Best business laptops: Top business notebooks from Apple, Asus, Dell, and more

When it comes to kitting out an office or workplace, the best business laptop is the right tool for the job at hand. This doesn't necessarily mean the most expensive, the newest, or even the most powerful. It's about picking the right machine for the role.

Do you need all-day battery life? A powerful dedicated GPU? A color-accurate display? Are you a Windows or macOS organization? Would you consider a Windows on ARM device? What's your policy on Copilot buttons? There are lots of key purchasing decisions to make – and, thankfully, lots of great laptops to choose from.

In this article, you'll discover our top picks for the best business laptops in every major category. IT Pro's team of laptop-reviewing experts has decades of experience in laptop reviewing, and in the past 12 months, we've rigorously tested and reviewed a broad selection of laptops from Apple, Dell, Lenovo, HP, and more.

What to look for in a business laptop

It's been another stellar year for laptops. The ARM-based competition from Qualcomm and Apple has given the x86 chips from both AMD and Intel some much-needed competition, and the result is that the latest generation of chips provides a more potent cocktail of application performance, graphics power, and battery life than ever before.

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This is great news for buyers: whether you want an affordable everyday business laptop, a long-lasting ultraportable, or a mobile workstation, there's plenty of great hardware out there to fit every use case, both in x86 and ARM-based flavours. You want a powerful, portable laptop and all-day battery life? Your wish has been granted.

AI remains on everyone's lips – and it also remains on their laptops. The neural processors (NPUs) in laptop chips are steadily increasing in power, and both Apple and Microsoft are harnessing that new resource to deploy a range of AI-powered features in their operating systems. These features aim to both boost productivity, power local large language (LLM) models, and shift battery-sapping video, image, and audio processing onto the NPU for more power-efficient operation.

Oftentimes, though, it's the far more basic, physical aspects of a laptop's design which elevate it above the competition: the display, keyboard and touchpad, the connectivity, the upgradability – or lack of it. These are the crucial factors in laptop design that you can only evaluate with proper hands-on testing. And that's why all of the laptops we recommend here have been tested by experts who use these devices for day-to-day work, and benchmark and test every key aspect of their performance.

Read on, and you'll discover our pick of the best laptops that have crossed our desks in recent times. Whether it's an affordable everyday laptop, a high-end ultraportable, or a heavyweight workstation, you'll find something for every desk.

Best business laptops

The Asus ExpertBook Ultra borrows a little glitz from the consumer-focused ZenBook range and brings some much-needed glamour to the business portable. It's also a potent demonstration of just how dramatically Intel's latest Panther Lake generation has caught up with the competition.

The hardware is luxurious. A stunningly bright, vivacious OLED touchscreen takes centre stage, and despite the 14-inch 2,880 x 1,880 panel, Asus has somehow kept the kerb weight down to an impossibly slight 0.99kg.

It's not delicate, though: the featherlight shell is built from magnesium alloy with a 'Nano-Ceramic' coating and has a MIL-STD-810H accreditation for toughness. A matte layer of Corning Gorilla Glass Victus shields the OLED screen from damage, too. You'd expect an 11mm-thick laptop to feel delicate, but the ExpertBook Ultra is anything but.

Nor is it poorly connected. You get two Thunderbolt 4-equipped USB-C ports, one on each edge, and also a further two USB-A ports, which reach USB 3.2 Gen 2 speeds. Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 are included, too – although it's worth noting that there's no physical Ethernet socket.

The advances made by Intel's Panther Lake chips are transformative. The result is a laptop which is able to balance quite formidable power – both in applications and gaming – with excellent power efficiency. The 70Wh battery kept going for almost 21 hours in our tests.

For more information, check out our full Asus ExpertBook Ultra review.

Sometimes you just need a good everyday laptop. A simple balance of sturdy build, ample performance, and good battery life. The Omnibook 5 delivers exactly that for a retail price of around £900 – and far less if you shop around.

Bear in mind, though, that this is a Windows on ARM device. If that doesn't immediately rule it out for your business – software compatibility issues can be a dealbreaker – then Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Plus chip offers a good balance of stamina and performance. It's around 25% slower than its Elite cousins, but we've found performance to be more than ample for everyday browser-based work. It consistently lasts a full day of work with some left in the tank.

Only GPU performance disappoints. Qualcomm is behind the competition here, and the modest Adreno X1-45 GPU limits it to very casual gaming.

