Laptops with best battery life in 2023 — longest lasting laptop batteries

Only the laptops with best battery life can deliver all-day endurance, and even the most powerful of cutting-edge specs are rendered useless if your need-it-now notebook can't hold a charge. Nowadays, you can eke out 13+ hours of endurance from the best laptops on our short list, which should more than suffice for that cross-country flight, a long day of meetings or multiple, back-to-back classes.

Fortunately, there are plenty of notable notebooks that go the distance. In February 2018, we upgraded our testing process from Laptop Battery Test 1.0 to Laptop Mag Battery Test 2.0, which involves continuous Web surfing over Wi-Fi at 150 nits of brightness. After putting dozens of tip-top machines through the ringer this year, we've narrowed down our favorite laptops with best battery life on the market.

Note: Laptop Battery Test 1.0 was conducted at 100 nits of brightness, and newer test scores have declined somewhat to reflect the more aggressive (and realistic) test.

What are the laptops with best battery life in 2023?

From affordable budget laptops to elite business laptops, there are plenty of all-day-strong notebooks to choose from these days. Even gaming laptops like the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14, which achieved more battery life than the 16-inch MacBook Pro thanks to its AMD Ryzen CPU, have come a long way in terms of balancing raw power with general mobility. Read on for our top picks!

The Quick List

Best MacBook Pro (16-inch)

The new king of the MacBooks is here. Long be its reign (which should be about a year). Apple’s coming out of the gate swinging, outfitting the laptop with the company’s proprietary M2 Max chip. It puts competitors to shame while putting a clear gulf between its predecessors. And yes, it is possible to game on this system thanks to the chip. I had a hell of a good time being terrified during Resident Evil Village. 

In addition to the powerful chipset, you get a captivating 16-inch display, powerful audio and a super comfy keyboard. But the cherry on the top is the battery life, which lasted nearly 19 hours. In short, the MacBook Pro 16 is an unmitigated beast. But not so fast — there’s always a price. And in the case of MacBook Pro 16 M2 Max, the price is the actual cost ($2,699 starting, $5,299 as reviewed). It’s par for the course with Apple, but it still will give most people, including this reviewer, pause. 

But if you want the crème de la crème of Macs, the MacBook Pro 16 sits at the top of the heap.

See our full MacBook Pro 16-inch (M2 Max, 2023) review.

Best MacBook Pro (13-inch, M2)

Apple has a tough act to follow with the new MacBook Pro 13 ($1,899 reviewed, $1,299 starting). Its predecessor took the world by storm back in 2020 with its show-stopping M1 chip. And the climb seems even steeper this time. There's no snazzy design update, no extra ports to get excited about. That means everything riding on the new M2 SOC, and as per usual, Apple rises and surpasses the challenge.  

The next chapter in Apple computing continues and the company's bet on custom silicon continues to hit the jackpot. M2 is 18% more powerful than its ancestor with an 8-core CPU. M2 is also bringing a new 10-core GPU that's 35% faster than the previous model. And if that isn't enough to get you excited, Apple has found a way to improve on the laptop's power efficiency, delivering over 18 hours of battery life. Read on to learn more about Apple's latest home run.

See our full Apple MacBook Pro (13-inch, M2, 2022) review.

Best HP Laptop

The HP Elite Folio is packed with innovative, solution-solving tech — not gimmicks — that substantiates its $2,000 price tag. It also gives the Energizer Bunny a run for its money; it lasted a jaw-dropping 16 hours and 21 minutes on a charge.

Not only does the Elite Folio have the endurance of an Olympic champion, but it breaks records like one, too. The Elite Folio is the world’s first business convertible with a spectacular pull-forward mechanism. The feature lets you transform the display into a digital easel so you can get your Bob Ross on. The Elite Folio comes with an awesome stylus — a plus for users who have an affinity for digital note taking and doodling.

See our full HP Elite Folio review.

Best MacBook Air with M1

It's amazing what a new heart can do for a laptop. The latest MacBook Air ushers in a new era for Apple with its custom-made M1 chip. Yes, Apple's long-awaited transition away from Intel and into the ARMs of custom silicon has arrived, and the new chip blows us away. 

