The Best Work Laptops for 2024

Got work to tackle? Business laptops are now sleeker and more powerful than ever before. Discover your ideal mobile work companion by exploring our top picks for business laptops, all supported by our in-depth reviews.

How should I choose a laptop for my business? Deciding on the perfect laptop for your team is a significant decision for any company. You need a device that is durable, secure, powerful, lightweight, and capable of enduring long workdays. With numerous options available, making the right choice can be overwhelming. We’ve reviewed the latest business laptops and narrowed down our top recommendations for productivity. However, even choosing from this refined list requires careful consideration. Not every laptop will suit the specific needs and work styles of you or your employees.

Check out some of the top choices available, and then continue reading to understand the details of IT management, deployment, secure logins, and durable chassis and keyboards. Business laptops are built to handle more demanding tasks than consumer models (and they typically come with a higher price tag), but your business deserves the best. Here are the best work laptops for 2024.

1- HP Elite Dragonfly G4 

Why We Chose It

If you’re looking for a sleek business ultraportable beyond the Lenovo brand, the HP Dragonfly G4 is an excellent option. It features a sharp design, a spacious 3:2 screen, and a long-lasting battery within a slim and lightweight frame. This makes it a top-tier machine for business users. It’s even a bit lighter than the top Lenovo models. Add to that a wide range of ports and optional mobile broadband for connectivity on the go, and you have an ideal laptop for the office or traveling across the country.

Who It’s For

Professionals seeking an ultraportable business laptop have many high-quality options, but the HP Dragonfly G4 stands out as a fantastic alternative to the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11. Catering to a broad range of users, this laptop combines portability and performance, offering nearly 20 hours of battery life, all wrapped in a sleek design.

SPECS

Class	Ultraportable, Business
Processor	Intel Core i7-1365U
RAM (as Tested)	16 GB
Boot Drive Type	SSD
Boot Drive Capacity (as Tested)	512 GB
Secondary Drive Type	–
Secondary Drive Capacity (as Tested)	–
Screen Size	13.5 inches
Native Display Resolution	1920 by 1280
Touch Screen	–
Panel Technology	IPS
Variable Refresh Support	None
Screen Refresh Rate	60 Hz
Graphics Processor	Intel Iris Xe Graphics
Graphics Memory	–
Wireless Networking	Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.3, 5G
Dimensions (HWD)	0.65 by 11.7 by 8.7 inches
Weight	2.22 lbs
Operating System	Windows 11 Pro
Tested Battery Life (Hours:Minutes)	19:46

Testing the HP Dragonfly G4: An Office Ultraportable Showdown

For our benchmark comparisons, we tested the Dragonfly G4 against the Dell XPS 13 Plus and Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11, as well as two other 13.3-inch compacts weighing 2.2 pounds: the Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED and the MSI Prestige 13 Evo. All these laptops rely on Intel’s integrated graphics, suitable primarily for media streaming. The MSI and Dell models feature the more robust 28-watt P Series processors, while the others use 15W U Series processors.

Productivity Tests

We use the same general productivity benchmarks across both mobile and desktop systems. The first test is UL’s PCMark 10, which simulates a variety of real-world productivity and office workflows to measure overall system performance and includes a storage subtest for the primary drive.

Our other three benchmarks focus on the CPU, utilizing all available cores and threads to rate a PC’s suitability for processor-intensive tasks. Maxon’s Cinebench R23 uses the Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene, while Geekbench 5.4 Pro from Primate Labs simulates popular applications ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning. Finally, we use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to convert a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p resolution (lower times are better).

Additionally, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Systems, which uses Adobe’s Creative Cloud version 22 of Photoshop to rate a PC’s performance for content creation and multimedia applications. This automated extension executes a variety of general and GPU-accelerated tasks, such as opening, rotating, resizing, and saving images, and applying masks, gradient fills, and filters.

The Dragonfly performed near the back of the pack, but all five of these lightweights easily handle everyday office tasks, scoring well above the 4,000 points in PCMark 10 that indicate excellent productivity for applications like Word and Excel. Occasional image editing or other content creation is feasible, though these ultraportables are not on par with powerful mobile workstations.

Graphics Tests

We test Windows PC graphics with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark: Night Raid (suitable for laptops with integrated graphics) and Time Spy (more demanding, suitable for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs).

