ASUS ROG Flow Z13 Review – Go with the flow

The best way to describe the ASUS ROG Z13 is that it’s the physical manifestation of a flex. It’s a unique contender in the tablet space usually dominated by Apple and Microsoft, addressing an area of the hardware spectrum that neither brand is completely focused on. Whereas iPads are fashionable workhorses aimed at creatives, and Microsoft Surface devices offer a Windows experience with a portable form factor, ASUS wants you to know that the Z13 is a gaming machine first and foremost.

This ROG branded product is loaded with technology that has been optimized for its ambitious push into the tablet sector, and it more than keeps its promise of being able to play cutting-edge games on its attractive screen. With a few caveats, that is.

Out of the box, you’re cradling a tablet with a Windows 11 operating system, a 13.4 inch 120Hz refresh rate display, and some attractive physical design. The rear has a built-in kickstand and a drop-dead sexy window that shows off some of the internal hardware, which for this specific model, includes a 12th Gen Core i9 12900H processor, an Nvidia RTX 3050 Ti, 16GB of LPDDR5 memory, and an entire terabyte of storage from an M.2 2230 NVMe SSD. That’s not too shabby, and puts the Z13 in mid-range gaming laptop territory. Only even more portable.

If that’s not enough power for you, an optional XG Mobile external graphics card enclosure with an Nvidia RTX 3080 can be plugged in to give the tablet a turbo-boost that would make Knight Rider jealous. Also included is a rather fetching keyboard, one that offers some punchy travel with its keys, and it’s an admittedly great platform to whip up some emails between gaming sessions.

As a Windows device, the Z13 was an absolute walk in the park to set up Steam and my Xbox Game Pass accounts. With a couple of games loaded up, I was off to the races as I tried out the likes of Tunic, Firewatch, They Are Billions, Death’s Door, and a few other titles. There’s a running theme here that you might have picked up by now because my initial batch of games aren’t exactly known for being hardware-pushers. I wanted to get a feel for the Z13 with games that were more modest in their technical requirements, and on this front, the tablet did not disappoint.

With an Xbox controller plugged in and visual settings loaded in at around the 1920 x 1080p and 60 frames-per-second mark, I was averaging fantastic performance overall. The display helped sell the vibrancy of these games, providing crisp details so sharp that I’m amazed that I haven’t lost an eye. With a few days of indie-testing, I was impressed with how the Z13 ran those titles overall. It was time to up the ante then, and grab some more graphically-demanding titles.

Batman: Arkham Knight, Far Cry 5, Cyberpunk 2077, and Forza Horizon 5 provided a good spread of games that could push the Z13 much further than my previous experiments, and overall I was getting results that I’d call respectable at the very least. The best way to describe AAA performance is that it’s cinematic with its frame-rates. With more taxing requirements, 25-30 FPS was the average on games that were running with medium-to-high graphics settings enabled.

That’s not bad at all, though, and its downright jaw-dropping to see modern titles running on a device that I can easily set up at a coffee shop or on a camping trip. Heck I even grabbed Elden Ring–after being goaded to do so by friends–and in the 90 minutes that I played the game before I asked for a refund from Steam, it hit some solid performance numbers. All of this potential, in a lightweight package that has ASUS’ signature physical flair for attractive design.

If you need more power though, the external GPU that I was supplied with was more than capable of pushing those numbers to a level that made it compete with my own gaming rig. Frame rates easily doubled and I was able to play with every graphical bell and whistle checked, but… the Z13 wasn’t much of a gaming tablet at this point.

Picture this scene: You’re desperate for a few rounds of Elden Ring during your lunch hour, and you’re fortunate enough to own a Z13. Time to set it up. You’re going to want to plug it in so that you don’t lose battery power–I was averaging around an hour per game from a full charge–and you crave a 60 FPS experience. No problem, grab the portable RTX 3080 and plug that into the tablet and a nearby power point as well. Oh and don’t forget your controller!

Right there, you’ve got a tablet tethered to a wall with several cables in front of you, essentially robbing the Z13 of its portable form factor. It’s a sight to behold, and it makes you wonder if a proper gaming laptop would be better. ASUS has no shortage of those, and they also have power to spare. Make no mistake, AAA games looked fantastic with this tablet configuration. Cyberpunk 2077 with ray tracing enabled looks impossibly good; Batman: Arkham Knight has no right to appear this impressive after almost seven years; and Forza Horizon 5 is still petrolhead bliss at high frame rates.

With the Z13, my main takeaway is that I’d love to own one of these just for indie gaming. I doubt I’d use it for creative purposes, because while it is capable of running Adobe photography programs and Wondershare video editing apps, it’s a touch slower as well in that department. Windows 11 is not a great operating system for tablets, the 16:10 aspect ratio exposes some thicc bezels during gaming, and the battery life isn’t great for anything other than a quick round of gaming or video editing. I’m not exactly surprised though, given the power-hungry demands of the hardware inside of it.

Honestly, it’s just a tough market to crack. This amount of power in a device of this size is always going to come with drawbacks until technology catches up. At R39,000 on the ASUS store, that price is a bitter pill to swallow unless you genuinely don’t mind dropping that amount of coin for something that’s moderately more portable than a laptop but less powerful. I still see the potential of the Z13, though – as a prototype that can act as a foundation for future development of hardware in a market where the Steam Deck has just made its presence known.

More tinkering, more fine-tuning, and it could be a viable contender in this emerging space. The intriguing capabilities are there, and if you’re prepared to make some concessions, the Z13 has a lot to offer.