I'll start by saying the new MacBook Air is an improvement over the previous model in every way, bringing monumental performance and battery life enhancements. Those bold claims Apple made about the M1? They weren't exaggerations. This MacBook Air out-muscles every laptop in its class while lasting a full day on a charge. And it does so with a fanless design, meaning the Air is pin-drop silent. 

Along with record-setting performance, Apple Silicon adds iOS and iPadOS apps to the Mac App Store. You also get better webcam quality, and macOS Big Sur is a gorgeous redesign of Apple's desktop OS. The new MacBook Air may have a few faults, but it's the closest Apple has ever been to crafting the perfect laptop.

See our full MacBook Air with M1 review.

Best Lenovo Laptop (16-inch)

I’ve been on the hunt for a really good business laptop, and with the ThinkPad Z16 in my hands, I can finally end my search. It’s got a slick, dual-tone design: silver on the outside and dusky on the inside. And to Lenovo loyalists’ delight, the keyboard features the beloved, striking-red TrackPoint that will catch your eye every time you open the lid.

It’s also the perfect size for a business laptop. It’s not too small (like the compact machines on our best 13-inch laptops page), but it’s not ridiculously unwieldy like the 18-inch laptops that are gaining popularity nowadays — it’s juuuust right. 

However, I will admit that the ThinkPad Z16 is a bit heavier than I expected. But to be fair, Lenovo never marketed this laptop as a thin-and-light ultraportable. It’s a business laptop, which means it will likely be sitting on a desk for hours on end before it’s picked up and thrown inside a laptop bag.

The ThinkPad Z16 definitely earned a spot on our best business laptops page, but that doesn’t mean it’s perfect.

See our full Lenovo ThinkPad Z16 review.

Best Chromebook

The Acer Chromebook 514 is outfitted with an MediaTek Kompanio 828 ARM Cortex A76 processor, Mali-G57 MC5 integrated graphics, 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM, 64GB of flash memory storage, and a 14-inch FHD (1920 x 1080) IPS touchscreen all for just $460.

This Chromebook, like most, fulfills a simple aesthetic with a silver chassis that comes in at 12.7 x 8.9 x 0.7 inches and 2.9 pounds. Packed within that build is a pair of top-firing speakers and performed surprisingly well. We listened to several hit songs that translated voices crisply and clearly.

You're not going to be breaking down any digital doors with its processor, but you'll get some decent performance from the Acer Chromebook 514, as it managed to compete with an 11th Gen Intel Core i3-1115G4 CPU.

What you'll be happy about the most to see is its incredibly long battery life. The Acer Chromebook 514 lasted 14 hours and 8 minutes on our Laptop Mag battery test. That's way more than the 9:03 Chromebook average. If you're using this for work or school, you'll get more than a day's work out of this.

See our full Acer Chromebook 514 review.

Best MacBook Pro (14-inch)

No matter what your configuration, the MacBook Pro 14 is in a class of its own. The laptop retains its stunning good looks, powerful speakers, high-resolution camera, and comfortable keyboard. But the real stars of this story are the M2 Pro and M2 Max chips, which bring even more power and efficiency to the table. 

True to its word, the M2 Pro and Max MacBooks consistently outperform their predecessors as well as the Intel-powered competition. Seriously, look at those benchmarks, outside of the display section, the MacBook Pro 14 was rarely not on the winning edge of the spectrum. 

And if that wasn’t enough Apple is finally addressing the gaming issue, teaming with Capcom to make its case with a port of Resident Evil Village that played just as well as if it were PC or console. All the company has to do now is to get more AAA titles into its roster, and we’re having a seriously interesting conversation on just what a Mac can and can’t do. 

See our full MacBook Pro 14-inch (2023) review.

Best Lenovo Laptop (14-inch)

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 11) is a refinement of the best ultraportable laptop for business users. The newest X1 Carbon now flaunts a 14-inch, 16:10, 1920 x 1200-pixel touch display, which means it offers 120 more vertical pixels than your typical 1920 x 1080-pixel screen. Also improving productivity are a wider touchpad and a human presence detection sensor for convenient login and enhanced security. 

