How the Huawei MateBook 16 became the ultimate Windows 11 laptop

Any search for the best laptop on the market at the moment has to involve the stylish, capable Huawei MateBook 16.

You might find that it's the best option for you, beating out the competition in terms of value for money, features, specs and battery life. It can go head-to-head against just about any laptop on the market at the moment.

For creative professionals and anyone looking to maximise their productivity, the Huawei MateBook 16 makes a lot of sense. Whether you work from home or from the office, it's a laptop that's likely to cover all your needs and then some.

As with any hardware purchase though, you need to make sure you've done all of the necessary research before spending the cash. With that in mind, we'll guide you through the key features of the laptop.

 A premium design matched with a beautiful screen

One glimpse at the Huawei MateBook 16 is enough to see just how well-engineered it is – and actually touching it is even better, thanks to the smooth matte finish in an eye-catching space grey, created by the precision ceramic sandblasted process that Huawei has used here.

Dominating the device is a glorious 16-inch, 2,520 x 1,680 display. The taller 3:2 aspect ratio makes it particularly suitable for office tasks – word processing, web browsing, editing spreadsheets – while at the same time the 300 nits of brightness means it works great as an entertainment device too. Whatever is on screen really shines.

It's the sort of laptop that feels finely crafted and carefully judged from just about every angle, and even with its 16-inch screen it remains lightweight and eminently portable. The laptop tips the scales at just 1.99 kilograms or 4.4 pounds, which isn't going to add a whole lot of weight to your bag. When you get it out of your bag to get on with some work, expect a few envious glances in your direction.

When closed the laptop is just 17.8 mm (0.7 inches) thick, and when you add in the contoured curves and spacious trackpad, it's a laptop you'll enjoy looking at as much as you'll enjoy using. You can get over 12 hours of battery life from the Huawei MateBook 16 as well, so you don't need to worry about spending a day away from a power source – the laptop is going to offer enough in the way of battery capacity to cope.

Features for staying productive and connected

The Huawei MateBook 16 feels like it was made for creative work, what with that 2.5K display resolution, close to 100 percent coverage of the sRGB gamut, a total of 1.07 billion colours and a 1,500:1 contrast ratio so text and images look pin sharp. With the Low Blue Light certification, you also know that you can work late into the evening when necessary, without putting too much of a strain on your eyes.

Most of us are doing a lot more video calling these days, and this is a laptop perfect for it: consider the 720p integrated webcam, the dual-mic configuration that can pick up audio from as far as five metres away, and the artificial intelligence that works behind the scenes to reduce echo and add noise cancellation.

Then there's the latest Windows 11 software: as one of the best Windows 11 laptops in the business, the Huawei MateBook 16 is able to take advantage of all the features and functionality Microsoft has packed into the OS, even before you get to the best-in-class tools like Adobe Photoshop that Windows is able to run.

If you need to hook up extra devices to this Huawei laptop, that's no problem at all: the computer boasts two USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 ports, two USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports, a 3.5 mm audio jack and a full-size HDMI 2.0 port. Compare that with the other laptops on the market and you'll see that it's relatively generous in terms of what you get.

Whether it's a secondary screen or an external hard drive, a digital camera or a USB-C hub, there's plenty of room for it all on the Huawei MateBook 16. Speaking of a secondary screen, the Huawei MateBook 16 is compatible with Huawei's Super Device technology, enabling you to use Huawei-branded phones, tablets and even smartwatches together to get stuff done faster. One of the features this includes is being able to use a Huawei tablet wirelessly as a second screen for the MateBook 16.

High-spec power for working anywhere 

Put any laptop up against the Huawei MateBook 16 and it stands up well: it offers a larger screen than the Apple MacBook Air, for example, it costs less than something like the HP Elite Dragonfly, and it packs in more pixels into the display than the LG Gram 17. Whatever metric you're using to choose your next laptop, this model from Huawei is definitely a contender.

With the multicore power of the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H on tap, paired with 16GB of RAM, you're not going to struggle to get tasks done on the Huawei MateBook 16. You can load up dozens of browser tabs or run a pile of applications alongside each other and the laptop won't get into difficulties, thanks to the superior heat management and high-performance silicon under the hood.

You also get 512GB of super-speedy SSD storage, reducing your reliance on external drives and the cloud, and Huawei has put this machine through some pretty demanding durability tests too – you're not going to have to worry about the laptop letting you down whether it's sat on your desk or on the move with you. We should mention the all-day battery life as well – this is a laptop that can power through everything you can throw at it and not have to worry about finding a charging point before the evening. It's an all-round champion suitable for all the computing tasks that are going to come your way.

When it's time to kick back and enjoy some entertainment on the laptop, you've got the screen that we've already mentioned, but there's also the sweet-sounding stereo speaker system: even at top volumes, you get audio that's clear and rich, so you don't necessarily have to plug in a pair of headphones or make use of an external speaker set. From playing podcasts to queueing up music while you work, it's a capable setup.

Just about every aspect of the Huawei MateBook 16 impresses, from the big features like the 16-inch screen to the more subtle ones such as the integrated fingerprint sensor – meaning you can log into Windows 11 in an instant, no password required. The icing on the cake is that the laptop is priced very competitively too. You can be sure that you're going to get great value and a fantastic return on your outlay as well.

To learn more about the Huawei MateBook 16's performance and features head on over to the official Huawei website.