Calling all engineering students! If you’re in the market for a laptop that can handle resource-intensive coursework, you’ve come to the right place. These laptops offer reliable performance as well as a portable form factor, which is important for when you’re running from class to class. We’ve also included budget-friendly machines and gaming rigs for those late night gaming sessions. Read on to learn more.
Why you should trust us: Hey, it’s in our name! PCWorld prides itself on laptop experience and expertise. We’ve been covering PCs since 1983, and now review more than 70 laptops every year. All of the picks below have been personally tested and vetted by our experts, who’ve applied not only performance benchmarks but rigorous usability standards. We’re also committed to reviewing PC laptops at every price point to help you find a machine that matches your budget.
Looking for great laptop deals? Check out our regularly updated list of the best mainstream, gaming, and 2-in-1 laptop deals. By the way, since we’re in the middle of back-to-school season, be sure to check out PCWorld’s extensive back-to-school coverage for advice and deals.
Updated August 16, 2024: We added the MSI Titan 18 HX ($5,399.99) as the Best High-Performance Laptop pick. If you’re going into 3D modeling, for example, you’ll need a powerful laptop that’s up to the task. While the MSI Titan 18 HX will run anything you throw at it (yes it’s that powerful), it’s also wildly expensive. We also updated our list of recent laptop reviews, so be sure to check those out near the bottom of the page!
The best laptops for engineering students
Dell Inspiron Plus 14 – Best overall
Pros
- Strong performance
- Phenomenal battery life
- Fantastic typing experience
Cons
- CPU throttles under very heavy loads
- No user upgrades
Why we like the Dell Inspiron Plus 14
The Dell Inspiron 14 Plus is one of the most well-rounded laptops we’ve come across in recent months. This sub-$1,000 machine offers reliable performance, phenomenal battery life, and a gorgeous display. You really can’t get much better than that. With an exceptional PCMark 10 score of 7,061, it toppled comparable machines like the Acer Swift Go 14 and the more expensive Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon. This laptop also has a battery life of 17 hours on a single charge (a spectacular result!), so you don’t have trouble yourself with finding a wall outlet to juice up.
Who should buy the Dell Inspiron Plus 14
Anyone looking for a laptop that checks off all the right boxes. Battery life and overall performance are outstanding, sure, but don’t forget about the gorgeous 14-inch 1400p display, which is “exceedingly well suited to office work and static imagery,” according to our review. It has a maximum brightness level of 418 nits and an anti-glare coating, so you can use this laptop in various lighting conditions. The design is far from sexy, but its hardware capabilities and amazing battery life make up for the uninspired aesthetics.
Alternative option: If you’re willing to shell out the extra cash, the Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i ($1,699.99) is a more premium option. It’s loaded with a faster processor (Intel Core Ultra 9 185H), more RAM (32GB), and a higher resolution display (3200×2000). It also has a bigger screen that measures 16 inches and a killer keyboard. You can’t really go wrong here if you need high-end power for high-end engineering tasks.
Microsoft Surface Laptop 7 – Best battery life
Pros
- Attractive, slim, and light
- Class-leading battery life
- Excellent wireless connectivity via Wi-Fi 7
- Good performance in real-world situations
Cons
- Vague keyboard falls short of competitors
- IPS touchscreen's image quality can't compare to OLED
- Gaming performance doesn't hold up
Why we like the Microsoft Surface Laptop 7
Microsoft’s 2024 Surface Laptop is one of the first machines to release with the new Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite CPU. While we really like its slim profile and reliable day-to-day performance, we’re absolutely astonished by the 20 hour battery life. The 54 watt-hour battery is small compared to the 90 watt-hour battery inside the Dell Inspiron 16 Plus, making the 20 hour battery life all the more impressive. According to our review, we strongly believe it poses a “significant threat to alternatives with AMD and Intel hardware.” The competition better watch out!
Who should buy the Microsoft Surface Laptop 7
Anyone that needs a long-lasting laptop. It’s a solid choice for those who travel often or those who don’t want to worry much about battery life. The Qualcomm chip isn’t the best for hardcore gaming, but it’s fantastic for battery life and daily activities. It also scores quite well in benchmarks with Arm support and wireless connectivity is excellent thanks to Wi-Fi 7, which is the latest Internet standard. If your workload includes heavy-duty tools designed to stress x86 chips, without a dedicated Arm version available, you’d probably be better off selecting a laptop with an Intel or AMD CPU inside however. The Asus Zenbook 14 OLED is a great option with strong 16-hour battery life (though the Surface Laptop 7 lasted about 3 hours longer in our battery rundown test).
