The Best Laptops for 2026

Design: Essentially, the OmniBook is a silver sliver with a clean look. The laptop is just light enough to qualify as an ultraportable, and it features a full-metal frame and a soft-touch plastic keyboard deck. HP fit the OmniBook with a 1080p webcam with infrared sensing for biometric logins and a privacy shutter. Of course, you won’t see Thunderbolt 4 ports here without an Intel chip inside, but at least they’re versatile USB-C connections.

Display: HP made some measured decisions to optimize the OmniBook 5 display for performance and price, offering a 1200p OLED panel without touch (though it’s optional) and a 60Hz refresh rate. It’s basic in sharpness and speed, but super-premium in color coverage.

Performance: In terms of speed, the OmniBook 5 is firmly midrange, designed more for longevity than performance. Regardless, this laptop will easily handle homework, paying bills, and web browsing. It’s just not your go-to video editing or gaming rig. The OmniBook 5 is a laptop designed for most people, not edge cases like content creation or gaming.

Battery life: Here’s where the OmniBook 5 distinguishes itself from every other laptop on this list: more than 34 hours of battery life. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X laptop processors are highly efficient, confirmed by our battery testing. Expect this laptop to last well more than a full workday off the charger.

Value for money: The OmniBook 5 maintains a healthy focus on value with an approachable starting price, further enhanced by frequent sales on HP's own web store. We’ve seen it for as low as $699.99, which is quickly approaching traditional budget-laptop pricing—that’s a steal for what this laptop is capable of.

Casual computer users: With a midrange processor inside designed to run battery-efficient, the OmniBook 5 is ideal for general audiences who just need a laptop for the most basic tasks. This laptop is perfectly optimized for managing home finances, web browsing, and even basic photo editing.

Kids in school: This laptop is a fine fit for students of almost all ages. It’s affordable for what it includes, elevating basic homework at virtually any grade level. The OLED screen will enhance all visuals, and the laptop’s webcam is ready for remote learning.

AI early adopters: The HP OmniBook 5 is also, importantly, a Microsoft Copilot+ PC, meaning its processor has the AI hardware needed to power the full complement of Windows 11 Copilot AI features. These include full chatbot models, text editing and generation, and video call enhancements.

Design: The XPS 14 refined Dell’s leading laptop design into something much more comparable and competitive with the MacBook Pro while maintaining its own identity. The most critical design revisions include a more traditional keyboard layout that ditches the capacitive touch keys, and a new touchpad with defined edges. Both are significant quality-of-life improvements.

Display: Dell sells the XPS 14 with two different display options. One is a 1200p LCD panel without touch control but featuring a 1Hz-to-120Hz variable refresh rate, which maximizes power savings by minimizing the refresh rate when viewing still content. The other is a glitzy 1800p OLED touch screen with a similar 120Hz refresh rate but less range and excellent color coverage. We prefer the sharper and colorful screen, but always welcome choice.

Performance: This is where the XPS 14 begins to pull ahead of the rest, thanks in no small part to one of Intel’s new Core Ultra X7 chips. These new "Panther Lake" processors have much-improved Intel Arc graphics units on board that even keep pace with the M5 graphics chip inside the MacBook Pro. Running on that engine, the XPS 14 is a capable content creator and pinch-hit gamer.

Battery life: Despite the muscular CPU, the Core Ultra X7 CPU can be a power-sipper when it needs to be. The XPS 14 lasted 21 hours in our battery rundown test, suggesting it will easily endure a full workday on a single charge. This result was from the sharper OLED model, so the entry-level models may last even longer.

Value for money: This is where the adage “you get what you pay for” applies. The XPS 14 is expensive, full stop, but it’s also one of the highest-quality builds we’ve seen from a Windows laptop to date. Dell has worked hard to build up the XPS brand to command the prices it does, and it shows in the product. However, you’ll pay a premium to enjoy Dell’s work.

Power-using commuters: This 3-pound laptop is well-suited to people who travel or commute often but still need a touch of power. Dell’s XPS 14 qualifies as an ultraportable while delivering highly competitive performance across the board.

Screen snobs: With the XPS 14, Dell’s 1800p OLED touch-screen option is a no-brainer for people who prioritize a pristine panel. This screen aced nearly all of our color gamut testing and shone more than brightly enough for varied use.

