Best VR-ready laptops 2023

Only the best VR-ready laptops are capable of handling virtual reality headsets like the HP Reverb G2 and the HTC Vive Cosmos. And since we tested a bunch, we know which ones will power the VR headsets that'll grant you all of your immersive experiences, including 360-degree games, apps and videos

The best laptops with the proper specifications such as Nvidia's 40-series GPUs or the company's Max-Q GPUs, which essentially make even the smallest laptops a virtual reality powerhouse, will do the trick. 

We strongly suggest looking at our best gaming deals page to find a gaming laptop at a great price. Also, see our latest Origin EON16-S review, a VR-ready laptop for less than $2,000. If you're looking for a multimedia monster that'll meet all of your needs and more, check out our Dell XPS 15 (9530) review.

Without further ado, these are the best VR-ready laptops.

The quick list

Best overall

We’re now at a place where it’s truly a competition — instead of Intel and Nvidia ruling the gaming laptop space, AMD is here making some serious noise and OEMs are starting to dance to AMD’s beat.

The latest team to make beautiful music with AMD? Alienware with the m17 R5. Boasting a AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX processor and a Radeon RX 6850 XT GPU, the laptop is not to be trifled with. Thanks to AMD Advantage Suite, this system is optimized up the wazoo to ensure that you’re getting the best performance out of the system no matter the situation. You also get Cherry MX keys, a stunning 4K display, great speakers and a slick design to boot. 

There are a few flaws, but there’s a lot to love about the $2,799 Alienware m17 R5

See our full Alienware m17 R5 review.

Best value VR-ready laptop

When laptops of this kind get into the $1,500~ range, major elements get tossed onto the chopping block. But it seems as if Lenovo was as sick of this trend as we are. 

Enter the Lenovo Legion 5 Pro, a gaming laptop that should by all means have cheaped out several elements at its shockingly low price of $1,469. Yet it somehow scrubbed similarly specced, more expensive hardware in gaming and productivity performance. 

Beyond that, we fell in love with its tactile and clicky keyboard, solid speaker system and sturdy chassis. And while displays are a common victim for gaming laptops at this price, the Legion 5 Pro’s 16-inch display is decently bright and colorful.

See our full Lenovo Legion 5 Pro review.

Best long lasting VR-ready laptop

For $2,000, the Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 (2022) comes with an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS processor, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Ti graphics card with 8GB of VRAM, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 15.6-inch, 2560 x 1440p, 240Hz display. I wouldn't call it affordable, necessarily, but for the price you're getting some beastly specs.

The Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 hit 84 frames per second in Far Cry New Dawn, 68 fps in Borderlands 3, 55 fps in Red Dead Redemption 2, and 57 fps in Metro Exodus.

If we're looking at the display, we'll see that the Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 (2022) came off with 79.9% of the DCI-P3 color gamut and 307 nits of brightness, which keeps it within a competitive range among other premium gaming laptops. I remember jumping in Assassin's Creed Valhalla and slitting some throats and watching the deliciously red blood spatter fill the air, and therefore the display.

One thing I love about Zephyrus G15 is its soft-touch deck, which lets me type away without worrying about my wrists getting uncomfortable. And if we're talking about audio, the top-firing speakers filled my room with sweet hacks and slashes.

Don't worry about the Asus dying on you anytime soon either like other gaming laptops. This baby will last 8 hours and 48 minutes, which is one of the longest lasting 15-inch gaming laptops, and you'll even find it on our best 15-inch gaming laptops page.

See our full Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 (2022) review.

Best 15-inch VR-ready laptop

If you're looking for a great VR-ready laptop that won't break the bank, it's hard not to recommend the MSI Katana 15. All of its flaws don't apply if you're using it exclusively for VR.

The MSI Katana 15 boasts affordability along with strong performance and a powerful RTX 4070 graphics chip. The Katana 15 also features a full-sized keyboard with satisfying 1.7mm key travel and glorious 4-zone RGB backlighting. Let's not forget its bangin' speakers with enough punch and bass to offer impactful sound across a medium-sized space.

