The Acer Chromebook 516 GE may be the best gaming Chromebook we’ve seen, but it’s still a Chromebook.
About the Acer Chromebook 516 GE
Here are the specs of the laptop we tested:
- Processor: Intel Core i5-1240P
- Graphics: Intel Iris Xe Graphics
- RAM: 8GB LPDDR4X
- Storage: 256GB SSD
- Display: 16-inch (2560 x 1600) 120 Hz LED
- Ports: 2x USB-C 3.2 Gen 2, 2x USB-A 3.2 Gen 1, HDMI, Headphone jack
- Network connectivity: 2.5Gbps Ethernet, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.1
- Camera: 1080p webcam
- Battery: 3-cell Lithium Ion
- Weight: 3.75 pounds
- Size: 9.8 x 14.0 x 0.84 inches
- Warranty: 1-year limited warranty
The Acer Chromebook 516 GE is currently only available in the configuration above, but Acer says it expects to release a 12th-gen Intel Core i7 model with 16GB of RAM.
What we like
Impressive hardware for a Chromebook
Credit:
Reviewed / Kris Wouk
The Acer Chromebook 516 GE’s processor is one of the most powerful we’ve seen in a Chromebook.
Compared to many Chromebooks, the Acer Chromebook 516 GE is impressive both inside and out. The Intel Core i5-1240P is more powerful than the processors we’ve seen in other gaming-focused Chromebooks, with 16 threads compared to 12 in the Intel Core i5-1235U. It’s also bigger than most Chromebooks, with a 16-inch screen, but we’ll look at that later.
Chromebooks are typically thin devices, measuring around 0.55 to 0.7 inches thick. The 516 GE is comparatively thick at 0.84 inches, but it doesn’t feel dramatically heavier than any other Chromebook. The only major difference is the overall size.
It’s important to point out that the 516 GE is a cloud gaming Chromebook, emphasis on cloud. This means, while it has a more powerful processor than your typical Chromebook, it doesn’t feature a discrete GPU like a standard gaming PC. So instead of running games on a local machine you have to stream them from a server.
While many Chromebooks play it safe when it comes to the look, Acer got a little fancy with the 516 GE. There’s a faux brushed metal look to the back of the display, which looks nice, even up close. There’s also the gaming laptop standard: a multi-zone RGB keyboard.
Fantastic screen
The screen is one of the most impressive elements of the Acer Chromebook 516 GE. While it’s not as novel to see a 16-inch display on a Chromebook as it once was but large displays have been a staple of gaming laptops for longer. The 2560 x 1600 resolution offers a nice, crisp pixel density, not to mention the 16:10 aspect ratio makes the display feel even larger.
Most Chromebooks and productivity laptops max out the refresh rate at 60Hz. This is good enough, but as more phones, tablets, and computers start offering panels with higher refresh rates, the extra smoothness of motion feels increasingly like something you don’t want to give up.
The 516 GE’s 120Hz display is a perfect example of this. Sure, it’s mainly meant for gaming, but once you’ve used a screen with a higher refresh rate for a while, going back to a 60Hz monitor feels like you’re looking at a flipbook.
Of course, the refresh rate isn’t the only aspect of the screen worth mentioning. It offers good brightness (395 nits, which is close to the exorbitant HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook we reviewed last year) and very good color reproduction. While in-game, the colors pop in a way that you likely wouldn’t see on a lower-end Chromebook.
A great, gaming-focused keyboard
Credit:
Reviewed / Kris Wouk
This Chromebook’s keyboard has a popular gaming keyboard feature: anti-ghosting.
Chromebooks aren’t known for their keyboard quality. Most Chromebooks offer serviceable keyboards, but they’re rarely notable unless they have strange key placement, which is sometimes the case on smaller Chromebooks. Surprisingly enough, the keyboard on the 516 GE is a joy to type on.
It feels like a standard scissor-switch laptop keyboard, but there’s a good feel to keypresses. The keys are large enough and easy to tap, and you don’t get the mushy, unresponsive feel of lesser keyboards. If you’re a touch typist and you’ve encountered keyboards that don’t always register lighter keypresses, you’ll be heartened to know that we didn’t encounter this in testing.
As is the case with the majority of gaming laptops, Acer’s Chromebook 516 GE has an RGB-backlit keyboard. That said, the lighting options are sparse. You can choose a single color for your keyboard, or you can opt for a rainbow effect.
Either way, the overall lighting of the keyboard is on the dim side, even when you turn it up all the way. It’s not a dealbreaker, but slightly brighter lighting would have been nice. On the other hand, the WASD buttons are highlighted in white, making it slightly easier to locate these in a dark room at night.
The keyboard also features anti-ghosting, ensuring that you don’t miss any keypresses when hitting multiple buttons. This is a feature essential for PC gaming, so it’s nice to see it included here.
A wealth of ports and connectivity options
The 516 GE features a selection of ports that even a high-end gaming laptop would be proud of. To start, you get two USB-C ports, with one located on either side of the Chromebook. These are where you plug in the charger, so it’s nice to be able to choose a side.
The right side of the 516 GE features a full-size HDMI port, which is handy if you want to plug this Chromebook into a TV for some big-screen gaming. You also get a full-size USB-A 3.2 port for mice, controllers, or other gaming peripherals you may want to plug in.