Design: Getting right in front of it, absolutely nothing has changed about the MacBook Air's look and feel this year. Few laptop makers could still drive the market like Apple does while doing basically nothing to the design. With that, the 2026 Air is still just 0.44 inch thick and weighs a slight 2.7 pounds. The laptop still has just two Thunderbolt 4 ports and MagSafe charging—that’s it. The MacBook Air design remains impressive, but it’s been the least dynamic part of the laptop for a while now.

Display: This area is another in which Apple has decided to hold firm, making no changes for several years. This year's Air screen is identical to the last, a 13.6-inch panel with a 2,560-by-1,664-pixel 16:10 Liquid Retina LCD with True Tone ambient color adjustment. The panel hasn't changed a bit with this model, so expect it to nail the sRGB and P3 color gamuts and clear 500 nits of brightness.

Performance: This area is where you’ll see the biggest change year over year, thanks to the M5 processor bringing so much more graphics and AI punch than before. The M5 chip in the MacBook Air pushes performance into the yard of some laptops approaching twice its price, and does it with a fanless design. This year’s Air solidified its position as Apple’s midrange laptop, thanks to this power boost coupled with that doubling in storage capacity.

Battery life: While the Air’s generational downgrading in battery life continues, Apple's lightweight laptop still impresses, clearing 18 hours in our video-rundown benchmark. That’s still plenty of juice, and within Apple’s promised time, but the Air hasn’t been the battery-life champion for a while now.

Value for money: The MacBook Air line spent most of its life serving as Apple’s most approachable entry point into its laptops. That’s no longer the case with the MacBook Neo in the mix, which changes the value discussion a bit. Yes, the Air is more expensive than it was before, but its level of performance and build quality is still a rarity at its new pricing.

Apple die-hards: If you currently use an iPhone or an iPad and want your laptop to look and feel similar in use, or you’ve used Apple computers for a while now, this is a no-brainer. Apple’s macOS offers deep continuity with your other Apple devices, sharing data from apps like Messages, Notes, and more—you can even fully mirror your iPhone on your Mac now, or use it as a high-end webcam.

College students: While the MacBook Air got a little pricier once again, chances are high you’ll see a lot of new Air laptops on college campuses this year. The Neo might change this calculus for some university students, but many will still need the extra power and capability for more demanding higher-education classwork. Treated with care, a new MacBook Air laptop can last an undergraduate's entire four-year stretch at school, and the MacBook Neo doesn’t change that fact.

Design: Apple cut no corners in designing the MacBook Neo, morphing its full-metal MacBook Air frame into something just as light but a little thicker and not quite as wide. It’s a 13-inch laptop (instead of the Air’s 13.6 inches) that’s slightly thicker than an Air, at half an inch on the nose. It’s also colorful, coming in three fun shades alongside the classic silver: Blush (pink), Citrus (lime green), and Indigo (dark blue).

Display: The MacBook Neo makes a scarce few concessions in adapting Apple’s Liquid Retina LCD. It’s a smaller 13-inch panel, but it’s just as bright as the Air’s screen. It’s also just as colorful, at least on the sRGB gamut. Apple also opted for a wider, contiguous display bezel to house the camera rather than use the notch found on Air and Pro MacBooks.

Performance: Apple made this conversation particularly interesting by powering the MacBook Neo with an A18 Pro iPhone processor running macOS. An iPhone chip running a Mac laptop seems like a fool’s errand, but Apple’s mobile silicon is potent enough (and cheap enough) for the job. It outperformed every other budget PC laptop we compared it with.

Battery life: MacBooks have long been known for their impressive longevity away from their chargers, and the Neo upholds that tradition. Again, however, context is key: The Neo lasted 15 hours and 35 minutes in our video-rundown test, right within the range of Apple’s claims and longer than most other laptops in its price range. Apple has optimized its entire Mac product stack for efficiency, and the result is an iPhone chip running macOS for many hours at a stretch.

Value for money: This one is a layup for the MacBook Neo. It packs impressive pep into a solidly built laptop for what seems like an impossible price. The MacBook Neo is for the budget laptop scene what the Mac mini has been for the affordable desktop market for a long time.

Hard-up Apple fans: We’ll just come out and say it: Apple has had a lot of fans for a long time who just couldn’t afford its stuff. That’s changed with products like the iPhone e series and now the MacBook Neo. This is the Mac laptop for the rest of us.

Middle-school and high-school students: This is the new laptop to beat for education, period. Particularly in middle school and beyond, and even in college, expect to see a lot of kids walking around with colorful metal laptops, and classrooms with Neos lined up on charging carts. The Neo has ample power for basic schoolwork through all of those years of study.

