The best laptop for graphic design delivers color accurate screens and top-tier specs for running Photoshop, Illustrator, Affinity and more.
My team and I have reviewed hundreds of design essentials, including the best graphic design software and the best monitors for graphic design. And, for laptops, these are our top picks for smooth, seamless design processes and workflows.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch is the best laptop for graphic design you can get right now. Equipped with an M3 chip, we experienced excellent performance for a range of content creation tasks, and one of the greatest displays you'll find on a laptop. I've rounded up our recommendations for art and design laptops at every budget. We've extensively tested and benchmarked each device we feature here, while also exploring color accuracy and coverage across the sRGB and Adobe RGB color spaces.
For more creator machines, my team has also reviewed the best laptops for photo editing and the best video editing laptops.
The quick list
Best laptop for graphic design overall
The MacBook Pro 16-inch (M3 Pro/M3 Max) sets the benchmark for graphic design laptops, with its powerful Apple chips handling 4K and 8K video editing effortlessly and a fingerprint-resistant design for a clean appearance.
Best budget laptop for graphic design
The Apple MacBook Air (M2) introduces a refreshed design, boasting a larger 13.6-inch display, excellent performance with teh M2 Chip and a fantastic battery life. All of this, at a fantastic price point. While you could get a few laptops cheaper, for your money, this one is pretty hard to beat.
Best Windows laptop for graphic design
The Dell XPS 14, with its elegant design and optional 3.2K OLED display, offers unmatched visual clarity and color accuracy, making it a superior choice for graphic designers seeking performance and aesthetics.
Best laptop for graphic design for professionals
Though primarily a business laptop, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 9 impresses with its robust build, responsive keyboard, and excellent port selection, making it a powerful option for design professionals.
Best graphic design laptop for battery life
The Apple MacBook Air (M3, 2024) shines for graphic designers with its sleek, portable design, vibrant display, and strong performance, complemented by a comfortable keyboard and long battery life.
Best laptop for graphic design students
Impressively speedy, ultra-portable, powerful, and affordable - the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 gets top marks for general graphic design work without breaking the bank.
The best laptop for graphic design in 2024
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Best laptop for graphic design overall
✅ You need top-tier performance for graphic-heavy tasks: The M3 Max chip makes this the most powerful MacBook Pro yet, perfect for demanding video editing, and 3D rendering.
✅ You want an immersive, high-quality display: Its 16.2-inch Liquid Retina XDR display offers sharp visuals, high brightness, and accurate colors, ideal for creatives.
❌ You’re looking for a more affordable option: The MacBook Pro 16-inch M3 has a high price tag that may be overkill for casual users.
❌ You don’t need workstation-level performance: If you’re not a heavy multitasker or creative professional, you could find better value in the MacBook Air or a smaller Pro model.
The MacBook Pro 16-inch (M3 Pro/M3 Max) is unparalleled in its suitability for graphic design, offering unmatched power with Apple's latest chips.
It excels in handling intensive design tasks, including 4K and 8K video editing, without faltering, marking a significant advancement in performance over previous models. Its design remains consistent, with a new Space Black option that resists fingerprints, keeping the device looking pristine.
Benchmark tests reveal a substantial performance boost, particularly in graphics-intensive applications, streamlining creative workflows. With up to 24 hours of battery life, it supports prolonged creative sessions on a single charge.
Although priced at a premium, its formidable capabilities justify the investment for graphic designers seeking a top-tier laptop that combines efficiency, durability, and aesthetic appeal.
Read our full Apple MacBook Pro 16-inch (M3 Max) review
Best budget laptop for graphic design
✅ You need excellent performance in a compact form: The M2 chip handles everyday tasks with ease, and the sleek, lightweight design is easy to carry.
✅ You want great battery life: The MacBook Air M2 lasts well over a full workday, making it perfect for on-the-go users.
❌ You need advanced graphics capabilities: While powerful for most tasks, it’s not the best choice for high-intensity gaming or heavy video editing.
❌ You want a wide selection of ports: With only two USB-C ports, you may find connectivity limited without an adapter.
The Apple MacBook Air M2 is a wildly popular laptop for good reason. It’s got an overall great performance for price, all with a brand new design. The larger display and redesigned body are sleek and modern.
The M2 MacBook Air adopts the notch, and makes the screen feel much more immersive overall. The re-introduction of MagSafe this generation year for MacBooks was a welcome surprise too, making charging much safer, faster, and possible without taking up the ports.
The Apple MacBook Air M2 offers an incredible amount of power, especially for the money. The MacBook Air with M2 chip is plenty computer for most people, and even overpowered for some.
Read our full Apple MacBook Air (M2) review
Best Windows laptop for graphic design
✅ You want a premium Windows alternative to MacBook: With an OLED display, Intel Core Ultra processors, and sleek design, the XPS 14 rivals Apple’s high-end offerings.
