HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i review: A well-designed 2-in-1 with smart pen storage | usagoldmines.com

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The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i is a 13-inch convertible laptop aimed at knowledge workers. It’s a solid convertible PC with a thoughtful design.

This laptop has a built-in pen slot so you can take your pen with you without worrying about losing it. That’s the kind of excellent touch that barely shows up on a spec sheet but really matters in day-to-day use. It all adds up to a comfortable day-to-day experience, although the display’s specs are on the weak side and you shouldn’t buy this machine if you’re looking for an “AI laptop.”

HP recently redesigned its product names, and the EliteBook is HP’s line of laptops aimed at business users. The 8 Series is the entry level line of EliteBooks, and the “G1i” here means this is a first-generation model in the new lineup with an Intel CPU.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Specs

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i comes with an Intel Core Ultra Series 2 processor — that’s an Arrow Lake-based chip, not Lunar Lake. Arrow Lake offers decent performance, but its neural processing unit is too slow for Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC requirements. Specifically, our review model had an Intel Core Ultra 7 265U CPU. Worth noting: While Intel’s Arc graphics are impressive, the Intel integrated graphics here are far behind what Intel is capable of producing.

Business laptops tend to be upgradable, so it’s worth noting that the LPDDR5X RAM in this machine is soldered and not user upgradable. (The AMD-powered HP EliteBook 8 G1a I reviewed at the same time does have user-upgradable RAM.)

The Intel NPU in this machine runs at up to 12 TOPS, which is much too slow for Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC requirements. It’s 2025, and manufacturers need to stop releasing “AI PCs” that don’t run the built-in Windows AI features. Even if you do have an app that uses an NPU for AI features, you’d want a faster NPU than this one.

If you don’t care about AI PC features, that’s fine, and this is still a solid machine. HP offers other G1i models with hardware that does meet Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC requirements, but there’s no G1i Flip model that does meet this bar. (This shouldn’t be so complicated.)

• Model number: HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i 13-inch
• CPU: Intel Core Ultra 7 265U
• Memory: 16GB LPDDR5X RAM
• Graphics/GPU: Intel graphics
• NPU: Intel AI Boost (up to 12 TOPS)
• Display: 13.3-inch 1920×1200 IPS display with 60Hz refresh rate and touch screen
• Storage: 512GB PCIe NVMe SSD
• Webcam: 1440p webcam
• Connectivity: 2x Thunderbolt 4 (USB Type-C 40 Gbps), 1x USB Type-C (10 Gbps), 1x HDMI 2.1 out, 1x combo audio jack, 1x USB Type-A (5 Gbps)
• Networking: Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4
• Biometrics: Fingerprint reader and IR camera for facial recognition
• Battery capacity: 62 Watt-hour battery
• Dimensions: 11.88 x 8.51 x 0.61 inches
• Weight: 3.08 pounds
• MSRP: $2,024 as tested

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Design and build quality

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The 13-inch HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i is available in a “Glacier Silver” color, and it has a metal chassis that feels solid in a good way. At just over three pounds, it’s a reasonable size and feels premium and high-quality.

HP delivered a minimal design here without a lot of flash — silver metal, a black bezel around the display, and a few unobtrusive HP logos. For a portable 13-inch convertible laptop, this machine has a surprising number of ports.

My favorite convertible feature here is the “garaged pen” or “nested pen” — you can insert the pen into a slot on the side of the laptop and store it there. You’ll always have the pen available with the laptop, and you don’t have to worry about losing it if the pen bumps against something in your bag. (I once had a Microsoft Surface Pro 2, and I lost my Surface Pen somewhere, because the magnetic connection was so weak that it was always trying to escape. It eventually did.)

The hinge here feels smooth, solid, and stable. You can open it 360 degrees to lay the laptop flat or use it in tent mode, which is ideal if you’ll be using that pen on the screen.

This machine includes built-in HP Wolf security. That will be a boon to enterprises who want to remotely manage these PCs, but I didn’t like the default end-user experience as an individual knowledge worker — it forced me to click through extra security dialogs to run applications like PCWorld’s usual benchmark tools.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Keyboard, trackpad, and pen

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i has large keyboard that’s responsive and feels good to use. While the keyboard here feels like it doesn’t have as much travel as the 16-inch HP EliteBook 8 G1a I reviewed at the same time, it still doesn’t feel mushy. 13-inch convertibles aren’t known for their keyboards, so this is solid. I do wish there were full-size arrow keys, however, I use the arrow keys a lot. I’ll never get fully used to having the arrow keys be the smallest keys on the keyboard.

