I Tested A Bunch Of Gaming Laptops And These Are The Best

Gaming laptops travel successful various shapes and sizes, though galore of nan dense hitters stay heavy and beefy machines that maximize cooling to get nan astir retired of their powerful chips. Most are awash successful RGB lighting and edgy designs geared towards capital-G Gamers, but location are besides thinner, lighter options that are much portable and little showy. 

Our go-to proposal that checks nan boxes for astir group is, and has been for a while, nan Asus ROG Zephyrus G14. It’s a gaming laptop that doesn’t hide nan “laptop” part. The G14 is simply a versatile instrumentality for some play and work, and it travels exceptionally well.

Other great, though pricey, recommendations see nan large and dense Asus ROG Strix Scar and Lenovo Legion Pro 7i, aliases nan Razer Blade 16 for tons of graphics powerfulness successful a bladed and sleek design.

The astir important portion of immoderate gaming laptop, conscionable for illustration desktop PCs, is nan graphics card. Laptop GPUs can’t stack up to full-size cards that scope overmuch higher wattage successful desktops, but that doesn’t extremity nan likes of Nvidia from making things a small confusing pinch nan naming strategy connected its RTX marque of GeForce cards. So support successful mind that, for example, an RTX 5090 laptop paper doesn’t travel anyplace adjacent nan capacity of a desktop 5090. Desktops whitethorn ever triumph retired successful earthy performance, but gaming laptops are a simpler turnkey solution that tin easy spell places (yes, moreover nan ones that consciousness for illustration you’re toting astir a cinderblock). 

Even much confusing: nan aforesaid GPU successful 1 laptop whitethorn not execute arsenic good successful different if it’s throttled by thermal constraints. We effort to trial a wide scope of gaming laptops, arsenic good arsenic regular laptops, and these are nan ones we confidently recommend.

The champion gaming laptop

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 270, HX 370 / GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060, RTX 5070, RTX 5070 Ti, RTX 5080 / RAM: 16GB, 32GB / Storage: 1TB / Display: 14-inch OLED, 2880 x 1800, 120Hz, 500 nits / Dimensions: 12.24 x 8.66 x 0.63 to 0.64 inches / Battery: 73Whr / Weight: 3.31 pounds

Asus’s ROG Zephyrus G14 has been a favourite among Verge staffers for years now, and it remains our go-to prime for its equilibrium of powerfulness and portability. It tin beryllium your full-time gaming instrumentality arsenic good arsenic your commuter-friendly mundane laptop. Asus redesigned it successful 2024 and toned down its much playful aesthetics for a sleeker, refined look, and for 2025 it conscionable sewage a humble spot bump pinch RTX 50-series graphics and nan expertise to complaint via USB-C connected either broadside (but you still request to usage its proprietary charger for max wattage). 

It now starts astatine $1,799.99 alternatively of $1,699.99. But you get a small much for your other money since moreover nan guidelines Zephyrus G14 comes pinch a lovely, high-res OLED show tin of a 120Hz refresh rate, and it still has a awesome keyboard and trackpad. Games play good connected precocious settings, though owed to nan bladed chassis, nan G14 — and moreover its 16-inch sibling, nan Zephyrus G16 — are known to get a small basking to nan touch, and their fans are rather noisy.

Zephyrus laptops are ne'er going to connection rather nan aforesaid capacity arsenic overmuch thicker models, for illustration nan Asus ROG Strix aliases different chunkers moving balanced GPUs — they conscionable don’t person arsenic overmuch thermal headroom. But if you want a jack-of-all-trades notebook that puts gaming astatine nan forefront, nan G14 (or G16, if you want to spell bigger and person nan budget) is improbable to steer you wrong.

The astir powerful gaming laptop

CPU: Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX  / GPU: Nvidia Geforce RTX 5090 / RAM: 64GB, 96GB / Storage: 6TB / Display: 18-inch Mini LED 4K (3840 x 2400), 120Hz display, 1,000 nits, 100 percent DCI-P3 / Dimensions: 15.9 x 12.08 x 1.26 inches / Battery: 99.9Whr / Weight: 7.93 pounds

The MSI Titan is your prime if fund isn’t a concern. It starts astatine a ridiculous $5,799.99 pinch Intel’s flagship Core Ultra 9 285HX CPU and Nvidia’s astir powerful GPU, nan RTX 5090. The Titan pairs its punchy hardware pinch a monolithic 18-inch 4K / 120Hz Mini LED surface that gets incredibly bright, on pinch 64GB of RAM and a 6TB SSD.

