Older Dell Latitude 7300 Core i7 runs just as fast as the newer Latitude 7310 Core i7

If you're in the market for a new 13.3-inch business laptop and can't decide between the excellent Dell Latitude 7300 or Latitude 7310, then it'll be important to keep in mind that the newer 7310 is only marginally faster than the Latitude 7300 at best even though it carries newer Intel processors. Instead, the most significant difference between them will be the chassis updates and other physical changes as the Latitude 7310 is a bit smaller for increased portability.

Users who have been following the Intel 9th gen Whiskey Lake-U and 10th gen Comet Lake-U series will find the lack of performance upgrades unsurprising. Most Comet Lake-U CPUs like the ones that power the Latitude 7310 offer essentially the same performance as the older Whiskey Lake-U CPUs like the ones that power the latitude 7300. Granted, these subnotebooks aren't targeting high-performance office users in the first place, but it also means that you can buy the cheaper Latitude 7300 and still get the same performance as the 7310.

For greater year-over-year performance gains, Dell could have included hexa-core Core i7-10710U or AMD Ryzen options for its Latitude 7310, but the series is instead "capped" at the Core i7-10610U for now.

Now, this doesn't mean that the Latitude 7310 should be written off as it offers a host of other benefits over the Latitude 7300 that's not related to raw processor performance. See our full review on the Latitude 7310 here to learn why we still think it's one of the better business clamshells available.