The Best College Laptop

We analyzed 6,592 reviews from 11 websites to find the best college laptop. Sources included:
WalmartNeweggB&H Photo Video
+8 More

Top College Laptops

Best for Most People
Best College Laptop Asus Chromebook Flip C302CA Laptop Computer
$569 from 7 stores
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Why Consider This:
With a hybrid hinge, touchscreen and support for Google Play apps, the Asus Chromebook Flip is a small Chromebook offering big value. Even after all this time, the Asus Chromebook Flip C302 is still worthy of its premium stature with a dazzling screen, tactile keyboard and a classy design that’s equally as comfortable to use in tablet mode or as a traditional laptop.
People Like:
  • Elegant tablet mode
  • Gorgeous, vivid screen
  • Tactile keyboard
People Dislike:
  • The USB-C ports don't support Thunderbolt 3
  • Middling speakers
  • Legacy connections require adapters.
82
Owner Score
1,770 Reviews from 6 Sites
95
Media & Critic Score
2 Media Reviews
Buy On Amazon.com
Why Consider This:
The best laptop you can get for the price, this ZenBook offers near-identical specs to the Dell XPS 13 we like, but has a larger chassis, no USB-C charging, less battery life, and a mushier keyboard. It also lacks Thunderbolt 3.
People Like:
  • Great value
  • Long battery life
  • Strong all-round performance
People Dislike:
  • Weird keyboard layout
  • Small touchpad
  • No thunderbolt 3 support
85
Owner Score
75 Reviews from 18 Sites
85
Media & Critic Score
2 Media Reviews
Buy On Amazon.com
Top Performance
Best College Laptop Dell XPS 13 7390 Laptop Computer
$995 from 16 stores
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Why Consider This:
The 2019 Dell XPS 13 (7390) configuration we recommend has a 10th-generation Intel Core i5-10210U processor, 8 GB of RAM, and a 256 GB solid-state drive. Its keyboard and touchpad are both responsive and comfortable, and it has a brilliant 1080p non-touchscreen display. This laptop would be a great for anyone!
People Like:
  • Light, thin, and portable
  • Great battery life
  • Massive power
People Dislike:
  • Graphics performance still lacking
  • Occasional fan noise.
  • Slightly uncomfortable keyboard.
73
Owner Score
619 Reviews from 10 Sites
95
Media & Critic Score
2 Media Reviews
Buy On Amazon.com

How Critic.ly Saves You Time

When it comes to reviewing the best college laptop, critic.ly is different than other sites. How?
Unbiased & Unsponsored: Critic.ly aggregates and analyzes reviews from real owners and industry critics. We remove spam, sponsored reviews, and other forms of bias to make sure you get the best possible sense of what people actually think about products.
Our reviews of the best college laptops were based on 6,592 reviews from 11 websites.
Get the Best Deal: Critic.ly aggregates sales from around the web, so you can get the best deal from a seller you actually trust.
Find the Right Product: Critic.ly lets you search and compare products from thousands of sites in one place.

How to Find the Right College Laptop

Students need a great laptop that’ll last for years of taking notes, writing papers at 3 in the morning, editing photos for a group project, or playing Overwatch. But choosing the best laptop for you can be more challenging than writing a thousand good words on Proust. The most important features in a laptop for college students are value, battery life, size and weight, keyboard and trackpad, performance, storage, screen, and ports. Not all college students will have the same priorities, though. For example, a film student may need a more expensive laptop that can handle editing video on a high-quality screen; a student who enjoys playing video games might be willing to put up with a larger, heavier laptop to get a decent graphics card. One thing to keep in mind, is the specific curriculum that your degree plan lays out. If your degree is engineering related, it is highly probable that you will be using very intense and heavy software. A good example would be Computer Science where you might need to run machine learning process on a GPU. Other engineering disciplines use equally intense software, which most computers will struggle with. But, if this is not a factor, then this list should help you find a computer to help you through college!

College Laptops We Eliminated

We research and analyzed 7 college laptops. Here's what we concluded about the ones that didn't make the cut.

Sources & Methodology

Critic.ly uses a combination of machine learning and human editors to help you find the best products.
We start by aggregating and analyzing reviews from real owners and industry critics. We remove spam, sponsored reviews, and other forms of bias to make sure you get the best possible sense of what people actually think about products.
We convert every review to a weight average score from 0 to 100.
For this article, we analyzed 6,592 reviews from 11 sites to find the best college laptop.