On the left side, you get a 3.5mm audio jack for headphones or a gaming headset, along with a 2.5Gbps Ethernet port. Considering latency and packet loss are such experience killers with cloud gaming, it’s nice to have a wired internet option when network performance is key.
Decent battery life
Credit:
Reviewed / Kris Wouk
The 615 GE has okay battery life.
The 516 GE got just over seven hours in our battery test, which may not sound particularly high given what other Chromebooks often have to offer in terms of battery life. Keep in mind, many of those Chromebooks have less powerful hardware and displays with half the refresh rate, which means they’re not drawing as much from the battery.
Heavy gaming will reduce that battery life overall, but when many gaming laptops struggle to offer more than four or five hours of game time, this shouldn’t come as a surprise. Our test isn’t the easiest on the battery either, so you could eke out more time, assuming you’re not pushing the hardware at all.
The included charger looks somewhat bulky compared to the relatively streamlined look of the rest of the package. That said, it charges the battery from completely empty in around one hour and twenty minutes.
What we don’t like
Cloud gaming still has a way to go
Credit:
Reviewed / Kris Wouk
Smoothly enjoy cloud gaming, run numerous programs and browser tabs at the same time.
When you first launch a game via Nvidia GeForce Now and, midway through your session, you remember that this isn’t running locally, but on a remote machine somewhere; it’s impressive, regardless of the type of hardware you’re running.
The Acer Chromebook 516 GE, for its part, handles everything well. If you run into trouble trying to play a game via GeForce Now, it’s probably your network connection that is at fault, hence the inclusion of that handy Ethernet port. For the 516 GE, Acer says it focused on optimizing the hardware to run Nvidia’s GeForce Now.
That said, GeForce Now’s free tier isn’t especially enticing. Yes, it lets you play games via your Steam, Epic Games, or Ubisoft library, but if you’re on the free tier, you’ll need to wait your turn until you can play, and even then, you only have an hour of play time before you’re tossed back into the queue. You’ll also need to upgrade if you want to stream games in 120Hz and take full advantage of the 516 GE’s screen.
You can also opt for Xbox Cloud Gaming via Game Pass as well as other cloud gaming platforms, but it seems like these were afterthoughts when it comes to the 516 GE; GeForce Now is the only service that currently supports 120Hz streaming, but that could change in the coming years as those other cloud gaming platforms catch up with Nvidia.
Unimpressive sound
One extra you’ll want if you’re regularly gaming or watching movies on the 516 GE is a quality gaming headset or a pair of headphones. These are nice to have for positional awareness, especially for certain types of games, but the speakers in the 516 GE also aren’t anything to get too excited about.
The speakers are functional, and you’ll certainly have no trouble hearing YouTube videos, but they don’t have a lot of heft. If you’re watching a movie or playing a video game that makes heavy use of sound for the atmosphere, you’ll probably find the overall sound lacking. The overall sound lacks power in the lows and details in the highs. Midrange-focused sounds like the human voice carry well, but you’ll want headphones or external speakers for music.
Considering the price of the 516 GE, the company had to make cuts somewhere, and it makes sense that it was in the speakers. The sound may be above average compared to a budget Chromebook, but compared to other gaming laptops, you’d think a four-speaker array would sound more powerful than it does here.
Should you buy the Acer Chromebook 516 GE
Maybe, it’s a great Chromebook with an identity crisis
Credit:
Reviewed / Kris Wouk
The Acer Chromebook is secure, fast, up-to-date, versatile, and simple. With thousands of apps, built-in virus protection and cloud backups.
It’s easy to get excited about the possibilities of gaming on a Chromebook after testing the Acer Chromebook 516 GE. In many ways, it’s just another Chromebook with a nicer screen and some beefier hardware, but Acer’s work on optimizing network speed for services like GeForce Now gives it a leg up on some of the competition. Yes, you can make cloud gaming work on plenty of other Chromebooks, but will they work as smoothly as this one?
Similarly to the Lenovo IdeaPad Gaming Chromebook, the main issue with the Acer 516 GE is that the hardware could be perfect, but Acer can’t control the quality of cloud gaming platforms. This model works wonderfully with GeForce Now, but it doesn’t work quite as well with Xbox Cloud Gaming, at least in our experience.
It’s tough to recommend any Chromebook strictly for gaming, regardless of how good it might be. A budget gaming laptop can still run GeForce Now, and plenty of older PC games will run on even the least-powerful gaming laptop. On the other hand, if you’re looking for a Chromebook to use for work or day-to-day browsing, but you also want to get in some cloud gaming when you’re done for the day, the Acer Chromebook 516 GE is a solid buy.
Acer Chromebook 516 GE
The Acer Chromebook 516 GE is equipped with everything you need to get into cloud gaming—on a Chromebook.
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Prices were accurate at the time this article was published but may change over time.
Meet the tester
Kris Wouk
Contributor
Kris Wouk is a freelance tech writer and musician. While he’s been writing about technology for more than 10 years, that’s a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of time he has spent enamored with tech. When he’s not testing gadgets, he spends most of his time in Ableton Live.
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