Most buyers are unlikely to care. The 14in chassis is finished in a nicely solid-feeling aluminium chassis that's around 13mm thick and weighs in at 1.3kg. Pop open the display, and you're faced with a comfy-feeling keyboard and a decent-sized mechanical touchpad. The only complaints are minor: the half-height Enter key is one, the touchpad's loose, rattly feel is the other.

The presence of a decent OLED screen really sweetens the deal. Color accuracy is good, brightness reaches an ample 300 nits, and it covers around 99% of DCI-P3. That's impressive for the money.

For more information, check out our full HP Omnibook 5 review.

If it's desktop-adjacent power you crave, then the Pro Max 16 Plus is a superb investment. The specification is highly customisable, the chassis handles high-power CPU and GPU combinations, and the design is rock-solid. Only the cramped keyboard really irks.

The beauty of the Pro Max 16 Plus is that you can build it to your specification. If your use case needs a powerful CPU, no GPU, and a fancy OLED touchscreen that is just burning your IT budget, then you can keep the price under £1,500. If, however, you want a top-end CPU, 128GB of CAMM2 RAM, up to three PCIe 5.0 SSDs, and one of Nvidia's high-end RTX Pro chips, you can relieve a big chunk of your IT budget with ease.

We tested a fully stacked model with a Core 9 Ultra 285HX, RTX Pro 5000, 128GB of LPCAMM2 memory, and a 2TB PCIe Gen 5 SSD; the bill totted up to over £7,000. Around £500 of that was due to the stunning 3,840 x 2,400 OLED touchscreen – and we can confirm that its DisplayHDR 1000 True Black certification is well deserved.

Connectivity is a highlight. You get drop-jaw 2.5GbE Ethernet, HDMI 2.1, two USB-C Thunderbolt 5 ports, a single USB-C Thunderbolt 4 port, two 5Gbps USB-A ports, a 3.5mm headset port, and a full-sized SD card slot. There are optional extras, too: a smartcard reader, Bluetooth, and WWAN.

Bear in mind that the 'mobile' in mobile workstation is relative. Even the most basic specification tips the scales over 2.5kg, and that's before you've considered the extra bulk of a big, brick-sized power supply. You'll need a big, sturdy bag, and you'll get a workout thrown in for free.

For more information, check out our full Dell Pro Max 16 Plus review.

Chromebooks are not always championed when it comes to laptops – even in this Chromebook Plus era. They're often seen as the last resort of IT stock, the machine you take when your Mac or your Surface machine is out of commission. But the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook Plus is different and doesn't deserve to be tarred with that brush.

For starters, it's genuinely brilliant – not 'brilliant for a Chromebook' but actually, surprisingly good. The i5 model we tested proved to be the fastest Chromebook from 2024, with a Geekbench 6 multithreaded score of 7608 – that put it ahead of the excellent Asus ExpertBook CX54.

The integration of Google's Gemini AI into Chrome OS is also a big shot in the arm for Chromebooks and, what's more, there is an argument to make about it being more useful than some of Microsoft's more flashy Copilot+ features.

While employees might want Apple Macs, or the flashest Windows devices, IT teams should go against the grain and look at Samsung's Chromebooks. From as little as £649, your employees can have a stunning slimline laptop with a lovely OLED screen. One that is fast, lean, efficient, and easy to manage for small businesses or larger enterprises.

Read our full Samsung Galaxy Chromebook Plus review here

Squeezing the sort of hardware that keeps hardcore creatives or power-users satisfied into a 13.3in laptop is no easy feat but Asus has managed it and with some aplomb with the new ProArt PX13. Inside this compact laptop, you'll find a 100W Nvidia RTX 4070 GPU, AMD Ryzen 9 CPU and 2TB of storage. And there's a 360-degree lid thrown into the bargain for true convertible flexibility.

Made from matt-black aluminium the ProArt PX13 isn't the lightest 13.3in laptop on the market at just shy of 1.4Kg but the 360-degree hinge accounts for some of that and the whole package is MIL-STD 810H-rated so it should prove every bit as robust as it feels.

Connectivity is bang on point with Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 on the wireless side along with two Thunderbolt 4 and a single 10Gbps USB-A port, an HDMI 2.1 video output, an SD card reader, and a dedicated DC-in jack so you don't have to sacrifice a Type-C port to charging duties.

Performance from the new 'Strix Point' AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 is impressive but it's the graphics performance from the 100W TGP RTX 4070 GPU that marks the ProArt PX13 out from the herd. To find a better performer you'll need to invest in a larger and more expensive high-end gaming laptop.

