Sub-£1000

Once upon a time (a few years ago), £800 used to be a sweet spot for the laptop buyer. Nowadays, only a few slinky heroes squeeze under the line…

You don’t need to spend a fortune to get a truly portable laptop – and no, we’re not talking about waiting for a fire sale on an obsolete model

All limits are off: we’re now only looking for the wildest, most ambitious laptops out there – most notably one that doesn’t look like a laptop at all

AMD’s best Ryzen CPUs are hard to top for their combo of raw power when plugged in and battery efficiency when not – ideal for gaming machines

Inflation, inflation, inflation… the sad truth is you need to spend a good amount of cash to get a truly top-class ultra-light laptop these days

Slim and light laptops look nicer, feel better and tend to last longer between charges than the rest. And no, you don’t actually need workstation-grade power just to record those music tracks you like to fuss over at the weekends. Here, then, are 2025’s top truly portable laptop contenders, ranging from under £500 to well over two grand…