The trackpad here is large for a 13-inch laptop and makes good use of the available space. The surface feels good, and the click-down action feels satisfying. I would’ve liked to see a haptic trackpad, but this feels good.

This isn’t a glass trackpad, though — that’s a higher-end feature for premium machines that makes the surface feel even smoother. Additionally, the trackpad and keyboard are both quiet. This is nice to have on a business laptop where you may not want a lot of loud click-clacking.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The pen is a standout feature here. It’s an active pen that works well for writing notes in OneNote and drawing. But the garage is a serious innovation: Having the pen be “garaged” in the laptop itself ensures it’s always close at hand and there’s no concern of losing it. Plus, the pen charges itself inside the laptop, so you don’t have to go out of your way to charge it. The manufacturers of other convertible laptops should learn from what HP is doing here. It may be a bit thinner than some other pens I’ve used, but I could hold it just fine and I think many people would prefer having a slightly thinner pen that’s always at hand.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Display and speakers

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i has a 13.3-inch 1920×1200 IPS display with a 60 Hz refresh rate. Those are pretty average display specs, which makes them low for a laptop in this price range. Our review model had a display with 400 nits of brightness, which is nothing special and HP even offers a model with just 300 nits of brightness, which sounds quite dim.

The display is serviceable, and it looks fine, but it’s just nothing special. Many consumer laptops in this price range have displays with a higher display resolution, faster refresh rate, more brightness, or other nice-to-have specs like an OLED display. While the display here is fine, this is the part of the experience that stings the most. While HP offers variants with more brightness and other features, you can’t get this laptop with a higher-resolution display or a faster refresh rate.

The Flip’s stereo speakers sound better than I’d expect for a 13-inch laptop. To my ear, the sound on this machine even sounded better than it did on the 16-inch HP EliteBook 8 G1a I reviewed at the same time. These speakers can pump out a good amount of volume. I test each laptop I review by playing Steely Dan’s Aja and Daft Punk’s Get Lucky.

While you don’t get the kind of crisp instrument separation here that you would with a higher-end audiophile setup, audio sounded “full.” In Get Lucky, the sound was reasonably fun, and the bass sounded better than it had any right to for the size of the laptop, but you’d still want to use headphones for the best media experience.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Webcam, microphone, biometrics

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i has a 5-megapixel 1440p webcam that HP seems proud of. It’s just a standard business webcam. I was expecting a bit more given how HP talked it up. It’s fine, but it’s a little noisy and seems to do better with bright lighting. I wouldn’t want to use this built-in webcam to record YouTube videos, but you’ll look clear enough in business meetings. This machine does have a physical privacy shutter so you can cover the webcam.

The dual-array microphones here sound good but not amazing, although the background noise removal worked well. Business laptops often focus on microphone and webcam quality, and this feels average for a business laptop webcam. If you want a higher-end, crisper representation of your voice, you’ll want an external microphone. If you just want to be heard properly on video calls, this is more than good enough.

This machine has both an IR camera for Windows Hello and a fingerprint reader at the top-right corner of the keyboard. Both worked well on our review model, and you have the option of signing in with either your face or a fingerprint.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Connectivity

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i has a generous selection of ports, especially for a 13-inch 2-in-1 laptop. You get a total of three USB Type-C ports and two of them are Thunderbolt 4 ports, too.

On the left side, this machine has two Thunderbolt 4 (USB Type-C 40 Gbps) ports, an HDMI 2.1 out port, and a combo audio jack. On the right side, there’s another USB Type-C port (10 Gbps), a USB Type-A (5 Gbps) port, and a security lock slot.

Because there’s at least one USB Type-C port on each side of the laptop, you can plug the charging cable in on either side. That’s a great quality-of-life feature.

HP also offers some models of this laptop with a Smart Card Reader and nano SIM card slot for cellular connectivity, but there are no models with any type of SD card slot.