The Katana 15 is a beast of a gaming laptop for those who refuse to spend anything over $2,000. And if you're plugged in with your VR headset, you're never going to notice its lackluster display and poor battery life.

See our full MSI Katana 15 review.

Best 16-inch VR-ready laptop

This has been a fantastic year for gaming laptops, and the Lenovo Legion 5i Pro is up there as one of the best. For its price, you’re getting a power-packed system in a sleek chassis with decent battery life, excellent thermal performance and plenty of ports for all your gaming needs.

That’s not to say it’s perfect: the webcam is pretty pants (though we’ve come to expect that from gaming laptops), there are no biometric security options, and the SSD is a little slower than its competition.

But while others brought interesting innovations to the table, such as the convertible nature of the Asus ROG Flow X16, Lenovo stuck to its guns and just gave us a damn good gaming laptop.

See our full Lenovo Legion 5i Pro review.

Best 17-inch VR-ready laptop

If I had to dream up the ultimate gaming laptop, the Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 G733 would be the closest manifestation of what my wild, gamer-centric imagination would create. A 17.3-inch display with a 360Hz refresh rate that shows off the might of an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 GPU made more powerful by an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX processor — that’s exactly what I’d conjure up. Asus’ latest 17-inch beast turns these dreams into reality and materializes even more exciting and unexpected qualities.

With its dream-like features, from the laptop’s dazzling RGB light show and commendable optical-mechanical keyboard switches, the Strix Scar 17 comes with a price tag that makes it a fantasy purchase for most. For those willing to empty their pockets, you’ll be treated to one of the best gaming laptops on the market. One, however, without a webcam and poor battery life. Despite that, it's one of the best VR-ready laptops around.

See our full Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 (2021) review.

Best performance VR-ready laptop

Where do we even begin with the MSI Titan GT77 HX? It’s the monster gaming laptop that packs the best specs at a super high price, but if you’re reading this, you probably already knew that.

This latest one comes with the ultimate power of a 13th Gen Intel Core i9 and RTX 4090, alongside a 17.3-inch, 4K panel, all the I/O you could possibly want and a Cherry mechanical keyboard. On those alone, it’s fair to say that this beast is for the pro gamers out there.

But with these, you’re paying a price. This thing is a chungus, and there are some other compromises that don’t make this such a great all-round laptop — not even mentioning the battery life.

So is this one of the best VR-ready laptops around? Sure, but it’s worth piping up about what you’re paying a very steep price for here.

See our full MSI Titan GT77 HX review.

Best 30-series VR-ready laptop

Acer’s updated Predator Triton 500 SE is a sleek, subtle powerhouse you can sneak into the office, get nearly a day’s worth of work done. And if you plug in during your lunch break, you can vanquish your enemies and get back to business. 

Featuring a 12th Gen Intel Core i9 CPU and Nvidia’s powerful 3080Ti GPU with 16 GB of VRAM, this Predator is hiding its potent gaming genes underneath a gorgeous all-aluminum, gun-metal grey exterior that is office elegant. Even its air vents possess an understated aggressive look that will excite you.              

With pretty quiet fans and one of the better laptop webcams I’ve seen in a long time, the Predator seems destined to join our best gaming laptops.

See our full Acer Predator Triton 500 SE (2022) review.

Best workstation VR-ready laptop

As one might expect from the Metatron of mobile workstations, there are tradeoffs for this magnitude of muscle. Clocking in at a flat 7 pounds, this clunky beast wasn’t exactly designed for on-the-move jetsetters, especially since you’ll only get about 7 hours of battery life on a full charge, at most. That being said, if you plan on plunking the Fury 17 G8 down on a desk and just leaving it in place most of the time, there’s plenty to like about its best-in-class trackpad, keyboard, Bang & Olufsen speakers, and raw, unbridled horsepower.

