The 14-inch laptop has a small — but noticeable — screen size upgrade over even the best 13-inch laptops, making them better choices for entertainment, gaming, or professional design while still being slim and portable enough to carry anywhere with you.
If this seems like a good fit for your busy life, we have the best 14-inch laptops you should check out, beginning with the excellent all-rounder Apple MacBook Pro 14. The brand-new machine has some of the best performance and battery life around to go with an excellent display. We also have picks for gaming, extra power, and affordability, so there should be something for everyone.
MacBook Pro 14
The best 14-inch laptop
- Incredible XDR display
- Fantastic creative performance
- Extensive port selection
- Keyboard and trackpad are perfect
- Excellent speakers and webcam
- Endless battery life
- Notch is a distraction
Why you should buy this: It offers the best combination of performance, efficiency, and display quality in a 14-inch laptop.
Who's it for: Anyone who wants an incredibly fast laptop that also offers superior efficiency.
Why we chose the Apple MacBook Pro 14:
The Apple MacBook Pro 14 slots in between the 13-inch and 16-inch models. However, it shares much more in common with the larger machine, including running Apple's new M2 Pro or M2 Max chips. On the MacBook Pro 14, these hybrid processors are available with either ten or 12 CPU cores and 16, 19, 30, or 38 GPU cores. RAM can be configured from 16GB all the way up to 96GB, and storage can be ramped up to an 8TB PCIe solid-state drive (SSD). Not only are the M2 Pro and M2 Max incredibly fast chips, but they're also efficient, meaning the MacBook Pro 14 should get superior battery life as well.
The laptop's display is also top-notch, utilizing Apple's 14.2-inch Liquid Retina XDR mini-LED ProMotion panel. This display offers incredibly wide and accurate colors, inky blacks thanks to deep contrast, and a 120Hz refresh rate. Apple has finally incorporated thin bezels in the MacBook Pro 14, making it a smaller laptop as well. And finally, Apple provides solid connectivity, adding an everything from an HDMI 2.1 port and SD card reader to USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, Wireless connectivity is as fast as you can get today with Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 too.
Razer Blade 14
The best 14-inch gaming laptop
- Gaming performance is excellent
- Colorful, 1440p display
- Surprisingly small
- Cheaper than Razer Blade 15
- Great battery life
- Warm surface temperatures
- Thick bezels
Why you should buy this: It's the best 14-inch gaming laptop by a country mile.
Who's it for: Gamers who want all the power but not all the weight.
Why we chose the Razer Blade 14:
Many gaming laptops are massive affairs, with aggressive venting and angles that make them embarrassing to use in conference rooms. That's definitely not the Razer Blade 14, which adheres to Razer's conservative yet elegant aesthetic with its all-black chassis with simple lines and a single Razer logo on the lid. It's a gaming laptop you can proudly use anywhere.
Inside, you'll find a powerful beast centered around the ultrafast AMD Ryzen 5900HX CPU. GPU choices include the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060, 3070, and 3080, meaning you can pack a real powerhouse into that svelte chassis.
The Razer Blade 14 goes head-to-head with the best 15-inch laptops you can buy, including Razer's own Blade 15. And it does so in a chassis that's remarkably thin at just 0.66 inches and light at 3.9 pounds.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10
The best business-class 14-inch laptop
- Solid build quality
- Dizzying array of display options
- Excellent keyboard
- Above-average battery life
- Good business support
- Touchpad is too small
- Expensive for the performance
Why you should buy this: It's the best 14-inch business laptop you can buy.
Who's it for: Anyone who wants a solid business performer with great battery life and solid build quality and support.
Why we chose the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10:
The latest version of Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 line offers plenty of portable power with a laptop that’s a good fit, no matter what tasks you have in mind. The 14-inch Full HD+ (1920 x 1200) display we reviewed is a taller 16:10 aspect ratio for better productivity, and there are a full seven displays to choose from up to a 4K+ IPS display. The base model comes with a 12th-generation Intel Core i5-1240P processor with vPro, 8GB of RAM, and a 256GB solid-state drive (SSD). Ports include HDMI, two Thunderbolt 4/USB-C ports, and two USB-A 3.2 ports. Battery life is strong, and we also like the slim, spill-resistant keyboard with backlighting.
While you can upgrade a few different specs, including RAM and storage (new versions also include brightness and resolution upgrades), the base model of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10 makes for an ideal 14-inch laptop that’s ready for the long haul. However, the integrated graphics card is somewhat limited, and gamers in particular may want to look for something a little more specialized.
HP Elite Dragonfly G3
The lightest business-class 14-inch laptop
- Incredibly light at 2.19 pounds
- Solid build quality
- Strong business-oriented security and management
- Intel 12th-gen CPUs
- 13.5-inch 3:2 IPS display
- Expensive
Why you should buy this: It's a fully-featured, business-class, 14-inch laptop that's also the lightest available.
Who's it for: Business users who need all the important business features without additional weight.
Why we chose the HP Elite Dragonfly G3:
For shoppers searching for a good business laptop, try HP’s 13.5-inch Elite Dragonfly G3 series, which is one of HP's best featherweight laptops. Yes, the display is technically less than 14 inches, but its 3:2 aspect ratio gives it a similar viewing area. And at 2.19 pounds, it's the lightest business-class 14-inch laptop you can buy.