The review unit HP provided had Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 radios. This machine supports the latest wireless standards, and I had no problems with wireless networking.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Performance

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i we reviewed had a modern Intel Core Ultra 7 265U CPU (that’s Intel Arrow Lake) with Intel graphics, 16GB of RAM, and an NVMe SSD. That’s solid hardware for getting good day-to-day performance from the web browsers, productivity apps, and communication tools you’d be running on a business PC. But let’s dig deeper.

As always, we ran the HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i through our standard benchmarks to see how it performs.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

First, we run PCMark 10 to get an idea of overall system performance. With an overall PCMark 10 score of 6,968, the HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i came in a bit behind some other recent convertible laptops in terms of overall performance, but only a little bit, and it’s a smaller, more compact machine.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

Next, we run Cinebench R20. This is a heavily multithreaded benchmark that focuses on overall CPU performance. It’s a quick benchmark, so cooling under extended workloads isn’t a factor. But since it’s heavily multithreaded, CPUs with more cores have a huge advantage.

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i and its 12-core CPU produced a Cinebench R20 multithreaded score of 4,322. That’s a solid score for this type of machine, and let’s be honest: You’re not buying a 13-inch convertible PC with a pen if you plan on running CPU-heavy workloads. That’s not what this form factor is for.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

We also run an encode with Handbrake. This is another heavily multithreaded benchmark, but it runs over an extended period of time. This demands the laptop’s cooling kick in, and many laptops will throttle and slow down under load.

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i finished the encode process in an average of 1,515 seconds — that’s over 25 minutes. If sustained CPU performance is your goal, this type of machine isn’t ideal for you, but you can see Arrow Lake beating a Lunar Lake system (the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 10 Aura Edition) by a bit here.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

Next, we run a graphical benchmark. This isn’t a gaming laptop, but it’s still good to check how the GPU performs. We run 3Dmark Time Spy, a graphical benchmark that focuses on GPU performance.

With a 3Dmark Time Spy score of 2,362, the Intel integrated graphics in this machine did not impress. While Intel’s Arc graphics is now surprisingly good, don’t assume that all Intel integrated graphics has become impressive. If you plan on playing PC games or running demanding 3D applications, look for a Lunar Lake PC.

Overall, the HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i’s performance was fine. The story here is just the story of this Intel’s Core Ultra 7 265U. It’s fine, but the graphics performance really chafes. After Intel showed it could deliver serious graphics horsepower, I don’t like seeing $2,000 laptops with graphics performance this low.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Battery life

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i has a 62 Watt-hour battery, which is a reasonable size for a 13-inch 2-in-1 machine. It delivered solid battery life in day-to-day use. Intel’s Arrow Lake CPU isn’t quite as power efficient as with Intel Lunar Lake and Qualcomm Snapdragon X processors, but it still delivers long-lasting performance.

Foundry / Chris Hoffman

To benchmark the battery life, we play a 4K copy of Tears of Steel on repeat on Windows 11 with airplane mode enabled until the laptop suspends itself. We set the screen to 250 nits of brightness for our battery benchmarks. This is a best-case scenario for any laptop since local video playback is so efficient, and real battery life in day-to-day use is always going to be less than this.

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i lasted an average of 964 minutes in our benchmarks — that’s over 16 hours. That’s a solid number, and while real-world battery life will be substantially less, you should be able to get all-day battery life from this machine depending on your workload. That’s what really matters for business users, and the Flip delivers. But it would be nice to see Lunar Lake-level battery life here.

HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i: Conclusion

The HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i is exactly what it appears to be. As a machine for businesses, HP has gone out of the way to make this laptop feel premium with a thoughtfully designed metal chassis, a spacious keyboard, and the best pen storage and charging system I’ve ever seen on a laptop.

But not all parts of this machine are quite so premium. I was expecting more from the webcam and microphone, and the display is the main part of the machine that doesn’t stand out.

As far as performance, the story here is the story of Intel’s CPU troubles. After reviewing Lunar Lake laptops, I wince at seeing $2,000 Intel-powered productivity laptops with significantly lower graphics performance and power efficiency. And the Arrow Lake CPU here doesn’t deliver noticeably faster performance than Lunar Lake CPUs in our benchmarks.

If you’re looking for a long-lasting, power-efficient portable PC, you should seriously consider getting a Lunar Lake-powered machine.

But this laptop is still good, and if your workplace gets one for you, you may just love it, especially if you frequently use a pen and don’t want to juggle it.