Not everyone needs the fastest CPU and the highest-quality high-resolution display. Sometimes, a machine with a last-gen CPU and a decent Full HD display is plenty for the web browsing, email, and Office applications that make up many users’ workflows. This can be true for students, or for buyers who are looking for a secondary machine to augment one of the best laptops you can buy.
That’s where budget laptops come in. The definition is a loose one, with some machines costing a bit more, but offering a lot more to go with it. But they’ll save you hundreds over midrange and premium laptops that are overkill for what you need. This list will provide several options, including for gamers and those with the lowest budgets. You can check out our best laptops under $500 and best laptops under $300 lists for even more affordable options.
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Asus ZenBook 14 OLED
Best budget laptop
Pros
Excellent value
Competent productivity performance
Great battery life
Comfortable keyboard and NumberPad 2.0 touchpad
Solid build and attractive aesthetic
Outstanding OLED display
Cons
Creative performance is lacking
Why you should buy this: The features and battery life are game-changers at the price.
Who it’s for: Anyone who wants a beautiful display for less money,
Why we picked the Asus ZenBook 14 OLED:
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Sometimes, companies have to cut corners to fit a laptop into a remarkable $500 price. The display is often one casualty, with a panel that might suffer in terms of color quality and contrast. The ZenBook 14 OLED is a major exception, offering a spectacular OLED display that’s bright, colorful, and displays inky blacks. It’s equal to displays on laptops costing twice as much.
But that’s not all. The AMD Ryzen 5 or 7 CPUs on offer provide competent productivity performance to go with great battery life. And the laptop’s build quality is excellent, with a great keyboard and touchpad with an LED numeric keyboard. It’s a tremendous value all around, landing it on our list of best laptops.
Asus ZenBook 14 OLED
Best budget laptop
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Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3
A Chromebook 2-in-1 that won’t break the bank
Pros
Good enough productivity performance
Excellent battery life
Surprisingly good display
Folio kickstand and keyboard included
Strong value
Cons
Keyboard is too cramped
Limited to Wi-Fi 5
Why you should buy this: It’s the best budget Chromebook.
Who it’s for: Anyone on a budget who doesn’t mind sacrificing performance for extreme value.
Why we picked the Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3:
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Chromebooks have become popular budget choices over the last few years, and many have won us over as well. One style that hasn’t done as well as some others is the detachable Chrome OS tablet. That changed with the introduction of the Lenovo Chromebook Duet, now in its third generation, which not only is a very usable tablet but one that represents tremendous value thanks to the included kickstand cover and detachable keyboard.
The Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3’s low price brings some limitations and basic specs. Its Qualcomm Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 processor, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB of storage don’t deliver stellar performance, although it’s good enough for the kinds of tasks you’ll want to run on it. The display is very nice, with a 15:9 2K (2000 x 1200) resolution that’s not as pixel sharp as Apple’s baseline iPad that the Duet competes against. If you want a tablet for web browsing, light productivity work, and consuming media, then the Chromebook Duet 3 and Chrome OS have you covered.
Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3
A Chromebook 2-in-1 that won’t break the bank
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HP Victus 15
Solid gaming for less than $1,000
Pros
Solid productivity performance
Decent 1080p gaming performance
Good keyboard and touchpad
Conservative good looks
Affordable
Cons
Confusing configurations
Poor battery life
Ho-hum screen
Why you should buy this: It’s the best budget gaming laptop.
Who it’s for: Gamers and only gamers.
Why we picked the HP Victus 15:
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Although the best gaming laptops are typically expensive, the HP Victus 15 is a great example of why they don’t need to be. Often priced at less than $900, you get some impressive specs. That includes an AMD Ryzen 5 8645HS chipset, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 GPU, 8GB of RAM, and a 512GB solid-state drive (SSD), with options for faster CPUs, more powerful graphics, extra and faster storage, and memory if you don’t mind spending a little more. Every model comes with a 15.6-inch, 1080p IPS display, and for just a little more, that display can run at a refresh rate of 144Hz.
With a decent build quality and surprisingly good gaming performance, the Victus 15 offers an all-around solid gaming package at an impressively competitive price. It does have its weak points, most notably that the starting graphics card isn’t as powerful as what you’ll see in more expensive laptops, but it’s still enough for entry-level gaming.