✅ You need a lightweight yet powerful laptop: The XPS 14 is both powerful and portable, ideal for business professionals and creatives alike.
❌ You prioritize long battery life: While the battery is decent, it’s shorter than what you’ll find on the MacBook Pro, especially under heavy use.
❌ You rely on traditional function keys: The lack of physical function keys can be an inconvenience for some users.
The Dell XPS 14 positions itself as a prime choice for graphic design, boasting an elegant design with a cutting-edge processor and an optional 3.2K OLED display that sets a new standard in visual clarity and color accuracy within the XPS series.
Starting at $1,499, the laptop may require additional investment in upgrades like the Nvidia RTX 4050 GPU to fully unleash its potential, making it a worthy investment of nearly $2,400 for professionals seeking longevity and performance.
It features notable design enhancements including superior top-mounted speakers for improved audio quality and slim bezels around a 1080p webcam. Despite its slim profile, the XPS 14, powered by an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H and Nvidia RTX 4050, efficiently manages a wide range of tasks from basic computing to complex content creation, marking it as an essential device for graphic designers who prioritize power, durability, and aesthetics.
Read our full Dell XPS 14 review
Best laptop for graphic design for professionals
✅ You need flexibility in a business laptop: The 2-in-1 design offers a versatile form factor for work, presentations, and collaboration.
✅ You prioritize battery life and a wide range of ports: The ThinkPad X1 boasts long battery life, multiple USB-A and USB-C ports, and HDMI, making it great for professionals.
❌ You’re on a budget: This model is relatively expensive and might be excessive for basic tasks or personal use.
❌ You need a compact device: The 2-in-1 design adds weight and bulk, making it less ideal for those seeking extreme portability.
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 excels in offering both productivity and flexibility through its 2-in-1 design, allowing users to transition smoothly between traditional laptop use and tablet-like work. This flexibility makes it ideal for handling various professional tasks, from writing reports to sketching ideas or giving presentations. The ability to fold the device into different positions, such as tent mode for displaying content or tablet mode for easy navigation, makes it a versatile tool in any business setting.
In terms of battery life and charging, the ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 boasts long-lasting battery performance and rapid charging capabilities. This feature ensures that professionals can stay productive throughout the workday without needing frequent breaks to recharge. The device is well-suited for long work sessions, meaning it’s very able to handle demanding tasks while maintaining excellent battery efficiency.
Read our full Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 review
Find the best deals on Lenovo products with our Lenovo coupon codes.
Best laptop for graphic design for battery life
✅ You need a versatile, powerful MacBook at a lower price: The M3 chip provides powerful performance in a lightweight and compact design, making it great for students and professionals.
✅ You want a high-quality display and long battery life: The 13.6-inch Retina display is sharp and color-accurate, with up to 16 hours of battery life.
❌ You need a wide variety of ports: With only two USB-C ports, connectivity may be limited for users who frequently use multiple peripherals.
❌ You need workstation-level performance: For more demanding creative work, the MacBook Pro 14-inch or 16-inch with M3 Pro or Max chips would be a better fit.
The Apple MacBook Air (M3, 2024) stands out as an exceptional laptop for graphic designers, offering a modern, sleek design that's both light and portable—ideal for professionals on the go.
Its expansive, vibrant display, with minimized bezels, provides an immersive experience for detailed design work without sacrificing the laptop's compactness. Performance-wise, the MacBook Air excels with fast boot times and smooth application handling, crucial for managing complex design projects.
The comfortable, redesigned keyboard facilitates prolonged design sessions, enhancing productivity.
Additionally, its impressive battery life of up to 16 hours supports extended creative endeavors without the need for frequent recharging, making it perfect for designers working on long projects or while traveling.
Read our full Apple MacBook Air 13-inch (M3) review
Best laptop for graphic design students
✅ You want laptop that's good value for money: With some excellent specs and gaming chops, the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 still offers good value compared to some.
✅ You want long battery life: Most laptops for gaming suffer short battery life, so we were pleased to see that's not the case here.
❌ You need a basic laptop for general tasks: The Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 is, first and foremost, a gaming laptop, offering top-tier performance.
❌ You need 100% AdobeRGB: While we love the style and power of the Zephyrus G14, it lacks full color space coverage.
The Asus Zephyrus G14 is a phenomenal gaming laptop with all the specs you’ll need to smoothly run Photoshop, Affinity, and other graphic design apps without spending well over $2000.
Design-wise, this is a slimline, lightweight laptop. We’ve noticed a trend with the G14 is for thinner bodies as generations pass. The current 2024 model measures 32.4 x 22 x 1.99cm (12.76 x 8.66 x 0.78in) and weighs in at 1.70 Kg (3.75 lbs), making it ideal for slinging in the bag and carting across campus or on the commute to the studio.
