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If there's one thing we know at 18WENKU it's the best gaming laptops. We review every new generation of machines, every year, and with every new graphics generation. That's how we know that these are the best gaming laptops, because we've tested a huge range of machines in our time.
So, if you want to know what the best gaming laptop is for a budget, for the best performance, in a compact size, or even at a mahoosive scale, we've got a list of six great gaming notebooks that will cater to all needs.
Our experts
Dave James has been working in the industry as a technology journalist, testing the latest and greatest (and sometimes the worst) PC gaming hardware for 20 years. And in that time he has tested probably in the region of 50 to 100 gaming laptops. He has written for a host of different PC technology titles since switching discipline from games journalism to technology, including PC Format, What Laptop, Techradar, PC Answers, PC Plus, and PCGamesN. He also formulated the current gaming laptop testing methodology used on 18WENKU.
Nick Evanson's encyclopaedic knowledge of computing and computing hardware has made him a mainstay of 18WENKU's hardware testing since he joined the company two years ago. He has tested a host of modern RTX 40- and 50-series gaming laptops, from budget machines to beefy 18-inch Alienware machines. He has lectured and taught computer science and engineering and has been writing about hardware for 30+ years, and also ran the gaming outlet of Futuremark, the makers of industry standard benchmarking software, 3DMark and PCMark.
We have individually and independently tested 44 of the best gaming laptops in the past two years.
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
Image credit: Future
The gaming performance is excellent with the RTX 5090 version we reviewed, and so is the content creation and productivity chops of this machine. The Intel processor at its heart may not be as efficient, or have as good an integrated GPU inside it, but it's still an outstanding computational architecture.
Even the nominally faster Core Ultra 9 285HX inside the MSI Raider 18 HX AI can't keep up with the Alienware, as its cooling allows the Core Ultra 9 275HX chip to deliver more in terms of raw compute power.
It's not a perfect desktop replacement, however. Honestly, in a high-priced 18-inch laptop I want a great screen, and this one just isn't. It's fine, but an OLED at least would be more than welcome, as would even a higher resolution panel. Sure, you do get 300 Hz refresh when powered directly from the discrete GPU itself, but it's still not a winner.
Still, this is an excellent big-screen gaming laptop that beats out the rest of the 18-inch competition because of its quality cooling, funky chassis, and excellent overall gaming and computational performance.
November 17, 2025: We have a new block at the top to roundup our picks for the best gaming laptop, as well as adding in the new Gigabyte Aero X16 and Framework 16 laptops into the also tested section. Quite clearly they're not going to topple the Blade 16 from the top of the best gaming list, but the Framework is still a hugely important machine, marking the first generational graphics card update for an existing laptop, with an RTX 5070 mobile able to be dropped into a notebook that was released a year and a bit ago.
November 5, 2025: The individual reviews have been tweaked to make the pages load faster, and I've added in the Acer Predator Triton 14 AI to our also tested section. I've also included a full break down of the gaming battery life benchmarks for all the machines we've tested this year. But all of our actual recommendations remain the same. If you're after a new gaming laptop this year, these are the best gaming laptops to spend your money on.
October 16, 2025: I've added in the Gigabyte Gaming A16 laptop review into the also tested section, as its weak 85 W RTX 5060 GPU can't keep up with Lenovo LOQ 15 in terms of budget performance.
