementation has a relatively low output ceiling in more demanding applications despite its access to so much more memory. IGP-led workstations may be the future that so many—Apple, Intel, and Nvidia included—are gunning for, but their takeover is further off.

Design: Looks Like a Business Laptop, Feels Like a Workstation

The HP ZBook Ultra G1a is a surprisingly portable machine for a workstation laptop. Measuring 0.71-inch thick and weighing about 3.5 pounds (it varies slightly between the OLED model we reviewed and the IPS model, but only a little), it's the lightest mobile workstation we've reviewed, looking and feeling more like a business laptop, but with exceptional performance. Just be aware that the charger is bigger and heavier than what you'd get for a standard work laptop, to power the high-performing hardware inside.

The ZBook Ultra’s aluminum body is sturdy and sleek, and it won't be out of place in a meeting. But it's also built for ruggedness, to survive everything from the commute to a business trip. The frame even holds up satisfyingly well when you do something simple, like lift the open laptop by one corner of the palmrest—you’ll feel no flexing, just steadfast support that doesn't weigh too much.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Our model included the 14-inch OLED touch screen. With 2.8K (2,880-by-1,800) resolution, the display quality is excellent. In addition to the vibrant color quality and crisp contrast you'd expect from an OLED panel, it also has a variable refresh rate, syncing to content up to 120 frames per second. And with blue light reduction, it should even help prevent eye strain. The touch screen is an unusual option on a workstation, but note that this model only supports fingertips; you'll find no stylus or pen option here.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The ZBook's speakers, made by HP-owned Poly Audio, produce decent volume and rich sound. Arranged in a quad-speaker array, positioned on either side of the keyboard, they pump out excellent audio, though the bass is pretty anemic without any sort of woofer built in.

The G1a also has a 5MP webcam, which records with sharp enough image quality, accurate color quality, and capable low-light performance, so you'll look slick on Zoom even if you're in a poorly lit office. Plus, the laptop has a pair of microphones (also Poly Audio) for tailor-made voice capture and ambient sound reduction. The webcam and mics get an AI-infused software boost, making everything look and sound better. And, because it also has IR and human presence detection sensors, the webcam doubles as a security device, with Windows Hello facial recognition for easy, secure logins and dimming or locking the laptop when you step away.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The biometric security extends to the keyboard, where the power button does double duty as a fingerprint sensor. The whole keyboard is pretty comfortable, with a complete 84-key layout and premium feel, thanks to keys that provide a balance of soft touch and sufficient feedback, all with a deep 1.5mm key travel. You’ll find no numpad here, but we wouldn't expect one on a 14-inch system.

Below the keyboard is an extra-large glass clickpad (5.0 by 3.1 inches), extending vertically from the space bar to the lip of the palmrest with only the slimmest of margins around it. The pad has an image sensor for high accuracy and fast responses with flawless palm rejection, while the glass surface glides easily for all your multitouch gestures. The mechanical click provides a satisfying tactile feel that haptic pads can't quite replicate.

The ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is protected at every level—from the hardware up—using dedicated security chips, live malware isolation, and a BIOS that can heal itself from deep attacks. This design prevents hackers from getting in, even with the most advanced methods, and keeps your device secure, even if something goes wrong.

Multiple security features are collected under the HP Wolf Security umbrella, including the abovementioned methods, and advanced threat containment through micro-virtualization, isolating risky files and activities in hardware-enforced secure containers to prevent malware spread. It also integrates next-generation AI-driven antivirus and anti-phishing tools to proactively detect and block sophisticated malware and phishing attacks. And it provides real-time threat analytics for IT teams, protecting a single machine and a company's entire fleet of HP devices.

Ports and Connectivity: The Latest and Greatest Hookups

The HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 is a well-connected laptop, though its port selection is slightly lighter than standard workstations. On the left, you'll find a USB-C port (10Gbps, with Power Delivery and DisplayPort 2.1 support), an HDMI 2.1 output, a 3.5mm combo audio jack, and a 40Gbps Thunderbolt 4 port.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The right side houses a USB-A port (with charging support), a security lock slot, and a second Thunderbolt 4 port. We might have liked to see a full-size SD card reader or an Ethernet jack for a hardwired network connection, but this setup is still quite versatile, as both Thunderbolt 4 ports are compatible with a wide array of docking stations.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The laptop includes Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, and an optional NFC module for wireless connectivity. You can connect up to four external displays when docked, making this a fine option for a stationary setup.

Performance Testing: Embattled Ultraportable

The HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 may be an unusual workstation. However, it's still an ISV-certified machine for heavy-duty number crunching, so we compared it against some of the best workstation laptops around, like the Dell Precision 5490 ($3,897 as tested), Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 ($4,019 as tested), the AMD-powered Editors' Choice winner HP ZBook Power 16 G11 A ($2,629 as tested), and the exemplar iGPU workstation, the Apple MacBook Pro 16-Inch (2024, M4 Pro) ($3,649 as tested), which also uses shared memory and GPU-level graphics on the CPU chip die for peak performance.

Productivity and Content Creation Tests 

We run the same general productivity benchmarks across both mobile and desktop systems. Our primary overall benchmark, UL's PCMark 10, puts a system through its paces in productivity apps ranging from web browsing to word processing and spreadsheet work. Its Full System Drive subtest measures a PC's storage throughput. 

