5 Of The Best Laptops For Graphic Design In 2025

Graphic designers have a specific set of needs when choosing a laptop. In addition to a processor robust enough to handle creative tasks, and enough memory to make sure design programs run smoothly, you also need a bright, high-resolution, and well-calibrated display to make sure you can see every detail of your work with a degree of accuracy. For those who work with video or 3D graphics, you'll additionally need a decent graphics card. Additionally, files pile up quickly when you're working with media, so ample onboard storage matters, too. All of these considerations mean that choosing the best laptop for graphic design isn't as simple as picking the most expensive one, or the one with the latest specs.

As one of SlashGear's resident laptop enthusiasts, and having done my fair share of design work in the past for clients including law firms and university-affiliated nonprofits, I've spent a lot of time in the weeds of spec sheets, pixel-peeping displays, and applying what I know to round up five of the best laptops graphic designers can get their hands on in 2025. From Apple's most powerful silicon to stylus-enabled tablet hybrids for visual artists, there's something for everyone. Whether you're a by-the-book professional creative, or an iconoclastic artist who wants to stand out from the pack, and whether you want the most premium options or something a little more down to earth. So, here are five of 2025's best graphic design laptops.

Apple's MacBook Pro has long been beloved by people in creative professions, but they've only gotten better for graphic design since the Cupertino giant made the leap from Intel processors to its own, ARM-based silicon. The M series of processors have proven themselves to be incredibly powerful, especially when running software optimized for them. The one thing to be aware of is that you'll get a mini-LED display rather than an OLED.

Graphic design software like Adobe Illustrator or an alternative, Canva, or Procreate run like a dream on Apple's newest MacBook Pro models. Even if you're working with large, high-resolution video files in programs like Adobe Premiere or Apple Final Cut Pro, they'll happily zip across your timeline with ease and export videos without much sweat. Best of all, they'll do all of it while practically sipping the laptop's battery, since ARM processors are much more efficient than traditional x86 systems. SlashGear awarded it an Editor's Choice and a perfect 10/10 score in our review.

If you're a graphic designer, the biggest black mark on the MacBook Pro's ledger is its price. Configured with a basic M4 chip, 16 GB of memory, and 512 GB of storage, you're looking at a starting price of $1,599 before any add-ons. That pricing is all for the base M4, but if you opt up to the higher-performing M4 Pro, you'll spend at least $2,000, and the full-fat M4 Max will bleed you for a blistering $3,200. For that money, you could get a pretty great Windows laptop as well as a drawing tablet and still have money left over for professional creative software.

If what you're after is the best Windows competitor to the MacBook Pro, look no further than the ASUS ProArt P16. As the ProArt name implies, this brand is geared toward creative professionals. Starting with a 16", 4K, OLED, touchscreen display, it's clear that this device is geared toward people who are interested in doing serious design work.

Internally, the ProArt P16 packs an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 processor, one of the latest from the chipmaker. For those using on-device AI, you'll be pleased with the processor's 50TOPS NPU. That chip is paired with a hefty 64 GB of LPDDR5X RAM for blisteringly fast performance, as well as an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 laptop graphics card for 3D and video workloads, or even some gaming. Some may balk at the lack of a latest-generation 5000 series laptop GPU, but given the shaky launch of that series, others may appreciate the known reliability of the 4070. There is additionally a robust selection of I/O, including high-speed USB-C and USB-A ports, along with HDMI. In a review, PCMag found this creator-class laptop to be powerful and its screen to be gorgeous, but did note that it can run hot on heavy workloads. Tom's Guide, meanwhile, called it "a creative powerhouse that outshines the MacBook Pro" but noted the same sweating with a full workload.

However, many designers may find this laptop a bit rich for their blood. At an eye-watering $2,900, it's within spitting distance of the most expensive MacBook Pro. Less powerful configurations start at $1,700, with options including less RAM, or an RTX 4060 rather than the 4070 offered on the full-fat skew.

For graphic designers who prefer to draw by hand, nothing beats the ability to do so directly on the screen. That's where the Microsoft Surface Pro comes in. It's far from the only Windows laptop to offer a touchscreen or a stylus, but it does so in a tablet form factor. That's important because you don't have to fold back the screen to stabilize it, or do any other gymnastics. You can simply lay it down on a table or easel and get to work. For designers who prioritize portability and place a premium on precision, the Surface Pro is a great option. But while it may be the perfect design laptop for some, there are some quirks to be aware of.