Additionally, we run two tests from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses both low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like image rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Car Chase tests, rendered offscreen to accommodate different display resolutions, exercise graphics and compute shaders using the OpenGL programming interface and hardware tessellation. More frames per second (fps) indicate better performance.

As expected, hardcore gaming is not feasible on these laptops. Their lack of discrete GPUs limits them to basic tasks like solitaire and video streaming, not 3D gaming or CAD/CGI rendering. The integrated graphics are sufficient for web meetings, video calls, and streaming videos.

Battery and Display Tests

We test laptop battery life by playing a locally stored 720p video file (the open-source Blender movie “Tears of Steel”) with display brightness at 50% and audio volume at 100%. We ensure the battery is fully charged before the test, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.

To test each laptop’s display, we use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Windows software to measure the screen’s color saturation—what percentage of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 color gamuts the display can show—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per square meter).

All the laptops, except the Dell, demonstrated impressive stamina, but the HP Dragonfly G4 took the gold medal in our battery rundown, lasting nearly 20 hours of video playback. This ensures it can easily get through a busy work or school day. The Dragonfly’s display is also bright and colorful enough for productivity and light creative work, though not quite as vivid as the OLED panels in the Zenbook S 13 and XPS 13 Plus.

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2- Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 1HP Elite Dragonfly G4 

Why We Chose It

For those seeking a capable business laptop at a very affordable price, the Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 1 is an excellent choice. Starting at under $600, this laptop offers solid productivity features, including a 16-inch display, a generous selection of ports, Lenovo’s top-notch keyboard, and a choice of Intel or AMD processors. It comes in Lenovo’s classic black ThinkPad design, known for its excellent build quality, with relatively few compromises given its budget-friendly price.

Who It’s For

If you’re looking for a business laptop on a budget, the Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 1 is an easy pick. Designed to appeal to small and mid-sized businesses, it also suits individual users who need a reliable work machine without breaking the bank. If you need the dependable quality of the ThinkPad brand while adhering to a modest budget, this is the best cost-effective option available.

Specification	Details
Class	Business, Budget, Desktop Replacement
Processor	Intel Core i5-1335U
RAM (as Tested)	16 GB
Boot Drive Type	Hard Drive
Boot Drive Capacity (as Tested)	512 GB
Secondary Drive Type	N/A
Secondary Drive Capacity (as Tested)	N/A
Screen Size	16 inches
Native Display Resolution	1920 by 1200
Touch Screen	N/A
Panel Technology	IPS
Variable Refresh Support	None
Screen Refresh Rate	60 Hz
Graphics Processor	Intel Iris Xe Graphics
Graphics Memory	N/A
Wireless Networking	802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6), Bluetooth
Dimensions (HWD)	0.77 by 14 by 9.8 inches
Weight	3.9 lbs
Operating System	Windows 11 Pro
Tested Battery Life (Hours)	11:57

Lenovo positions its Think Pads as corporate laptops while targeting Think Books at small offices. However, not all large businesses have large budgets. The company markets the economical ThinkPad E series as “traditional, entry-level business laptops.” The E16 Gen 1 (starting at $638; $909.99 as tested) serves as a desktop replacement, replacing the traditional 15.6-inch, 16:9 aspect ratio display with a slightly taller 16-inch, 16:10 panel. It’s not a flashy device, but this ThinkPad offers a great value for companies looking for a budget-friendly business notebook.

Configurations and Design: An AMD Advantage?

The Intel-powered ThinkPad E16 starts at $638 and includes a 13th Gen Intel Core i3 processor, 8GB of memory, a 256GB solid-state drive, and a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel non-touch screen. Our review unit (model 21JN0040US) runs Windows 11 Pro and is priced at $909.99 at Best Buy and about $5 cheaper at B&H. It doubles the RAM and storage, upgrades to a Core i5-1335U chip (with two Performance cores, eight Efficient cores, and 12 threads), and features an IPS touch screen.

Like its brandmates, the ThinkPad E16 has passed MIL-STD 810H tests, ensuring it can withstand travel hazards such as shock, vibration, and extreme temperatures. However, it cuts costs in several areas. Its processor does not include Intel’s vPro IT management technology. The laptop’s familiar matte black chassis features an aluminum top and an ABS plastic bottom; you may notice some flex when grasping the screen corners, but the keyboard deck remains sturdy. The webcam lacks Windows Hello face recognition, although a fingerprint reader is integrated into the power button. Additionally, its wireless networking uses the older Wi-Fi 6 standard rather than the newer Wi-Fi 6E.

