While the holidays are about appreciating our friends and family, there can be a financial element, too: With the cost of living and economic turmoil, many of us are saving our dollars where we can.  Laptops were once considered a luxury item, but now, they (or desktop tower PC alternatives) are often necessary for work and study. Thankfully, there is now a hugely diverse ecosystem of laptops suitable for different budgets and intended uses.  If you’re stuck for ideas regarding laptops suitable to give as gifts this holiday season, check out our top picks below. We will update our recommendations as Christmas approaches and keep an eye out for the best deals we can find.  Must read:

The best cheap tech gifts for under $100The best cheap tech gifts under $75The best cheap tech gifts under $50The best cheap tech gifts under $25

The best laptop gift ideas for the holidays

Below are 19 laptop gift ideas I found for the holiday season this year. 

The best laptop deals during the holidays

Below are other laptop deals I found happening right now.
Sure, the specifications aren’t the best we’ve seen on the market, but they are still fair considering the price point.  Stocks tend to sell out quickly. You can expect approximately 13 hours of battery life on a single charge.  As an added bonus, the laptop’s 360-degree hinge and 2-in-1 design mean you can flip it around to operate in a tent shape or close the keyboard and display together to become a tablet. The laptop runs on Windows 11 Home.  While extravagant, perhaps, the Acer Predator Triton 500 is a laptop gift option if you’re looking for your device to have top specifications. The laptop is equipped with a 15.6" display, an Intel Core i7 processor, 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD storage, Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Graphics, and a backlit keyboard, among other features.  At $2000 for a refurbished model, you are saving over $1000 on the typical RRP.  MacBook Air laptops are a great choice if you need a gift idea for students or people who frequently travel for work. This particular model, currently available for a $150 discount at Best Buy, comes with a 13.6" Liquid Retina display, Apple’s M2 processor, 8GB RAM, and 256GB SSD storage. The MacBook Pro range is weightier than the Air line but trades portability with improved specifications and a larger screen size. You can expect up to 17 hours of battery life on a single charge with casual use. The Samsung Galaxy Book Flex2 Alpha comes with a 13.3" touchscreen Full HD QLED display, an Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB RAM, Intel Iris Xe Graphics, and 512GB SSD storage. This laptop operates on Windows 11 Home. You can expect up to 10 hours of battery life on a single charge.  The laptop operates on Windows 11 Home.  This laptop comes with a 17.3" Full HD display (refresh rate: 165Hz), a 12th-gen, 14-core Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD storage, and Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Graphics. The laptop operates on Windows 11 Home and also includes intelligent cooling modes to stop your device from overheating, a common problem when you are running resource-intensive games.  For added safety, you can go into the laptop’s settings and opt for different levels of parental control.  You may need to balance expectations, budget, and the need for new equipment – and, perhaps, even more so considering the shift toward remote and hybrid working.  Laptops or tower PCs are needed for work and study, and on the entertainment side, can also be used to stream media, use creative applications, and play games.  While choosing these products, we tried to include options to suit a range of budgets while also keeping age ranges and their intended use in mind.  If you intend to use your laptop for work and at home, for example, you will probably want a model with at least a 15.6" display. However, if you will be traveling with your new device, you might prefer a more lightweight and easily portable 13.3" laptop.  Gamers might opt for a larger screen still and higher resolutions, whereas with daily tasks such as email and study – with the occasion video call or social media check – you can easily get away with mid-range specs, such as 8GB/16GB RAM.  Unless you are a Linux fan, you then need to decide what operating system you are the most comfortable with. The most common options are either Microsoft Windows or Apple macOS.  You tend to see many Apple MacBook Airs and Pros around campus, and the majority of courses won’t require a laptop that must run high-powered, specific software packages.  However, if the course is creative, things can become a little more complicated, as you will probably want to focus on a screen of at minimum 15.6", at least 16GB RAM, and a high-quality graphics card.  1TB is usually adequate for apps, software, games, and music. However, in any case, you can purchase portable hard drives to boost your storage space – and create backups of your valuable data.