The 11th generation Surface Pro can be configured with a 13" OLED display, which is favored for design work. The Surface Pro runs on Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon X Plus or X Elite chips, which are both powerful and power efficient. They are also well suited to on-device AI tasks. Windows on ARM is better than ever, although you should double-check that the design software you use has an ARM-optimized version for the best results, as x86 apps will be run through Microsoft's Prism emulator, which can lead to some performance issues. As of this writing, Adobe Illustrator and InDesign have native ARM versions available, while Photoshop, Lightroom, and Premiere Pro run via emulation. The Surface Pro also lacks a dedicated GPU, though video editing is still snappy thanks to ARM's efficiency. It can get expensive, though, starting at $1,000 for the Snapdragon X Plus variant, or $1,200 for the Snapdragon X Elite. That may sound alright, but the keyboard and pen are sold separately for $279 when bundled.

If other options on this list burn too much of a hole in your pocket, and you want to stick with Windows, you might want to take a gander at the HP Spectre x360. It's a two-in-one style laptop, meaning the screen folds a full 360 degrees over the body of the device to create a makeshift tablet. It might not have the raw horsepower of the Asus ProArt P16, nor the ARM efficiency of the Surface Pro, but it's much more affordable at $1,465, and you get an included stylus in the box.

The latest Spectre x360 is packing an Intel Core Ultra 5 125H processor, which is Intel's newest midrange chip. It's coupled with Intel Arc integrated graphics and 16 GB of RAM, as well as 512 GB of storage. Standard middle-of-the-road specs all around, in other words, at least before you factor in the display. HP transformed the x360 from forgettable to tantalizing for graphic designers by including a 14", 2.8K, OLED touchscreen. If you're the kind of designer who does a lot of work in Canva or other web-based alternatives, this might be exactly the laptop for you thanks to that display. It also helps that the x360 is a looker, with an angular design that sets itself apart from other Windows laptops that are trying desperately to evoke a MacBook.

The HP Spectre x360 is well reviewed, nabbing a nearly perfect 9/10 score from CNET, whose reviewer's main gripe included a lack of ports beyond two Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports, a single Type-A port, and a headphone jack. Tom's Hardware stamped it with four and a half out of five stars, calling it the "classiest convertible" laptop on the market.

If the MacBook Pro is out of your budget, and you're still hoping to get a MacBook, there's really only one option. Luckily, it's a really good option. When Apple refreshed its MacBook Air lineup at the beginning of 2025, no one expected too much in the way of a refresh. But Apple made an otherwise ignorable refresh undeniably appealing by not only upgrading it to Apple's latest M4 silicon, upgrading the base RAM to 16 GB, enlarging the battery, and updating the webcam, but also by dropping the starting price for the base model back down to just under $1,000.

That entry-level price will only get you 256 GB of storage, so most people will probably opt to spec the laptop out with at least 512 GB for an additional $200. Even so, that's a fair enough price for a machine that can handle nearly all the same tasks as the more premium MacBook Air. In comparison, you're losing some ports (the Air retains two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, MagSafe charging, and a headphone jack) along with active cooling. You'll also be stuck with the base M4 chip  – no Pro or Max options here. That makes it less robust for video editing, but it's still packing plenty of power for Photoshop and the like, at least if you're cool with the lack of an OLED display. Like the MacBook Pro, the Air is stuck with a mini-LED Liquid Retina display.

Despite its few quirks, this laptop also garnered stellar reviews, with Ars Technica shocked that Apple found so much room to improve on what was already one of the best all-around laptops at an even lower price, while WIRED handed out a 9/10 rating.

To ensure compliance with SlashGear's rigorous editorial standards, each of the laptops in this roundup was selected based on a meticulous analysis of their specs, professional reviews, consumer opinion, and the expertise of this writer. As indicated, they were selected with an eye toward their relative usefulness at the center of a graphic design workflow. Therefore, the above products are not necessarily the best laptops overall. They are rather the best within the scope of the applied criteria, as determined by the subjective evaluation of the writer. Additionally, these products may not represent the full spectrum of laptops that could be classified as the best laptops for graphic design, as we cannot guarantee that every laptop available on the market was considered. This article should not be considered as definitive, but rather as one resource among many available to consumers.