Best Gaming Laptops 2024

Whether you want to take your rig on the road, carry it to the couch or just save space on your desk, a gaming laptop packs PC performance into a compact, portable form factor. Because people have different needs and BEST GAMING LAPTOPS 2024 budgets, the market is loaded with choices that come with screens ranging from 14 to 18 inches, graphics cards that can handle a variety of resolutions and prices that start at less than $999 but creep over the $5,000 mark. The best gaming laptops often come with fancy RGB lights, high refresh rate panels and, sometimes, even mechanical keyboards.

Best Gaming Laptops

To help you choose the right gaming laptop for you, we test many models each year, benchmarking them in popular games such as Cyberpunk 2077 and Borderlands 3, measuring the color gamut and brightness of their screens, determining battery life and, of course, playing with them. Below, we’ve listed the best gaming laptops for different sizes, price points and use cases. For those on a tight gaming budget, we also have dedicated pages for the best gaming laptops under $1,500 and the best gaming laptops under $1,000.

THE QUICK LIST Best Gaming Laptops 2024

Best Gaming Laptops 2024

THE BEST GAMING LAPTOP

The MSI Titan GT77 HX has everything, and, we’ll be honest, it should. We tested it at $5,399.99, which is way out of reach for most people (don’t worry, there are cheaper options further down the list). Between powerful performance, an excellent 18-inch mini-LED screen, and a clicky, mechanical keyboard, there’s a lot to enjoy here.

The Intel Core i9-14900HX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU are powerful, though they admittedly don’t offer a huge bump over previous generations. But with 128GB of RAM and 4TB of SSD storage there’s plenty of room for games and more memory than you’ll ever need for gaming. This would be a great machine for video editors.

Admittedly, the 14th Gen Intel Core processor doesn’t have any huge performance gains over 13th Gen Core gaming laptops, but the Titan 18 HX did great in some of our most difficult tests, like running Cyberpunk 2077 on the Ray Tracing Ultra preset.

MSI is using a Cherry MX mechanical keyboard, which is clicky and comfortable. It’s a luxury for typing and gaming, though it’s unfortunate that MSI doesn’t also use these switches for the number and arrow keys.

But the highlight is the 18-inch, mini-LED display, which covered 112.4% of the DCI-P3 color gamut in our testing and measured an incredibly bright 559 nits with our light meter. Games and movies look excellent on this HDR display.

With the Titan, MSI has come as close to cramming a desktop into a laptop chassis as possible. It’s for people who don’t have room for — or don’t want — a desktop. It’s the best in many ways, assuming you can afford it.

Read: MSI Titan 18 HX review

THE BEST BUDGET GAMING LAPTOP

The Acer’s Nitro line has often a place on this list, mixing build quality, performance, and low pricing to create a reasonable product. The Nitro 16, replacing the old Nitro 5, delivers the entry-level power of an RTX 4050 and a Ryzen 5 7640HS, but with some niceties you can get for under $1,000.

Our $999 review unit included a 1920 x 1200, 165 Hz display with G-Sync support, which is great for esports gaming. It’s nice and bright at 371 nits on our light meter, and covered 91% of the DCI-P3 color gamut.

In our game testing, we found that the system is not the most powerful, but that it has enough power for today’s games at the system’s native 1920 x 1200. In almost every game we tested, the Nitro surpassed 60 fps.

We also appreciated that the laptop offered 8 hours and 24 minutes of battery life on our test, which beat other laptops in i’s class — some by multiple hours.

The webcam isn’t amazing, and Acer has a habit of putting too much bloatware on laptops that you’ll spend some time uninstalling. But getting USB 4 under $1,000, alongside a solid screen and decent performance for the price makes this a great choice for someone whose budget it set at $1,000.

Read: Acer Nitro 16 Review

BEST BUDGET ALTERNATIVE

The MSI Katana 15 is among our favorite gaming laptops for those with just $1,000 to spend. We tested a $999 model with a Core i7-13620H and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 offering strong 1080p performance, though you may have to turn down some settings in some games.