Best gaming laptop battery life
Gaming laptop | PC Mark gaming battery life (minutes) |
|---|---|
Gigabyte Gaming A16 | 183 |
Asus TUF A14 (2025) | 156 |
Razer Blade 16 (2025) | 135 |
Razer Blade 14 (2025) | 134 |
Acer Predator Helios Neo 16 Al | 115 |
Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 (2025) | 112 |
Acer Predator Triton 14 Al | 110 |
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 | 106 |
Gigabyte Aorus Master 16 | 102 |
MSI Crosshair 16 HX (AI) | 101 |
MSI Stealth A18 HX AI | 100 |
HP Omen Max 16 | 96 |
MSI Raider 18 HX AI A2XW | 93 |
Asus ROG Flow Z13 | 90 |
Lenovo LOQ 15 Gen10 | 89 |
MSI Vector 16 HX AI A2XW | 88 |
MSI Stealth 18 HX AI | 82 |
Alienware 18 Area-51 | 81 |
Lenovo Legion 7i Pro Gen10 | 73 |
Alienware 16 Area-51 | 73 |
Asus ROG Strix G16 | 72 |
Acer Predator Helios 18 Al | 71 |
Erazer Deputy 15 P1 | 59 |
Erazer Scout 15 E1 | 44 |
Also tested
The above gaming laptops are the ones we recommend you spend your hard-earned cash on if you're looking for a new machine, but they aren't the only ones we've reviewed. We regularly test different gaming laptops to make sure we're recommending only the absolute best.
These are the machines we've looked at recently that didn't make the cut...
How we test gaming laptops
For the new generation of gaming laptops we have changed our testing suite for the new machines coming through in 2025. Part of that is bringing in more up to date games, but also ensuring that we're capturing both gaming at a consistent, comparative 1080p resolution as well as at each machine's native resolution.
We are currently using Cyberpunk 2077, Baldur's Gate 3, Black Myth Wukong, F1 24, and Metro Exodus Enhanced Ed. as our GPU testing suite. This gives us a spread of third-person, first-person, driving, and RPG/strategy games to really push the machines being tested, and also allows us to feature the latest in GPU features, such as upscaling and frame generation.
As such, we have also included a 'real-world' benchmark for games where that makes sense in our reviews, where we utilise both Quality upscaling as well as frame generation where available. We also test without so that we can get a bead on how the hardware performs, but this metric allows you to see what sort of frame rates you can get in standard gaming.
As well as games, we use the industry standard 3DMark benchmarks of Time Spy Extreme, Port Royal—for ray tracing performance—and the storage benchmark to see how the system will work in terms of slick game loading.
We track both gaming temperatures, using Nvidia's Frameview application while capturing both average and 1% Low frame rates, and we also capture thermals of both CPU and GPU while engaging in more productivity lead testing.
On that count we run Cinebench 2024 for CPU-based rendering, 7zip 24.07 for general CPU performance, Blender 4.2.0 to test both CPU and GPU rendering performance, and Procyon to test a machine's AI image generation capabilities.
Finally, we use the PCMark 10 Gaming battery life benchmark to allow us to get a standard number for how long a machine will stand up to the rigours of modern gaming.
But we also run some experiential tests on a given system, which will involve using it as a day-to-day PC for work and play, ensuring we get a read on how well a machine performs across different use cases. We also check out a system's panel—we use Lagom's LCD test images to help discern things like black levels and white saturation as well as general desktop and gaming testing to see how it feels to use a laptop's screen.
It's also important to check the actual gaming frequency of both a laptop's GPU and CPU, to see how a given slice of silicon performs given the thermal constraints of different notebook chassis.
We will also open up every laptop, not only to see how easy it is to get the back off the different machines, but also to see whether it's possible to upgrade or repair anything inside them. It's important to see whether there might be a second M.2 SSD slot hiding away in there, or whether there is upgradeable memory, or whether some unscrupulous manufacturer has decided to just go with single channel memory or some such poor play.
Personally I also like to always write a review of a given laptop on the machine itself. That gives you a good feel about both the trackpad and keyboard, as well as the ergonomics of the chassis design, too.
We then bring all of that subjective and objective data together alongside the price to decide how well each machine we test stands up against all the other gaming laptops we've looked at in our combined decades of PC hardware testing.
How to spot the best deal
👉The latest gaming laptop deals are right here👈
18WENKU's got your back Our experienced team dedicates many hours to every review, to really get to the heart of what matters most to you. Find out more about how we evaluate games and hardware.
Where are the best gaming laptop deals?