Design: Measuring just 0.55 inch thick and weighing only a feather heavier than 3 pounds, the Prestige 14 Flip is one of the most portable 2-in-1 laptops you can buy. MSI's full-metal chassis feels rigid, but its curved corners and sides make it more comfortable to hold as a tablet. The laptop's hinges are stable for touch-screen interactions in A-frame or clamshell modes, too.

Display: MSI's display, while a crisp and colorful OLED, is where the company took the most liberty to reach its landmark battery life result. It's a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel (1200p) screen that refreshes at the work-laptop-standard 60Hz. Here's the trick: The panel reached a max brightness of a little shy of 300 nits, dropping to only 63 nits at the machine's 50% brightness level in our testing. That helped extend the battery life.

Performance: While the Prestige laptop's thinner design limits the Intel Core Ultra X7 CPU's performance ceiling, it will still push hard on a range of productivity tasks. This laptop is more focused on efficiency than raw performance, so keep that in mind when considering your computing needs. That said, the CPU's strong built-in graphics solution is hard to beat in a laptop this thin and light.

Battery life: This is where the Prestige shines, with longer battery life than any laptop we've tested to date. While local video playback isn't what most folks do all day, every day, the 42-hour figure shows its longevity on an even playing field, demonstrating the capability for up to two full workdays of use in anecdotal testing. Even dual-battery laptops haven't outlasted this machine on that test, a testament to its superior efficiency.

Value for money: MSI's laptop is a high-end workhorse, but its pricing is reasonable given what it packs under its keys and its overall build quality. With 32GB of memory, a 1TB solid-state drive, and a potent Intel Core Ultra X7 processor, the Flip appears well-prepared for a long tour of duty at a reasonable price.

Mobile professionals: Frequent flyers or workers with a daily train commute will love the MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ for its award-winning battery oomph. The Core Ultra X7 CPU inside is also an ace for productivity tasks, leveraging an advanced Arc B390 integrated graphics unit, so the super-long battery life doesn't require too much sacrifice.

Workers in presentation-heavy fields: As a hybrid 2-in-1 device, the Prestige laptop fits especially well with workers who often present slide decks and other files to colleagues, clients, and customers. Professionals who live in presentation apps, share design materials, or present complex purchase options in the real world should consider this laptop.

Pen-computing aficionados: MSI's garaged stylus (aka the "Nano Pen") that comes with the Flip will satisfy office-meeting note-takers, conference participants, students in lecture halls, and doodlers alike.

Design: Still a combination of magnesium, aluminum, and carbon fiber, Lenovo's matte-black beauty is the benchmark for business laptop design. Lenovo somehow made the laptop even lighter this year at just 2.17 pounds, which outclasses Dell's XPS 13 and Apple's 13-inch MacBook Air.

Display: This version of the ThinkPad X1 Carbon has the same stunning OLED panel as before, with a 2,880-by-1,800-pixel resolution, rich colors, and up to a 120Hz refresh rate. With intense brightness and wide viewing angles, it's still ready for most working environments, whether in an office or on a jet.

Performance: Last time, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon was a potent performer but not the top dog, and Intel's "Lunar Lake" platform tells the same story. Lunar Lake, or Core Ultra V200-series processors, are built primarily for AI tasks and overall efficiency, so you won't see class-leading output here but rather enough to get you by in a standard working environment.

Battery life: This is another area in which we've seen massive improvement, thanks to Core Ultra V processing. Whereas the outgoing ThinkPad lasted just 13 hours and some change, this latest model outlasted that by more than six hours. This doesn't earn it an overall win against its rivals but makes it competitive on daily lasting power.

Value for money: We gave this ThinkPad X1 Carbon another Editors' Choice award and a five-star rating, a rarity for us, recognizing Lenovo's responses to previous criticisms on performance and battery life. This will never be the most affordable business ultraportable, but you get what you pay for, and here you get quite a lot for the steep price.

Mobile professionals: If you travel for work or take a long bus or train commute often, this is the ultimate machine for you. With a thin, lighter, and MIL-STD 810H-certified chassis, this ThinkPad is prepared for the rigors of frequent travel. The boosted battery life and performance help keep the latest ThinkPad X1 Carbon's position as a top business laptop.