One of the main priorities for this laptop is its security: HP’s security software suite is automatically included. The computer supports several other standout features, like NFC compatibility, which ultimately helps your files transfer efficiently. The Elite Dragonfly G3 also comes with two USB-C ports with Thunderbolt 4 and legacy connections including USB-A and HDMI.
The Elite Dragonfly G3's base model comes with a 12th-gen Intel Core i5-1235U processor, 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB SSD. It can be configured with up to a Core i7-1265U with vPro, and it also offers a host of display options including HP's Sure View privacy screen. The Elite Dragonfly G3 provides great productivity performance, solid business features, and long battery life.
Acer Swift 3 (2022)
The best affordable 14-inch laptop
- Excellent productivity performance
- Bright display with deep contrast
- Very good keyboard
- Solid battery life
- Full HD webcam
- Display is old-school 16:9
- Small touchpad
Why you should buy this: It's an affordable laptop that offers something for everyone.
Who's it for: Anyone who wants a laptop that can handle anything you throw at it.
Why we chose the Acer Swift 3:
The Swift 3 is consistently updated to offer some of the most well-rounded specs we've seen in a utilitarian laptop that's suitable for just about anything — and packs enough power to handle impressive tasks. This particular update offers a 12-core/16-thread 12th-gen Intel Core i7-1260P processor with Iris Xe graphics, with a variety of options for 8GB or 16GB of RAM depending on your preferred configuration.
The Acer Swift 3 (2022) also offers 512GB of SSD storage with various options for upgrading that to 1TB if necessary. Ports include HDMI 2.0, Thunderbolt 4/USB-C, and USB-A, along with support for Wi-Fi 6E. The immense amount of configuration options here, plus all the tech updated and ready for 2022, makes the Swift 3 an amazing pick, especially if you want a laptop ready for a little of everything.
Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 7
The best 14-inch 2-in-1
- Excellent performance
- Beautiful OLED display
- Gorgeous design
- Useful security and privacy features
- 1080p webcam
- Keyboard is only okay
- Average battery life
Why you should buy this: It's the best convertible 2-in-1 you can buy and one of the best laptops, period.
Who's it for: Anyone who wants a laptop or convertible 2-in-1 with a luscious OLED 16:10 display and gorgeous design.
Why we chose the Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 7:
We are huge fans of Lenovo's Yoga convertible 2-in-1s, compact and versatile laptops that pack plenty of power to handle even more demanding business situations. This 2-in-1 is no exception, portable enough to take anywhere and powerful enough to serve as a desktop replacement on business trips or in similar situations. Plus, Lenovo's reliable security features will help keep your data safe. The excellent configuration options also let you scale this laptop to exactly where you need it based on your software demands.
Inside, this 14-inch with 16:10 aspect ratio version equips a 12th-gen Intel Core i7-1260P processor, 16 GB of RAM, and up to 1TB of SSD storage. There are also two Thunderbolt 4/USB-C ports with USB4 support that are ready for all your upcoming connection upgrades, along with a USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 port. You can also choose a 4K+ OLED display option if the details are especially important in your line of work.
Frequently Asked Questions
To be precise, 15-inch laptops typically equip 15.6-inch displays, which are considerably larger than 14-inch displays and provide quite a bit more room to work. That also makes 15-inch laptops themselves significantly larger, even given today's minimal display bezels, which is one tradeoff. Another is that the larger the display, the less sharp it will be at a given resolution. So, while Full HD (1920 x 1080) might be fine at 14 inches, it can be less sharp than you want at 15.6 inches. You'll want at least QHD (2560 x 1440) resolution to ensure that text and images remain sharp. Another tradeoff is in battery life, where the larger the display, the less longevity — which is why 15-inch laptops tend to have larger batteries, which contributes to their usually heavier weight.
So, the question of whether you should buy a 14-inch or a 15-inch laptop comes down to how you feel about those tradeoffs and how important the increased screen real estate is to your workflow. If you tend to open a lot of windows and keep them side by side, then you'll benefit from a 15-inch laptop. If you tend to single-task, then a 14-inch laptop might provide a good compromise between chassis size and weight, screen size, and resolution.
Most 13-inch laptops tend to be 13.3 inches, making less of a difference between display sizes in a 13- and a 14-inch laptop. At the same time, the 14-inch chassis sizes have decreased as manufacturers manage to pack 14-inch displays into ever-smaller laptops. Therefore, there's less of a tradeoff in laptop size and weight than there is between 14-inch and 15-inch laptops. You'll also probably find Full HD to be sharp enough on 14-inch displays, meaning you don't have as much of a need to jump up in resolution. In addition, battery life isn't as impacted, and 14-inch laptops often get better battery life than 13-inch laptops given the increase in available space for battery capacity. Finally, manufacturers are more likely to include discrete graphics in 14-inch laptops, making them better for creative types and gamers.
For many people, then, a 14-inch laptop will indeed be a better choice than a 13-inch laptop. You'll get a slightly increased display size in a laptop that's still small enough to be highly portable, and it might be more powerful as well.
Looking for something a bit different? Check out our list of the best laptops we've tried and tested for more options.
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