HP Victus 15
Solid gaming for less than $1,000
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Dell Inspiron 15 3000 Laptop
A business laptop for less
Pros
Large display
Good keyboard and touchpad
Solid build quality
Spill-resistant keyboard
Cons
Display is only Full HD
CPU is one generation behind
Why you should buy this: It’s the best budget business laptop.
Who it’s for: Office workers who want to save the cash for other investments.
Why we picked the Dell Inspiron 15 3000:
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Whether you’re typing up another spreadsheet or winding down with a game at the end of a long workday, the Dell Inspiron 15 3000 strikes a great balance as a business laptop. It features powerful and efficient general computing power, like a 12th-generation Intel Core i7-1255U CPU, 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB SSD. That’s a lot of computer for just $280, even if the chipset is several versions behind.
With the typical Inspiron build quality, we’d expect this system to borrow several great design features from the more premium XPS range but make them available in a more affordable form. It’s not the lightest laptop at just under 4 pounds, but it has a great, spill-resistant keyboard, Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth connectivity, and a top-mounted 720p webcam for conferencing.
The Dell Inspiron 15 3000 also comes in an attractive business black paint job, which helps it fit in with any setup.
Dell Inspiron 15 3000 Laptop
A business laptop for less
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Apple MacBook Air M1
The only MacBook that could be considered ‘cheap’
Pros
Apple’s M1 blows Intel away
Phenomenal battery life
Excellent keyboard and touchpad
Rock-solid build quality
Simple good looks
Cons
Supports only one external display
Why you should buy this: It’s the only modern MacBook you’ll find for well under $1,000.
Who it’s for: MacBook fans who don’t want to pay thousands for a newer model.
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Why we picked the Apple MacBook Air M1:
The MacBook Air M1 isn’t the latest and greatest MacBook, but it still holds it own in a number of ways. Its performance is still excellent, competing easily with recent generation Windows laptops. It also sports impressive battery life, with close to 20-hours between charges. In typical MacBook fashion, too, the build quality is excellent, and the display is Apple’s usual Retina-grade with a high resolution and crisp, bright picture.
The design is lightweight and portable, making it good for use in transit or when commuting, and it supports the fastest possible Thunderbolt 3 connections (up to 40 Gbps) so will work well with any external display or accessory. There’s not a lot of storage space in this base model, but there’s enough there to get you started and external or cloud storage can make up the short fall.
This model is a few years old, but still holds its own well. Grab one while you still can.
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Apple MacBook Air M1
The only MacBook that could be considered ‘cheap’
Acer Aspire 3
Best cheap Windows laptop
Pros
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Great performance from the CPU
Lots of storage space
Wi-Fi 6 fast networking
Good selection of ports
Cons
Lacks a dedicated GPU
Display is a little dull
Why you should buy this: It’s performance is impressive for the price.
Who it’s for: Anyone who wants a capable laptop for a fair price.
Why we picked the Acer Aspire 3:
For basic business and entertainment use, you’ll find little better than the Acer Aspire 3. It’s a very affordable laptop using a new CPU design – although based on an older Zen 2 architecture – with four cores and support for eight simultaneous threads. It has some fast DDR5 memory and a full half terabyte of SSD space, which gives you plenty of room for documents, films, and and for backing up your important data.
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The onboard Radeon GPU is fine for the most casual of gaming, but it won’t be powerful enough for anything taxing. With Thunderbolt 3 you could attach an external GPU if you wanted, although that’s a very expensive add-on for this affordable machine. The Thunderbolt 3 ports are super handy, though. With support for up to 40 Gbps data transfer speeds, you can attach anything from an external monitor to a high-speed external storage drive.
There’s fast networking on this laptop too, thanks to its Wi-Fi 6, though you’ll need to use an adapter if you want Ethernet.
Absolutely! Depending on what you need your laptop to do, budget options can be just as good as their high-end counterparts. If you only need a laptop for watching Netflix and answering emails, a budget Chromebook can save you hundreds of dollars and perform no worse than something that costs $2,000 or more.
That said, you do need to be careful about which system you pick. Budget laptops tend to make some sacrifices where the expensive options don’t, so be sure to make sure that the system you’re interested in can do what you need it to before buying.
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Do any budget laptops have Thunderbolt 4?
Certain features are less common in budget laptops, and Thunderbolt 4 is one of them. Plenty of budget laptops offer USB-C support, but only some provide Intel’s Thunderbolt 4 spec. This is changing, however, and future budget laptops are more likely to include it. Good Thunderbolt 3 ports are just as good, too, so look out for them.
