The Best Laptops of 2023 - For Gaming, Creators & Students!

so with 2023 coming to an end I want to quickly put together a video sharing some of the best laptops that we've tested this year now we've roughly gone through 25 different laptops here in the studio and so I'm going to split this video into two separate categories laptops that are productivity focused as well as laptops that are gaming beasts now I should mention that some of the productivity focused laptops can be used for gaming as well as vice versa you just have to look through the line to see which one of these laptops would fit your lifestyle so I'm going to try and keep this as simple as possible now before we dive in I thought it'' be nice to give you guys a quick recap in terms of what happened this past year 2023 so back in January Intel dropped their 13g rap life CPUs along with uh laptop manufacturers rolling out newer designs and then AMD announced their ryzen 7000 series Dragon range CPUs which once again was a n clature mess with a clash of Zen 2 zen3 Z3 plus n and4 CPUs it wasn't until later in April that we started to see some of these processors make their way into laptops um there's also a bit of uncertainty when it comes to availability for AMD based laptops but we all know that's just not a surprise so yeah it's just an AMD thing on the GPU front Nvidia did announce RTX 4000 for laptops which did give us a pretty generous bump in terms of gaming performance and the same month in January Apple also announced the M2 Pro and M2 Max chips for the MacBook Pros we did see the M2 Ultra chip come to the Mac Studio later in June but the surprising part about just Apple's whole so announcement is that just within a matter of 10 months back in October they announced M3 for the MacBook Pros which is absolutely insane that's probably the fastest product cycle release or product announcement that I've seen within the same year let alone less than a year and then fast forward to December out of the blue AMD drops their ryzen 8000 series of laptop processor specifically codenamed hogo which we all know is is essentially just ryzen 7000 with tons of AI so that whole presentation to me was just basically MD saying let's just put together a quick slide deck showcase it to the press to see if we can kind of break the the news cycle right before Intel dropped their meteor Lake CP so I think it was just like literally a couple days before Intel announced meteor lake so yeah should be interesting I'm not sure about availability for these chips again it's just all a question mark there's no other confirmation on that inel also dropped meteor Lake this year which was also very interesting timeline um I'm assuming you know folks over higher people at Intel just needed to cash in those bonus checks but yeah just saying it's it's been a pretty interesting year in terms of CPU announcements for laptops now if I look at laptop designs the one thing that I found common was that 16-in laptops have been gaining a lot more popularity uh this year simply because laptop manufacturers are able to cram in bigger 16 by10 displays along with better cooling Hardware to cool both the CPU and the GPU because the power ratings for both components have been going up just cuz it's just bringing so much performance to the table so you need proper cooling system to keep things under control I think it's pretty difficult to find a bad laptop these days because no manufactures have certainly improved on the build quality front as well as modernizing some of the design as well plus uh you can also find some really good deals on laptops around this time of the year unfortunately earlier in the year and somewhat towards the middle of the year the prices for laptops have been quite high and I think inflation is definitely something to blame as well but other than that yeah it's been a pretty good year for laptops guys so that's a quick recap of 2023 I'll make sure to leave links to all the laptops that I discuss here in the video down in the description if you guys are interested in picking one up uh also I want to mention that I will only be mentioning the laptops that I've tested here uh in the studio uh I'm sure there are many of laptops that we haven't tested that are great devices in fact I would recommend you referring to other creators who have covered them because I'm I'm sure they're great machines but uh yeah that's what we're going with so without any further Ado let's kick things off with the best productivity focused laptop and my pick goes to the MacBook Air 15in with the M2 Chip this laptop just combines great build quality in a super thin design which only comes to around 42 in it features a 15-in display which is probably one of the best and brightest you can find for a laptop the battery life is also better than the 13-in air since Apple was able to incorporate a bigger battery um considering the larger chassis and the performance is Rock Solid it is actually faster than the 13-in air because of the bigger chassis the passive cooling is better on the 15-in MacBook Air which allows for the clock speed to stay higher for consistent workloads so all in all I think