Best gaming laptop 2019

2019 best gaming laptop

Find the best gaming laptop to suit your fragging needs.

Picking the best gaming laptop at the start of 2019 is a tricky business. With the price of laptop GPUs dropping, SSDs becoming more affordable, and screen technology getting better every few months, even lower-priced gaming laptops are becoming capable of running the best PC games out there. At the top end, you're now getting more for your money, with some portable PCs offering 1070 and even 1080 graphics cards, along with dual-hard drives and heaps of RAM to spare. They're made out of tougher materials, yet they're lighter and more portable than ever before. The best laptops in 2019 really are lovely pieces of kit.

So, what should you look for in a gaming laptop? Price is an obvious concern, especially as money is potentially tight in January. If you're buying a laptop with a 1070 Max-Q graphics card, along with an i7 processor and a decent-sized SSD and quantity of RAM, you're looking at $1800+ for some of the best models. Sure, you can cut corners on SSD size, and maybe dip down to a 1060 Max-Q, but that won't future-proof you for the next 3-4 years. If you're going for something like this, the MSI GS65 Stealth Thin and the Razer Blade 15 are our top picks, both being the best gaming laptops we've tested. At the lower end of the scale, you're looking at a 1050 GPU with a slower processor and a regular HDD for as little as $650. Anything around that price will run plenty of great games, but won't bee suitable for the best at higher settings, and you'll probably look to upgrade in a couple of years.

We know that 2019's newest laptops will bring dazzling 4K OLED screens with them, and these will be super expensive when they land, so the current crop of LCD panels (many of which run at 144Hz) will still be perfect for gaming for many years to come. Here are our picks of the best gaming laptops right now.

1. MSI GS65 Stealth Thn 15.6-inch

The best gaming laptop in 2019—Elegant. Portable. Powerful.

CPU: Intel Core i7-8750H | GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q | RAM: 16GB DDR4-2400MHz | Screen: 15.6-inch FHD (1,920 x 1,080) wide-view 144Hz | Storage: 512GB M.2 SSD | Battery: 82 Whr | Dimensions: 9.75 x 14.08 x 0.69 inches | Weight: 4.14 lbs

The GS65 Stealth Thin delivers everything I want in a gaming laptop. It has the convenience and portability of a productivity notebook—light and thin enough that I can toss it in my backpack, tote it to meetings, and comfortably use it on the couch—married with the internal guts of a gaming PC—powerful enough to play the latest games at high or max settings once the workday is over. 

It has a sleek matte black aluminum body with gold accents that feels sturdy and luxe—and thankfully lacking in obnoxious gamer aesthetics. Best of all, in addition to a slim, 18mm thickness, the screen's 4.9mm thin bezels allow for a overall chassis size that's about an inch smaller than most 15-inch laptops. 

Performance-wise, the GS65 doesn't disappoint. The base spec features a GTX 1060 Max-Q GPU, but I recommend the GTX 1070 (again Max-Q) model for a few hundred dollars more. It brings with it an upgraded SSD and Killer wireless networking. This spec lets the GS65 maintain framerates above 60 fps in most of the latest games with settings maxed out. And by tweaking a few settings and disabling some of the more demanding, less visually-impactful options, you can easily push your framerates up to 100 fps and above, taking advantage of the system's 144Hz display. 

There are other nice details, too: a keyboard from SteelSeries that's solid and responsive (and RGB-lit, if you care about that sort of thing), a responsive touchpad, and a webcam that's placed at the top of the screen, thankfully avoiding the abysmally unflattering "nose-cam" found on most thin-bezeled laptops like the Dell XPS 13.

The only gaming feature missing here is G-Sync, but that's a forgivable offense as the omission allows for both a lower price tag and battery life that legitimately lasts through a whole day of email, web browsing, and streaming video.

Price: $1,599

2. Razer Blade 15

The toughest, most well designed gaming laptop of 2019

CPU: Intel Core i7-8750H | GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q | RAM: 16GB DDR4-2666MHz | Screen: 15.6-inch FHD (1,920 x 1,080) IPS 144Hz | Storage: 512GB SSD | Battery: 80 Whr | Dimensions: 9.25 x 13.98 x 0.68 inches | Weight: 4.63 lbs
Price: $2,999.11

With the new Blade 15, launched earlier this year, Razer has finally caught up to the competition in terms of what makes a great gaming laptop. Solid construction, slim body, elegant design, long battery life, thin bezels, 144Hz screen, and internals powerful enough to play the latest games. That means an Intel Core i7-8750H processor paired with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q GPU. 