It’s loaded pinch RGB (including an illuminated haptic trackpad), a mechanical keyboard by SteelSeries, 5 USB ports (two of which are Thunderbolt 5), and a four-speaker / dual-woofer sound setup. It tin tackle astir games you propulsion astatine it connected ultra settings. The surface whitethorn not beryllium arsenic accelerated arsenic different laptops pinch 2.5K / 240Hz panels, but 4K astatine 18 inches looks truthful crisp. You person to salary retired nan chemoreceptor for this no-holds-barred experience, but nan astir eight-pound behemoth is astir arsenic powerful arsenic laptops get correct now.

In nan past, our prime for this tier of laptop was Asus’s ROG Strix Scar 17 utilizing 1 of AMD’s X3D chips. That exemplary was particularly unsocial since it was importantly cheaper (under $4,000). Perhaps nan 18-inch MSI Raider pinch nan Ryzen 9 9955HX3D and RTX 5090 could sway maine distant from nan Titan, but we’ll person to effort it retired first. (At $5,099.99, nan Raider isn’t precisely a fund prime either.)

The champion mid-to-high-tier gaming laptops for astir people

CPU: Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX / GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 / RAM: 32GB / Storage:  2TB / Display: 16-inch Mini LED 2560 x 1600, 240Hz show / Dimensions: 13.94 x 10.55 x 0.9 to 1.21 inches / Battery: 90Whr  Weight: 6.17 pounds

You don’t person to walk Titan money to onshore location successful nan ballpark of fantabulous gaming performance. There are a fewer awesome options successful nan mid-to-high tier of gaming laptops, sporting RTX 5080 graphics (or nan RTX 5070 Ti if you request to prevention a spot more). My apical prime is nan Asus ROG Strix Scar 16, followed intimately by nan Lenovo Legion Pro 7i.

The 16-inch ROG Strix Scar is decked retired pinch a wraparound RGB ray barroom that creates a colorful underglow and a dot-matrix LED lid for adorning nosy illuminated animations. The Strix Scar’s crippled capacity is exceptional, pinch its RTX 5080 astir matching nan 5090 successful nan overmuch thinner Razer Blade 16 — and for $1,200 less.

The Lenovo Legion Pro 7i is simply a likewise specced 16-incher, offering nan aforesaid CPU and GPU successful a better, metallic build. It’s sewage its stock of RGB lighting, but it’s done a small much tastefully than nan Asus. Meanwhile, nan Strix Scar’s 2.5K / 240Hz surface is simply a Mini LED show that’s bright, colorful, and visually pleasing. It matches nan solution and refresh complaint of nan OLED connected Lenovo’s Legion Pro 7i, but nan OLED connected nan Lenovo is moreover better, pinch a punchier look.

It’s a spot of a toss-up betwixt these two: nan Lenovo has nan amended surface and build quality, yet it lacks look aliases fingerprint unlocking. But nan Asus is $200 cheaper, and I for illustration nan trackpad and amended cardinal spacing of its numpad-less design. You can’t spell incorrect here, truthful picking 1 based connected mini nuances for illustration that aliases conscionable immoderate you tin get a woody connected is fair. (The Lenovo has dipped to arsenic debased arsenic $2,899 astatine retailers for illustration B&H Photo, and a savings of $600 is significant.)

The champion fund gaming laptop

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7445HS, Intel Core i5-13420H / GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 / RAM: 16GB / Storage: 512GB / Display: 15.6-inch IPS, 1920 x 1080, 144Hz, nary touch action / Dimensions: 14.09 x 10.04 x 0.93 / Battery: 70Wh  Weight: 5.06 pounds

Our erstwhile prime among fund gaming laptops was nan HP Victus 15 pinch an RTX 3050 GPU, which costs astir $800 in 2022 erstwhile it wasn’t connected a steep waste for less. It had a 60Hz surface and conscionable 8GB of RAM, which feels a small paltry for gaming connected Windows 11 successful 2025. Now, you tin get nan aforesaid chassis pinch a 1080p / 144Hz screen, a newer RTX 4050 GPU, and either AMD Ryzen 7 7000-series aliases Intel 13th-Gen CPU for astir $850 to $900.

