Need a new laptop or tablet? Whether it’s for school or work, now is a good time to snag one. Many of our favorite laptops and tablets are on sale for the Presidents’ Day holiday, so if your machine has been sputtering, you can save some cash when you upgrade. Be sure to check out our many buying guides, including the Best Macbooks, Best Chromebooks, Best Laptops, Best Cheap Laptops, and Best Laptop Backpacks, for more recommendations.
Updated February 18: We’ve added the Samsung Galaxy Book Flex2 and Apple MacBook Pro.
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Laptop Deals
Apple MacBook Pro
Photograph: AppleThe M1 MacBook Pro (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is powerful enough to be a mobile workstation for creatives, thanks to the speedy house-made M1 chip. Reviewer Brenda Stoylar loved the beautiful display, the re-addition of more ports, and the redesigned MagSafe charger. The downside: It’s spendy, even with this $200 discount. This is the 14-inch model with 1 terabyte of flash memory, but the 512-gigabyte model and 16-inch model are also on sale.
WIRED senior writer Scott Gilbertson likes the Surface Laptop 4 (7/10, WIRED Recommends) for its solid build quality, class-leading battery life, and great screen. He’s not totally in love with the keyboard, but the addition of a USB-A port is an added plus for those with older gear (especially if you hate dongles). This deal is only for the AMD Ryzen 7 model with 8 gigabytes of RAM and 256 gigs of storage. Read more about it in our Microsoft Surface buying guide.
The Dell XPS is an icon in modern computing. For more than a decade, they’ve been workhorse laptops that perform well and stand the test of time. This model (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is no exception, with tiny bezels, one of the nicest keyboards around, and powerful specs—including an RTX 3050 Ti that can handle some gaming.
We’ve tested a slightly different version of this Samsung Windows laptop. This discounted model doesn’t have a touchscreen, but it’s svelte, lightweight, has a reasonably powerful 11th-gen Core i5 chip, and runs Windows 11 out of the box. You get a 15.6-inch AMOLED screen, along with 512 gigabytes of storage.
A quantum dot touchscreen makes this one of the prettiest 2-in-1 options you’ll find. Add to that an Intel Core i7 processor, 16 gigabytes of RAM, and a 512-gigabyte solid-state hard drive, and you have a powerful mobile performer. The battery is also a winner, with enough juice to last 17 hours on a single charge, according to Samsung.
Acer Swift 3
Photograph: AcerThis Acer frequently drops to this price, but with an 11th-gen Intel Core i7 processor, it’s one of the most powerful Windows laptops you can buy for the price. The screen is nice, and there’s decent battery life and four USB ports (including one USB-C).
The latest HP Spectre x360 boasts a 16-inch screen, Windows 11, and an 11th-gen Intel Core i7 processor. It’s a touchscreen, and as the name suggests, it has a 360-degree hinge that lets you flip the screen all the way to the other side so you can use it in tablet mode. That’s handy for watching movies. We haven’t tested this exact model yet, but we’ve recommended several Spectre x360 variants from prior years.
This Chromebook touchscreen tablet attaches to the included keyboard and turns into a surprisingly capable machine. It’s not very powerful, but if you can manage to live in the confines of Google’s Chrome browser, we like this little computer a lot (8/10, WIRED Recommends).
Tablet Deals
Amazon Fire HD 10
Photograph: AmazonIt may not be as powerful as an iPad, but the latest Fire HD 10 (7/10, WIRED Recommends) is still a great, cheap way to access Kindle, Prime Video, and Audible content, among many other Amazon properties. There’s no Google Play Store, but other apps like Netflix are available. Plus, the MicroSD card slot for extra storage means you can store media on the go for offline consumption. The Kids version is also on sale for $140. It’s the same but comes with a bumper case and a two-year, worry-free warranty in case your kid breaks it.
This is our favorite Fire tablet for kids because it has the smallest, easiest-to-grip size. Like the Fire HD 10 Kids tablet, it comes with a two-year, worry-free warranty, as well as one year of Amazon Kids+, which serves up kid-friendly content. It’s $3 per month after the first year. Read our guide to Amazon’s Fire tablets for more.
It’s not the steepest discount, but if you’ve been eyeing a new iPad with a good amount of storage, this is the best deal online right now. We’re fans of the 10-inch model (8/10, WIRED Recommends), which is easy to throw into a backpack or bookbag when on the go. Read our Best iPads guide for more details.
You get a pretty solid tablet experience with this Samsung tablet running Android. It runs relatively well, comes with a stylus that magnetically sticks to the back of the slate, and has a sharp (and large) display. The speakers sound great too, making it a good machine for catching up on The Witcher before bed.
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