Definitely a regional thing. In Germany both terms appear as loanwords (I don't think there is a "real" German word for it) and they're used interchangeably. O

Definitely a regional thing. In Germany both terms appear as loanwords (I don't think there is a "real" German word for it) and they're used interchangeably. One of the two was a trademark leading to the other one being pushed as an alternative. But I can't even remember which one -- at this point I couldn't even tell you which phrase is more widely used. EDIT: IIRC at some point "Notebook" was used to refer to laptops that were smaller and/or lighter than the regular (rather heavy and bulky) laptops at the time. There's also a major online discounter called notebooksbilliger.de (literally "cheaper notebooks"). In day to day language I would err towards "Laptop" being the more widespread term but not by much.