Three more tests are CPU-centric or processor-intensive. Maxon's Cinebench 2024 uses that company's Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene; Primate Labs' Geekbench 6.3 Pro simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning; and we see how long it takes the freeware video transcoder HandBrake 1.8 to convert a 12-minute clip from 4K to 1080p resolution.

Finally, workstation maker Puget Systems' PugetBench for Creators rates a PC's image editing prowess with a variety of automated operations that it performs in Adobe Photoshop 25.

In terms of pure productivity, the ZBook Ultra G1a more than held its own, frequently beating the Precision 5490, the ZBook Power laptop, and the ThinkPad P16 Gen 2. In PCMark 10, the ZBook Ultra placed second, though it pulled up the rear in the storage comparison, if not by much. And if not for the dominant MacBook Pro, the Ultra would have posted leading scores in HandBrake, where it tied the MacBook, and Cinebench, where it came in second. Ditto for Geekbench and Photoshop, though the Mac’s advantages were much more pronounced in those tests. Despite trailing the MacBook Pro throughout the benchmarks, for day-to-day productivity and plenty of more intense, results-driven tasks, the G1a is a petite powerhouse.

Graphics Tests

We challenge all systems’ graphics with a quintet of animations or gaming simulations from UL's 3DMark test suite. Wild Life (1440p) and Wild Life Extreme (4K) use the Vulkan graphics API to measure GPU speeds. 

Steel Nomad's regular and Light subtests focus on APIs more commonly used for game development, like Metal and DirectX 12, to assess gaming geometry and particle effects.

We turn to Solar Bay to measure ray tracing performance in a synthetic environment. This benchmark works with native APIs, subjecting 3D scenes to increasingly intense ray-traced workloads at 1440p. (Some systems couldn't produce results for one or more of these subtests, so they've been omitted from those charts.)

It's in graphics testing where the G1a starts to show its imperfections. The integrated Radeon GPU is massively capable compared with something like Intel HD Graphics or AMD's usual integrated solutions. But while it posted admirable marks in our various 3DMark tests, it routinely fell behind competitors like the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 2, which produced dramatically better results in those same tests. This scenario is where the limitations of integrated graphics begin to show: in demanding 3D rendering tasks. This outcome plays out again in another GPU-bound test below.

Workstation-Specific Tests 

First, we measure workstation performance with SPECviewperf 2020 (version 3.1), which renders, rotates, and zooms in and out of solid and wireframe models at 1080p resolution. The three subtests represent PTC's Creo CAD platform, Autodesk's Maya modeling and simulation software for film, TV, and games, and Dassault Systèmes' SolidWorks 3D rendering package.

Next is Blender, an open-source 3D content creation suite for modeling, animation, simulation, and compositing. We record the time it takes for Blender 4.2 to render three distinct scenes to measure CPU and GPU rendering performance.

Then, we run an automated PugetBench extension in Adobe Premiere Pro that tests real-world video editing tasks like live playback, file export, and high-res encoding with different codecs, processing and decoding different types of source media, and applying GPU-accelerated special effects.

Finally, we also use PugetBench for Creators to test DaVinci Resolve Studio 18 video editor performance on systems suitable for that challenging app. As with Adobe Premiere, these automated tasks and features push the CPU and GPU, letting us gauge real-world media creation speeds. (Some systems could not produce results for one or more of these benchmarks, so they've been omitted from those charts.)

The HP ZBook Ultra G1a 14 held its own in most of these tests, which is a real testament to the capabilities of the AMD Ryzen AI MAX+ Pro 395 processor and graphics (not to mention the impressive 128GB of shared memory it used in our review unit). But it wasn't a clear win across the board. In tests that require a combination of CPU and GPU power, the ZBook Ultra managed excellent scores, as seen in SPECviewperf and the Blender CPU test. But in the Blender GPU tests, which shifted the workload entirely to the ZBook's AMD Radeon 8060S graphics, the numbers dropped precipitously, landing in the 100-to-200 range where competitors scored hundreds or thousands of points.

The takeaway? The HP ZBook Ultra G1a is a step above the best business laptops in raw power for number crunching and media work, and it provides a unique spin on the mobile workstation. However, you'll want something more traditional, with a dedicated GPU for pure power.

Battery and Display Tests

We test each laptop and tablet's battery life by playing a locally stored 720p video file (the open-source Blender movie Tears of Steel) with display brightness at 50% and audio volume at 100%. We make sure the battery is fully charged before the test, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.

To gauge display performance, we also use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Windows software to measure a laptop screen's color saturation—what percentage of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 color gamuts or palettes the display can show—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per square meter).

The ZBook Ultra G1a 14's AMD Ryzen AI Max+ PRO hardware again proves to be an interesting wrinkle when comparing it against other products. Where other 16-core chips have a TDP of something like 55 watts (W), the advanced capabilities of the ZBook can push this laptop up to 70W or more under heavy load. And while the integrated Radeon 8060S GPU may be more efficient than the average dedicated Nvidia GPU when comparing peak power consumption, it's also the integrated option for the CPU to use, so it's always active. The relatively high power draw and IGP load may explain why the battery life was so short in our testing, even compared with other power-hungry workstations. Even the 14-inch Dell Precision 5490 lasted more than 14 hours, and it doesn't have room for a larger battery like the 16-inch models we mentioned.

HP’s display, on the other hand, is excellent. The OLED panel stands head and shoulders above even the best competitors, with superb color quality. The brightness is a bit low, but that's expected for an OLED panel, which doesn't have the same backlight as an IPS display.