Best early Prime Day laptop deals: Discounts on Dell, HP, Asus and more

Amazon’s annual Prime Day sales event is about to begin and it’s one of the best chances of the year to score big on some great laptop deals. This year, Prime Day will run from July 11 through July 12 and should include great deals on everything from gaming PCs to all-in-ones, as well as more traditional desktop machines.

We’ve sifted through all of the humdrum sales to pinpoint only the very best laptops on sale during this year’s Prime Day. You’ll need to be a Prime member to take advantage of these steep discounts. Not a Prime member? Not a problem. By signing up for the 30-day trial, you can get Amazon Prime for free.

We’re also including deals from other retailers like Best Buy and Walmart. Our picks offer strong processing and graphics performance, and we also take battery life, form factor, budget, and display size/quality into consideration. Whether you’re a hardcore gamer or a college freshman on a budget, we’re here to help you every step of the way.

Best Prime Day laptop deals

There are already some great early deals from the likes of Amazon and other retailers such as BestBuy, Dell, and Newegg. If you’re looking for a productivity laptop then the best value pick is the Acer Swift X Creator Laptop. For $170 off on Amazon, this Acer laptop comes with a Ryzen 7 processor and an Nvidia RTX 3050Ti GPU. Plus it’s only 0.7-inches thick and weighs in at a very reasonable 3.31 pounds. Alternatively, if you are looking to get your hands on the latest 15-inch Macbook Air then Amazon is offering a rare sale for $100 off this brand new model.

It can be argued that we’re seeing even better deals on gaming laptops right now. The pick of the bunch has to be Alienware m17 R5 for a mouth-watering $1,150 off on Dell. It’s loaded with upsides, including a Ryzen 9 processor, a Radeon RX 6850M XT GPU, and a whopping 32GB of RAM, which is enough to do 4K gaming. The 17-inch display is also capable of a blazing fast 360Hz refresh rate so you’ll never have to worry about your opponents having a speed advantage.

Best productivity and everyday laptop deals

• Acer Swift X Creator Laptop, Ryzen 7/RTX 3050Ti/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/ 14-inch 1080p display, $899.65 (16% off on Amazon)
• Dell Inspiron 2-in-1, Core i7 Evo/Intel Iris Xe integrated graphics/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/16-inch 1200p touch display, $899.99 (28% off on BestBuy)
• LG Gram (2022), Core i7/Intel Iris Xe integrated graphics/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/15.6-inch 1080p display, $1,170.41 (22% off on Amazon)
• MSI Creator 17, Core i7/RTX 3070/16GB RAM/1TB SSD/17.3-inch 2160p 120Hz display, $1,999.00 (27% off on Amazon)
• Apple MacBook Pro 2023, M2 Pro/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/14.2-inch Liquid Retina XDR display, $1,899.00 (5% off on Amazon)
• Apple MacBook Air 2023, M2/8GB RAM/256GB SSD/15.3-inch Liquid Retina display, $1,199.00 (8% off on Amazon)

Best gaming laptop deals

• Alienware m17 R5, Ryzen 9/RX 6850M XT/32GB RAM/1TB SSD/17.3-inch 1080p 360Hz refresh rate display, $1,199.99 (49% off on Dell)
• Dell G16 Gaming Laptop, Core i7/RTX 3050Ti/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/16-inch 1600p 165Hz refresh rate display, $899.99 (28% off on Dell)
• Victus by HP 15 Gaming Laptop, Core i7/RTX 3050Ti/8GB RAM/512GB SSD/15.6-inch 1080p 144Hz refresh rate display, $1,149.99 (6% off on Amazon)
• Acer Predator Triton 300 SE, Core i7/RTX 3060/16GB RAM/512GB SSD/14-inch 1200p 165Hz refresh rate display, $959.99 (40% off on BestBuy)
• Asus ROG Zephyrus, Ryzen 9/RTX 3080/16GB RAM/1TB SSD/15.6-inch 1440p 165Hz refresh rate display, $1,429.99 (35% off on BestBuy)
• MSI Pulse 15, Core i9/RTX 4070/32GB RAM/1TB SSD/15.6-inch 1440p 165Hz refresh rate display, $1,799.00 (5% off on Newegg)
• Gigabyte G5, Core i5/RTX 4060/8GB RAM/512GB SSD/15.6-inch 1080p 144Hz refresh rate display, $899.00 (18% off on Newegg)

What to look for when buying a laptop

Laptops come in all shapes and sizes, each with myriad features. All of these options can leave your head spinning. But before you dive into the deep end of laptop shopping, there are a few things you should consider first to help get you started.

The very first thing you should think about is what type of laptop will be best for you. There are traditional clamshells, 2-in-1’s, and even Chromebooks. If you want something that is portable and can work as both a laptop and tablet, then a 2-in-1 is a good choice. Traditional clamshells can offer better hardware and often are the way to go for professionals and gamers who require strong performance.

For hardware, there are a few things to consider first. If you need a lot of processing power for gaming or work tasks, then a higher number processor such as an Intel Core i5 or Ryzen 5 is a minimum requirement. You can generally stick with integrated graphics unless you intend to game or do graphically demanding tasks such as 3D rendering. Memory is important and no matter what your intended uses are for a laptop, you should try to aim for at least 8GB of RAM, with 16GB the optimal amount for gaming and productivity work.

Finally, there are two additional things you should consider before buying your new laptop: display size and battery life. Display size is dependent upon your personal preference. A smaller display will allow for your laptop to be more portable, but if you need to do multimedia work, you may want something bigger. As for battery life, look for something in the 10 to 12 hour range on a single charge as this should be enough to get you through a full work day before recharging.