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Do budget laptops have good battery life?
Some do, and some don’t. The models that prioritize portability tend to offer a little more, and you’ll want to skip a dedicated graphics chip if you want the most battery life. The MacBook Air M1 is amazingly efficient, offering close to 20 hours of battery life.
However, you can find plenty of budget systems that offer a full workday and beyond on a single charge. In some cases, budget laptops offer better battery life than many laptops that cost a few hundred dollars more. Many Chromebooks also offer impressive battery life thanks to how lightweight the software is.
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Can I find a good display on a budget laptop?
Definitely, but as with battery life or specific ports, you’ll need to pick and choose the right laptop. A good display will need to be a key component of the laptop, as color accuracy and contrast can be some areas where savings can be made on certain systems.
Is AMD better for budget laptops?
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AMD’s release of the Ryzen 4000 line of CPUs shook up the budget laptop space, and since then AMD has released the Ryzen Ryzen 6000 range and, just recently, the Ryzen 7000 series. In short, the fastest machines we’ve tested that aren’t based on Intel’s 45-watt powerhouse CPUs have been running AMD, and that’s a major advance. Intel is still a far more dominant force in the laptop space with a wider range of options available, but as far as the CPUs that go into budget — and even premium thin and light — laptops, Ryzen chips rule the performance roost. That’s changing, though, as Intel’s 12th-gen Alder Lake CPUs make their way into budget machines even as Intel’s 13th-gen Raptor Lake CPUs have been introduced.
Even so, we strongly suggest that you consider AMD when picking your next budget laptop. If you can find one that matches your needs, you’ll get much better performance per buck.
The OnePlus 12 is one of the first phones to launch in 2024, and it’s an impressive one. As I said in my review back in January, “OnePlus 12 is a no-compromise smartphone that’s an early contender for Best Smartphone of 2024.” And I stand by that, six months later.
However, now you can get the OnePlus 12 for just $649. That makes it the lowest price it has ever been. This is actually the Prime Day pricing, it’s just stuck around longer than Prime Day did. This is $150 off of the regular price, which is a really great value for this phone.
This phone has just about everything you can imagine. That includes a 6.8-inch QHD+ 120Hz Adaptive refresh rate display that can get as bright as 4,500 nits. It also has the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor inside, with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. There’s a 5,400mAh capacity battery inside that will keep it running all day and then some.
In my experience, the OnePlus 12 is one of the best smartphones on the market period. Never mind the best for 2024. Not only does it perform well, it has a stunning display and an incredible camera setup. OnePlus has really turned itself around in the camera department in the last couple of years. And now I almost prefer the OnePlus 12 over any other smartphone camera setup.
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Now, you can pick it up for just $699—that’s $600 less than the Galaxy S24 Ultra. Actually, if we compare the 512GB models of each phone, that’s around $720 cheaper, which makes this a little more insane.
After a long and winding road, Remedy Entertainment has unveiled its multiplayer follow-up to Control. FBC: Firebreak is for teams of three, and the trios will face down waves of enemies with an intriguing arsenal of weapons. For instance, the trailer shows a gatling gun of gloopy poison and a gun with a launching piston attached to the front for aerial attacks.
Since FBC: Firebreak is set in the same world as Control (and Alan Wake II), there will be more for players to explore about this surreal place. The trailer showed off gunfights in the Federal Bureau of Control and the Oldest House, familiar settings to those who have played Control and its DLC. But with the different approach to gameplay, FBC: Firebreak isn’t intended to be a direct sequel to the psychological hit game. “I guess you could say that it’s a spin-off, but in the most positive sense of the word,” Game Director Mike Kayatta said. “It’s not designed to be some kind of lesser, bite-sized Control. FBC: Firebreak is its own, fully formed thing.”
A co-op project from the studio was first teased all the way back in 2021. Firebreak has clearly gone through some refinements from the original concept Remedy announced with 505 Games. At the time, it was also working on a free-to-play co-op shooter with the conglomerate Tencent, but the codenamed Project Vanguard was scrapped in 2023. The duo attempted to reenvision the game as a premium title, but that also fell by the wayside.
FBC: Firebreak is currently scheduled for release in 2025 on the Xbox Series X|S, PC and PlayStation 5. Remedy announced that the game will be on Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass at launch, as well as on the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog for Extra and Premium members.