Swapping the engine for 13th Gen Intel chips adds considerably faster performance, but the battery life upgrade is even more enticing; the Gen 11 model lasts for nearly 14 hours on a charge. These perks are packaged in a familiar matte-black design with an aerospace space grade carbon fiber lid. It's super lightweight at 2.5 pounds, and it's even incredibly thin at 0.6 inches.

See our full Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 11) review.

Best Dell Laptop

You don’t typically get good battery life on a laptop with a large display — more screen space means more battery drain — but the Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 (7620) says “bump that.”

For $1,249, you’re buying a premium chassis (please get Dark Green), packed with a bright 16-inch touchscreen display, strong performance, and a long-lasting battery. It’s not perfect — I didn’t like the keyboard and touchpad experience, and the audio wasn’t up to par. But it’s also not exorbitantly expensive.

If you want a big laptop with a big battery, the Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 (7620) is easily one of the best laptops you can buy.

See our full Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 (7620) review.

Best Asus laptop

The Asus ExpertBook B9450 doesn't meet the 13+ hour mark, but what's two minutes when you're looking at a sea of laptops that die before you even have your morning coffee? This machine clocks in at 12 hours and 58 minutes, so we're going to give it its time to shine.

The Asus ExpertBook B9450 is crafted for business people on the move — it’s simultaneously light and thin yet as hard as a rock. Its 14-inch, 1080p display scored 80.4% of the DCI-P3 color gamut and 354 nits of brightness, which means it's hella colorful and hella bright.

If you're looking for bumpin' speakers, look no further than the Asus' speaker system. The audio comes through clear, loud and impactful. Overall, the ExpertBook B9 is great for those in need of a thin and light yet sturdy business laptop.

See our full Asus ExpertBook B9450 review.

How We Test Laptops with Best Battery Life

We put each laptop through extensive benchmark testing — both synthetic and real-world — before they end up in the hands of our reviewers. We evaluate each aspect of the laptop, including its performance, battery life, display, speakers and heat management.

In our benchmark testing, we use a Klein K10 colorimeter to detect the brightness and sRGB color gamut of the laptop's display. For performance testing, we run the laptop through a gauntlet of benchmarks, including Geekbench 4.3 and 5.0 and 3DMark professional graphics tests. 

To determine real-world performance, we task the laptop to convert a 4K video to 1080p resolution and to duplicate a 4.97GB multimedia file. Our real-world graphics test is the Dirt 3 benchmark with medium settings at 1080p resolution.

We also run heat tests by playing a 15-minute full-screen video and measuring temperatures in different areas of the laptop. Last but not least, our battery test consists of continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi at 150 nits of brightness. For MacBooks and premium Windows 10 laptops, a runtime of over 9 hours is considered a good result whereas gaming laptops and workstations that can stay powered for longer than 5 hours deserve praise. 

These tests are complemented with extensive hands-on testing from our reviewers who critique everything from the laptop's materials to the feel of its touchpad.

Why Trust Laptop Mag

Laptop Mag reviews over one hundred different laptops every year, from paperweight ultralights to everyday workhorses to lumbering gaming notebooks that scorch the frame rates of even the hottest AAA games. We're not just experts in the laptop field, as we go one step further by meticulously testing smartphones, tablets, headphones, PC accessories, software, and even the latest in gaming. 

We are 100% independent and have decades of experience to help you buy with confidence. In fact, Laptop Mag has been testing and reviewing products for three decades, and we continue to deliver trustworthy reviews you can rely on. 

Our experienced team of writers and editors scour the available information about the laptop and put it through its paces to determine which is best for you. But before they start, the testing team subjects each system to a rigorous regimen of synthetic and real-world tests to see how a system handles the type of work and games you’re most likely to throw at it. 

Our editorial trustworthiness is enforced by one of the world's largest technology publishers, Future Publishing. As a company, we have unrivaled experience across every tech sector — and we're the group's specialist for all things mobile tech.