HP – Omnibook 5 – 14” 2K OLED Touchscreen Laptop – Intel Core 5 Series 3 (2026) – 8GB Memory – 512GB SSD – Smoke Silver

Great value for students and general office use - The new 2026 Omnibook 5 14 OLED is a good basic laptop at a reasonable price. It’s not intended to be a powerhouse for creators or gamers, but it’s a solid choice for everyday use. The build quality is good. It has an all-metal case that’s very compact and thin (less half an inch), and it’s very lightweight at just over 2.5 lbs. The battery life is rated at up to 22 hours of “everyday” use. These features along with a compact USB-C GaN 65W mini wall charger make it a very portable laptop. The 2K OLED touchscreen is sharp with deep, saturated colors and high contrast are great for all uses and a joy when streaming videos and movies. There’s an excellent touchpad, an above average keyboard, and speakers with good sound quality. Adding to its value is the previously mentioned exceptional battery life. Connectivity includes a full-sized HDMI 2.1 port, two USB-C high speed PD ports, and a headphone/microphone jack. The internal specs are mid-level with an Intel Core 5 Series 3 processor, a 521 GB SSD, 8 GB RAM, and WIFI 6e. The FHD IR camera has HDR auto-switching which provides a quality picture in a variety of lighting conditions. It also supports face recognition log-in which was quick and reliable. The non-expandable 8 GB of RAM is minimal for Windows, especially when it’s shared with the graphics system. Windows is reportedly working on reducing its memory usage, but Copilot and AI features can consume significant resources in the background. After startup without user apps running Task Manager showed 65% of the memory in use. With that said, it handled everyday tasks such as browsing, email, Office apps, video streaming and conferencing quickly and smoothly even with multiple apps and windows open. The Omnibook 5 is a well-built, highly portable laptop that offers strong value for students and general office users. It is worth considering if you need a reliable device for everyday tasks.

RAM reduction?? - The HP OmniBook 5 14-inch AI PC is a nice everyday laptop with a lot going for it, but there's one decision HP made with this newer model that I really don't understand: cutting the RAM in half. What?! Ok hang on, let’s at least start with the positives. I like the overall design. It's slim, lightweight, portable, so a good option if you’re going to be carrying this around. The 14-inch OLED touchscreen is another highlight. Picture is sharp, nice vibrant colors. Really no complaints here. The newer Intel Core 5 processor is an interesting addition, big change from last model’s Snapdragon. I like Intel and frankly, I know it better so I appreciate having an Intel-based system without some of the software compatibility concerns associated with the Snapdragon processors in previous OmniBook models. We’re good here for general productivity, everyday use, etc. The 512GB SSD is also a reasonable amount of storage for a laptop in this category. BUT!! Now we have to talk about my biggest complaint: the RAM. The previous-generation OmniBook 5 configuration came with 16GB of RAM, while this newer model has just 8GB. That's a pretty significant step backward, especially considering that we're moving into a new generation of the product (running Windows 11, AI, etc.) I would expect specifications to improve or, at the very least, remain comparable rather than take a noticeable downgrade. To be fair, 8GB is still perfectly usable for basic tasks. If you're primarily browsing the internet, checking email, streaming, or working with documents, it's not necessarily going to be a problem. However, multitasking can quickly eat into that memory, especially with multiple browser tabs and applications running simultaneously. With 16GB becoming increasingly common, 8GB feels like a limitation that could affect how well this laptop holds up over time. And frankly, I can get a laptop for half this price that runs 8 GB RAM. Granted, you’d sacrifice on other things but… it’s worth noting… What makes that decision even more frustrating is that the RAM isn't something you can simply upgrade later. You're stuck with what HP gives you. For a laptop at this level, I really think 16GB should have been the starting point. Overall, I like the OmniBook 5. The OLED display is excellent, the lightweight design makes it convenient, and the Intel processor is a sensible choice. It's a good laptop for everyday use, and there are plenty of reasons to be happy with it. However, I can't overlook the reduction in RAM, particularly when the previous generation offered twice as much. It feels like an unnecessary compromise on an otherwise well-rounded laptop. I'm giving it 4 out of 5 stars. It's a solid machine with some very appealing features, but HP really should have kept the 16GB of RAM. That one decision keeps it at 4 stars.