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Update, October 17, 3:55 pm ET: Article has been updated with full launch platform and service information.
It’s been 20 years since Apple discontinued the iMac G4, a unique computer with a funky half-globe base and a flatscreen LCD on a fancy hinge and adjustable arm. In its unaltered state, it’s a nice-to-look-at, nostalgic relic that’s unusable in modern contexts. I coveted it and never got to own one at the time, but thanks to Juicy Crumb’s DockLite G4, I’m using this classic iMac every day as an external monitor.
The DockLite G4 is a drop-in replacement motherboard for the iMac G4’s board that features an HDMI port, along with three USB-A and a single USB-C port, and 3.5mm ports for audio. Most importantly, it uses the iMac’s existing mounting holes and internal connectors for power and video, so all you need is a couple of screwdrivers and a prying tool — no soldering required.
It took about 30 minutes for me to open my eBay-acquired 17-inch 1.25GHz iMac G4, remove the motherboard, put in the DockLite, and close it back up, and suddenly, I could plug in whatever I wanted, from a MacBook Air to my Anbernic GBA SP knockoff. (Juicy Crumb even has a helpful video guide.) It was much easier than some alternativeDIY methods.
Here are a few pictures I took of the installation process:
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With the DockLite installed, my iMac now works exactly like an external display. It sleeps when my computer does (although you have to tap the iMac’s power button to turn off the backlight) and I can control the brightness in software or using hardware buttons in the back.
I did it because this computer looks great on my desk.
There are things you lose in the process, like access to the iMac’s optical drive. And you can’t run it as a standalone computer unless you go the extra mile and replace more of its internals with something like a Mac Mini. On the plus side, the installation is reversible — you can always put the original motherboard back in.
The DockLite G4 doesn’t come cheap, at $260. The price owes to the “time, effort, and money to get even a relatively simple product such as the DockLite out to market,” Juicy Crumb CEO and co-founder Timothy de Denaro told me in an email. The DockLite G4 “is a relatively low volume product,” he added, and “every unit is manually tested by myself before being shipped” to customers.
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That seems fair, and it also doesn’t change the fact that I spent a lot of money and effort just to use a low-res display with bad viewing angles. Then again, I didn’t buy the DockLite G4 because I admire the quality of my iMac G4’s 21-year-old LCD. I did it because this computer looks sick on my desk, and I wanted to be able to use it every day.
Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
Your Strands expert
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Your Strands expert
Marc McLaren
NYT Strands today (game #231) – hint #1 – today’s theme
What is the theme of today’s NYT Strands?
• Today’s NYT Strands theme is… Make yourself at home
NYT Strands today (game #231) – hint #2 – clue words
Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
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BELT
MELT
MEAL
SOIL
METAL
PLIER
NYT Strands today (game #231) – hint #3 – spangram
What is a hint for today’s spangram?
• Lounging around
NYT Strands today (game #231) – hint #4 – spangram position
What are two sides of the board that today’s spangram touches?
First: bottom, 3rd row
Last: top, 4th row
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #231) – the answers
The answers to today’s Strands, game #231, are…
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OTTOMAN
RECLINER
TABLE
SOFA
FIREPLACE
SHELF
SPANGRAM: LIVING ROOM
My rating: Easy
My score: Perfect
Today’s Strands gave me a good reminder not to jump to conclusions, which I guess is a good lesson for life in general. The theme clue of ‘Make yourself at home’ had already suggested relaxing in some way, so when I spotted OTTOMAN followed by RECLINER I was sure that ‘things you sit on’ would be the answer. When I followed up with TABLE I was slightly confused – but I figured maybe there was such thing as a table chair, and I just didn’t know the term. And then I got SOFA and my hunch seemed all but confirmed.
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At that point, however, I stalled. I couldn’t find any more words that worked and couldn’t see what the spangram could be. So I had another look and tried to think less literally. And there before me, obvious for all to see, was the spangram: LIVINGROOM. Everything made sense now, and I was able to add FIREPLACE and SHELF to complete the set.
Yesterday’s NYT Strands answers (Saturday, 19 October, game #230)
ZING
KICK
SPARK
PIZZAZZ
FIZZ
OOMPH
VERVE
SPANGRAM: EXTRASOMETHING
What is NYT Strands?