In our testing, the Katana passed 60 fps in most benchmarks at some pretty high settings, though some, like Red Dead Redemption 2, were run lower. As games get more challenging, budget laptops won’t run at the highest settings for long.

Even under $1,000, you get 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage, which is nice to see, as those are often some of the first specs to get cut for a budget PC. Instead, the chassis is made of cheap plastic, but the internals should get the job done.

The display could be a bit more vivid, but its 144 Hz refresh rate will be a boon for esports players. And for its price, it delivers solid audio.

Read: MSI Katana 15 Review

BEST THIN AND LIGHT GAMING LAPTOP

The Asus ROG Strix G16 is catching up to Razer in powerful, portable gaming laptops well. The Strix G16’s Core i9-13980HX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 provided great performance in a  0.89-inch thick chassis. Is the design as sleek as Razer’s Blades? No, but at $1,999.99 when we tested it, Asus is also competing on price.

We also appreciated the Strix’s battery life — it lasted for 8 hours and 49 minutes on our battery test, as well as the RGB keys with 2 millimeters of travel.

The laptop’s lid is aluminum, but the rest is plastic. In our time with the laptop, not once did we think the ROG Strix G16 felt cheap.

In fact, in each of the benchmarks we ran, the ROG Strix G16 surpassed 60 fps (often handily!), showing solid performance at both 1080p and its native 1920 x 200. Perhaps the biggest issue we had is that our unit had a 1920 x 1200 touch screen. The RTX 4070 should power that no problem based on our benchmarks, and in this price range you often see 1440p (or, in 16:10 screens like this one, 1600p) display panels.

Read: Asus ROG Strix G16 Review

BEST 16-INCH ESPORTS MACHINE

Best Gaming Laptops

For under $1,500, you can get a 16-inch esports machine with a screen that also allows for high-resolution, intensive titles. The 2560 x 1600 display goes up to 165 Hz, which is fast enough for esports at 1080p, while the high resolution will make action games look great. Sure, some gaming laptops have faster displays, but they’re often more expensive.

The “i” in 5i Pro stands for Intel. We tested with an Intel Core i7-13700HX along with Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 4060. Our system also had 16GB of DDR5 RAM and a 512GB SSD.

This model has an improved 1080p webcam over previous generations, which is good for working as well as gaming. We found that its SSD was fast in our testing, and it offered competing gaming performance. That being said, you may want to consider one of the best gaming headsets because there’s plenty of fan noise and the audio quality isn’t the best.

Read: Lenovo Legion Pro 5i (Gen 8) Review

THE BEST DESKTOP REPLACEMENT

If you get an 18-inch laptop, it’s likely a semi-permanent fixture on your desk. The Alienware m18 R2 is good for that, as it’s pretty heavy at 8.63 pounds, but it also delivers strong gaming performance on a large, high-resolution display.

Best Gaming Laptops

While a gaming laptop won’t compete with a desktop for upgradeability, the Alienware m18 R2 is still impressive. When we opened it up, we found a slew of extra slots for M.2 SSDs, as well as slotted RAM, a replaceable Wi-Fi card, and, of course, the battery.

The laptop is built solid, with plenty of aluminum along the frame (though that may be part of what makes it a bit heavy). Perhaps our favorite part is the Cherry MX low-profile mechanical keyboard, which is excellent for both typing and gaming. It’s worth the $50 upcharge, and I wish all sorts of laptops had mechanical keyboard options. Unlike the MSI Titan, portable gaming laptops well. The Strix G16’s Core i9-13980HX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 provided great performance in a  0.89-inch thick chassis. Alienware’s mechanical keyboard covers every key.

That’s not to say we have no qualms.

Best Gaming Laptops

The display, while usable, isn’t as bright as some of the OLED options out there. And while you’re likely using a gaming mouse, the touchpad could use some love. But the build quality, performance, and upgradeability still make this one a winner in our book.

Read: Alienware m18 R2 Review

BEST CROSSOVER PRODUCTIVITY/GAMING LAPTOP