What sets the Blade 15 apart from the competition is the details. Its aluminum body is the most solid and flex-resistant of all the laptops we've tested lately, and by a measure of about half a millimeter, it's the thinnest as well. Of course, that half-millimeter difference is mostly negligent in terms of perception—more impressive is the overall solid feel of the body, which Razer says is CNC-milled from a single block of aluminum. Opening the clamshell, the touchpad is noticeably larger than its peers, and the keyboard is flanked on either side by large speakers.

3. Acer Predator Helios 300

The best budget gaming laptop—GTX 1060 graphics for a grand

CPU: Intel Core i7-7700HQ | GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB | RAM: 16GB DDR4-2133MHz | Screen: 15.6-inch FHD (1,920 x 1,080) wide-view 60 Hz | Storage: 256GB M.2 SATA SSD | Battery: 48 Whr | Dimensions: 10.47 x 15.35 x 1.05 inches | Weight: 5.95 lbs

Price: $1,178

Acer's Predator Helios 300 offers an incredible value proposition. At just over a grand, sometimes less if you can find it on sale, it offers a GTX 1060 6GB graphics card that can lock down 60 fps at near-max settings in most games from the last few years. The system's lacking in any fancy screen features like G-Sync, although you can get a model with 144Hz refresh rate, and you'll probably want to think about investing in a large HDD to back up the 256GB SSD. But those minor issues don't mean much when you factor in the super-affordable price tag. 

The Acer Predator Helios 300 is the best budget gaming laptop you can buy, without compromising on the features you need from a portable gaming device. Right now you can get the 1060 GPU version, with a 144Hz screen, 1TB HDD and 256GB SSD for $1,149 at NewEgg, saving you $250. That's a great price for what you're getting here.

4. MSI GF63 8RC

The best entry-level gaming laptop, currently under $650

CPU: Intel Core i5-8300H | GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 4GB | RAM: 8GB DDR4-2666 | Screen: 15.6-inch FHD (1,920 x 1,080) IPS | Storage: 1TB HDD | Battery: 3-cell 51 Whr | Dimensions: 14.13 x 9.99 x 0.85 inches | Weight: 4.10 lbs

Price:$549

The MSI GF63 8RC has to be our top choice for ultra-budget gaming laptops. Priced as low as $649.99 on sale, the GF63 comes equipped with Intel’s i5-8300H, 8GB of DDR4 RAM, Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 1050 and one of the thinner bezels we’ve seen in this price range. The only obvious downside is the lack of an included SSD. The laptop comes loaded with a 1TB HDD which means you’ll probably want to upgrade the storage fairly quickly.

With its highly competitive price tag, the Newegg exclusive MSI GF63 8RC is one of the cheapest gaming laptops we could find with a GTX 1050 discrete graphics card. It’s priced just a little bit higher than Acer’s Aspire E 15, but the GF63 offers up to 67% higher gaming performance and exponentially higher performance when compared to laptops with integrated graphics. If you’re working with a tight budget, the GF63 offers everything you’d need in a laptop without putting a huge dent in your wallet.

5. Gigabyte Aero 15X v8

Productivity powerhouse with longer battery life

CPU: Intel Core i7-8750H | GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q | RAM: 16GB DDR4-2666MHz | Screen: 15.6-inch FHD (1,920 x 1,080) IPS 144Hz | Storage: 512GB SSD | Battery: 94 Whr | Dimensions: 9.8 x 14.0 x 0.74 inches | Weight: 4.49 lbs
Price: $1,999

Gigabyte's Aero 15X was the first thin Max-Q laptop to catch my eye, and the 2018 Aero 15X v8 refresh remains a promising entry in the field, fixing most of the issues I had with its predecessor while keeping everything else that I love about it. Primarily, the keyboard works much better after a driver update, and the screen's been updated to a snappy 144 Hz panel. 

Compared to MSI's GS65 and the Razer Blade 15, the Aero 15X has a less attractive body with sharp edges, but wins in the productivity category on account of a bigger, 94 Whr battery. In practice—that is, our streaming video test—that larger battery lasts upwards of six hours, compared to the GS65's four and a half. With near-identical internals, gaming performance is comparable to the GS65 as well. The biggest difference, other than the body design and battery, is that the Aero 15X can be outfitted with a 4K screen. I recommend sticking with the high refresh rate 1080p screen if gaming is your primary concern, but 4K is a nice option for productivity power users who can take advantage of the extra pixels.