Asus VivoBook S 14 (M3407) 14" VS Lenovo ThinkPad P14s Gen 5 14" (Ultra 7 155H / 32GB RAM / 1TB)

Both laptops share the same fundamental design philosophy: a conventional clamshell form factor with a backlit keyboard, no fanless architecture, and no weather-sealing or rugged certification. For most office and home environments this is perfectly adequate, but users needing splash resistance or drop protection should look elsewhere regardless of which model they choose.

Where the two diverge is in physical footprint and mass. The Asus VivoBook S 14 comes in at 1390 g with a volume of 1264.41 cm³, while the ThinkPad P14s Gen 5 is noticeably heavier at 1610 g and bulkier at 1370.55 cm³. That 220 g difference is meaningful in practice — it is roughly the weight of a large smartphone added to your bag. Thickness is nearly identical at 18 mm vs 18.5 mm, so the extra mass in the ThinkPad comes mostly from its wider and taller chassis (325.5 × 227.6 mm versus 315 × 223 mm), suggesting denser internal components and likely a more reinforced build frame typical of a workstation-class machine.

On design alone, the VivoBook S 14 holds a clear portability edge: it is lighter, more compact, and effectively just as thin. For commuters and travelers who prioritize carry weight, this distinction matters daily. The ThinkPad's larger frame is less of a penalty and more of a trade-off — it accommodates workstation-grade internals — but purely from a design and ergonomics standpoint, the Asus is the more travel-friendly of the two.

The two screens share the same 1920 × 1200 resolution and 60Hz refresh rate, but the similarity ends there. The ThinkPad P14s ships with a slightly larger 14.5″ panel versus the VivoBook's 14″, and because the resolution is identical, that extra diagonal space translates directly into a higher pixel density — 189 ppi versus 161 ppi. In practice, text and fine UI elements will appear noticeably crisper on the ThinkPad, a meaningful advantage for professionals who spend long hours reading documents or reviewing detailed visuals.

The more consequential differentiator for daily use, however, is the ThinkPad's anti-reflection coating — a feature the VivoBook lacks entirely. In any environment with overhead lighting or windows behind the user, a glossy or uncoated screen forces constant repositioning to manage glare. An anti-reflection coating largely eliminates that friction, which is especially relevant for a workstation-class machine likely to be used in varied office settings.

With sharper pixel density and glare resistance, the ThinkPad P14s holds a clear display advantage. The VivoBook is by no means deficient — the resolution and aspect ratio are solid for a consumer laptop — but for productivity-focused users, the P14s delivers a more refined and versatile viewing experience on both counts.

The CPU architectures here reflect two very different design philosophies. The VivoBook S 14 uses a homogeneous 8-core, 16-thread chip built on a 4nm process with a high 4 GHz base and 5.2 GHz turbo, favouring raw single-core speed and power efficiency. The ThinkPad P14s Gen 5 takes a hybrid approach — a mix of performance and efficiency cores totalling 22 threads — but at significantly lower base clocks and a 4.8 GHz turbo, on a comparatively older 7nm node. For lightly-threaded tasks and everyday responsiveness, the VivoBook's higher clocks and newer process node give it an edge; the ThinkPad counters with more threads, which benefits heavily parallelised workloads like rendering or compilation.

Storage and current RAM are effectively matched — both ship with 32GB DDR5 and roughly 1TB NVMe PCIe 4 SSDs. The critical long-term differentiator is upgradeability: the ThinkPad offers 2 memory slots and supports up to 96GB of RAM, while the VivoBook's single soldered slot hard-caps it at 32GB forever. For a workstation-class machine handling large datasets, virtual machines, or memory-intensive professional software, that ceiling matters enormously. On the graphics side, the VivoBook's integrated GPU runs at a notably higher 2800 MHz turbo versus the ThinkPad's 2250 MHz, though both are integrated solutions without dedicated VRAM.

There is no single winner here — the right answer depends entirely on the use case. The VivoBook S 14 leads on raw CPU clock speed and process efficiency, making it the snappier machine for everyday and single-threaded tasks. The ThinkPad P14s holds a decisive advantage for scalability: its dual memory slots and 96GB ceiling make it the only viable choice for users who anticipate growing memory demands over the machine's lifespan.

PassMark scores put measurable distance between these two machines. The VivoBook S 14 posts a multi-core result of 31,104 against the ThinkPad P14s Gen 5's 24,879 — a gap of roughly 25% in favour of the Asus. In practical terms, multi-core performance governs how quickly a laptop handles demanding parallel workloads: video exports, large file compressions, multi-tasking under load. A 25% lead is not a marginal rounding difference; it is consistently felt in sustained, CPU-heavy sessions.

The single-core story follows the same pattern. The VivoBook scores 3,970 versus the ThinkPad's 3,468, a roughly 14% advantage. Single-core performance is arguably more important for everyday use — it governs app launch times, UI responsiveness, browser tab switching, and the general ″snappiness″ of the system. A lead here means the VivoBook will feel faster in routine interactions, not just under synthetic load.

Across both dimensions, the VivoBook S 14 holds a clear and unambiguous benchmark advantage. These results align with the architectural differences noted in the performance specs — the newer process node and higher clock speeds translate directly into measurable real-world gains. Users prioritising outright CPU throughput, whether for creative workloads or general productivity, will find the VivoBook the stronger performer on the data available here.