The 2.8K OLED screen covers 99.5% of the DCI-P3 color gamut and recorded a Delta-E variance of just 0.48 which is outstanding. All-in-all It's a great display for creative work and media consumption: HDR content looks particularly impressive. The 60Hz refresh rate rather limits the ProArt PX13 when it comes to motion fidelity and gaming but it's hardly a deal-breaker.

The keyboard is of very high quality and the touchpad is surprisingly large given that this is quite a small laptop. Built into the upper left part of the touchpad is Asus' DialPad, a virtual scroll-wheel that provides granular access to tools in several creativity apps though its real strength is its deep integration with Adobe's creative apps.

Read our full Asus ProArt PX13 review here

Apple hasn't reimagined the MacBook Pro for the arrival of the M5, but then it didn't need to. The 14in model is the smaller of the two Pros, and it's a beautiful thing both inside and out.

The design is simple and elegant and the 1.55kg aluminium body is tough. It's not just a looker, though. The keyboard and touchpad remain top of the heap, with a lovely crisp feel to the keys and a haptic touchpad which doesn't put a foot – well, finger – wrong. It's still the benchmark by which laptop touchpads should be judged and demonstrates the benefit of tight hardware and OS integration.

Connectivity is eminently sensible compared to some rival laptops, too. You get three Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports, HDMI 2.1, a full-sized SD card reader, and – yes – a 3.5mm headphone socket.

The move from M4 to M5 is quiet evolution rather than revolution, adding a little more single core power and some neural AI processing chops, but if you can pick up an M4 model on the cheap, then do – it's more than good enough. Bear in mind that, at the time of writing, buying direct from Apple only gives you the choice of M5, M4 Pro or M4 Max. For power users, the previous generation Pro and Max chips still outmuscle the M5.

The 14in Liquid Retina display is a typical highlight. The 3,024 x 1,964 resolution is sharp, the 120Hz refresh rate is slick and the Mini LED backlighting pushes brightness over the 1,000 nit mark with ease. You'll need to pay an extra £150 for the matte Nano-texture screen finish if anti-glare coatings are top of your wantlist, though.

Unfortunately, UK and EU buyers won't get a charger in the box. The EU push to reduce e-waste means you'll be paying an extra £59 for the privilege of charging your new MacBook. US buyers can gloat quietly.

For more information, check out our full Apple MacBook Pro M5 review.

The Acer Aspire Vero 16 is a solid 16in business laptop that costs a little less than most. For well under £1,000, you're looking at a 16-inch laptop with a capable all-round specification and good design. Throw in MIL-STD-810H certification for toughness, and you have a recipe for affordable laptop success.

At the time of writing, we're seeing the Vero 16 down to as little as £750 at some retailers – for that money, it's very easy to forgive the all-plastic build. Not that you'll mind: the base feels taut and well-constructed, and there's only a little give in the lid. The 1.8kg weight is modest, and you can remove the base and replace the battery or SSD as required.

There's no skimping on connectivity. You get two Thunderbolt 4-equipped USB-C ports, a pair of 5Gbps USB-A sockets, an HDMI 2.1 port, and a 3.5mm headphone output. Ethernet is absent, but fast onboard Wi-Fi 7 offers some consolation.

The 16:10 panel is a welcome sight: the 1,920 x 1,200 resolution makes the Windows desktop feel more roomy than on a standard Full HD panel. That's not the highest resolution, but the quality is superb. Color accuracy is good, and the panel covers 99.8% of the sRGB color gamut and 82% of DCI-P3.

Performance is also good across the board thanks to the Lunar Lake chips. NPU performance is low at 13 TOPS, but everyday applications – and even games – run incredibly well thanks to the Core Ultra 7 255H in our review sample. For GPU-based duties, the display's modest resolution is more a blessing than a curse. Efficiency is excellent, too, with an impressive 17-hour-plus runtime.

For more information, check out our full Acer Aspire Vero 16 review.

HP's big-screen convertible is a consumer model, but it gets a lot right. The 360-degree hinge allows it to transform from a standard laptop into tent mode and through into tablet mode. The USB-C stylus adds some welcome inking support, too.

It's another good-looking laptop from the HP camp. The chassis is clad in plates of aluminium, which add a nice, sturdy feel, and it weighs a reasonable 1.88kg. The all-important 36-degree hinges feel reassuringly solid, too.

Connectivity hits the spot. There's one full-sized USB-A port on either flank, and two USB-C ports, one of which supports Thunderbolt 4. Full-sized HDMI 2.1 and a 3.5mm headphone socket are welcome, too. Networking is solely wireless: you get Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.