Acer Aspire Go 15 – Best budget option
Pros
- Affordable
- Decent battery life
- Good display visibility
Cons
- Big and bulky
- Cheap build
- Limited performance
Why we like the Acer Aspire Go 15
The Acer Aspire Go 15 is a great laptop for day-to-day tasks like general web browsing, watching a streaming service, Microsoft Office, and so on. The Intel Core i3-N305 CPU won’t be able to handle more demanding applications, but that shouldn’t be a problem as long as your use is relatively light. The 53 watt-hour battery, however, lasted 12 hours on a single charge–a respectable result and definitely more than a full school day.
Who should buy the Acer Aspire Go 15
Anyone on a tight budget! It’s just $300 right now on Acer’s online store, a great value for a laptop with a 15.6-inch 1080p display. It isn’t stretched too thin for clarity and it even has decent contrast, which is hard to come by on a laptop priced this low. The port selection is pretty good, too. You’re getting USB-A, USB-C, HDMI, a Kensington lock slot, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a DC power adapter.
Acer TravelMate P6 – Best ultraportable
Pros
- Long battery life
- Light and portable
- A good price for a business laptop
Cons
- Keyboard is a tad mushy
- Consumer laptops deliver similar specs for a lower price
Why we like the Acer TravelMate P6
The Acer TravelMate P6 is so lightweight it may very well float off into the clouds. It weighs just 2.65 pounds and is made of magnesium aluminum alloy, which is meant to be light yet durable. You can easily toss this laptop in a smaller bag and it’ll do just fine inside. It also has a battery life of 13 hours, so you can work on your school projects well into the night. The 14-inch 1200p display isn’t the brightest, but it makes up for it in battery life and in the taller 16:10 aspect ratio, which makes scrolling through school assignments and web pages a heck of a lot easier.
Who should buy the Acer TravelMate P6
Anyone that needs a portable device to take with them to class. Not only is the Acer TravelMate P6 ridiculously lightweight, but it’s also long-lasting. This laptop includes a 1080p webcam, important for remote learning, and a good selection of ports–surprising for a laptop this slim. Connectivity options include two USB-C (with Thunderbolt 4 support), one HDMI 2.1, one USB-A, a combo headphone jack, a microSD card reader, and a Kensington lock slot.
Asus Zenbook 14 OLED – Best OLED laptop
Pros
- Robust build quality
- Attractive OLED touchscreen
- Good CPU and integrated GPU performance
- Outstanding battery life
Cons
- Uninspiring design
- Keyboard isn't memorable
- Mediocre connectivity options
Why we like the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED
The Asus Zenbook 14 OLED dazzled us with its peppy CPU performance, outstanding battery life, and slick-looking OLED touchscreen display. According to our review, “movies and games look realistic and vibrant” on the 14-inch 1980x1200p OLED touchscreen, although it can be difficult to view content in brighter environments because of the reflective surface. It also died at the 16 hour mark on a single charge, which is absolutely fantastic. That result outclasses comparable machines like the Lenovo Slim 7 14 Gen 9 and the HP Pavilion Plus Laptop 14. As for how it performs, you should have zero problems zipping through real-world tasks like web browsing, video conferencing, and so on.
Who should buy the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED
Anyone that’s looking to pick up an affordable laptop with an OLED display. It’s so much more than that, though. The build quality is solid and day-to-day performance is both fast and responsive. Connectivity options are a bit limited, but that’s not unusual for a laptop in this price range. Overall, this is an exceptional budget laptop, as you can’t really beat the price to performance ratio.
Asus TUF Gaming A16 Advantage Edition – Best for work and gaming on a budget
Pros
- All-day battery life
- Robust chassis
- Gorgeous 16:10 display
Cons
- 720p HD camera leaves little to be desired
- Keys feels a little soft
Why we like the Asus TUF Gaming A16 Advantage Edition
The Asus TUF Gaming A16 Advantage Edition is something of a unicorn and I mean that in the best way possible. It exhibits strong graphics performance as well as long battery life. Long battery life? A gaming laptop? How preposterous! Well, not anymore! The Asus TUF managed an incredible 11 and a half hours on a single charge. Also, thanks to the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 GPU inside, it achieved an impressive 123 frames-per-second in the Rise of the Tomb Raider benchmark. That’s nothing to sneeze at, especially for a sub-$1,000 gaming machine.
Who should buy the Asus TUF Gaming A16 Advantage Edition
The Asus TUF Gaming A16 Advantage Edition is a good option for those on a tight budget. For under a grand, you’re getting reliable graphics performance, a spacious keyboard, and long battery life. It also works as a good general purpose machine, which is perfect for college students that want to work on homework during the day and then switch to gaming at night. With a Cinebench R20 score of 589, it should have “no trouble running lightweight apps and programs,” according to our review.
Alternative option: The Lenovo LOQ 15 is a good alternative option, as it comes with a slightly better GPU (RTX 4060). Despite getting a high rating, it didn’t make the cut because of poor battery life and limited connectivity options.
