{"id":478019,"date":"2025-12-29T16:34:16","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T16:34:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/478019\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T16:34:16","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T16:34:16","slug":"windows-on-arm-had-another-good-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/478019\/","title":{"rendered":"Windows on Arm had another good year"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2024, Qualcomm\u2019s Snapdragon X chips finally made Arm-based Windows laptops viable. Unlike previous Arm laptops<\/a> that struggled to even run Windows well, this new class offered solid performance and the best battery life on Windows, and they impressed us<\/a> in Microsoft\u2019s own Surface Laptop<\/a> and Surface Pro<\/a> offerings. But inconsistent app compatibility remained the biggest hurdle to running Windows on Arm. (It forced me to use the watered-down Adobe Lightroom app instead of Lightroom Classic, and that\u2019s a sin.) And playing games, one of Windows\u2019 greatest strengths against the walled garden of Apple\u2019s Macs, was basically a nonstarter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Throughout 2025, a slow burn of software improvements have taken the situation from pretty good<\/a> to much better. Some creative apps that were absent from Windows on Arm now have native versions or run with Prism emulation. Adobe Premiere Pro works natively. And I found that Lightroom Classic, compatible in emulation, works just fine for light edits, even on lower-end Snapdragon X Plus chips.<\/p>\n

More games work too, thanks to emulator improvements<\/a> supporting x86 Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX) and AVX2. Qualcomm even has a designated Snapdragon Control Panel<\/a> for delivering prompt graphics driver updates, just like Nvidia, AMD, and Intel. Epic\u2019s Easy Anti-Cheat<\/a>, used by Fortnite and other games, now works on Windows on Arm. And the Xbox game launcher now supports local game installs on Arm<\/a> instead of only offering cloud streaming.<\/p>\n

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At this point, I have no hesitation recommending a Windows on Arm laptop to friends and family as long as they don\u2019t require specific software, like Ableton Live<\/a>, that\u2019s not yet compatible (and even Ableton is getting an Arm version in 2026<\/a>). Or, if gaming is their highest priority and they\u2019re better served by the Asus ROGs and Lenovo Legions<\/a> of the world than a thin-and-light. In fact, I encouraged my sister to buy the 13-inch Surface Laptop<\/a> while it was on sale for $550 during Black Friday. That\u2019s such a good deal, and I\u2019m confident it\u2019ll be the quietest, most portable, most powerful, and longest-lasting laptop she\u2019s owned yet.<\/p>\n

Even if you\u2019re not upgrading from a 10-year-old laptop, the first generation of Snapdragon X chips offer battery life and standby times that were once unheard of for Windows laptops, especially coming off of a few especially bad<\/a> generations<\/a> of Intel processors<\/a>. However, Intel\u2019s Lunar Lake and AMD\u2019s Strix Point chips took some of the wind out of Qualcomm\u2019s sails when they launched a few months after, with competitive performance and nearly as good battery life.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

Intel and AMD showed that the x86 architecture still has fight left in it. And as hype builds<\/a> for 2026\u2019s face-off between Qualcomm\u2019s Snapdragon X2<\/a>, Intel\u2019s Panther Lake<\/a>, and AMD\u2019s rumored \u201cGorgon Point,\u201d<\/a> we could be in for an even fiercer battle than usual. It could get more heated if Nvidia enters the fray.<\/p>\n

There are rumors<\/a> and leaked benchmarks<\/a> indicating Nvidia is working on a new Arm-based chip to debut in a not-yet-announced Alienware laptop \u2014 in addition to whatever it\u2019s cooking up with Intel<\/a> for x86. The combination of Nvidia and Alienware points to an Arm chip with a big focus on graphics, much like AMD\u2019s excellent Strix Halo<\/a> on the x86 side. The integrated GPUs we\u2019ve seen so far on Snapdragon chips aren\u2019t powerful enough to run modern games at high settings, and Arm chips don\u2019t yet support discrete GPUs. An Arm chip with Nvidia graphics could be pretty compelling for gamers.<\/p>\n

Windows on Arm had a good year. The gap between x86 and Arm Windows laptops is narrowing, and it\u2019ll narrow further in 2026. Arm laptops are easier to recommend to more people, though x86 will still be the better choice for gaming for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

2026 will bring fresh challenges: not just new Intel and AMD chips, but fiercer competition from Linux, which also had a very good year. As Microsoft transforms Windows into an \u201cagentic OS,\u201d stuffing it with more semifunctional AI bloat<\/a>, it risks further pissing off users<\/a>, who might find greener pastures elsewhere. Maybe the question in 2026 won\u2019t be \u201cShould you buy a Windows on Arm laptop?\u201d but \u201cShould you buy a Windows laptop at all?\u201d<\/p>\n

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