Gigabyte Aorus Master 16 review: A power-packed AI machine for gamers and creators

Another day, another gaming laptop — that was literally my first thought when I heard Gigabyte had launched its Aorus Master 16 in India. But little did I know that the brand, which usually sits behind the scenes crafting motherboards, GPUs, and high-end PC components for others to build on, had a few surprises of its own this time. The Aorus Master 16 isn’t just another addition to Gigabyte’s expanding laptop lineup; it’s a statement of intent. After all, it carries the ‘Master’ tag with it – yes yes – the reference is from the motherboards. But, the laptop here aims to merge the brand’s hardware expertise with a new layer of intelligence, thanks to Intel’s Core Ultra 9 275HX and Gigabyte’s own GiMate AI companion while delivering the raw performance with the help of the RTX 5080 graphics card. Filled with all the curiosity I decided to give this machine a try and test its capabilities in the real-world scenario.
So, does Aorus Master 16 live up to its name? Or does it fall short of the expectations? Let’s find out.

Design and display
The first thing I noticed about the Aorus Master 16 was its texture and overall gaming laptops’ design language with big radiator-like vents at the back. Some RGB touches all around the body, including the keyboard and front panels. But, the entire body is made out of plastic. The build quality is good here – nothing out of the world. But, there’s no big flex in the keyboard dock or the display.

The top panel has a ribbed lenticular effect around the RGB-lit Aorus falcon logo, which catches light nicely and adds to the gaming aesthetics. Open the lid, and the laptop shifts into a more familiar Aorus aesthetic: bold branding across the palm rest, RGB lighting that wraps under the keyboard, and even a subtle projection of the word “Aorus” from the rear vent. The keyboard deck glows with per-key RGB, complemented by a transparent set of WASD keys. It’s flashy — and while that fits the Aorus DNA. In fact, there’s the entire Aorus puddle light as well at the back center part.

The 16-inch OLED panel, however, redeems much of this. It’s a 2560 x 1600 (QHD+) display running at 240Hz, and it’s both bright and fluid. In bright scenes the display has enough brightness and warmth to feel pleasant and admire the panel. The panel is colour accurate and vivid as well and being an OLED panel, there’s no viewing angle issues present here.

Gigabyte’s display calibration covers around 81% of the DCI-P3 gamut — not the most color-accurate screen for creators, but perfectly tuned for gamers who value speed and sharpness.

The laptop measures about 14 inches across and weighs 2.5 kilograms. Certainly, the Aorus Master 16 isn’t pretending to be the slimmest beast in the market, but the thickness does help with the better thermal management. Talking about the ports, the laptop kind of offers all the necessary ones. What’s frustrating is the port layout: all ports sit along the sides, with the power connector jutting out near the front, which often interferes when using a mouse. Still, the inclusion of Thunderbolt 5 and Thunderbolt 4 ports alongside HDMI 2.1, Ethernet, and dual USB-A 3.2 ports makes it versatile enough for docks and external GPUs.

Performance and thermals
Inside, the Aorus Master 16 features Intel’s Core Ultra 9 275HX — a 24-core chip with 8 performance cores and 16 efficiency cores, rated at 55W. It’s paired with Nvidia’s RTX 5080 Laptop GPU running at up to 175W TGP. The result is a machine that feels relentlessly fast, even when pushed across gaming and creative workloads.

In my time with the laptop, Alan Wake 2 ran between 95 to 140 frames per second at native resolution on high-quality settings with DLSS and Frame Generation enabled. Without Frame Gen which is good enough for a demanding title.

Synthetic benchmarks reinforced this performance. In Shadow of the Tomb Raider at 1080p, it averaged around 180fps. The RTX 5080 also handled Cyberpunk 2077 at ultra settings respectably, hitting about 38fps natively without DLSS which is again pretty good.