Shared features first: both laptops offer two USB-A ports, HDMI 2.1, Bluetooth 5.3, and Wi-Fi support — a reasonable baseline for modern connectivity. The divergence, however, is significant. The VivoBook S 14's two USB-C ports run at USB 3.2 Gen 1 speeds (up to 5 Gbps), while the ThinkPad P14s replaces them with Thunderbolt 4 / USB4 40Gbps ports — delivering up to eight times the bandwidth. That gap matters concretely: Thunderbolt 4 supports external GPUs, daisy-chained 4K displays, and high-speed docking stations that simply will not function at Gen 1 speeds.

Two additional ThinkPad advantages round out the picture. Its Wi-Fi supports Wi-Fi 6E, which adds access to the less congested 6GHz band for lower latency and faster throughput in dense wireless environments — the VivoBook tops out at Wi-Fi 6. More practically for office and travel use, the ThinkPad includes a dedicated RJ45 ethernet port, eliminating the need for a dongle in wired network environments. The VivoBook has no such port.

The ThinkPad P14s wins this category decisively. Faster and more capable USB-C ports, a newer Wi-Fi standard, and a built-in ethernet jack make it the substantially more versatile machine for professional connectivity scenarios. The VivoBook's port selection is functional for casual use, but it cannot match the ThinkPad's breadth or bandwidth.

Battery capacity is nearly identical here: 70 Wh in the VivoBook S 14 versus 75 Wh in the ThinkPad P14s Gen 5. That 5 Wh difference is slim — roughly 7% more capacity on paper — and both machines share sleep-and-charge USB ports, meaning either can top up a phone or peripheral even with the lid closed. Neither features a MagSafe-style magnetic connector.

Rated capacity alone does not determine real-world battery life; power draw from the CPU, display, and other components plays an equally large role. Given that the VivoBook's more efficient 4nm chip showed stronger benchmark performance per the specs reviewed earlier, it is plausible the smaller battery still delivers competitive endurance — but that inference goes beyond what the battery specs alone can confirm. On the numbers provided here, the ThinkPad's 75 Wh pack gives it a marginal theoretical edge in raw stored energy.

Taken strictly on battery specifications, this group is effectively a near-tie. The ThinkPad holds a nominal capacity advantage, but it is too small to declare a meaningful real-world winner without runtime data. Users for whom battery longevity is critical should weigh this alongside the performance and display specs rather than treating the 5 Wh gap as decisive.

Much of this category is common ground: stereo speakers, a 3.5mm audio jack, a front camera, and 3D facial recognition appear on both machines. Neither supports ray tracing, DLSS, Dolby Atmos, or includes a stylus — a consistent baseline that covers the essentials without extras.

The meaningful separators are security and audio input. The ThinkPad P14s adds a fingerprint scanner alongside 3D facial recognition, giving users two distinct biometric authentication methods — useful in environments where a face scan may be impractical, such as when wearing a mask or working at an angle. On the microphone front, the ThinkPad doubles up with 2 microphones versus the VivoBook's single unit. Dual-microphone arrays enable better noise cancellation and more accurate voice pickup during calls and recordings — a tangible advantage for professionals in remote meetings or collaborative environments.

The ThinkPad P14s edges ahead in this category, specifically on security versatility and audio capture quality. Neither difference is dramatic in isolation, but together they reflect the ThinkPad's broader positioning as a professional-grade device where reliability and redundancy in everyday interactions — logging in quickly, being heard clearly on calls — are treated as priorities rather than afterthoughts.

The integrated GPU specs reveal a clear split in graphical capability. The ThinkPad P14s packs the Arc Xe-LPG 128EU with 1024 shading units and 64 TMUs, against the VivoBook's Radeon 780M with 768 shading units and 48 TMUs — a roughly 33% advantage in raw shader count for the ThinkPad. The P14s also supports the newer OpenCL 3 versus OpenCL 2.1 on the VivoBook, which matters for GPU-accelerated compute tasks like AI inference, image processing, and scientific workloads that leverage compute APIs. On paper, the ThinkPad's iGPU is the more capable graphics processor.

CPU-side, the ThinkPad's larger 24 MB L3 cache versus the VivoBook's 16 MB is worth noting — a bigger cache reduces how often the CPU must reach out to slower main memory, which smooths performance in cache-sensitive workloads like databases and compilers. Offsetting this, the VivoBook's 45W TDP versus the ThinkPad's 28W signals that the Asus chip is tuned for sustained high-performance output, while the Intel chip prioritises power efficiency — a trade-off that aligns directly with the benchmark results seen earlier. RAM speeds are effectively matched at 7500 MHz versus 7467 MHz, a negligible real-world difference.

This group does not produce a single winner — it surfaces a deliberate architectural trade-off. The ThinkPad P14s leads on integrated graphics capability and cache size, making it better suited for GPU-accelerated workloads and cache-sensitive applications. The VivoBook S 14 counters with a higher TDP envelope, sustaining greater CPU throughput when thermal headroom allows. The right choice depends on whether the user's workload leans more on graphics and compute APIs, or raw CPU horsepower.