ThinkPad loyalists: Lenovo's ThinkPad brand inspires loyalty and earns it with every X1 Carbon generation. Its iconic design, best-in-class keyboard, distinctive TrackPoint navigation, and impeccable business pedigree inspire professionals to pay more for the full package that the Carbon name promises. That said, this latest model earns and deserves the hype.

Design: Acer's Plus Spin 714 is housed in a gray metal shell that measures just 0.71 inches thick and weighs 3.21 pounds with everything inside. The Chromebook has a 14-inch, 1200p touch screen with a 1440p webcam above it. Acer tops off the laptop's exterior features with two Thunderbolt 4 ports, among other connections, for uncompromised connectivity.

Display: You don't get much sharper for Chromebooks than a 1200p display, and Acer made sure to preserve those pixels with a layer of Gorilla Glass and antimicrobial protection. Both would be welcome features in a classroom if this laptop weren't priced as it is.

Performance: Acer's Spin 714 is a competitive Chromebook in terms of raw speeds, though it didn't lead in any of our benchmark results. Regardless, its processor will carry out all the usual Chromebook work and grant access to some helpful AI features, particularly Google Gemini

Battery life: At 14 hours and 46 minutes on the battery, the Spin 714 is among the longest-lasting Chromebooks we've tested. This should be enough endurance to get through a day of work with some time to spare for light gaming or watching Netflix.

Value for money: This is one of those Chromebooks that challenges the broader value proposition of the category. The Spin 714 is a high-quality laptop for its price, but aren't Chromebooks supposed to be cheap? Relatively speaking, this laptop is high-value in that it displays lots of high-end performance and features for far less than $1,000.

Google mega fans: If you're already sold on ChromeOS and own an Android device, the Chromebook Plus Spin 714 represents the finest ChromeOS experience in both hardware and performance. This laptop effectively runs more of the latest Android apps and handles more work at once. The Spin 714 should also support new Google updates containing fresh features for many years based on its next-generation silicon.

AI early adopters: Speaking of silicon, the Spin 714 is one of the first Chromebooks to spearhead Google's Gemini program. It can access Gemini over cloud servers and take on key processes using the laptop's neural processing unit, or NPU. Getting AI aspirants off to the races, each Spin 714 sale includes one year of access to Gemini Advanced for more intense interactions and projects using machine learning.

Design: The Raider is all about size and stature. With a giant 18-inch screen and weighing a ponderous 7.94 pounds, this laptop isn't designed to go much of anywhere. Instead, it's a desktop replacement through and through. This large design allows for several ports, including Thunderbolt 5, as well as substantial cooling to keep its top-end components from overheating during play.

Display: This is one of the stars of MSI's show: the 18-inch mini-LED screen with a super-sharp 3,840-by-2,400-pixel resolution and speedy 120Hz refresh rate. It's a regular Rolls-Royce of gaming displays. The screen includes Nvidia G-Sync so that the screen redraws and the GPU frame rate will always match, at up to 120 frames per second.

Performance: Surprising no one, the Raider is an absolute beast at any task you throw at it, short of super-specific workstation applications. It more than doubled the baseline in the PCMark 10 test for general productivity, set the record for our HandBrake video encoding benchmark, and posted extremely competitive frame rates in our gaming benchmarks.

Battery life: You don't come to a laptop like this expecting high efficiency. Despite its size and power profile, the Raider lasted a few hours longer than some competing 18-inchers (and even a few 16-inch laptops) in our battery rundown video-playback test. And you can just forget about gaming on the battery—keep this laptop on your desk as much as possible, plugged in.

Value for money: A laptop this expensive requires a different approach to evaluating its value than most other kinds of laptops. Rather than comparing it with other laptops, compare it instead with the cost of a comparable gaming desktop setup. Including the top-end screen and high-power components, you're not paying too much more than it would cost to build such a desktop setup. Regardless, however, this is an expensive machine for deep-pocketed enthusiasts only.

Power-hungry gamers: This laptop's primary audience is gamers who want peak power from their semi-mobile PC gaming system. The Raider aced all of our performance benchmarks, gaming or otherwise, pairing super-potent parts with a top-notch cooling system to run at maximum output.

Space-starved PC players: Of course, most people will tell you to just buy a gaming-desktop setup for this amount of money, and they would be right. However, what if you just don't have the space in your home for such a thing, or you need the option to pick up your system and take it to a friend's house or an esports tournament easily? The Raider shines in those scenarios.

