Everything we know about the new, upcoming Lenovo Chromebook Duet

Of the upcoming Chromebooks ready to roll out, we have the best overall sense of what’s on the way with two models: the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook Plus and the Lenovo Chromebook Duet. Of all the devices that could be just around the corner from release, these two have historically been the most popular, most interesting, and most sought-after Chromebooks each and every time a new one arrives.

We talked at length already about the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook (previously known as ‘Xol’) and the details we dug up about that Chromebook over the months are pretty high in volume. At the end of last week, I put together a post just like this one for that device, so when you are done here, you should go and see all we expect from the Galaxy Chromebook Plus.

But the situation with the new Duet is even more specific as the general specs, form factor, and other details have already shown up on the web in the past few weeks. Still, there’s a lot to know about this new Chromebook tablet, so we wanted to get it all here in one place for you to see, absorb, and digest before it actually shows up.

Size, specs, dimensions, screen confirmed

First up, there was a leak about a month ago that saw the new Lenovo Chromebook Duet’s user guide up and available on the web. It’s still there, so I don’t think Lenovo is too overly worried about it, but in that guide we got a bunch of images, specs, and other general confirmations across the board.

As you can see, we’re getting an 11-inch 1920×1200 (16:10) screen, a unique hinge mechanism for vertical and horizontal standing, thoughtful placement of the 2 USB Type-C ports to accommodate these modes, and a pretty serious camera module. We’ll talk more about that last one in a second, but this leak provided some specs along with the photos, and I’ll list those here:

• Processor: MediaTek Kompanio 838
• Memory: 4GB/8GB LPDDR4X
• Storage: 64GB/128GB SSD
• Display: 11-inch 1920 x 1200
• Battery: 29Wh
• Weight: 0.51 kg (1.12 lbs) (tablet only)
• Dimensions: 255.3 x 166.92 x 7.6 mm (10.05 x 6.57 x 0.3 inches) (tablet only)
• Ports: 2x USB-C 3.2 Gen 1, 3.5mm headphone jack

Overall, this leak gives us a pretty good look at this yet-to-be-released ChromeOS tablet, and I’m very interested to see how that stand operates, what the build quality feels like, how good the screen is, and most importantly, how good this new Kompanio 838 actually is in real life.

MediaTek Kompanio 838

So, let’s talk about the new SoC that will power this upcoming tablet. MediaTek officially announced the Kompanio 838 as a part of Computex 2024 back in June. And when we heard the official news about the SoC we’d been referring to as the MT8188 (or MT8188G), I was pretty excited.

As you can see in the provided graphic, the Kompanio 838 comes with some exciting features. First and foremost is the premium imaging processor for cameras. Again, we’ll talk about that in a minute. Right after that section, you see the next superlative is highly efficient AI, something that Google is clearly quite keen on for Chromebooks right now. But we also see that this chip can deal with AV1 and HEVC decoding for 4K HDR media and can handle dual 4K displays. That’s a massive step up from what we see in current Chromebook detachables.

Along with this, we also see some big numbers that show how much more powerful this Duet will be compared with the 1st-gen model. That older version comes with the sluggish Kompanio 500, so big performance gains should be the case, here. Still, the improved performance in both CPU and GPU should make using this tablet a very fun experience. Based on benchmarks, it’s a solid upgrade from the Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 in the last few Duets as well, so I’m hoping for some very usable day-to-day performance.

AI and ML at the core

The biggest jump in abilities, however, will be in the AI/ML scores. We found commits back in March that Google and Lenovo were prepping the new Duet to utilize both MediaTek’s Neuron and Google’s TensorFlow Lite. Both of these technologies offer better on-device AI/ML performance, and you can see it in the benchmark scores already out there for the new Duet. It doesn’t just beat existing Chromebooks – it handily demolishes them. For reference, ‘Cherry’ is the Kompanio 1380, ‘Nissa’ is the Intel N100, and ‘Brya’ is 12th and 13th-gen Intel Core SoCs.

Clearly, this device is going to be quite good at handling AI/ML tasks and while not on the level of an AI-first SoC like Google’s own Tensor G4 in the new Pixel 9 series, this Kompanio 838 more than holds its own in this department with any Chromebook out there currently, handily besting even the bigger-core Intel devices for now. So that would align it to be a Chromebook Plus, right? Well, not so fast.

Not Chromebook Plus?

When the leaks rolled out, it was confirmed that this tablet is not a Chromebook Plus model. Maybe it comes down to performance? Maybe it has to do with the form factor? I’m honestly not entirely sure, but for now it looks like this device will not be marketed as Chromebook Plus; and with all this AI/ML power, that is a real shame.

However, there’s a chance that could change. If you look at the specs, there are at least a couple variations that will ship when the new Lenovo Chromebook Duet arrives. One of those won’t have the necessary RAM or storage to qualify, but one most definitely will. And perhaps we’ll see that version get the Chromebook Plus upgrade and branding.

Thus far, nothing we’ve seen indicates this from a branding standpoint, but we could be surprised. It makes very little sense to me to have a device that is clearly built from the inside out to take advantage of on-device AI/ML and not give it the software perks to take advantage of that processing power. I sure hope there’s a surprise coming in that vein, and I really do hope the new Duet gets a proper Chromebook Plus version.

First truly great Chromebook camera?

Now, on to that camera I’ve been hinting at. There are an inordinate amount of commits surrounding this device specifically targeted towards the camera module. We have a very detailed post about all this that I suggest you go read if you are interested in diving a bit deeper, but what you really need to know is there has been a massive amount of work on this particular camera, and I’m hopeful the fruit is a truly useful imaging experience in a Chromebook tablet.

Additionally, that Kompanio 838 graphic up there clearly lays out the fact that this chip is capable of some serious image processing. In the past, ChromeOS has not taken advantage of this sort of thing mainly because the hardware isn’t there to support it. That’s not the case with this new Duet, so maybe we’ll finally have a camera on a Chromebook worth using for more than video calls.

Finally, the image sensors on this tablet will be the same as we’ve seen in some Android phones over the past 18 months, so we know they are capable of great images. They aren’t absolute top-shelf components, but as you can see in a couple sample images, they are very capable of collecting enough data to be very solid cameras for sure.

No proof of a larger Duet 5 sequel

Finally, we can’t talk about Lenovo Duets without mentioning one of the most popular Chromebooks of all time: the Duet 5. While our early findings on ‘Ciri’ pointed to a larger display being tested, those dreams were dashed and it seems Lenovo is moving forward for now with a single model that focuses on the 11-inch form factor.

Now, that doesn’t mean a spin-off isn’t in the works; we’ve just not found evidence of it at this point. It would make a ton of sense for Lenovo to follow up the Duet 5 with a sequel, but maybe they are waiting on the new MT8189 or MT8196 chips to fully emerge before doing so. While it was a very, very popular device, I wouldn’t be holding my breath for a new Duet 5 in the near future.

And that’s all we know about the new Lenovo Chromebook Duet for now! It’s a lot, I know, and really all that is left is to get the thing in our hands. Again, I expect it at the Chromebook Showcase that is happening tomorrow, but nothing is certain. We’ll be there in-person, but for now, I can’t share anything else about it. Be sure of this: as soon as we can let you know anything about this new Chromebook tablet from actual time spent with it, we’ll report it as fast as possible. Stay tuned!