The Surface Pro is Microsoft's best tablet Windows PC, and the most recent model arrived alongside Windows 11 last year. Now the Surface Pro 9 is official.
The Surface Pro 9 doesn't look much different from earlier models, with a slim form factor, 13.3-inch 120Hz touchscreen with pen support, and built-in kickstand. However, it is available in four colors, two of which are new -- Platinum, Sapphire, Forest, and Graphite. The tablet can be configured with 8, 16, or 32 GB of RAM, and 128, 256, or 512 GB of storage. The front camera supports Windows Hello, and a Center Stage-like feature Microsoft calls "Automatic framing."
If you were hoping for a Surface Pro with an AMD Ryzen processor, like Microsoft has offered with the Surface Laptop, you'll be disappointed. The Surface Pro 9 is available with an Intel Core i5-1235U chipset, and more expensive variants will use a Core i7-1255U. Those are still regular laptop-class processors, so you can expect a slight efficiency and performance boost compared to the 11th-gen parts found in last year's Surface Pro 8.
Even though AMD isn't joining the party, Microsoft is selling a version of the Surface Pro 9 with an ARM-based Microsoft SQ 3 chipset. Earlier rumors claimed the chip is based on Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8cx Gen3. That's still unlikely to reach the same level of performance as Apple's ARM-based M1 and M2 chips, but it does support 5G connectivity, which isn't integrated into any Mac computers. Microsoft is promising up to 19 hours of battery life on the SQ 3 model.
The Surface Pro 9 starts at $999.99, with the base model including a Core i5-1235U CPU, 8 GB RAM, and 128 GB of internal storage. That's a lot of money to pay for a computer without 16 GB RAM and barely enough room for Windows and a few large applications -- doubling the storage will cost you another $100, and the cheapest version with 256 GB storage and 16 GB RAM is $1,400.
Source: Microsoft