Design: The design and the display are generally the weakest areas for budget gaming laptops. While the Katana doesn't escape that trope entirely, it does fairly well. Although this is an all-plastic laptop, it's built without excessive flex in any area and includes a comfortable keyboard. It's also relatively portable for its class, making for a fine one-and-only device for cash-strapped buyers.

Display: Screens in lower-end gaming laptops are often the first to take a quality hit when cutting costs, and Katana presents a bog-standard budget gamer screen: a 15.6-inch 1080p IPS panel with a 144Hz refresh rate and middling color coverage. Its heightened refresh rate pushes this screen just above the "1080p/60" minimum spec for PC gaming expected from most players.

Performance: The Katana is impressive in its class for both general productivity speeds and gaming frame rates. The star of the show is its Nvidia GeForce RTX 5050 graphics chip paired with DLSS 4 frame generation, which achieves high enough frame rates in high-fidelity games to make use of the laptop screen's 144Hz refresh rate. Budget-limited customers will be delighted by the broad selection of games these performance boosts make available.

Battery life: Gaming laptops aren't often favored for their battery longevity, but the Katana reported a decent 8 hours in our battery rundown video test. However, expect this number to drop by more than half while running a game, especially an intense one. You'll get by on a few commuter rides per day, but don't forget to pack your charging cord.

Value for money: The Katana offers one of the best values in laptops today, gaming or otherwise. Getting RTX 50-series graphics into the hands of gamers for less than $1,000 is a feat in itself, but doing so while maintaining decent build quality and a potent enough processor to limit bottlenecking is a significant accomplishment.

College students: For the PC gamers among the undergraduate college population, the Katana 15 HX is an excellent all-in-one solution. It can handle most general collegiate work while serving up some serious frag sessions in between classes.

Casual or first-time PC gamers: The new Katana would delight both dabblers in PC gaming and kids hoping for a sweet first gaming laptop. It offers a great gaming experience without requiring a steep investment.

Design: The 16-inch Framework design remains largely unchanged from the previous generation, which is just fine. Framework has made every consideration in its laptop design, allowing you to upgrade nearly every important part individually, including the screen. (You can even replace the bezels around it.) It's not a luxurious-looking system, but it's eminently practical, customizable, and consumer-friendly.

Display: Framework has significantly upgraded its screen technology to keep pace with the new components inside, adding Nvidia G-Sync for automated refresh rate management up to 165Hz. It's a 1600p IPS panel that won't compare with OLED, but it achieved super-competitive color coverage in our display testing, as well as nearly 490 nits of maximum brightness.

Performance: This laptop isn't just a dazzling DIY desktop replacement; the Framework 16 proved to be one of the most potent 16-inchers we've tested recently. With a high-end AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor, and a powerful Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 graphics chip in the removable rear module, this laptop aced our benchmarks—even the gaming ones at 1600p.

Battery life: This is where the Framework 16 falls behind the competition, lasting barely more than 7 hours on our battery rundown test. While it's far off the mark that competing systems hit, the screen's high screen brightness at the 50% level we use for testing might have worked against the laptop. If you can work on the Framework 16 at less than 50% brightness, you can expect increased longevity.

Value for money: Value is the name of Framework's game, and it plays that game better than any laptop maker in the industry. Framework's dedication to DIY modular design enables individualized upgrades and repairs to nearly every component and part. This means you can live with the same Framework 16 indefinitely, upgrading parts piecemeal as they come. No more replacing your whole laptop for a better CPU.

Desktop replacement shoppers: This is the leading laptop for shoppers replacing an aging or broken desktop. Regardless of whether you're into the Framework 16's DIY design, you will be interested in this laptop's screen quality and silicon performance. In both areas, the Framework 16 clashes with luxury systems that are nowhere near as easy to tweak or repair, instead requiring you to buy an entirely new laptop when it's time for an upgrade.

DIY enthusiasts and PC builders: This is the ultimate laptop for people who enjoy building PCs and getting hands on with their hardware. Framework sells its new 16-incher in a DIY edition that comes with the parts you order completely unassembled—you can even skip getting a preloaded operating system and install your own (likely Linux). If you want to build a laptop nearly from scratch, this is as close as you'll get.

Design: Lenovo has long been a leader in 2-in-1 laptop design, and its latest flagship carries the torch for its most recent chassis revision, last seen on the outgoing ninth-generation model. It's a full-metal ultraportable system, measuring 0.61 inches thick and weighing just 2.91 pounds, and the protruding webcam housing returns to preserve more screen real estate.

