Compatible with the Surface Pro Type Cover and Surface Pro Signature Type Cover only (sold separately). Battery life varies significantly based on usage, network and feature configuration, signal strength, settings and other factors. See Surface Battery Performance for details. Now, Microsoft has improved the device's studio microphones for stronger accuracy when using Cortana with your voice, but that's such a minor improvement it's hardly worth mentioning.

Some older devices will be limited to support for 1,024 levels of pressure due to limitations of earlier MPP protocols, but for the most part, all these devices will support the Surface Pen. It's also worth noting that the Surface Laptop lineup, as well as the Surface Pro 3, do not support magnetic attachment for the pen. All the others let you store the pen on the side in some way. Could you expect to game on the Surface Pro 7? Sure, as Intel promises smooth 1080p gaming from its latest CPUs, but we certainly wouldn't buy this tablet for that purpose. You might be able to get Fortnite to a playable frame rate at 1080p, but why bother when you could grab a solid gaming laptop for the same price?

Go from pen to (digital) paper

Important Make sure the Bluetooth is turned on your Surface by switching the Bluetooth toggle to on as in the picture above. If you’re willing to wait for those battery life improvements to come, and you don’t necessarily need all day staying power, then by all means jump in on the most technologically advanced Surface ever. But, know that those technological gains aren’t exactly massive, and come at the expense of other aspects of performance, specifically battery. Colours available on selected models only. Available colours, sizes, finishes and processors may vary by store, market and configuration. Another pro is the Windows Hello facial recognition, which uses the tablet’s infrared camera next to its webcam, and is as speedy and accurate as before. Once again, we can open the tablet from its Type Cover and it’s already logged us into Windows 10. Talk about instant-on performance. The white LED light will flash while in pairing mode. Now you can continue the pairing process on your computer.

Battery life varies significantly based on usage, network and feature configuration, signal strength, settings and other factors. See here for details. Like just about every Surface before it, the Surface Pro 7 isn’t necessarily feature-rich or has many key pieces of software to discuss, which has its pros and cons. The major pro here is that there is practically no bloatware on this tablet at all, as it’s issued directly from Microsoft. The Surface Pro 7 notched 395 nits of brightness on our light meter, which is better than the average laptop but behind last year's Surface Pro 6 (408 nits) and the iPad Pro (484 nits). Our Pro 7 color tests told a similar story, as it reproduced a solid 97% of the sRGB color gamut but failed to top the Pro 6 (136%) or the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 (113%). Microsoft Surface Pro 7: Audio The Microsoft Surface Pro 7 delivers big on performance and display quality, complete with a responsive screen for note-taking and drawing and a convertible design that really shines with the excellent Type Cover keyboard. The introduction of USB-C is a much-needed change, and the Pro 7's design remains as travel-friendly as ever.As for the most major Surface Pro 7 design change, we get USB-C at long last, but it’s on the USB 3.1 standard and not Thunderbolt 3. With that, you get the versatility of this new connection without the raw throughput of the Thunderbolt 3 technology. On your pen, press and hold the top button until the LED light blinks, to turn on Bluetooth pairing mode. System software and updates use significant storage space. Available storage is subject to change based on system software and updates and apps usage. 1 GB = 1 billion bytes. 1 TB = 1,000 GB. See Surface Storage for more details.

Your pen is receiving power and trying to pair with a device. Restart your Surface and try pairing it again. The Surface Pro 7 isn't exactly on par with one of our best gaming laptops, but its integrated Intel Iris Plus graphics can handle non-intensive games at decent settings. The 2-in-1 ran racing game Dirt 3 at 36 frames per second, which is perfectly playable but not quite as smooth as the upward of 47 fps we saw from the XPS 13 2-in-1. Microsoft Surface Pro 7: Battery life Make sure Bluetooth is on, then select Add device. Choose Surface Pen in the list of devices. Follow any other instructions if they appear, then select Done. Surface Go and Surface Go 2 use a third-party UEFI and do not support DFCI. DFCI is currently available for Surface Go 3, Surface Pro 8, Surface Laptop Studio, Surface Duo 2, Surface Laptop 4, Surface Pro 7+, Surface Laptop Go, Surface Book 3, Surface Laptop 3 and Surface Pro X. Find out more about managing Surface UEFI settings.Aside from magnetic attachment, third-party pens also support all of these features, so they're a great choice too if you don't think you need to store the pen magnetically on your device. The Surface Laptop Go doesn't support active pens Surface Headphones 2+ require use of the included Microsoft Surface USB Link to achieve Microsoft Teams certification, available only on Windows and macOS. Rest your hand on the screen, like you would on a piece of paper, then start writing. Your Surface is designed to ignore your hand and other inputs while you write. Use the pointer that appears under your pen tip to guide you while you ink. Battery life varies significantly based on usage, network and feature configuration, signal strength, settings and other factors. See Surface Battery Performance for details. The touchscreen is just as sharp, vibrant and responsive to touch as the previous generation. (Image credit: Future) Microsoft Surface Pro 7: Software and Features

You would normally expect battery life to increase when moving to supposedly more efficient processor architecture. However, Core i5 and i7 versions of Intel’s CPUs made major boosts to graphical performance, which could come at the expense of battery life. Make sure Bluetooth is on, then select Add Bluetooth or other device > Bluetooth. Choose Surface Pen in the list of devices. Follow any other instructions if they appear, then select Done.

In fact, you don’t have to pair or connect your Surface Pen to start sketching or drawing on your Surface device. However, pairing the Surface Pen with your laptop or tablet lets you access the full suite of Surface Pen functionalities and information. Microsoft's 2-in-1 endured through just 7 hours and 52 minutes of Wi-Fi web surfing on our battery test, which is down significantly from last year's Surface Pro 6 (9:20). The first reason for this, as we've mentioned, is the design. For the Surface Pro models, starting with the Pro X, Microsoft removed the magnetic attachment from the side of the tablets. Instead, you're supposed to store the Surface Slim Pen 2 inside the Surface Pro Signature Keyboard, where it also stays charged. At the same time, the Surface Laptop Studio and Laptop Studio 2 are designed to store the Surface Slim Pen 2 on its underside, and with the Surface Duo 2, you can attach the Slim Pen 2 magnetically to the outside using the Surface Duo 2 Pen Cover. All of these options also charge the pen at the same time. The 256GB SSD in Microsoft's detachable transferred about 5GB of files at a decent 267MB per second, again trumping the Pro 6 (203) but falling behind the Dell's 512GB SSD (463).