The latest in Acer’s lineup of annual green laptops, the Aspire Vero laptop (reviewed at $750) brings a fresher change than usual, thanks to one of Intel’s new AI-powered processors on its logic board. Equipped with a 16-inch 16:10 WQXGA (1,920 by 1,600) display, a thinner design, and a 1440p webcam, the 2024 Vero makes for a decent productivity machine—on paper, at least. In practice, the latest Vero shows measurable gains but not a competitive performance boost. Even if this year's carbon-neutral Acer Aspire Vero is one of the cheapest entry points into Intel Core Ultra, it's on about the same level as last year's model.
Configuration: A New Intel Chip
Aside from its carbon-neutral footprint, the most interesting thing about the Aspire Vero is its new Intel Core Ultra processor. Intel’s codenamed “Meteor Lake” laptop CPUs were released in late 2023 as Core Ultra but have now become part of almost every laptop released this year. Featuring Intel's new neural processing unit (NPU), the new silicon promises a wave of powerful new features, including extensive AI integration.
The Acer Aspire Vero uses an Intel Core Ultra 5 125U (though an Ultra Core 7 model is set to release sometime in June). The U-series processors are tailored for thin-and-light systems, like ultraportable laptops and 2-in-1 convertibles. The "U" stands for ultra-low power, and the processors, though capable, are built for efficiency and portability. U-series chips are perfect for all manner of productivity tasks, though they’re not as powerful as the H-series chips most common in gaming laptops.
Still, the Acer Aspire Vero is one of the cheapest entry points into Intel’s new ecosystem (unless you count the MSI Claw, which employs an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H). With 16GB of RAM and 512GB SSD, this Vero seems more than battle-ready.
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Design: The Greenest Laptop
Of course, the Acer Aspire Vero’s true claim to fame is its commitment to its carbon-neutral footprint. From touchpads made of reclaimed ocean-bound plastic to 100% recyclable packaging and a chassis made of 60% post-consumer recycling (PCR), this year’s Vero is by far the greenest computer on the market. Acer reflects this in its design, opting for a cement-colored chassis with a smooth, speckled surface. Turning it over, you'll find accents of aquamarine along the laptop’s rubber feet and hinges.
Despite the size differences, its design is similar to previous Vero models, albeit slightly bigger. Unlike the 2023 Acer Aspire Vero, the 2024 Vero only comes in one color. At 0.6 by 14.1 by 9.7 inches (HWD), it’s roughly 15% thinner than last year’s model and even other 16-inchers like the MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo, which measures 0.7 by 14.1 by 10 inches. At 3.7 pounds, however, it is a bit heavier.
Moving to the keys, you’ll find a familiar scene—a standard island-style keyboard with dedicated shortcuts (including the new Microsoft Co-pilot button). While not as satisfying as a mechanical keyboard, the low-profile scissor switches have fans and are still far from the rubber membranes of cheaper laptops and keyboards. And yes, the Vero’s stylized R and E Keys return (which are reversed on purpose).
The aforementioned recycled touchpad sits just under, and while I enjoy the wide surface area and fingerprint reader, I find myself misclicking often. My clicks barely give any feedback, and usually, I have to press two or three times for a click to register.
My review unit uses a WUXGA (1,920 by 1,200) LCD with a 16:10 aspect ratio wrapped by a thin bezel—a slight upgrade from last year's FHD (1,920 by 1,080) 16:9 screen. You won't find a touch-screen option here, but that’s probably not too much of a loss on a laptop like this. A QHD (2,560 by 1,440) webcam is tucked away at the center of the top bezel, complete with a privacy shutter.
Features and Connectivity: Mixing Legacy Outputs With the Latest Tech
On the left and right flanks, you’ll find the lion’s share of the Vero’s ports, which include an HDMI 2.1 port, a headphone jack, two USB-C ports (with support for USB4), two USB-A ports, and a lock slot. You won't find a microSD card slot or Ethernet port here, but aside from that, it’s standard fare across the board. However, the Vero has a few more features, making it more than just an eco-friendly driver.