Display: This laptop's 14-inch OLED touch screen is one of its major highlights, shining bright and displaying nearly perfect color coverage. Its color-rich quality makes for a fantastic entertainment device and a cinch for minor content creation projects.

Performance: Our Yoga 9i review unit packs an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V processor, which is rated for the full suite of Microsoft Copilot functions in Windows 11 via its neural processor. The Yoga didn't dominate our performance benchmarks, but it posted high enough numbers to instill deep confidence in its capabilities, leading in the PCMark 10 productivity simulation, too.

Battery life: This is where the Yoga excels. In our battery rundown test, it ran for nearly 22 hours, longer than any 2-in-1 laptop we tested and second only to even more efficient Snapdragon-based systems. This is a long-lasting show-binging laptop or a power-sipping photo editor and digital drafter—take your pick.

Value for money: As Lenovo's top-end convertible laptop line, the Yoga 9i starts out at a premium price, but as tested, it offers a decent value for the experience it provides. This 2-in-1 looks and feels just like laptops that cost $1,000 more, making the Lenovo 9i a relative steal.

Flush, fashionable laptop fans: Clad in a gorgeous full-metal shell and adorned with the highest-end parts inside and out, the Yoga 9i is an understated, sleek affair that gives off demure, well-to-do vibes. It's just about as close to a MacBook or iPad as a 2-in-1 laptop can reach.

Amateur creators and TV bingers: The OLED touch screen, refreshing at 120Hz, is a dream for both relaxed TV streaming fans and motivated creators at home. The dynamic color coverage pops in both scenarios, and the 120Hz refresh rate provides smooth video and more realistic drafting with the included stylus.

Design: The ProArt PZ13 features compact dimensions (0.35 by 11.7 by 8 inches) and a lightweight design (1.87 pounds) that enhance portability, but the aluminum chassis and Gorilla Glass front ensure durability and a premium feel. The magnetic kickstand and keyboard cover provide stability and usability, although the absence of a bundled stylus is a drawback.

Display: The tablet boasts a stunning OLED touch screen with a resolution of 2,880 by 1,800 pixels, delivering vibrant colors and deep contrasts. The Pantone-validated display offers exceptional color coverage, outperforming many competitors, including the Surface Pro's IPS panel, and the high contrast ratio makes it suitable for various lighting conditions.

Performance: Powered by an eight-core Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus processor, the PZ13 is positioned as a capable device for multitasking and creative applications. While it lagged behind competitors in synthetic benchmarks, subjective performance was strong, with the tablet feeling responsive during everyday tasks and moderate multitasking. The Hexagon NPU provides 45 TOPS of AI processing power, making it suitable for AI-enhanced applications, though it still trails behind more powerful chips like the Ryzen AI 9.

Battery life: The ProArt PZ13 demonstrated impressive battery life, outlasting its rivals by over three hours during video playback tests, making it a reliable choice for on-the-go use.

Value for money: Even at more than $1,000, the ProArt PZ13 is competitively priced, especially considering the included accessories, which are often sold separately with competitors. The combination of a high-quality display, solid performance, and included keyboard cover makes it a strong value proposition, even despite the lack of a stylus and the limited port selection.

Creative professionals: The ProArt PZ13's stunning OLED screen and Pantone validation make it an excellent choice for graphic designers, digital artists, and even video editors—anyone who needs a vibrant, high-quality display for color accuracy and detail. Additionally, its portability allows creative professionals to work on projects in various locations, whether in a studio, at a client meeting, or while traveling.

Business multitaskers: The ProArt PZ13 is well-suited for professionals who need a reliable and portable device for presentations, meetings, and remote work. Its detachable design allows for easy transitions between tablet and laptop modes, making it convenient for on-the-go productivity. The high-quality display is ideal for showcasing presentations, while the solid performance and excellent accessories ensure smooth multitasking with business applications.

Design: Apple's 14-inch MacBook Pro design has remained essentially unchanged for several years, but the current version addresses so many fan concerns that it leaves little to be desired. The all-aluminum build could benefit from an update to its USB-C ports to Thunderbolt 5, currently still on Thunderbolt 4. However, the M5 chip's power delivery limitations might be at play here, as it lacks the additional cores you'll find in its Pro and Max variants.