Is the HP ZBook Fury 17 G8 the best workstation on the market? I suppose that depends on your budget and configuration, but if your pockets are deep enough for an Intel Xeon processor and Nvidia RTX A5000 graphics (boy howdy!), this is about as future-proof as laptops get right now. If you're looking to do some professional work with VR, this easily is one of the best VR-ready laptops around.

See our full HP ZBook Fury 17 G8 review.

How to choose the best VR-ready laptops for you

Before you get around to choosing the best VR-ready laptop for you. Consider the specs you’ll need in the gaming laptop you’re looking at. 

Here are the VR minimum specs:

• Intel Core i5-6300HQ processor
• Nvidia GeForce GTX 980, 1050 Ti (due to Oculus' Asynchronous SpaceWarp), 1060, 1070 or 1080 GPU. RTX 2060, 2070 and 2080 are the stronger alternatives. Here's how to check your GPU.
• 8GB of RAM
• 4GB of VRAM. Here's how to check your VRAM.
• Two USB 3.0 ports
• HDMI 1.4
• 1920 x 1080 display
• Windows 8 or 10

The main thing you have to worry about when picking out a VR-ready laptop is what kind of specs it has and if it has a mini DisplayPort. Anything apart from those features are negligible if you’re just focused on the VR portion, but you should be mindful of the display, keyboard and size of the laptop, as you’re likely to use it as a normal gaming laptop as well.

If you’re on a budget, consider looking at laptops with lower-end AMD GPUs, such as the Dell G5 15. It won’t be ideal, but it’ll get your VR setup up and running. Of course, you can spring for a laptop with an RTX GPU, like the Alienware m17, which would absolutely kill it in VR, but that’s going to cost you. Overall, you have to figure out your budget and what’s important to you in a VR-ready laptop.

How we test the best VR-ready laptops

We put each laptop through extensive benchmark testing — both synthetic and real-world — before they end up in the hands of our reviewers. We evaluate each aspect of the laptop, including its performance, battery life, display, speakers and heat management.

In our benchmark testing, we use a Klein K10 colorimeter to detect the brightness and sRGB color gamut of the laptop's display. For performance testing, we run the laptop through a gauntlet of benchmarks, including Geekbench 4.3 and 5.0 and 3DMark professional graphics tests. 

To determine real-world performance, we task the laptop to convert a 4K video to 1080p resolution and to duplicate a 4.97GB multimedia file. Our real-world graphics test is the Dirt 3 benchmark with medium settings at 1080p resolution.

We also run heat tests by playing a 15-minute full-screen video and measuring temperatures in different areas of the laptop. Last but not least, our battery test consists of continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi at 150 nits of brightness. For MacBooks and premium Windows 10 laptops, a runtime of over 9 hours is considered a good result whereas gaming laptops and workstations that can stay powered for longer than 5 hours deserve praise. 

These tests are complemented with extensive hands-on testing from our reviewers who critique everything from the laptop's materials to the feel of its touchpad.

Why Trust Laptop Mag

Laptop Mag reviews over a hundred different laptops every year, from paperweight ultralights to everyday workhorses to lumbering gaming notebooks that scorch the frame rates of even the hottest AAA games. We're not just experts in the laptop field, as we go one step further by meticulously testing smartphones, tablets, headphones, PC accessories, software, and even the latest in gaming. 

We are 100% independent and have decades of experience to help you buy with confidence. In fact, Laptop Mag has been testing and reviewing products for three decades, and we continue to deliver trustworthy reviews you can rely on. 

Our experienced team of writers and editors scour the available information about the laptop and put it through its paces to determine which is best for you. But before they start, the testing team subjects each system to a rigorous regimen of synthetic and real-world tests to see how a system handles the type of work and games you’re most likely to throw at it. 

Our editorial trustworthiness is enforced by one of the world's largest technology publishers, Future Publishing. As a company, we have unrivaled experience across every tech sector — and we're the group's specialist for all things mobile tech.