In the US:
Amazon - RTX 3050 laptops from Acer and Dell starting at $650
Walmart - cheap Gateway laptops. Remember them?!
B&H Photo - up to $500 off Lenovo, Asus, & MSI gaming laptops
Target - sub-$1,000 gaming laptops
Staples - up to $300 off MSI gaming notebooks
Lenovo - $1,000+ discounts on Legion laptops
Newegg - $500+ off RTX 30 series gaming laptops
Best Buy - save up to $500 on gaming laptops
Microsoft - up to half price on last-gen laptops
Dell - save over $300 on Dell and Alienware gaming laptops
In the UK:
Amazon - save on Asus, Razer, and Acer gaming laptops
Dell - Alienware and Dell Gaming laptops with up to £500 off
HP - Save £450 on HP Omen laptop powered by an RTX 3070 Ti
Overclockers - gaming laptop deals and components
Ebuyer - RTX 3060-powered gaming laptop for just £799.98
Very - save up to £450 on RTX 3070 MSI gaming laptops
Box - Just £1,916.99 for a Razer Blade 15 Base gaming laptop
Scan - up to £400 off gaming laptops from different manufactures
FAQ
What's the most important gaming laptop component?
When it comes to gaming, the obvious answer is the graphics card, but that's where things have gotten a little more complicated recently. With GPU performance now so dependent on cooling, you have to pay attention to what wattage a graphics card is limited to and what chassis it's squeezed into.
Laptop GPUs can come in a variety of different wattages, where something like an 45 W RTX 5060 will perform markedly worse than one rated to 100 W in a particular chassis. But both of those laptops might just be marketed as having RTX 5060 graphics.
The most important thing you can do when looking for a new gaming laptop is check what level of power the graphics silicon is running at. That might take some digging, but will be the difference between getting hobbled with a weakling of a machine and a frame rate chewing monster.
Which GPU is best for a laptop?
We've done a host of testing and you can check out our Best graphics card for laptops guide for all the details, but we think the overall best GPU for gaming laptops is the Nvidia RTX 5080 mobile. It can sometimes outperform RTX 5090 GPUs that have been jammed in the wrong kind of laptop chassis, and is starting to become more and more affordable.
If you're on a more limited budget, our pick as the best budget GPU for gaming laptops is the Nvidia RTX 5060 mobile. It has more of the graphics silicon to deal with the ray tracing good stuff, even if the RTX 5050 can often post similar rasterised gaming figures.
Should I worry about what the CPU in a gaming laptop is?
That really depends on what you want to do with your laptop. An 8-core, 16-thread AMD Ryzen chip will allow you to do a whole load of productivity on the road, but honestly, it will have little benefit in gaming. As long as the CPU has at least six cores and 12 threads, and they're clocked high enough, it will be more than enough to deliver high-end gaming performance when paired with something like the RTX 5070.
What screen size is best for a gaming laptop?
This will arguably have the most immediate impact on your choice of the build. Picking the size of your screen basically dictates the size of your laptop. A 13-inch machine will be a thin-and-light ultrabook, a 14-incher will be a slimline gaming machine, while an 18-inch panel almost guarantees workstation stuff. At 16 inches, however, you're looking at the most common size of the gaming laptop screen and with that generally the best mix of size and gaming performance from the machine itself.
Are high refresh rate panels worth it for laptops?
We love high refresh rate screens here, and while you cannot guarantee your RTX 5070 will deliver 300 fps in the latest games, you'll still see a benefit in general look and feel running a 300 Hz display.
Should I get a 4K screen in my laptop?
Nah. 4K gaming laptops are overkill; they're fine for video editing if you're dealing with 4K content, but it's not the optimal choice for games. The standard 1080p resolution means that the generally slower mobile GPUs are all but guaranteed high frame rates, while companies are slowly drip-feeding 1600p panels into their laptop ranges.
A 1600p screen offers the perfect compromise between high resolution and decent gaming performance. At the same time, a 4K notebook will overstress your GPU and tax your eyeballs as you squint at your 16-inch display.