Acer Chromebook Spin 513 review: A great MediaTek surprise

Compared to the last generation, which featured the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7C, this year's Spin 513 Chromebook model sports MediaTek's Kompanio 1380 Octa-Core CPU, which is at the top of the MediaTek chip line. Combining this with the slightly stylish design of the device, as well as the super long battery life, and you get a real surprise of a Chromebook for the sub $600 price. I really enjoyed using this Chromebook during my demo period, even though I had some small performance issues when things got a little too busy on the device.

About this review: This Chromebook was sent to us for MediaTek for review to sample the Kompanio 1380. We were allowed to keep the device after our review period.

Navigate this review:

• Acer Chromebook Spin 513 pricing and availability
• Acer Chromebook Spin 513 specs
• Design: It has a little bit of bling and is lightweight
• Display: 3:2 is amazing for productivity but I hate the bottom chin
• Keyboard: Bouncy and great
• Performance: The Kompanio 1380 Octa-Core CPU surprises
• Should you buy the Acer Chromebook Spin 513?

Acer Chromebook Spin 513 pricing and availability

• The Acer Chromebook Spin 513 is available on Amazon for $549

You can buy the Acer Chromebook Spin 513 from Amazon today for $549. However, be careful not to buy the last generation version, which has the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7C inside. Supplies may be limited; at the time of writing this review, there were only three left in stock at Amazon, and Acer's retail website also has them out of stock.

Acer Chromebook Spin 513 specs

Design: Lightweight with a little bit of bling

• I like the shiny edges on the top lid of the Chromebook
• This Chromebook is built very strong and feels premium
• It's a compact device

I won't lie, a lot of 2-in-1s these days look the same, many Chromebooks especially. With the Chromebook Spin 513, though, Acer tried to be a little different. The top lid of this Chromebook has some shiny accents that complement the rest of the chassis nicely. It also reminds me of the diamond-looking edges on Lenovo's Yoga Windows laptops.

Other than that, the side of the Chromebook has a bit of a "hump" where the ports are. I call it a hump because this area is thicker than the rest of the chassis at the front. The sides of the Chromebook go from thick to thin from back to front. This actually gives you room to slide your fingers in between when you use the Chromebook or convert it over to tablet mode.

And speaking of converting it over to tablet mode, the hinges and overall design of this Chromebook are very strong. It's not plastic, and it feels sturdy as a result. Trust me, I tried pressing on the keyboard deck as hard as I could and there wasn't any bending.

Generally speaking, this is a nice and compact Chromebook, too. It comes in at ‎11.81 x 9.25 x 0.64 inches and weighs about ‎2.82 pounds. I actually carried this Chromebook with me on a quick weekend family trip to upstate New York, and it didn't add an extra lug to my backpack. This isn't surprising since a lot of modern Chromebooks are compact. For reference, a $1,000 Chromebook, the HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook weighs in similarly at 2.6 pounds and is about 0.6 inches thick.

I love the shiny accents on the lid. It gives this Chromebook some style.

In other areas of design, I do like the inclusion of USB-A ports. USB-C is the future and the present, but not everybody is ready for it, especially if you're like me and always use USB drives and SSDs. HDMI would have been nice, too, but that's something for the bigger Acer Chromebook Spin 713. I had to dongle up to connect this to my display at home.

Display: 3:2 is amazing for productivity but I hate the bottom chin

• The screen has a super high 2256 x 1504 resolution and combined with the 3:2 aspect ratio, it's great for productivity
• The display is quite bright and colorful

From years of using Windows 2-in-1s and Chromebooks, I've noticed two big trends in the industry. The bezels on displays are getting slimmer and OEMs are switching displays on laptops to either the 16:10 or 3:2 aspect ratio. Unfortunately. with this Chromebook, there's only one trend: the 3:2 aspect ratio. The Chromebook Spin 513 still has an ugly bottom bezel, but for the sub $600 price, it's hard to complain.

For the price of this Chromebook, I do think the display is still good. This device has a pixel-packed, 13.5-inch, 2256 x 1504-resolution display that can hit 360 nits of brightness. The usual tools that I use to review laptops don't work on ChromeOS, though, so I have to be a little bit more subjective to support my claims.

For my daily workflow, I stack two Chrome windows side by side. The taller 3:2 aspect ratio on this Chromebook lets me see more of the internet. Webpages felt a bit more complete and a lot less cut off. Outside of that, the display also supports a USI pen. One was not provided for me to review, but with such a high-resolution screen, I don't see why someone won't want to use this machine for quick doodling or taking notes.

This Chromebook's display is great for productivity but it has an ugly bottom bezel.

To test the brightness and color accuracy, I ended up watching my favorite NBC series on this device and converted it over to the stand tent. Chicago Fire is a show that's often colorful with a lot of contrasting scenes. In an episode where a theater was on fire, I couldn't help but notice how bright the flames looked on the display. It didn't look washed out or dull. The display does a good job with color accuracy, but it might be too overly reflective for some people. I noticed this when I used it on a sunny day and had my windows open.

