I’ve Found the Best Laptops for MacBooks and More (2026)

It’s that time of the year. Amazon Prime Day is upon us, and with it, some of the best laptop deals of the year.

I test laptops throughout the year, so when it comes to these big products, I can recommend devices that I’ve personally tested. The last thing you want to do is make a hasty decision on a cheap laptop that you’ll regret in a week. These are the best laptops for their price, and often, they’re heavily discounted.

If you haven’t found the product you’re looking for, browse what we’re adding The absolute best deal on Prime Day it is ours Amazon Prime Day Liveblog about our latest updates.

Updated Wednesday, June 24: I’ve added a laptop sale, including the HP OmniBook 3 and the Asus Chromebook CX15.

The Best Laptop Option

Photo: Brenda Stolyar

Microsoft

13.8-inch Premium Laptop (7th Edition)

The Premium Laptop has been one of my favorite laptops since it was launched in 2024. However, recently, it has seen an unexpected price increase, which has made it difficult to accept. But here comes Prime Day to save the day with the best laptop deals of the week so far. The 2024 Premium Laptop dropped by 37 percent, bringing the price down to $835. This puts its price below the entry-level configuration of the MacBook Air.

And what you get in exchange is a well-designed, versatile and high-quality Windows laptop that’s as durable as a MacBook. The keyboard is very high quality, and the trackpad uses a responsive engine, just like the MacBook Air. If you haven’t used a Windows laptop in a while, you’ll be impressed by how the Surface Laptop series compares to the current MacBook, even when it comes to performance and battery life. And in my experience, the Premium Laptop has several features that make it superior to the MacBook Air. The 3:2 aspect ratio is glorious, which I really like. The larger window size gives you more vertical space to work with, which I enjoy when browsing the web and useful for work.

There is one important caveat, however. This configuration only comes with 256 GB of storage. Microsoft no longer sells this version technically, so the prices are higher for the base version. There is also a new model (more expensive). which was only available with the Snapdragon X2 chip inside. But when it comes to the best laptops, this is the best I’ve found so far.

Best of MacBook

The prices of laptops in 2026 have been rising. But not the MacBook Air. While it’s a great laptop in its own right, it’s also cheaper than the competition. This is the latest version of the M5 device, which was launched earlier this year. At $950 on Amazon, it’s $150 off the retail price, which is nice but not unusual. Most people already know the MacBook Air, and it hasn’t changed much externally since 2022. But the 2026 model has two important additions: better graphics thanks to the M5 chip, and graphics thanks to the M5 chip, and support for two external monitors.