This 15-inch Pavilion laptop fits right in with HP's consumer mid-range line; it's a not-quite-ultrabook with a lot going for it. This variant has 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, a 15.3-inch FHD touch-screen display, and a 4th-gen AMD Ryzen 7 CPU. It rocks those components, generating scores that, although not as high as Intel's 11th-gen mobile CPUs, are creditable. All of those innards are wrapped inside a gorgeous and boldly appealing chassis, a slim-enough shape that appears costlier than it is, and given more than enough ports to make this completely functional no matter what you have in mind for it. We liked the full-size keyboard and spacious trackpad. Whether it's casual picture editing, online surfing, or "working" in front of a movie, this has what it takes and doesn't become too hot (or, critically, too noisy) while doing it.

But this is an $849 (£850, AU $1,099) laptop, and HP isn't renowned for miracles. The items left behind are sensible and possibly items you can live without. There is no keyboard backlight, and the plastic enclosure is well-braced. The HP Pavilion 15 has no discrete graphics, so it relies on the Ryzen SoC's marginally better-than-average integrated CPU. Those hoping for a full-on entertainment or creative laptop may be turned off by this. If you're comfortable with its constraints, choose the HP Pavilion 15. It fits wonderfully with computers like the Lenovo Thinkbook 15 in its price range. It doesn't feel or look compromised unless you open a game or spend a long period off-grid on its battery. If your needs match the Pavilion 15, get it.

The Ultrabook definition is tricky. If you mean "any slim-looking laptop," then this fits. The HP Pavilion 15 (2021) looks great for its price, thanks to HP's cuts. The screen, for example, is thin but firmer than we'd anticipate from a plastic-cased laptop. Because it lacks a glass front, it's well-braced inside. This makes operating the touchscreen a bit stickier than on a glass display, but it's a modest price compromise. The base's angles cover its somewhat bulbous belly.

This brings us to another possible interpretation of the Ultrabook: "any slim and light laptop"—emphasis on real thinness and lightness, not suggested. The HP Pavilion 15 almost qualifies. We've seen bigger and heavier machines, but the 15-eh0014na is neither. It's neither one-handed nor slim like the MacBook Air. Subtly dense We suspect HP had problems putting the Ryzen 7 inside the chassis. The base is slightly bent; we weren't sure whether it was a trick of the eye after staring at it so long, but a straight edge shows it. It's an aesthetic speedbump, but we're not docking points. It's crowded but not horribly planned. There are two USB Type-A ports on each side, a Type-C connection on the left, a full-size HDMI output, and a microSD reader. The keyboard has a natural full-width ten-key layout, no flex, and sufficient key travel; we were comfortable, but there's no backlighting. Below it is a clicky multi-touch touchpad and a fingerprint reader on the wrist rest.

Things are not easy in the laptop market. As usual, AMD and Intel are at odds with each other, and they're playing a game of "leapfrog." The Ryzen 4000-series CPU in this machine may have been the crown jewel of laptop chips a few months ago, but now Intel's 11th-gen processors have come along and made it look less impressive. Since this machine can't quite match its competitor's benchmark scores in some areas, it would be easy to think that it's not very good. However, that's not the case at all. The Ryzen 7 4700U is still a great mobile processor. Together with the fast storage and lots of RAM, it gives this laptop a snappy feel and makes it easy to do everyday desktop tasks. This doesn't feel like a less powerful laptop at all.

It can't do much in terms of how well it plays games, though. You have to rely on the built-in Radeon graphics, which aren't completely useless but don't do as well in benchmarks as the Nvidia GeForce GTX 960M, which came out in 2015. It can handle esports games if they are turned down a bit, but anything bigger will be too much for it to handle. But again, things look and feel great on the desktop. This isn't sold for its ability to play games, so it wouldn't make much sense to mark it down for not having a discrete graphics solution. As it is, this package is enough to give you more than enough power without requiring too much cooling or giving up too much. This just won't get too hot. Even when we really put the SoC through its paces with benchmarks, the fans rarely kicked in. When they did, they weren't too bad, and the B&O tuned sound system was loud enough to drown them out. We're not too focused on the speakers that fire down (there must be a better way), but this works well.

The screen is fine, but nothing special. Its highest resolution is 1,920x1,080, which gives it enough pixel density so that things don't look too grainy. It's also very reflective, which helps make up for the somewhat disappointing contrast of its IPS panel but makes it less fun to use if you're near a window. We've talked about how sticky the touchscreen is. We've seen bigger fingerprint magnets, but a microfiber cloth will come in handy if you poke at this panel a lot.