Review: Acer Chromebook Plus 516 GE (2024)

Gaming isn’t something you'd typically associate with Chromebooks, but Google and its hardware partners have made strides toward shaking that up with a handful of cloud gaming laptops in recent years. One of the more popular options is the Acer Chromebook Plus 516 GE, which just got updated for 2024 with a new processor while keeping everything great about the previous model. It's a modest upgrade, but it’s still one of the best Chromebooks you can buy.

Let’s get this out of the way first: If you already have the previous Chromebook 516 GE, there’s very little reason to upgrade to the 2024 Chromebook Plus model. Outside of some small aesthetic updates, this is largely the same device. The processor is now an Intel Core 5 120U instead of the older model’s Core i5-1240P, and you likely won’t notice much of a difference in speed.

Photograph: Daniel Thorp-Lancaster

Still, performance on the Chromebook Plus 516 GE is fantastic, and the battery kept me chugging through regular eight-hour workdays. Combined with 8 GB of RAM, you have plenty of room and horsepower for multitasking. The laptop frequently handled quick swaps between different apps and more than a dozen tabs with ease during my testing, and the dual fans keeping things cool never got loud enough to be annoying.

In contrast to Windows gaming laptops, the Chromebook Plus 516 GE is geared as a cloud gaming machine, and it fits that role well. You’ll do most of your gaming via Xbox Cloud Gaming and streaming through Nvidia GeForce Now, and ChromeOS handles both well. The laptop has Wi-Fi 6E and a dedicated Ethernet port on board to keep things running smoothly, and I didn’t experience any major hitches or issues with even competitive games.

The one gaming area that was hit-or-miss was Steam, which is still in beta on ChromeOS. Lightweight indie games like Vampire Survivors run like butter on the Chromebook Plus 516 GE’s hardware, and that’s the lane I’d stick with if I wanted to run games natively instead of streaming. Heavier games can have some trouble, which is to be expected with integrated graphics and a lightweight (by gaming standards) processor. I couldn’t get Dead by Daylight, one of my favorite time killers, to open through Steam beyond the initial loading screen, for example.

Photograph: Daniel Thorp-Lancaster

All of that cloud-gaming prowess would be wasted if games didn’t look great, but I’m happy to say that’s not the case with this laptop’s fantastic 16-inch screen. It’s one of my favorite features of the 516 GE and is its biggest selling point. It’s incredibly vibrant with beautiful colors, and the 2,560 x 1,600-pixel resolution keeps it looking crisp despite its large size.

The 16:10 screen ratio is excellent for productivity, giving you more vertical space to work with if you’re immersed in documents and spreadsheets most of the day. The screen gets more gaming cred from its 120-Hz refresh rate, keeping it exceptionally responsive in daily tasks and gaming. I wish there was a way to adjust the refresh rate on the display to eke out some more battery life when I’m not gaming, though (something you can do with external monitors).

You’re likely going to use your laptop for a lot more than gaming, and the good news is the 516 GE is a solid companion for work tasks. The keyboard feels great to type on for extended periods, and the trackpad is pretty spacious. There’s an adjustable backlight for all the keys, and Acer has included RGB lighting to change the key color with four lighting zones.

Photograph: Daniel Thorp-Lancaster

The keyboard is flanked by two large speaker grilles that cover upward-firing speakers. Unfortunately, this is also the weakest area for the 516 GE. I was consistently disappointed with the sound quality of the speakers, with music and game sounds feeling almost like they were slightly muffled. They are far from unlistenable, but I’d recommend snagging a good pair of headphones if you want truly immersive game sounds.

The 1080p webcam on the 516 GE is pretty good—it’s relatively crisp and handles both bright and low-lit conditions fairly well—though you can find machines that deliver nicer video call clarity. A full-size HDMI port, two USB-C ports, and a USB-A port mean you can easily hook up to an external monitor and webcam when you’re at home.

Photograph: Daniel Thorp-Lancaster

Overall, the Acer Chromebook Plus 516 GE is an excellent option if you love Chromebooks and want to add some gaming flavor to your life. It has nowhere near the horsepower to compete with dedicated Windows gaming laptops for native gaming. However, game streaming is getting better, which makes more budget-minded laptops like the 516 GE a legitimate option if you have consistent access to an internet connection.

The one hitch is that you can get all of the same features on the prior model, which is still available (at least at the time of writing) for $200 less. That won’t remain the case forever, but the modest processor bump may not be worth the full $650 asking price while the previous iteration is still available. However, Chromebooks are notorious for excellent sale prices, so I would expect the Chromebook Plus 516 GE to see some decent discounts in the coming months.