One such addition is Wi-Fi 7, which is four times faster than Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E, with maximum data rates of 9.6Gbps. It’s also about six times faster than Wi-Fi 5, which maxes out at 6.9Gbps. This allows for faster download speeds, reduced latency, and increased network capacity.
The new model also supports Bluetooth LE Audio, which enhances the performance of Bluetooth audio. The Vero is also MIL-STD-810H certified, which is a fancy way of saying it is heat-resistant, water- and dust-resistant, and shock-resistant. For a laptop made mostly of recycled parts, it can take a beating.
Testing the Acer Aspire Vero (2024): Midrange Defined
The Acer Aspire Vero 16 is a familiar laptop on its surface, with a bleeding-edge Intel heart, but to see how much of a difference the new silicon makes, we've compared its performance with a few other laptops in its size class using similar system configurations. The laptops joining the Vero for this benchmark gauntlet include the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 12 (2024), the Lenovo Yoga 7i 16 Gen 9, the MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo, and the MSI Modern 15 (2023), which uses one of Intel’s 13th Gen CPUs.
Productivity and Content Creation Tests
We run the same general productivity benchmarks across both mobile and desktop systems. Our first test is UL's PCMark 10, which simulates a variety of real-world productivity and office workflows to measure overall system performance and also includes a storage subtest for the primary drive.
Our other three benchmarks focus on the CPU, using all available cores and threads, to rate a PC's suitability for processor-intensive workloads. Maxon's Cinebench R23 uses that company's Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene, while Geekbench 5.4 Pro from Primate Labs simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning. Finally, we use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to convert a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p resolution (lower times are better).
Finally, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Systems. It uses Adobe's famous image editor, Creative Cloud version 22, to rate a PC's performance for content creation and multimedia applications. It's an automated extension that executes a variety of general and GPU-accelerated Photoshop tasks, from opening, rotating, resizing, and saving an image to applying masks, gradient fills, and filters.
The Vero couldn't keep pace with the competition in these tests. We weren't too surprised to see the H-series processors take the lead, not to mention the 13th Gen Core i9 within the MSI Modern, but even the Lenovo Yoga with the same chip inside kept pace with or bested the Vero. This likely comes down to implementation and cooling: The Lenovo Yoga tested here is larger and thicker than the Vero, leaving more room for cooling and, therefore, more power without throttling.
Graphics Tests
We test the graphics inside all laptops and desktops with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL's 3DMark, Night Raid (more modest, suitable for laptops with integrated graphics) and Time Spy (more demanding, suitable for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs).
To further measure GPUs, we also run two tests from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like image rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Car Chase tests are rendered offscreen to accommodate different display resolutions, exercise graphics, and compute shaders using the OpenGL programming interface and hardware tessellation, respectively. The more frames per second (fps), the better.
The Vero performed better here, but these results aren't all that relevant to what you're most likely to use it for. It's important to note that the Vero is not a gaming laptop by any stretch despite its size. Betraying that caveat, the Vero can still handle games that aren't too demanding and low-detail settings, but more appropriately, it's well-equipped for streaming high-res movies and other videos.
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).
Acer promises around 10.5 hours of battery life on a single charge, but we got a little more from that, topping out at barely more than 13 hours. We also found that the Vero has a brightly shining screen—in fact, this was one of the few tests it did remarkably well on (the other being the PCMark Storage Test). Perhaps more damning, the performance gains across the board aren't that much better than last year's model, though that's more of an indictment on the quality of Intel's latest chips than Acer's laptop.
Verdict: Greener, But Not Markedly Better
Overall, we can't stay mad at Acer's green laptop, as it consistently finds ways to incorporate more PCR into its system year after year. It also remains an effective productivity machine for well below $1,000—a feat that is becoming rarer by the day. However, despite being one of the more affordable entry points into Intel's latest CPU, the Vero's performance isn't stellar. It's not terrible either, which makes the Acer Aspire Vero 16 a fine purchase for those looking to handle work and school with some play on the side. The Acer Aspire 3 (A315-24P) is a smart place for the most cash-strapped shoppers, but our Editors' Choice remains the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED Touch (UM3406).
The 2024 Acer Aspire Vero is the most sustainable laptop on the market and one of the most affordable ways to use Intel's latest silicon.
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