Sure, ASUS' fragrance laptop is beautiful – but why on earth does it exist? I asked the designer

Yesterday I attended ASUS’ Design You Can Feel event at Milan Design Festival to view the new range of limited edition Ceraluminum laptops. While I completely bought into the new material, which could have been a gimmick but absolutely wasn’t, there was one laptop that flabbergasted me.

A laptop that dispenses air freshener. Fancy air freshener, but air freshener nonetheless.

Yes, really. Apparently on sale in China (and also apparently actually selling well, the glossy ASUS Adol 14 Air is adorned with a disc that sprays out fragrance made by fashion brand Anna Sui. If you’re chorusing, ‘but why, just… why?’ then you’re really not alone. I had many, many questions about this product that is not on sale in the UK or US (I wonder why) including and not limited to ‘how did this thing get conceived?’, ‘who is using it and when?’ and then ‘why?’ some more.

I spoke to the designer of the laptop, attempting to keep the incredulous look buried, and asked him about whose idea it was, and why they would have come up with it in the first place. As a fusion of ideas it feels like a ‘because you can doesn’t mean you should’, but I was willing to be convinced.

The idea originated from ASUS, he said, and it was born out of the concept of sensory tech, which is the ethos of the whole Ceraluminum range. It was conveyed to me that if you have design you can touch and hear, why not design you can smell, too? Well, sure, I guess... But surely you could only use the functionality at home – imagine invading everyone’s senses in a public space with your own choice of air freshener. In that respect using the laptop feels like an act of sensory self-care – I’m just not sure I need my laptop to be the thing that delivers that for me.

Though pitched as high design, the Adol 14 is ripe for the influencer market (evidenced by the number of influencers actually at the event), the display itself was stunning with a number of glass cloches with fragrances within, all set up amongst flowers.

All snark aside, the way the laptop’s fragrance function has been designed is clever and looks great. On the laptop’s lid, a little circular disc houses another disc that is infused with the fragrance. You can swap the disc out for different scents including Basil & Mandarin and Rose depending on your mood. It smells delightful – the scent feels expensive and rich, and the laptop is also branded beautifully, in a soft pink and limited-edition purple – and of course, it’s made out of that silky smooth Ceraluminum.

Is the laptop any good, though? Well, it’s reasonable. 2.8K OLED display, with up to a 120Hz refresh rate. There’s 32GB of RAM, 1TB of storage, an RGB keyboard, and the AMD Ryzen 9 8945H chip. It doesn't rival the best laptops for graphic design but it could work if you've got a light creative workflow.

If you'd like a laptop that isn't smelly, see deals below.