this would be just an excellent productivity focused laptop if you're looking to sort take notes uh and you know just get work done and if you're looking for a premium Computing experience the macare just is the way to go the only worst part about this laptop is Apple's base config um you know 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of SSD just isn't enough for anybody in 2023 let alone 2024 and just the following years so if I were you I would probably upgrade to the 16 GB option along with half a terab of storage just to feature prooof the laptop for the next 5 to 6 years now if money is not an issue when if you're somebody who's just looking to get into some creative work if you're a photographer or a Creator or if you're just looking for just a laptop that's going to last you for the next 5 to 6 years that can handle all sorts of intensive tasks creative Focus tasks the MacBook Pro with the M3 Pro and the M3 Max jip is a way to go I would actually also recommend the M2 Pro and the M2 Max uh refurbished models if you're looking just a few bucks now one of the reasons why I'm recommending a MacBook Pro is simply because of its consistent performance on battery because you're not losing any performance whether you have it plugged in or not unlike any Windows laptop it's still difficult to find a Windows laptop that can still run at it's 100% utilization on battery mode cuz you're losing a ton of performance the moment you you know have it unplugged whereas with the max it's simply you know you can take away with wherever you are on an airplane and still edit a video edit a photo or just get all sorts of work done without sacrificing on performance which really goes to show Apple's amazing power and efficiency combined into this s so it's truly remarkable if you're a pro photographer or a content creator or developer or 3D artist who can leverage the performance of these empowered Maxs uh you're seriously in for a treat guys because the fact that you can cram all of that performance into a very thin and Light chassis is pretty awesome uh the fact that it comes with tons of ports you get a fullsize SD card slot along with a fulls siiz HDMI port lots of Thunderball ports for expansion and most importantly if you need a higher resolution display with accurate color representation this has you covered it's also got one of the best sounding speakers on a laptop period in fact the MacBook Air is also have one of the best sounding speakers so you're just guaranteed for an awesome multimedia experience as well the keyboard and trackpad is awesome that onetoone experience especially the optimizations built into with Mac OS just gives you an awesome computer experience I still use one every day uh to get tons of work done so yeah best productivity laptop if money isn't a problem MacBook Pro is a way to go that being said there is an amazing windows-based laptop for productivity as well and and that none other than goes to the Lenovo slim Pro 9i you see this laptop comes in both 14in and 16-in flavors and simply put an engineering Marvel from the team over at Lenovo picture high performance premium design into a thin and Light chassis and this laptop delivers exactly that so you know the design is incredible it's very minimal with rounded corners for better handling you also have a ton of ports to work with including fullsize USB type A ports something that the MacBook proax Lal keyboard is also by far some of the best out there coupled with their massive and smooth glass trackpad and they also get a beautiful 16-in mini LED display with 165 HZ refresh rate it's essentially the MacBook of Windows laptops the chassis is only 7 in thin and yet it packs an RTX 47d running at 100 Watts along with a core I9 CPU so it's got the horsepower to run stem Focus applications video editing and photo editing apps no problem plus you can also dab a little bit into gaming as well well this is one of those laptops that defines a true premium Windows Computing experience and you can't go wrong with the slim Pro 9i now if you're looking for the best value focused laptop in 2023 that one easily goes to the Asus Zenbook 14x OLED look for $9.99 this is probably one of the best built thinlight laptops on the market it's super thin coming in at 67 in you get a Core i7 CPU with 20 threads which offers great multi-core performance and an RTX 350 to just give you a little bit of boost for graphic intensive tasks when you need it the keyboard and trackpad is awesome uh the 16 X10 Ola display is 120 HZ and it's truly an awesome panel to work with for both productivity and as well as a little bit of entertainment as well the port setup is pretty respectable as well including a fullsize HDMI Thunderball 4 for expansion if you want to plug it into a desktop setup and you also get a fullsize USB a port which is pretty neat and the included power supply is super compact it's easy to carry around it's got really good battery life and I think it's a great option for students who just don't want to break the bank and now I want to quickly go over some honorable mentions and the first laptop that comes to my mind is D Dell xps15 you see