Dell revives XPS 13 at $599 to challenge Apple’s MacBook Neo
Dell put the XPS 13 back on sale at $699, but a $599 student price makes it look built to meet Apple’s cheapest MacBook head-on.
Dell has reopened the affordability fight in premium laptops with a revived XPS 13 that starts at $699 and drops to $599 for students, a pricing move aimed squarely at Apple’s $599 MacBook Neo. The strategy puts Dell back into a segment it had ceded ground in, while giving students and young professionals a new entry point into the XPS line at a moment when buyers are trading down and scrutinizing every dollar.
The new XPS 13 is being pitched as Dell’s thinnest and lightest XPS ever, and the company is loading it with the kind of features that usually justify a higher tag. Dell says the laptop includes a 2.5K touch display, Wi-Fi 7, and up to 17-hour battery life. Early coverage says the entry model uses Intel’s Wildcat Lake chip and starts with 8GB of RAM, while one report says the base configuration pairs a six-core Intel Core 5 320 processor with 512GB of storage. Some configurations are also described as carrying a 13.4-inch 2.5K touchscreen with a 30-120Hz variable refresh rate and DCI-P3 color coverage.
The question is whether $599 marks a durable repositioning or a headline price built for the moment. Dell first teased the return of the XPS 13 at CES 2026 on Jan. 6, when it said XPS was back and that the 13-inch model would arrive later in the year at its most accessible price yet. That matters because Dell is not just lowering the price of one laptop. It is reestablishing XPS as its premium consumer brand after a stretch in which the name had been replaced by other lines. The company’s student pricing starts at $599, but the public starting price remains $699, which suggests the lower figure is a targeted promotion rather than the new everyday floor.
Apple reset the market first in March 2026, when it introduced the $599 MacBook Neo and a $499 education price, giving Apple its least expensive laptop ever and setting a new benchmark for budget-conscious buyers. Dell’s answer is less about matching Apple on price alone than about keeping premium design in the conversation as memory-chip supply tightens and back-to-school demand builds. Higher-end XPS 13 versions are expected later with Intel Panther Lake chips, reinforcing the idea that Dell is using the cheaper entry model to bring buyers in now, then moving them up the stack later.
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