Shopping For Back To School Laptops? Here Are 8 Shortlist Machines
Summer is not over just yet, but we are fast approaching the back-to-school shopping season. If you're itching to get a head start and are in need of a new laptop for the upcoming semester/school year, then good news. There are several worthy options out there, including an all-time low price on Apple's newest M4-powered MacBook Air laptop.
Now priced at $799 at Amazon (save $200), the 13.6-inch Apple MacBook Air is listed for 20% below the MSRP. Of course, we don't put a ton of stock into MSRPs, but even looking at the street price trend, this latest discount drops the MacBook Air back down to the lowest price it's ever been, after having briefly dipped to $799 early last month.
Released in 2025, this is the latest version of the 13.6-inch MacBook Air, which sports Apple's custom M4 silicon inside. As configured in this baseline SKU, the M4 features a 10-core CPU comprised of 4 performance cores and 6 efficiency cores, 8-core GPU, and 16-core Neural Engine with support for Apple Intelligence.
Other features include 16GB of unified memory, a 256GB solid state drive (SSD), a 12-megapixel center stage camera, Touch ID support, four built-in speakers with Spatial Audio support, Thunderbolt 4 connectivity (two ports), Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 for wireless connectivity, a MagSafe charging port, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and up to 18 hours of battery life.
You can also find the bigger 15.3-inch MacBook Air on sale for $999 at Amazon (save $200). This is also the newest variant with the same M4 configuration, and it's likewise down to an all-time low—this is the first time it's ever been offered for $999.
Even the most diligent student needs to blow off some steam every once in a while. To that end, if you want a capable laptop that also has some gaming chops, then check out this Alienware Aurora 16 (AC16250) that is on sale for $1,335.49 at Amazon (save $64.50).
It's not a massive discount—just 5% below MSRP—but it's a strong value for the money. And, this is yet another machine that is marked down to an all-time low price.
This one sports a 16-inch display with a 2560x1600 resolution (16:10 aspect ratio) and a fast 120Hz refresh rate. It's powered by an Intel Core 7 240H processor (10C/16T, up to 5.2GHz, 24MB of L3 cache) based on Raptor Lake and a GeForce RTX 5060 GPU.
Other specs include 16GB of DDR5-5600 memory (expandable to 32GB), a 1TB SSD, dual 2W speakers with Dolby Audio support, Wi-Fi 7 connectivity, a new Cryo-Chamber design that pulls air from above the keyboard and pushed it out through four exhaust vents on the side, and a 96Whr battery.
Here are some more laptops that are worth checking out...
- 13-Inch Microsoft Surface Copilot+ (Snapdragon X Plus, 16GB/256GB UFS): $899.99
- 12-inch Microsoft Surface Pro Copilot+ (Snapdragon X PLus, 16GB/256GB UFS): $799.99
- 14-Inch ASUS Vivobook S 14 OLED (Ryzen AI 9 365, 32GB/1TB): $1,279
- 14-Inch Lenovo Yoga Slim 7X Copilot+ OLED (Snapdragon X Elite, 16GB/1TB): $930.59 (5% off)
- 14.5-Inch Lenovo Slim 7i Auroa Copilot+ OLED (Core Ultra 7 256V, 16GB/1TB): $1,299
- 15.6-Inch MSI Katana A15 AI (Ryzen 9 8945HS, RTX 4070, 32GB/1TB): $1,610.61 (5% off)