this isn't anything revolutionary from Dell we've start we've seen this design for the past two to three years consistently nothing really has changed from the outside or let alone even the inside as well I mean Del is sticking to the same if it ain't broke don't fix a type of approach if it works that's fine right and for $12.99 you get some pretty decent specs but what surprised Uris us the most from this laptop is just the remarkable batter life I don't know what sort of secret saws the team over at Dell or the engineers at Dell have done but they somehow have just figured out how to tune Intel's 13 gen CPUs to yield better battery life it seems like you know they just know how to run these chips when they are at a lower power state which I think is pretty impressive so if you're looking for a premium Windows laptop with a pretty data design that will yield you incredible battery life look no further than xp5 because it's still a great laptop guys I mean I still think it's awesome uh but I just wish the design was a little bit better but hopefully we'll see that uh change in 2024 the other laptop that I wanted to mention is the Lenovo slim 7 Series that come in both Intel and AMD flavors although good luck finding an AMD spec because it's again as I mentioned the beginning of this video impossible to find anything with an AMD chip uh so this laptop is essentially just a culmination of great build quality great design in a super clean minimal package package you get a lot of the premium features of the slim Pro 99 that I mentioned earlier into a fairly thinner and smaller package um so you know you're getting a pretty premium Computing experience at a relatively good price point so yeah I think this is another great option for students who are just looking for a really good solid well-built Windows laptop I think this is a great time to take a quick break and check out today's video sponsor the really capable performance 1fd is now available in white the perfect compliment to matching or contrasting Hardware with all the same great features four thick fans deliver proper airflow for the 40 series and Below there's a temperature display so you know when things get hot supports for dual 360s at the same time 10 GB per second type- c and a whole lot of character with that front grill dual TGs cable covers to hide the mess and antech is really turning things around pick your own color and enjoy this awesome full tower all right so now let's transition into the best gaming laptops of 2023 and I'm going to kick things off with the best portable gaming laptop now thing is it's just really hard to find a super thin or portable gaming laptop and even if you do usually the GPU power is capped uh unlike a thicker chassis that can fit a better cooling solution to power or to allow for more power into the GPU on the CPU so that's one of the compromises that you have to take when you are shopping around for a thinner you know portable gaming laptop but there's one laptop that that in our in my opinion just combines portability good pricing good battery life and good design into a single package and that goes to the RG sephus G14 this laptop comes with a ryzen CPU which is much more efficient compared to Intel it's super fast for multi-core workloads you can configure it with up to an RTX 490 though I would only recommend getting the 4060 or 4070 specs since you're getting a way better performance for the dollar the nebula HDR display is one of the best panels that I've looked at it's also 16x 10 allowing for more content to fill up or take up your screen real estate it's also built really well you get tons of ports you really can't go wrong with this laptop because if you look back at the very first G14 that I was announced just a few years ago it just sort of set the Benchmark in terms of what a portable true portable gaming laptop should be and this is still continuing to be one of the best gaming laptops that you can find on the market moving on to the best 6in gaming laptop and this one was a bit difficult for me to pick because we have a lot of 16in gaming laptops on the market that are really good in fact I made a whole rup video going over some of the best 16in laptops which I'll link right over here highly recommend checking it out but in my opinion I think the best 16-in gaming laptop goes to the legion slim 7 Series that come in both Intel and AMD flavors because for the price especially if you find one on sale you're greeted with a sleek and minimalist design with fantastic build quality the keyboard and trackpad is also awesome the 16 X10 display is bright and beautiful and it Sports up to 240 HZ refresh rate which just gives you a buttery smooth gaming experience the majority of the ports are located at the back for easo cable management plus the signs at the back are backlit so you can easily distinguish one from the other you can also configure this laptop with up to an RTX 470 that can run over 100 watts and the gaming performance is pretty incredible and remember the chassis is only 78 in thin which is pretty remarkable that being said I can't forget to mention it's Bigger Brothers like the legion 5 Pro