The 1080p screen may not offer the dazzling resolution of a 4K panel, but with 100% sRGB, just over 75% Adobe RGB, and Pantone Validated, the laptop offers good color space coverage and reproduction for general graphic design work. However, if you prefer a broader canvas, you may find the 14in screen too compact for your workflow. As an alternative, check out the ThinkPad line-up, such as the Lenovo ThinkPad P16s. It’s an entry-level mobile workstation for graphic design and 3D rendering at professional level, which retails for around the same price.
If it’s performance you want, though, it’s difficult to fault the G14 for graphic design work. Equipped with an AMD Ryzen 9 processor, up to 32GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti 4GB GDDR6 GPU, and 1TB SSD storage, it’s more than ready right out of the box. During our review, we even called this laptop “a speed monster” that smashed the competition in our CPU-heavy testing workloads. Battery life was just as impressive for a laptop of this power and size, lasting over eight hours in our 1080p movie test. Overall, a solid, affordable laptop for graphic design.
Read our full Asus Zephyrus G14 review
Best laptops for graphic design: FAQs
What is the best laptop requirements for graphic design?
Depending on the kind of tools you are using, your GPU and CPU hardware requirements may vary, but there's one thing that all laptops for graphic design must have: memory.
Media files can be quite large, and if you're working with a design that features a lot of layers or effects added into the mix, these are all going to fill up your app's RAM memory allocation very quickly. You'll need at least 16GB, but 32GB RAM is ideal.
Are Macs really better for graphic design?
There are some things that Macs do better than Windows laptops when it comes to graphic design work, with font rendering being one of the biggest. But overall, Windows laptops have come a very long way in the past several years to closing that gap. Now, it really is a matter of preference for the OS ecosystem, since all major graphic design software appears on both platforms and display quality (as well as color gamut coverage) for the best Windows laptops can even exceed what you'd get on the best MacBooks and best MacBook Pro laptops.
How to choose the best laptops for graphic design for you
When choosing which laptop is best for graphic design, there’s no one answer. With so many makes and models on the market, the trick is to first identify how you’re planning to use the device.
Here's the short answer:
In our experience, a good graphic design laptop needs a minimum Intel i5, AMD Ryzen 5, or M1 processor. We recommend at least 512GB SSD and 16GB RAM—though 32GB is preferable for flawless performance on complex projects. Check your screen offers at least 1080p resolution, and a good color coverage across sRGB and Adobe RGB. This makes sure your designs are color accurate on-screen and in print.
But for the longer answer:
There's no one graphic design laptop - it all depends on the work you'll be doing. As a baseline, however, we recommend minimum specs of 16GB RAM and 1TB of SSD storage - paired with one of the best photo cloud storage services for backups. Ideally, choose a display that features DCI-P3 for the most accurate on-screen colors.
Alternatively, a screen with a very high-percentage sRGB coverage will suffice. A machine with this power will keep you in the zone.
Professionals and power-users will want to opt for portables that ramp up the power and performance as high and as hard as they go. Graphic design apps like Adobe Illustrator can take their toll on hardware, so it’s important to select one that can manage running them smoothly without any lag.
Look for the best RAM, best CPU, and best GPU specs that your budget allows- and consider a device that offers plenty of storage space, too. You can really spend out on the very best graphic design laptops, but it’s not always necessary - especially if you’re more of a casual user or you’re designing using less resource-intensive tools like the best logo makers and best free logo makers or online design apps like Canva.
Check the screen specs. As a graphic designer, particularly if you’re working with print assets, what you create on the screen should be as accurate to the finished article as possible. Look for those with a wide color gamut, ideally hitting 100% DCI-P3, although a high-percentage sRGB coverage will be fine for more general use.
As the recommended specs are similar, it’s also worth exploring the best monitors for photo editing and graphic design if you need a second display.
How we test the best laptops for graphic design
✅ More than 1,800 laptops, Chromebooks, and MacBooks reviewed
✅ 15 years of product testing
✅ Over 16,000 products reviewed in total
✅ Nearly 200,000 hours testing tech
We test hardware built for a range of industries and professions, including the best laptops for writers, best laptops for engineering, and best video editing PCs.
When it comes to best laptops for designers, we rigorously test each device against a list of features, with special focus on screen quality and performance. These are two of the most important assets when running creative apps like graphic design software, photo editors, and graphics-hungry apps like the best VFX software, and best 3D modeling software. In our tests, we frequently use Photoshop and Lightroom, as generally any of the best Photoshop alternatives and the best Lightroom alternatives should be good if Adobe products run well.
Generally, we opt for laptops with at least 16GB of RAM - although 32GB is preferred - with internal SSD storage of 1TB and above. They also feature the latest-generation CPUs from AMD, Intel and Apple.
Some of the devices we’ve assessed are often marketed as the best business laptops or best gaming laptops - perhaps that’s no surprise, since these also need to be able to handle hardware-hogging applications without missing a beat. We also recommend checking out the best Lenovo ThinkPad laptops for professional alternatives for graphic design work.
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