The laptop’s left side features two USB-C ports—one 3.2 Gen 2 and one Thunderbolt 4, either of which can be used with the AC adapter. Additionally, there are USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A and HDMI ports, as well as an audio jack. On the right side, you’ll find a retro USB 2.0 port, an Ethernet jack, and a Kensington security lock slot.

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3- Apple 2023 MacBook Pro

Why We Chose It

For a reliable business laptop running macOS, the 14-inch MacBook Pro is an excellent choice. Equipped with the new M3 chip, this entry-level Pro model from Apple offers impressive performance. The M3 chip features more cores, faster processing, a more powerful GPU, and enhanced machine learning capabilities, making it suitable for all your productivity needs. It perfectly balances the portability of the MacBook Air with the capabilities of the Pro line, without the performance limitations of the Air. The 14-inch MacBook Pro boasts a bright and colorful Liquid Retina XDR screen, an excellent keyboard for comfortable typing, and battery life that can last through even the longest workdays.

Who It’s For

While graphic designers and content creation professionals might prefer the larger and more powerful 16-inch MacBook Pro (available with M3 Pro and M3 Max processors), office workers who desire macOS in a compact and efficient package will find the 14-inch MacBook Pro with M3 to be ideal.

Class	Desktop Replacement, Workstation
Processor	Apple M3
RAM (as Tested)	8 GB
Boot Drive Type	SSD
Boot Drive Capacity (as Tested)	512 GB
Secondary Drive Type	–
Secondary Drive Capacity (as Tested)	–
Screen Size	14.2 inches
Native Display Resolution	3024 by 1964
Touch Screen	–
Panel Technology	Mini LED
Variable Refresh Support	ProMotion
Screen Refresh Rate	120 Hz
Graphics Processor	Apple M3 (10-core)
Graphics Memory	–
Wireless Networking	Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.3
Dimensions (HWD)	0.61 by 12.3 by 8.7 inches
Weight	3.4 pounds
Operating System	Apple macOS Sonoma
Tested Battery Life (Hours)	22:14

Design and Dimensions

Externally, the 14-inch MacBook Pro remains unchanged. The latest edition measures 0.61 by 12.3 by 8.7 inches and weighs 3.4 pounds, mirroring the dimensions of the 14-inch MacBook Pro reviewed in October 2021, albeit slightly lighter by a tenth of a pound. While it exceeds our 3-pound ultraportable threshold—consider it more of a lightweight mobile workstation—it is still convenient and portable enough to carry in a briefcase or backpack without being cumbersome.

Display and Design

The 14-inch MacBook Pro continues to feature the impressive 14.2-inch Mini LED Liquid Retina XDR display, delivering a resolution of 3,024 by 1,964 pixels with a density of 254 pixels per inch. The screen reaches up to 1,600 nits of brightness for HDR content (600 nits for SDR) and offers a smooth 120Hz refresh rate, dynamically adjusted by Apple’s ProMotion technology. As always, Apple’s displays provide excellent color accuracy, which will be detailed further below.

Features and Ports

The keyboard and touchpad of the 14-inch MacBook Pro remain the same, as does the 1080p FaceTime camera. However, unlike previous base models that featured two Thunderbolt 4 ports, the entry-level M3 variant includes two USB4 ports with Thunderbolt 3 support. Additionally, it comes with an SDXC card reader, an HDMI port, a 3.5mm audio jack, and a MagSafe charging port. The device also retains Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth connectivity from the 2021 model.

Thunderbolt and USB4 Ports

The shift to USB4 ports in the M3 MacBook Pro is likely due to the lower-wattage processor used in this model compared to the previous two generations. While the Type-C USB4 ports provide the same 40Gbps transfer speed as Thunderbolt 4, they offer a lower power capacity of 7.5 watts (W) compared to Thunderbolt 4’s 15W. For professionals, this is significant: the M3 MacBook Pro can only support a single external display up to 6K resolution at 60Hz via its HDMI port. In contrast, the M3 Pro and M3 Max models, equipped with higher-power Thunderbolt 4 ports, can support multiple simultaneous displays. This is an essential consideration if you’re planning to use a MacBook Pro for a home office content creation setup.