and the legion Pro 7 Series because if you're looking for a little bit more GPU and CPU power with a little bit of compromise on the overall form factor if you're okay sacrificing a little bit of weight uh these are great Alternatives as well if you're looking for the absolute best gaming performance on a laptop this is one of those categories where money isn't an issue form factor isn't an issue you just want something that can be classified as laptop that can give you desktop class performance this none other than goes to the razor no no it's not a razor laptop guys I almost got you there okay this this one is the RG scar 17x 3D you see this is a very unique laptop from AMD this year and RG of course because what they did is they took a desktop class ryzen 9 7950 X 3D and just cram it into one of the fastest laptops on the planet paired with an RTX 490 running at 17 wats it absolutely demolishes what Intel has to offer with an exception if you're getting into sort of creative based applications that require built-in qsb for acceleration sure Intel CPUs have a bit of an edge there but from an overall CPU performance perspective the x3d chip is so remarkable it's probably one of the fastest chips that you can find on a gaming laptop period the 17-in form factor also allowed RG to cram in a really beefy cooling system specifically a vapor chamber cooling system to keep temperatures under control so things are running pretty cool on this laptop you also get a 17-in Quad HD display that runs at 240 HZ for that buttery smooth gaming experience you get tons of ports at the back back for uh expansion that being said I guess the runner up for the best asop RAC that one goes to the Razer Blade 18 because Razer just crammed a lot of performance into a fairly thin chassis it's not super thin but it's thinner than the RG scar laptop and you are getting amazing build quality in a really good form factor I love the Aesthetics again if you're into the matte black simple gam re Aesthetics the blade 18 is a pretty great alternative but if you don't want to break the Bank the RG zephrus M16 is a great option specifically I found a 4070 spec for a really good price on Best Buy which I think is a great option this just combines great build quality in a really stealthy design especially Matt Black if you're into that kind of stuff you're going to love the M16 the mini LED display is by far one of the best displays you can find for a laptop that paired with a really solid keyboard and a massive glass trackpad just gives you an awesome Computing experience overall now I want to wrap up this video by sharing one of the coolest laptops that I've encountered this year and that easily hands down goes to the Lenovo Yoga book 9i you see I had so much fun using this laptop for both productivity and just getting a little bit into content creation as well it doesn't necessarily have the hardware to back it up the specs are not on par with what you'd expect with a Creator Focus laptop but when you take the whole performance out of the equation and just use it from a productivity standpoint it's simply just an awesome experience so you get two 13.3 in Ola displays that are vibrant and sharp you can use it in different modes starting with laptop mode tent mode book mode and tablet mode so it's highly versatile the keyboard and trackpad are virtual on the bottom display but it also comes with a cool Bluetooth keyboard that syncs up to the laptop instantly and the coolest part is just how you can transform this laptop into a dual display workstation wherever you go remember this whole package can conform back to 63 in and it only weighs around 3 lb plus lovo has built in some cool Windows management tools to take advantage of all the screen real EST estate so if you bring this thing to a coffee shop or you know guess wherever you go you're going to be the TU of the town I think this laptop or I guess I don't even know if you can call it a laptop I think it's just a niche product catered towards those seeking a very different Innovative Computing experience and it's just one of those devices that just makes technology more exciting so there you guys have it best laptops of 2023 it's just a really fun little video that I decided to put together and it also helps me kind of go back into the year and take a look at some of the great laptops that have passed by the studio uh this is also the last video for the year so I'm excited for what 2024 has in store we already kind of know what's happening with metor Lake setting the stage so you know expect more content around meteor Lake and everything else coming along the pipeline so yeah stay safe happy New Year and uh I'll see you guys in the next one spend responsibly my friends

Channel: Hardware Canucks

Views: 357,514

Keywords: best laptops 2023, best gaming laptops 2023, best budget laptops 2023, best laptops 2024, fastest laptops 2023, best ultrabook 2023, best laptop you can buy, Macbook Air M2, Macbook Pro M3 Pro, Macbook Pro M3 Max, hardware canucks, hardwarecanucks, windows vs mac laptop

Id: JlXnYSWuv9g

Length: 19min 4sec (1144 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 30 2023