And atop that display is a 720p. 1080p is the new norm, but for a Chromebook, you can't complain. It'll get the job done for basic calls, but it doesn't hold up well in poor lighting.

Keyboard: Bouncy and great

• The keyboard is backlit
• It's also bouncy and accurate
• I love the smooth trackpad

Sometimes the keyboards on Chromebooks can be less than stellar, so I was happy to use the one on the Chromebook Spin 513. For me, the most important part was the backlighting. I like to use my laptops in bed, so I was glad that the Chromebook Spin 513 had even backlighting that didn't bleed much. Other than that, the keys have a nice bouncy feel, which helped me achieve fast typing speeds.

The trackpad is also good to use. It's surprisingly smooth to scroll on and doesn't make a lot of noise like a cheaper Chromebook's trackpad might. It's also very big, leaving lots of room for scrolling. I never had to use an external mouse with this Chromebook.

Performance: The MediaTek Kompanio 1380 Octa-Core CPU surprises

• The MediaTek Kompanio 1380 Octa-Core CPU stands up well for my web browsing needs, as well as Android games
• I benchmarked it against a 10th gen Intel Core i5 CPU on my daily Chromebook and it's almost the same, except in multi-core performance.

The real surprise for me with this Chromebook is the MediaTek Kompanio 1380 Octa-Core CPU. It's a change from the last generation of this device, which had a Qualcomm Snapdragon 7c inside. My daily Chromebook, the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook, sports an Intel 10th-generation CPU, so I honestly was expecting this MediaTek chip to be much slower than that. Boy, was I wrong. This is a really good-performing chip.

If you're not familiar with MediaTek CPUs, then consider this. The MediaTek Kompanio 1380 is its highest-tier chip and is designed to power premium Chromebook experiences. It sits in the 1000 series, above the 800 series and 500 series. It's also manufactured using the latest TSMC 6nm process. It has four performance cores (Cortex A78 2.6 GHz-3Ghz), and four efficiency cores (Cortex A55 2.00 GHz.) The CPU is a 5-core GPU, too. All of this helps the Chromebook excel in terms of performance.

The usual suite of software I use to test Windows laptops does not work on ChromeOS, so I had to tune it down a bit. I ran the Android version of Geekbench 5, as well as the Speedometer 2.0 benchmark. Android's version of Geekbench 5 doesn't really run the same as it does on Windows. Speedometer 2.0, meanwhile, runs simulated webpages to measure the responsiveness of web applications on a scale of 140.

On benchmarks, the Acer Chromebook Spin 513 hit a 936 single-core Score, and a 3250 multi-core score. With Speedometer 2.0, it hit a score of 45.6. I benchmarked my daily Chromebook with a 10th-generation Intel Core i5-1210U CPU, and the results were almost the same. It netted an 820 Single Score Score, and a 2285 Multi-Core score. On Speedometer 2.0, my Samsung Chromebook scored 59.9. With higher multi-core results, can see how this MediaTek CPU's performance and efficient cores help put it up better against this older Intel CPU.

This is a really good-performing chip for Android apps and more.

I just gave those benchmarks for reference, though. In my daily workflow, this MediaTek CPU was more than good enough in terms of performance. It handled 10+ tabs in Chrome (with the Instagram Android app open in the background) without issue. Webpages were occasionally a bit slow to load, but the experience was smooth once they got up and running.

Other than that, I played some of the highest-end Android games I could think off. This included the Android version of Asphalt 9, as well as Grand Theft Auto III and Call of Duty Mobile. All three of these ran perfectly without freezing or without lag. Even on my Intel-based Chromebook I sometimes felt lag in these games. I only wish that this Chromebook had a traditional SSD instead of eMMC storage because games were sometimes slow to load. This is still a great Chromebook for Android gaming regardless.

As for battery life, I got through a full day of work on this Chromebook, with some left over. I'd estimate it at about 9 hours. I started the day 100% charged at 9 a.m., and by 4 p.m., at the end of the workday, the Chromebook was down to 25%. That's better than some Windows laptops I've reviewed.

Should you buy the Acer Chromebook Spin 513?

Who should buy the Acer Chromebook Spin 513

• Anyone who plays Android games or uses Android apps on their Chromebook
• Anyone who wants a Chromebook with long battery life
• Anyone who does a lot of work on the web

Who should not buy the Acer Chromebook Spin 513

• Someone who wants a Chromebook with a super immersive display

All in all, I do love the Acer Chromebook Spin 513. It is quite good in terms of performance and is one of the best Chromebook 2-in-1s that I've used. I just wish the display didn't have an ugly bottom chin. That would have made it a contender for the best Chromebook, right up with the HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook. Until then, it's definitely one of the best Acer Chromebooks in 2022.