The OLED panel has a crisp 2,880 x 1,800 resolution, and peak brightness reaches 520cd/m2 in HDR mode. Color accuracy is great, and it also covers 100% of DCI-P3 and 95% of Adobe RGB. Impressive stuff.

Given the gloriously bright OLED display, the 15-hour battery life comes as some surprise. Performance from the Intel Lunar Lake chip is good, but we'd steer buyers towards a 32GB model, as the on-chip RAM is not upgradeable.

The only slight issue is that the integrated GPU struggles with the display's native resolution – you'll need to use Intel's XeSS upscaling to get playable framerates.

For more information, check out our full HP OmniBook X Flip 16 review.

FAQs

Why are business laptops more expensive?

You may have noticed that laptops which are specifically aimed at business buyers tend to be noticeably more expensive than those which are mostly consumer-focused. Although this is partially attributable to the fact that businesses can usually afford to drop a little more cash on their purchases, there are several good reasons why business laptops are more expensive.

For one thing, they’ll often come with AMD Ryzen Pro or Intel vPro chips. These special professional-grade components don’t confer any additional performance advantages, but they include extra security and manageability features designed to make it easier for IT admins to manage large fleet deployments.

Business machines are also more likely to have a wider range of ports and connectivity options, as many offices still rely on older connections like HDMI or even VGA for connecting to projectors and other peripherals. Other additional features like biometric security and better access to internal components for the purposes of repair and upgrade are a more common sight on business devices, too.

How long do business laptops last?

Another factor in why business laptops tend to command higher price tags is that they last longer than personal machines. The manufacturer’s warranty will generally cover a standard consumer laptop for a year, but business machines often come with a three year warranty.

Even beyond that, the typical device refresh cycle for most companies tends to be around five years - which means that business laptops will need to last for at least that long with no major problems in order to avoid unhappy customers. In fact, some companies can sweat their laptops for as much as ten years before replacing them – although they may upgrade certain components such as storage and RAM every so often.

Should I buy a convertible business laptop?

Convertible laptops allow users to seamlessly flip between tablet-style operations and the more traditional laptop form-factor. In theory, this offers increased flexibility and greater productivity, but while it can be a convenient way to display your screen for an informal presentation to colleagues, you may find its workplace utility to be somewhat limited unless you’re a big fan of taking handwritten notes or doing digital illustration.

The Dell XPS is a stalwart in the tech giant's laptop arsenal and its 13in 'Plus' variation is one of its very best. A refreshed design, smaller, portable size, and innovative keyboard design make the 13 Plus a laptop for the modern worker.

The keyboard design, known as 'zero-lattice', runs from edge to edge to house larger keys. The benefit here is that even the most inaccurate of typists can pick up a decent speed. The travel is good too, as it allows for a nice clean typing action across largely silent keys.

However, the real innovative part is the always-on illuminated symbols that run along the top of the keyboard. This appears to be Dell's take on Apple's ill-fated touch bar but with a more useful layout, with shortcuts for functions like print screen, volume dials, display controls play, and pause buttons.

You can also tap the Fn key and have the middle 13 of these symbols vanish to be replaced with backlit F1 to F12 icons. You can use the Fn-Lock to have the function key icons rather than the symbols as the default. Magic.

How we test

When we review a laptop, there are a number of tests that we use to determine its capabilities. To measure the quality of the display, we use the open-source DisplayCal app and a dedicated colorimeter to determine the maximum brightness, the contrast ratio and how much of the sRGB color gamut it covers (as well as the DCI-P3 and Adobe RGB gamuts where applicable) – which determines the range of colors the screen can reproduce. We also measure the average Delta-E rating, which indicates how accurately those colors are displayed.

Performance is tested by running it through our own in-house benchmarks, which consist of three tests: an image conversion test, which gives an indication of single-threaded speeds, a video encoding test, which makes greater use of multi-core processing, and a multitasking test which runs both processes simultaneously while also playing a video. This test is the most strenuous and is designed to push processors to their limits. These tests give us individual scores, as well as an overall result.

We'll also run the Geekbench 5 performance test to confirm the accuracy of these results, as well as assessing its performance in day-to-day tasks throughout our evaluation period. Storage is tested using the AS SSD benchmark.

In order to measure battery life, we'll charge the battery fully, then set the display brightness as close to 170cd/m2 as possible using a color calibrator, turn on flight mode and play a looped video until the battery dies. This gives us a consistent figure to compare the battery life of different models, although it may not necessarily give us an indication of real-world battery life. For this, we assess how long the battery lasts over several days of actual use, subjecting it to a range of workloads and activities.