Don’t be fooled by Fujitsu’s newest superlight Intel laptop

Following CES 2025, the newest and arguably coolest thin-and-light laptop on the block is the Asus Zenbook A14. That one doesn’t appear to be in anyone’s hands yet, but it already has a new challenger. The Fujitsu FMV Note U is an incredible 1.87 pounds (848 grams) and, perhaps even more impressively, it’s running an Intel CPU.

Asus and other laptop makers have been leaning on Qualcomm’s Arm-based Snapdragon X architecture to get laptops lighter as of late. But Fujitsu is sticking to Intel with a Core Ultra 7 258V in the base model. That stunning sub-two-pound weight class is well below the Zenbook A14, though I have to point out that its battery life estimate is a bit of a cheat.

The FMVWorld website (machine translated, via Tom’s Hardware) claims “36 hours of battery life” from 64 watt-hours, but that’s while using “long-term drive” mode. Elsewhere it says that the 36-hour figure is at idle (i.e., not doing anything). It quotes 15.5 hours of video playback, which is much more in line with the latest Lunar Lake laptops, and about half of the battery life of the Zenbook Z14 on the same test. Looks like Snapdragon laptops are still king for battery life, as long as you aren’t hitting them with anything too intense.

Other highlights of the FMV Note U include a 14-inch 1920×1200 screen, 32GB of RAM, 256GB to 2TB of storage, and a backlit keyboard. You get a surprising amount of ports on this 17.3mm (0.68 inches) laptop: two USB-C, two USB-A, full HDMI, microSD, and Ethernet. Fujitsu ensures that you can charge up the battery (slowly) with anything that can output 7.5 watts (i.e. most decent mobile batteries).

Fujitsu

It’s an interesting offering to be sure, especially if you’re willing to make some sacrifices to get an incredibly light laptop that still uses x64 hardware. For comparison, the 13-inch iPad Pro is only 1.28 pounds (582 grams) — just half a pound lighter with a lot less complexity in terms of hardware and components.

FMV.com is giving the price as 214,000 yen for the base model, shipping in a week or so. That’s approximately $1,370 USD (or €1,315) right now, but getting hold of specialty Fujitsu models outside of Japan can sometimes be tricky. There’s no word on an international release yet.