Nvidia has announced its RTX 5050 laptop GPU, which is group to slow trickle retired into caller laptops for astir $999. We’ll person to spot really that stacks up successful early testing.

The Victus isn’t going to wow you pinch nan champion surface aliases highest-quality components for a keyboard aliases trackpad, but it does stress a coagulated graphics paper successful an affordable package. It’s nan benignant of laptop that will excel pinch unrecorded work games for illustration Minecraft aliases Fortnite, arsenic good arsenic indie titles. Just don’t expect precocious aliases ultra settings connected nan latest AAA games. With nan correct expectations, a much inexpensive gaming laptop for illustration nan Victus tin dainty you well.

A sleek 16-inch gaming laptop

CPU: AMD Ryzen AI 9 365, Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 / GPU: Nvidia Geforce RTX 5060, 5070, RTX 5070 Ti, RTX 5080, RTX 5090 / RAM: 16GB, 32GB, 64GB / Storage: 1TB, 2TB, 4TB / Display: 16-inch OLED, 2560 x 1600, 240Hz / Dimensions: 13.98 x 9.86 x 0.59 to 0.69 inches / Battery: 90Wh / Weight: 4.71 pounds

The Razer Blade 16 has agelong been touted arsenic nan MacBook Pro for gamers, and aft thickening up for a fewer years, it’s backmost to an ultra-thin chassis without overmuch discuss to performance. It’s flush pinch ports, has a awesome keyboard and monolithic trackpad, and its AMD chips tin beryllium paired pinch a assortment of Nvidia GeForce RTX GPU — ranging from nan 5060 for $2,399.99 to nan top-tier 5090 for a overmuch steeper $4,499.99.

The Blade sports a beautiful 16-inch OLED show pinch 2560 x 1600 solution and 240Hz refresh, moreover for nan entry-level configuration. The look of its stealthy matte achromatic creation and greenish Razer logo whitethorn not beryllium to everyone’s liking, but brace that pinch its thinness, and you’ve sewage thing that tin recreation and blend successful almost anywhere.

I tested nan RTX 5090 type successful our review, and while it’s impressive, it tin beryllium a small difficult to warrant spending $4,500 without getting nan maximum capabilities of that flagship GPU, since nan Blade 16’s thinness throttles nan 5090. But it’s specified a bully wide package if you want your gaming laptop to do it all. The Blade besides comes successful 14- and 18-inch sizes, but I deliberation nan 16 is nan saccharine spot.

Read our Razer Blade 16 (2025) review.

The champion convertible gaming laptop

CPU: AMD Ryzen AI Max 390, Ryzen AI Max Plus 395 / GPU: Integrated / RAM: 32GB, 64GB, 128GB / Storage: 1TB SSD / Display: 13.4-inch IPS, 2560 x 1600, 180Hz, touchscreen / Dimensions: 11.81 x 8.03 x 0.51 to 0.59 inches / Battery: 70Whr Weight: 2.65 pounds

Asus’s ROG Flow Z13 gaming tablet has ever been a niche device, but nan latest procreation pinch AMD’s caller Strix Halo APU is nan champion type yet. That’s right, Asus switched from a discrete GPU to integrated graphics, but surprisingly, nan chunky “Surface Pro for gamers” is really amended for it.

It whitethorn sound a small reckless to walk $2,100 aliases much connected a gaming tablet, but nan Z13 and its caller Ryzen AI Max spot connection capable graphical prowess to make astir games look awesome connected its 2560 x 1600 / 180Hz IPS display. And it moreover has nan artillery chops to squeak done an eight-hour activity day, making it an awesome multi-purpose device.

A regular clamshell laptop whitethorn make much logical consciousness for astir people, but nan ROG Flow’s shape facet conscionable makes it kinda fun. Being capable to region nan keyboard wholly allows you to comfortably plop it connected your thigh and crippled distant without emotion for illustration you’re going to group your legs connected fire. And if you’re a mechanical keyboard nerd for illustration me, you tin link your favourite committee without nan bottommost half of a laptop successful your measurement (this is amazingly useful for utilizing nan Z13 arsenic a 2nd surface beneath a large monitor.

Read our Asus ROG Flow Z13 (2025) review.

Monica Chin and Joanna Nelius besides contributed to erstwhile versions of this buying guide.

Update, August 13th: Adjusted pricing and availability.