Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Computing
  3. Features

3 reasons why you should buy a gaming laptop in 2023

By

It’s assumed that with every new year, our tech will improve. But in 2023, gaming laptops aren’t just inching forward — they’re making a big leap.

Regardless of what brand of gaming laptop you prefer, you’ll likely see major improvements in key areas like performance, battery life, and display quality — and that’s great news if you’re looking to buy in 2023. While it may be a few months before some of these models are available to purchase, they’ll be worth the wait. Here are three reasons to but a gaming laptop in 2023.

Recommended Videos

RTX 4090s everywhere

The Razer Blade 18 on a table in front of a window.
Digital Trends

Nvidia announced its RTX 40-series mobile graphics at CES 2023, and that includes a new highest tier for laptops in the RTX 4090. Names of GPUs are just names, but clearly, Nvidia thinks its can deliver enough performance to justify calling this laptop card an “RTX 4090.”

Get your weekly teardown of the tech behind PC gaming
Check your inbox!
Privacy Policy

But beyond the raw performance and new features of this new GPU, it’s going to be more widespread than a top-end card has ever been before. Most notably, the RTX 4090 is going to end up in more compact gaming laptops than ever, including 14-inchers. In the past, the Razer Blade 14 was the only 14-inch gaming laptop that could be configured up to the most powerful graphics (the RTX 3080 Ti at the time). Other 14-inch laptops (whether gaming or not) were often capped at an RTX 3050 Ti or RTX 3060.

Now, though, that’s all going to change. Plenty of compact 14-inch laptops will be coming out in 2023 and will have an RTX 4090. The updated ROG Zephyrus G14 is a great example. This popular little gaming laptop is now offering configurations up to an RTX 4090, which should greatly expand the kind of performance you can expect out of it. Just how powerful these systems will be is to be determined (and will likely vary from laptop to laptop), but we can expect small laptops get a big boost in 2023.

HDR galore

The ROG Zephyrus M16 on a white table.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

HDR has long been a sore spot in PC gaming. The transition to more advanced backlighting like mini-LED or OLED in the world of PCs has been painfully slow. And that means proper HDR performance has been inaccessible to PC gamers, outside of plugging your PC into a television.

But now, many high-end gaming laptops are finally offering mini-LED as a configuration option. That includes the Razer Blade 16, ROG Zephyrus M16, and many more. With over 1,000 local dimming zones and 1,100 nits of peak brightness, these new gaming laptops should provide some solid HDR performance in games. These new mini-LED panels are high resolution and high refresh rate too — in terms of visuals, there’s really no downside.

Last year, we saw just a couple of high-end gaming laptops embrace high-refresh rate OLED, limited to only the Razer Blade 15 and MSI Raider GE67 HX. The rate of adoption for mini-LED is already much larger, and considering how much brighter these panels are, there’s finally reason to get excited about HDR gaming on laptops.

MUX Switches and Advanced Optimus

A visual graphic of how Nvidia's Advanced Optimus works.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

There are a couple of other features you’ll see in almost every gaming laptop in 2023, and they should help with battery life. MUX switches are nothing new — and neither is Nvidia’s Advanced Optimus. But in 2023, these two features are more widespread than ever, and they work in tandem to improve battery life by helping laptops switch between integrated and discrete graphics.

The MUX switch is the hardware component that physically toggles the adapter that connects the display from the integrated graphics and the discrete graphics. Nvidia’s Advanced Optimus is the software side of the equation — it automatically (and hopefully intelligently) detects which graphics the application you’re running needs. The point is to optimize battery life, since you really don’t want to be running your heavy RTX GPU while you’re writing in Microsoft Word.

These technologies will be even more important if you do opt for one these more advanced displays and high refresh rates, which hurt can battery life on gaming laptops that already don’t last very long. And in 2023, it’s no longer a premium feature reserved for the most expensive gaming laptops — and that’s really great to see.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Luke Larsen
Luke Larsen
Senior Editor, Computing
Luke Larsen is the Senior editor of computing, managing all content covering laptops, monitors, PC hardware, Macs, and more.
Nvidia could flip the script on the RTX 5090
The Hyte Y40 PC case sitting on a table.

We already know Nvidia is working on its RTX 50-series graphics cards, code-named Blackwell, but the rollout may not go as expected.

According to well-known hardware leaker kopite7kimi, Nvidia plans to launch the RTX 5080 before it launches the RTX 5090. That may not sound like a big deal, but it's a change of pace compared to what we saw in the last generation.

Read more
The RTX 50-series may fix the biggest weakness of its predecessor
Nvidia Blackwell chips.

Nvidia's RTX 50-series is still largely a mystery, but the occasional leak keeps the hype alive. And this time, it's gaming laptop enthusiasts who have reason to be happy. According to Moore's Law Is Dead, Nvidia's Blackwell laptop GPUs are receiving a much-needed boost to the memory interface, implying that Nvidia may have learned from its past mistakes.

Although rumor has it that Nvidia may be aiming to launch the first RTX 50-series desktop GPUs in the final quarter of 2024, we've heard very little about these graphics cards that didn't come from leaks. We've heard even less about their laptop counterparts, but it's possible that those will come later, as NotebookCheck reports that Nvidia may be delaying those models.

Read more
5 laptops you should buy instead of the Dell XPS 14
The Dell XPS 14 on a white table with the screen open.

The Dell XPS 14 is an excellent 14-inch laptop with a thoroughly modern design and aesthetic, as well as some fast components. You can even configure it with an Nvidia RTX 4050.

But there's no question that it's been controversial. Between the invisible trackpad to the LED touch keys, there are plenty of reasons to consider a different option. Here are the five alternatives you should consider before pulling the trigger on the XPS 14.
Apple MacBook Pro 14
Apple MacBook Pro 14 Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Read more