The 6 best battery life laptops weve ever tested

It's frustrating to sit down at your laptop for an afternoon of work, only to realize that it's hovering at two percent battery.

Oh, and you forgot your charger at home.

Perfect .

That's why battery life is one of the most important factors shoppers consider when searching for the best laptops , according to a 2025 CNET survey . (FYI: Mashable and CNET are both owned by the same parent company, Ziff Davis.) That makes total sense.

While not everyone needs a marathon runner — PC gamers and creative professionals will probably prioritize performance — a laptop that constantly leaves you stranded without juice is an inconvenience.

It's not truly portable, which is basically the whole point of buying a laptop instead of a desktop PC.

This is why Mashable tests every laptop we review for battery life using a standardized video rundown exercise .

Modern laptops should provide an all-day charge The battery lives of laptops have improved dramatically as of late — Windows laptops, in particular.

In 2024, only one PC we tested lasted over 20 hours.

In the last two years, three models have surpassed the 30-hour mark, two have lasted over 24 hours, and 10 more have lasted at least 20 hours.

Our median battery life for 2024-model-year PCs was 12.5 hours; for this year's models, it's at 18.5 — a 48 percent increase.

This boost was fueled by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X series chips and Intel's Panther Lake chips.

In the MacBook realm, Apple's switch to custom M-series silicon in 2020 was a game-changer.

With a rated battery life of up to 18 hours, the original M1 MacBook Air had 50 percent more stamina than its Intel-powered predecessor .