Display: The 3,024-by-1,964-pixel Liquid Retina XDR display returns, this time with a clever trick to boost the brightness of its mini LEDs to 1,000 nits for content in standard dynamic range and up to 1,600 nits in high dynamic range. Apple's display still rocks our color gamut coverage tests, and it would be a boon to any commute-bound photo or video editor.

Performance: This is where Apple focused its attention on with this update: the new M5 processor. This chip introduces a new architectural feature that integrates an AI-accelerating coprocessor with each of the system-on-chip's (SoC) graphics processing cores. The performance benefits are twofold: faster GPU-based AI task processing and even faster graphics processing, aided by new machine learning processes like artificial frame generation. The M5's productivity speeds lead the charts, too, making for an all-around superchip.

Battery life: While the MacBook Pro lasts 4 hours less this year than last year's model in our battery rundown, it still falls within Apple's 24-hour promise, and that's more than you need from such a high-power laptop. Expect to get through most, if not all, of a workday on this Mac's battery, especially if you plug in for high-intensity output periods, such as project exporting.

Value for money: While Apple's MacBook Pro laptops have always been expensive, many competitors have also started charging more for their products, which has given Apple room to make big waves with relatively small price reductions. The MacBook Pro's starting price remains unchanged with the M5 upgrade, and it competes well within its class at this price. Of course, Apple's storage and memory upgrade pricing at checkout continues its legacy of excess.

Creators on the go: Apple's newest MacBook Pro is a great fit for anyone who works in media or digital design who needs to get work done remotely or while commuting to the office. (Frequent fliers have also always had the pro Mac laptop top of mind.) If you need to get deadline-driven creative work done on the move without sacrificing power, battery life, or your office studio's superior displays, the MacBook Pro is the answer—and it's worth getting used to macOS for.

Sideline computer gamers: This machine's M5's graphics boost makes it a good fit for gamers who are Mac loyalists. Apple has been hot on improving its reputation among PC gamers for years, and its massive improvements to graphics processing via AI accelerators give the MacBook Pro M5 a tremendous upgrade. Multi-frame generation is finally available on Mac games, which should dramatically change the conversation as developers adapt to how Apple's GPUs apply the technology. High-power Macs won't ever replace gaming PCs, but that doesn't mean they can't handle games well enough for the mainstream.

Design: The Pro Max 18 Plus is a larger-than-life laptop, measuring 1.2 inches thick and weighing 7.2 pounds in its starting configuration. Dell's big-time laptop is still a high-end build, however, in a gorgeous all-metal frame that has passed MIL-STD-810H testing for durability. The laptop also takes full advantage of its size, cramming in all sorts of hard connections, including two Thunderbolt 5 ports.

Display: Dell's 18-inch screen is a focused effort, with just one available option: an IPS panel with a 1600p resolution, 120Hz refresh rate, and wide viewing angles. It's a vibrant panel with excellent color coverage, complemented by a helpful anti-glare coating that keeps images bold even under harsh ambient light. It's a bummer that it's the only display option available, but at least it's a seriously superb screen in its class.

Performance: Our Dell Pro Max 18 Plus configuration included top-end silicon from Intel and Nvidia—a 24-core Core Ultra 9 285HX CPU and a 24GB RTX Pro 5000 GPU—producing several first-place results in our benchmark tests. In fact, the Pro Max 18 Plus outperformed its competitors in our workstation-level tests. That's the true weight behind its claim on our Editors' Choice award.

Battery life: This is one area where the Pro Max 18 Plus falls behind its competition, lasting a bit more than 4 hours in our video rundown test. With such a large screen and such potent parts inside, we weren't expecting an epic running time. But you pay a battery-life penalty for that extra screen space and all that silicon muscle.

Value for money: The value you can derive from the Dell Pro Max 18 Plus entirely depends on your specific use cases for it. As tested, this is a monstrous powerhouse for the most demanding tasks in cutting-edge computing fields, such as software development, data science, AI engineering, and 3D visual management. If you work in a field like that, then this level of power is likely worth the cost.

Professionals willing to invest in high performance: This is the absolute best laptop for demanding professionals who need a top-end laptop to tackle cutting-edge computing work. People who work in resource-intensive fields like software development, 3D asset creation and manipulation, and AI model work will get the most benefit out of the Dell Pro Max 18 Plus.

Big-screen computing enthusiasts buying for work: People shopping for a high-end work laptop with a large display should start their search with this model. The Dell Pro Max 18 Plus marries a large, sharp, and vibrant screen with class-leading performance to present a peak big-screen work laptop.