Gaming laptops: When its time to save or create the world (or just blast some baddies), accept no substitutes. Thanks to their powerful graphics, gorgeous displays and great audio, gaming laptops provide an immersive entertainment experience in a portable package. Many also offer stylish designs, desktop-quality keyboards and the ability to use high-end VR headsets. Heck, a good gaming laptop can even pull double-duty as a serious workstation.
But most of all, gaming laptops are great for dedicated gamers with mobile lifestyles or looking to save more space than a desktop could. The gamut ranges from college students hoping to play anywhere on campus to businesspeople who want to play during a commute. Whatever you have planned for your machine, there are a lot of intricacies to mobile PC gaming, so it helps to do your research. But with so many laptops to choose from, things can get pretty complicated.
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To help you pick your perfect gaming laptop, we've compiled a list of the top gaming laptops, including our top picks from popular brands including Alienware, Acer, Lenovo, MSI, Razer, Dell and more. Over the course of a year, we review over 150 laptops covering every price point and use case. Whether you’re looking for a a badass gaming system with all the bells and whistles, a good mid-tier laptop that can play games at solid frame rates or an inexpensive gaming system that can play most titles, we can help you find your ideal gaming laptop.
But in order to make our best gaming laptops list, the system needs to score at least 4 out of 5 stars on our reviews and deliver on the things shoppers care about most. Over the course of our evaluations, we focus on overall and gaming performance. We're also checking for design, keyboard, audio and display quality and especially value.
What are the best gaming laptops right now?
The Alienware m17 R4 is currently our top gaming laptop. A formidable mixed of power, endurance and design, the m17 is a force to be reckoned with. The laptop has recently been refreshed with an overclockable Core i9 10th Gen octa-core Intel processor and Nvidia's new GeForce RTX 3080 GPU, making it an undeniable powerhouse on both the multitasking and gaming fronts
Budget-conscious gamers will want to take a closer look at the new Dell G5 15 SE. The newly refreshed gaming laptop is and all AMD-production, sporting an AMD Ryzen R7 4800H CPU and an AMD Radeon RX 5600M GPU backed the full power of the Alienware Command Center. It's also got a great battery life and a slew of ports. It's a good gaming laptop overall.
If you're looking for a true on-the-go gaming laptop, you have to take a gander at the Asus ROG Flow X13. One of the few convertible gaming laptops out there, the notebook weighs a scant 2.9 pounds, has one of AMD's new Ryzen 9 processors and comes with its own incredibly portable eGPU. And if you're looking for a full AMD system, take a gander at the Asus ROG Strix G15 Advantage Edition that delivers stellar performance and longevity at a seriously competitive price.