I also played the Call of Duty Black Ops 6 at 1440p resolution on Ultra settings with the DLSS and Frame Gen turned on and I got somewhere around 120 to 150 fps which is impressive here.

During extended stress tests, temperatures stabilised at around 81°C on the CPU package and 60°C on the GPU, with fans spinning audibly but not distractingly. The keyboard surface became warm during gameplay — noticeable, but manageable. The all-plastic chassis actually helps here, as it disperses heat more gradually, avoiding hotspots typical of metal builds.

Benchmark results

Across synthetic benchmarks, the Aorus Master 16 consistently reinforces its position as a top-tier performance machine built for both gaming and creato workloads. The Core Ultra 9 275HX leads with robust single- and multi-core numbers, while the RTX 5080 Laptop GPU drives high scores in 3DMark, reflecting the same smooth gameplay I experienced in real-world tests. Productivity tools benefit from the chip’s hybrid architecture — everyday workloads feel snappy, with minimal thermal throttling even under stress. The SSD isn’t record-breaking, but its responsiveness in load times and project file transfers keeps the system agile. Together, these results underline that Gigabyte’s power tuning and Intel’s AI-enhanced chip design combine effectively to balance raw strength with long-run stability.

GiMate, the AI companion
Gigabyte has been marketing GiMate — its AI companion — as one of the defining features of this year’s Aorus lineup. It’s an evolution of the company’s older Control Center software, designed to handle everything from performance modes to GPU switching through natural-language commands. In theory, it should be the bridge between human intent and system optimization.

GiMate lives as a sidebar interface. You can type or speak commands like “Switch to Game Mode,” or “I’m in a meeting,” and the system will adjust power, fan, and GPU configurations accordingly. It’s functional — it does change modes, tweak RGB, and optimize resource allocation — but it doesn’t go far beyond that.

But, what I actually want the GiMate to do is give me the best settings for particular games. For instance, Give me the best settings for Black Ops 6 – if I have one setup – it should turn it on instead of simply going for the Game mode.

Not that the GiMate is lacking here in terms of functionality, but having this kind of add-ons would have made it into a better companion.

Still, GiMate hints at where Gigabyte’s AI ambitions are headed. Its tight integration with Intel’s AI Boost architecture within the Core Ultra 9 275HX allows for some smart energy scaling. This chip includes Intel’s NPU (Neural Processing Unit), which offloads lighter AI workloads from the CPU and GPU, like background noise reduction, adaptive power scaling, or system-level inference tasks.
On paper, that means improved battery life and smoother multitasking when AI features are active. In daily use, I saw this reflected most clearly when GiMate dynamically managed GPU switching between the integrated Arc graphics and the dedicated RTX 5080. The transition was seamless.

Battery and connectivity
The Aorus Master 16 packs a 99Wh battery, the largest capacity allowed on flights, paired with a hefty 330W adapter. Battery life depends heavily on usage, but in my mixed web-browsing and video playback tests at 50 per cent brightness, it lasted just over five hours which is good enough for a machine that packs this much punch in it.

Audio quality is decent, though not outstanding. The upward-firing speakers handle mids and highs clearly, but there’s limited bass presence. Dolby Access comes preinstalled for tuning, though its adjustments barely change the output. I found the laptop more immersive when paired with headphones through the 3.5mm jack or Bluetooth.

Verdict
The Gigabyte Aorus Master 16 stands out with its strong performance, delivering high frame rates and consistent thermals for an immersive gaming experience on its vibrant OLED display. Powered by Intel’s Core Ultra 9 275HX and an RTX 5080, it offers excellent power management and responsiveness, with AI acceleration providing subtle yet practical benefits. While GiMate, Gigabyte’s AI, is a clever and convenient assistant, its potential for deeper features like dynamic fan acoustics and optimised game profiles could have made it better and more useful. The laptop's core strengths include its speed, bright display, efficient cooling, and impressive upgradability, making it a compelling choice for high-end gaming.