Strands is the NYT’s new word game, following Wordle and Connections. It’s now out of beta so is a fully fledged member of the NYT’s games stable and can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I’ve got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you’re struggling to beat it each day.
Of all of the many video game adaptations that are in the works right now in Hollywood, few carry quite as much promise as Amazon’s God of War TV series. The original God of War games — particularly the franchise’s 2018 and 2022 installments — already boast a cinematic quality that should make them easier to adapt for the big or small screen than most video games. Despite that fact, Amazon has made little progress on its God of War adaptation in the two years since it greenlit it with a series order.
As a matter of fact, the project has just taken a major step backward. Deadline reports that original God of War showrunner Rafe Judkins, as well as fellow executive producers Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus, have all parted ways with the project. This development comes even after the trio completed multiple scripts for the show’s intended first season and after Sony Pictures TV and Amazon MGM Studios’ shared a desire to take the series in a new creative direction.
Yumi Yang and Cory Barlog of God of War developer Santa Monica Studio are still attached to the TV show as executive producers, as are Asad Qizilbash, Carter Swan, Yumi Land, and Roy Lee. Moving forward, Amazon and Sony reportedly plan to put together an entirely new group of writers for God of War and essentially start over from scratch.
Amazon is no stranger to high-profile video game adaptations. Earlier this year, the platform premiered its long-awaited live-action Fallout series based on the video game franchise of the same name, and it quickly emerged as one of the biggest TV hits of the year. Rafe Judkins also has a history with Amazon. The creative is the showrunner of The Wheel of Time, which premiered on Prime Video back in 2021.
It’s been previously confirmed that Amazon’s God of War series will focus on the franchise’s Norse Era. Assuming that Sony and Amazon don’t intend to entirely move away from that approach, that means the show will pick up with its protagonist, Kratos, years after he has left his bloody, revenge-fueled days as the Greek God of War behind. 2018’s God of War specifically follows Kratos as he sets off on an epic quest with his son, Atreus, to fulfill his wife’s final wish of spreading her ashes from the highest mountain peak of the Norse realm of Midgard. Along the way, Kratos and Atreus are forced to fight for their lives against various Norse gods, monsters, and other mythological figures.
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It is, as of now, unclear what it was about Judkins, Ostby, and Fergus’ take on God of War that made Sony and Amazon decide to move away from it altogether. Taking into account the success of Fallout and the God of War franchise’s popularity, though, it makes sense that the studios want to take extra care with the new adaptation — even if that means potentially delaying its premiere by another several years.
In a recent podcast, Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump shared details about a call he had with Apple CEO Tim Cook regarding hefty fines imposed by the European Union. Speaking during a podcast with Patrick Bet-David, Trump revealed that Cook expressed concern over the impact of these fines on the company’s operations.
Trump says Apple CEO reached out to him regarding EU fines
The conversation reportedly took place just hours before Trump’s podcast appearance. He stated that Cook informed him about a recent EU fine of $15 billion against Apple, along with another $2 billion penalty, Reuters reported. Trump said, “He called me, saying the European Union has just fined us $15 billion. Then on top of that, they got fined another $2 billion.”
The European Union has intensified its scrutiny of large technology companies like Apple in recent years. The aim is to reduce monopolistic practices and create fair competition for smaller businesses. These investigations have led to significant financial penalties against several major players in the tech industry.
Last month, Apple faced a significant setback when it lost a lengthy court battle with the EU. The verdict required Apple to pay 13 billion euros ($14.08 billion) back taxes to Ireland. This decision is part of the EU’s wider strategy to clamp down on what it views as unfair advantages global tech firms enjoy.
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Trump’s Response to Tim Cook’s Concerns
During his podcast appearance, Trump mentioned that he reassured Cook about his commitment to defending American businesses. He said he told Cook, “Tim, I got to get elected first. But I’m not going to let them take advantage of our companies. That won’t be happening.”
The remarks highlight Trump’s ongoing criticism of the EU’s regulatory actions against American companies. He has consistently argued that these measures unfairly target U.S. businesses to benefit European competitors.
The issue between Apple and the European Union is part of a broader dispute that involves several tech companies. The EU’s approach has raised questions about the balance between regulation and innovation in the digital economy. While Apple has not commented on the authenticity of the call, Trump’s remarks have brought renewed attention to the ongoing battle between Big Tech and European regulators.
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