Laptops are designed for different user groups such as home users, gamers, designers and business users.  If you just want to surf the web, do e-mail, watch videos and pay bills, then a regular consumer laptop will easily handle these tasks.  Business laptops are intended for those who need a durable, portable computer for travel that can provide powerful computing for a variety of programs.  If you’re a gamer, designer or video editor, then you need a laptop with superior processing power and a dedicated graphics processing unit for your more demanding tasks.  These also come with a higher resolutions screen and higher system memory.

What to consider when choosing a laptop:

The CPU (Central Processing Unit)

The CPU or processor has a huge influence on performance, but depending on what you want to do, even the least-expensive model may be powerful enough to suit your needs.  Here's a rundown:

Intel Core i3: A good basic processor with performance is just a step below Intel Core i5 - and so is the price. If you can possibly step up to a Core i5, we would recommend it.

Intel Core i5: If you're looking for a mainstream laptop with the best combination of price and performance, get one with an Intel Core i5 CPU. Models that end in U are the most common. Those with a Y in the name are low power and have worse performance, while models with an HQ use more wattage and appear in thicker gaming and workstation systems. Intel's newest 10th Generation "Ice Lake" CPUs have four cores, and a number of useful features, including Wi-Fi 6 support, Thunderbolt 3 integration and better AI.

Intel Core i7: A step up from Core i5. i7 Models with numbers that end in HQ or K use higher wattage and have four cores, allowing for even faster gaming and productivity. There are also Core i7 Y series chips that have lower power and performance.  Look for CPUs that have a 10 in the model number because they are part of Intel's latest, 10th Generation Core Series, and offer better performance. (Note: Intel's H-series 9th Generation CPUs are available now).

Intel Core i9: Supplanting the Core i7 as the new top-of-the-line CPU from Intel, Core i9 processors provide faster performance than any other mobile chip.  Available only on premium laptops, workstations and high-end gaming rigs, Core i9 CPUs are only worth their premium price if you're a power user who uses the most demanding programs and apps.

Intel Pentium/Celeron: these processors offer the slowest performance, but are perfectly fine if your main tasks are web surfing and light document editing. If you can pay more to get a Core i3 or i5, you'd be better off.

Intel Core m/Core i5/ i7 "Y Series”: Low-power and low heat allow systems with these processors to go fan-less. Performance is better than Celeron, but a notch below regular Core U series.

Intel Xeon: Extremely powerful and expensive processors for large mobile workstations. If you do professional-grade engineering, 3D modelling or video editing, you might want a Xeon, but you won't get the best battery life or a lightweight laptop.

AMD Ryzen Mobile: AMD’s mainstream Ryzen processors are split across three
families: Ryzen 7 (pitched in opposition to the performance offered by an Intel i7), Ryzen 5 (a mainstream counterpart to the Intel i5) and Ryzen 3 (an entry-level alternative to the Intel i3). The higher the number, the higher the specs of the processor. Ryzen 3 has 4 cores; Ryzen 5 has 4 to 6 cores and up to 12 processing threads; Ryzen 7 has 8 cores with 16 processing threads; and Ryzen 9 has up to 16 cores and up to 32 processing threads.  Simple enough, right? 

This initial three-tiered approach also made it pretty easy to compare AMD’s Ryzen chips against Intel processors. The Ryzen 3 was an entry-level alternative to the Intel i3, the Ryzen 5 was a mainstream counterpart to the Intel i5, and the Ryzen 7 was pitched in opposition to the performance offered by an Intel i7.

RAM (Random Access Memory)

Some basic laptops come with only 4GB of RAM, but ideally you want at least 8GB on even a budget system and 16GB if you can spend just a little more.  For most folks, 32GB is more than enough while 64GB and above is reserved for power users like gamers or designers.

Storage Drive (The Hard Drive)

You might need to consider the type of storage of your laptop, such as  HDD (Hard Disk Drive) or SSD (Solid State Drive).  HDD storage is higher in capacity but lower in speed when compared to SSD.  Even more important than the speed of your CPU is the performance of your storage drive.  If you can afford it and don't need a ton of internal storage, get a laptop with a SSD rather than HDD, because you'll see at least three times the speed and a much faster laptop overall.  Among SSDs, the newer PCIe x4 units offer triple the speed of traditional SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) drives.  Laptops use eMMC memory, which is technically solid-state but not faster than a mechanical hard drive.

Laptop Display

The more pixels you have, the more content you can fit on-screen, and the sharper it will look. Sadly, some budget laptops still have 1366 x 768 displays and so do a few business laptops.  If you can afford it, we recommend paying extra for a screen that runs at 1920 x 1080, also known as Full HD or 1080p.  Higher-end laptops have screens that are 2560 x 1600, 3200 x 1800 or even 3840 x 2160 (4K), which all look sharp but consume more power, lowering your battery life.

Touchscreen

If you're buying a regular laptop, you won't get much benefit from a touch screen but you will get 1 to 3 hours less battery life. On 2-in-1s, touch screens come standard.  (A 2-in-1, is a portable computer that has features of both tablets and laptops).  If you still want a touch screen, check out our best touch screen laptops category.

Laptop Ports

While the absence of ports is usually not a deal-breaker when choosing a laptop, it's helpful to get the connections you need already on the laptop, rather than having to carry a slew of dongles.  (A dongle connects one device to another device.)  Other features you need to check are the USB ports to plug in peripherals, HDMI ports and SD memory card slots.  Most mainstream laptops will have USB 3.0 ports and HDMI-out for video.  However, an increasing number of laptops use USB Type-C or Thunderbolt 3 ports that are USB Type-C compatible.  Getting Type-C is a definite plus because you can use it to connect to universal chargers and docks.  If you can wait, USB 4 will arrive soon with faster transfer rates and the ability to daisy-chain 4K monitors with one cable.  Other useful connections include SD card slots, headphone jacks and Ethernet ports (especially if you're a gamer).

DVD / Blu-ray Drives

Few laptops now come without optical drives, because all software and movies are downloadable, though we've kept track of the laptops with DVD drives. However, if you really need to read/write discs and your laptop of choice doesn't come with a built-in DVD drive, you can always buy an external one that connects to your laptop via USB.  Easy!

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