I would recommend the 4k panel. 4k in a 14" screen is overkill, but compared to other options the 4k panel has a wider color gamut, higher dynamic range, and higher brightness (500 nits). You can easily use it in direct sunlight. I'm writing this comment in a sunlit room and my brightness is at 34%.

Most of the complaints about battery life seem to be by people who keep the screen at a certain percentage instead of keeping it at a certain brightness. eg: There are reviews where someone keeps the screen at 70% brightness instead of 200 nits. That's like a car reviewer keeping the gas pedal pressed down 70% of the way and then complaining about fuel efficiency.

Edit: Oh and if you're curious about battery life, see my comment here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23106156 You should expect 5-12 hours depending on what you're doing. You could go as low as 2 hours if you stress test the CPU while at max brightness.

cool, thanks! matte or glossy?

Sadly there is only a glossy option for the 4k panel.

I'd go with 1080p if you're planning to run Linux. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23107338

FWIW I have a t480s with the 1440p display and am using Linux and my battery life is typically around 6 hours or so for regular use. If I start running more dev tools and building things it plummets as to be expected, but the display really doesn't seem to make much difference.

The biggest thing I miss from my MacBook is being able to open it after a week of being closed and still have battery. There's definitely something not going into deep sleep when I close the lid, but that's probably my fault.

To use no battery when sleeping, you'll want to configure hibernation. I haven't done this because I only suspend my laptop for 10-12 hours at a time. Also it's tricky if you're using disk encryption with a swap file.

The Arch wiki has lots of information on how to do this: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Power_management/Suspen...

I've been issued MBPs at my past few jobs. On each of them "all day" is about five hours, tops. You must not be doing a heckin lot of dev work if you actually get all day out of a single charge of an MBP battery.

maybe "all day" on mbp was an embellishment. but i'm reading things like 3 hours of web browsing time on the latest thinkpad displays! i've also seen comments in here it's not that bad. maybe a batch of bad batteries? i really would love to try one and get away from the mac ecosystem (mainly because of dongles, although one must ask, is an AC brick better? and why can't anyone else make a brick like apple, with tidy cables!)

I got the 1080 screen for battery life considerations. Totally satisfied with it, however I haven't spent much time on retina screens.