MSI Titan 18 HX – Best high-performance laptop
Pros
- Robust build quality
- Superb 4K 120HZ Mini-LED display
- Excellent mechanical keyboard
- Extraordinary CPU and GPU performance
- Lots of connectivity
Cons
- Large and heavy
- Attractive but mediocre touchpad
Why we like the MSI Titan 18 HX
Sometimes engineering majors need a laptop with extreme computing powers, especially if the focus is on video editing or 3D modeling. If this is the case, the MSI Titan 18 HX is the nuclear option. It boasts a powerful Intel Core i9-14900HX CPU, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 GPU, 4TB of SSD storage, and 128GB of RAM. It’s an absolute beast of a machine and it will run anything you throw at it. That said, a laptop this powerful will drain the battery at a much faster rate. Also, it’s wildly expensive!
Who should buy the MSI Titan 18 HX
Anyone that needs intense computing power for video editing and 3D modeling. This laptop also has a 1080p webcam, Wi-Fi 7 connectivity, and a massive 99.9 watt-hour battery. That said, it does weigh close to eight pounds and it costs $5,399.99. It’s not the most lightweight or budget-friendly laptop out there, but if it’s raw firepower you’re after, the MSI Titan 18 HX will certainly deliver on that front.
Recent laptop reviews
- Framework Laptop 13: The Framework Laptop 13 is based on a compelling vision of a possible future, and some PC enthusiasts will love building, upgrading, and repairing their own laptop. But this isn’t the right machine for the average PC buyer.
- Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 5: The Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 5 is a serviceable business laptop with solid battery life, a vibrant display, and decent repairability.
- Asus ProArt PX13: The Asus ProArt PX13 is a creator-focused laptop with impressive CPU performance thanks to its AMD Ryzen AI 300 series hardware. But, while this x86 machine has power and beauty, AMD’s latest hardware still falls behind Arm PCs when it comes to fan noise and battery life.
- Dell Inspiron 14 Plus: Dell’s first Copilot+ PC is fine, but there’s nothing about it that stands out in the Snapdragon X lineup. That’s a problem when it costs as much as a Surface Laptop — but the right sale might make this machine a good buy.
- Gigabyte Aorus 17X: The Gigabyte Aorus 17X delivers a premium GPU and CPU in a surprisingly portable package for a 17-inch laptop. But the laptop’s dim display disappoints.
- Asus Vivobook S 15: The Asus Vivobook S 15 is a competent entry into the Copilot Plus PC arena, but one that struggles to stand out from the alternatives.
How we test engineering laptops
The PCWorld team puts every Windows laptop through a series of intense benchmarks that test GPU and CPU performance, battery life, and so on. The idea is to push the laptop to its limits and then compare it against others we’ve tested.
Below, you’ll find a breakdown of each test and the reasons why we run them. For a much deeper look at our review methodology, check out how PCWorld tests laptops.
Windows laptops
- PCMark 10: The PCMark 10 benchmark is how we determine how well the laptop handles general use tasks like web browsing, word processing, spreadsheets, streaming, and so on.
- HandBrake: HandBrake is more intensive than PCMark 10. It measures how long a laptop’s CPU takes to encode a beefy 30GB file.
- Cinebench: Cinebench is a brief stress test of the CPU cores. It renders a 2D scene over a short period of time.
- 3DMark: 3DMark checks if 3D performance remains consistent over time by running graphic-intensive clips. This is how we test a gaming laptop’s GPU.
- Video rundown test: To gauge battery life, we loop a 4K video using Windows 10’s Movies & TV app until the laptop dies.
FAQ
How much processing power will I need in an engineering laptop?
You’re going to need a good amount of processing power for engineering tasks, so we’d recommend an Intel Core i5 or higher. However, an Intel Core i7 is considered ideal. This type of processor is good for multitasking, gaming, and demanding workloads.
Is RAM important to an engineering laptop?
Absolutely! The amount of RAM directly impacts the speed of your programs. Engineering students will likely be living in programs like Java and Python, so making sure those programs run smoothly is absolutely vital. The bare minimum we’d recommend is 8GB, but 16GB is better.
What about storage?
You’re going to need quite a bit of space for a slew of engineering programs, so we’d recommend at least 512GB of SSD (solid state drive) storage. If you want more space and have the budget for it, go for 1TB of NVMe SSD storage.
How much should my laptop weigh?
You don’t want to be lugging a five pound beast from class to class. A portable laptop should weigh about three pounds or less. In terms of portability and value, we suggest buying a laptop with a 13- or 14-inch display.
Author: Ashley Biancuzzo, Associate Editor, PCWorld
Ashley Biancuzzo manages all laptop and Chromebook coverage for PCWorld. She's been covering consumer tech since 2016, and her work has appeared on USA Today, Reviewed, Polygon, Kotaku, StarWars.com, and Nerdist. In her spare time, she enjoys playing video games, reading science fiction, and hanging out with her rescue greyhound.