Microsoft’s latest Surfaces were built for serious business

Microsoft announced the Surface Pro 10 for Business and the Surface Laptop 6 for Business on Thursday, as expected. But what differentiates these new Surfaces from earlier models is that these new laptops actually feel like they were designed with businesses in mind — and the Surface Pro 10 is perfect if you’re coming down with spring fever.

Microsoft is accepting orders for both devices today, with shipments beginning April 9. Prices begin at $1,199 for both. Consumer versions of the Surface Pro 10 and Surface Laptop 6 are likely due in May. Microsoft has scheduled a second event just before its Build conference, with additional Surface hardware and AI improvements in Copilot and Windows on the table.

This marks the first time that the Surface for Business brand actually feels somewhat purpose-built. For years, Microsoft’s “business” devices have been essentially carbon copies of the consumer hardware, merely running the “Pro” version of Windows 10 and Windows 11. Meanwhile, competitors like Dell have differentiated commercial and consumer brands like Latitude and Inspiron through differences in design as well as marketing.

Inside these new devices are upgrades that will clearly benefit businesses, such as the use of Intel’s Core Ultra processor; the eventual addition of 5G to an Intel-based Surface, the first time Microsoft has done so; a new bolder, business keyboard; NFC (on the Surface Pro 10) and a smartcard reader (on the Surface Laptop 6). They’re Secured-Core PCs with enhanced sign-in security on by default. They do not, however, include Intel’s business-oriented vPro version of the Core Ultra chips.

Microsoft has also announced other upgrades to these new Surface devices that I expect will be a sneak peek at the consumer versions. They include a significantly brighter, but more anti-reflective screen and better webcams, including a new wide-angle camera on the Surface Pro 10 that most likely will be used for AI panning and zoom. And, of course, there’s the new Copilot key that will launch Microsoft’s AI service where it’s available.

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Otherwise, the new Surface Pro 10 for Business is the same 13-inch tablet you’ve seen before, and the familiar Surface Laptop 6 comes in both 13.5- and 15-inch options. Unfortunately, Microsoft still isn’t selling the (almost mandatory) new Surface Pro Keyboard or the (more optional) Surface Slim Pen 2 as a unified bundle out of the gate, though most retailers will eventually sell them as a bundle.

What’s new in the Surface Pro 10 and Surface Laptop 6 for Business

AI, of course, is the new watchword. Both Surface devices will include the dedicated Copilot key that Microsoft talked about earlier, with a catch: if Copilot isn’t available in your region, it will default to the standard Windows Search instead. Copilot can also select between “Work” and a personal account, so that Copilot can access a user’s workplace environment. And although Microsoft’s Windows app allows Mac users to access a Windows Cloud PC, Windows users in businesses can use it for Windows 365 and other cloud tools.

Both the Surface Pro 10 for Business and Surface Laptop 6 for Business will be the first Surfaces to use Intel’s Core Ultra (Meteor Lake) chips, which include a dedicated AI block, the NPU. Windows 11 taps that NPU for what it calls Windows Studio Effects, which includes automatic zoom and panning, as well as noise filtering.

Select laptops, including the Surface Pro 9, had used a dedicated Movidius AI card to achieve those same effects. Now, both the hardware and the processor have been more closely aligned for AI-enhanced video calls. The upcoming consumer versions of the Pro 9 and the Laptop 6 are expected to use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite chip instead, which also features a dedicated and likely more powerful NPU than what the Core Ultra offers.

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In a video, Microsoft showed off how Copilot could be used as an assistant to an app like OneNote — using AI to help organize and clean up notes, but also reformat them. One Microsoft exec showed off how her handwritten notes on agile software could be reformatted into a text table, just by asking Copilot.

Microsoft is also announcing a new Surface Pro Keyboard with a “bold” keyset — meaning that the characters on the keys are brighter and more pronounced. Microsoft is also making its Adaptive Accessories available to business customers.