The best laptops under $1,000 of 2025: Expert tested and reviewed

People tend to equate concepts like "budget" or "low-cost" with poor quality, but that isn't the case. You can find plenty of high-quality laptops that cost less than $1,000. I'm talking about well-crafted, powerful computers that can compete with the best laptops on the market when tackling productivity and entertainment workloads. It certainly helps that many budget laptops were former high-end devices. Apple, for example, frequently drops the price of older MacBooks whenever a new one comes out. It also helps that sometimes newer computers only provide an incremental upgrade, allowing the previous generations to continue performing well years after launch. MacBooks are one of these series, and it's why we often highlight MacBook discounts on ZDNET. What is the best laptop under $1,000 right now? ZDNET's experts carefully test many different laptops at release, putting them through their paces in order to provide our readers with the best advice on what you should buy. Our pick fo ... Read full article.