Our current top pick of the best 43-inch TVs is the LG C6. It's the latest model that surpasses the impressive C5 model, with vivid picture quality, high brightness and a fantastic range of gaming features.

If you're looking for something more wallet-friendly but still want a flagship-level visual experience, we recommend the Sony Bravia 3 II as the best budget 43-inch TV to shop for. Bright, sharp details and pops of color, along with great brightness and gaming features, make this a worthwhile pick.

Whether you need the latest features, a bright TV for sunny spaces or a thin design and great gaming features, these are the best 43-inch TVs I recommend right now, plus a few other TVs we tested that didn't quite make the cut.

Most recently-released TVs now come with some AI features. Upscaling aside, most of these are gimmicks or novelties with limited use. Don't pick a TV based on these; the hardware and picture quality should be your main priority, as the software will change over the life of the TV anyway.

The best 43-inch TVs available right now

Best 43-inch TV overall

The LG G6 is easily the best 43-inch OLED TV (alright, it's 42 inches, but that's close!), with better performance, colors and pretty much everything else compared to its competition. And the redesigned remote resolves one of our main complaints about the otherwise fantastic C5.

Everything we watched on the C6 looked great, and we were impressed with the variety of picture modes you can switch between, like Standard, Eco, Filmmaker and Vivid. Experiment with each one to find the option that suits your eyes best, but in our testing, we found it worked to set it to Filmmaker mode and leave it there.

Like the LG C5 before it, the LG C6 runs on the company's webOS platform, which is one of the most minimal and easy-to-navigate TV platforms. The C6 ships with webOS 26, which is a lot like webOS 25 but with more AI. Fortunately, we found you can pretty much ignore those features if you want to.

Like the others on this list, we tested the 65-inch version, which has a few differences compared to the 42-inch model. The larger one has 40W speakers, while the 42-inch comes with 20W speakers.

This sounds (!) like more of a problem than it is, as the audio is still good, and I also still recommend picking up one of the best soundbars if you want more immersive audio. The more noticeable difference is, once again, how bright the TV gets.

Now, this smaller model doesn't have LG's Brightness Booster; the pixels are closer together, and increasing the power risks the TV overheating, so its performance here is more limited than its larger siblings.

But it's important to put it in context. After all, we are talking about some of the best TVs available right now. The brightness on the 65-inch model is flawless, and even a bit of a drop in that performance on the 42-inch set will still blow away most other TVs.

• Read our full LG C6 review

Best budget 43-inch TV

Smaller-sized TVs are already supposed to cut costs down, but you still don't want to miss out on high-end visuals and top-of-the-line features. You want value where it counts, and that's what the Sony Bravia 3 II delivers. At just under $600, it's the best budget 43-inch TV you can buy right now. And yes, this one is actually 43 inches.

In our testing, it nailed color accuracy and punched above its weight for HDR brightness, hitting 520 nits in lab measurements. While you’ll find pricier OLEDs with deeper contrast, the Bravia 3 II’s overall picture holds up surprisingly well, and you’re not paying a premium for features you might never use in a secondary space.

We threw on the opening of "Project Hail Mary," showcasing dark spaceship interiors and scattered highlights, and the Bravia 3 II brought out plenty of detail, both in the shadows and in the midtones where other budget sets can get muddy. For a compact TV, that kind of balanced handling is what makes movies and shows watchable night after night.

Sony’s image processing deserves a mention, too. Even at this midrange price, the Bravia 3 II manages to deliver a cleaner, more consistent picture than most rivals at this size. As in, no cheap-looking soap opera effects or obvious artifacts.

On the practical side, you get a whopping four HDMI 2.1 ports — something even a lot of flagship sets skip at this price. That means you’re set whether you want to hook up a console, a streaming box or even a gaming PC, without playing cable shuffle every time you switch inputs.

For gaming, the Bravia 3 II’s dedicated game mode delivers the goods. It's a Sony TV, after all, so hardly a surprise. Input lag feels minimal, and everything from fast-paced action titles to casual co-op runs feels responsive. It’s not quite up there with the best gaming monitors or the absolute top-end OLEDs, but for a living room or bedroom setup, it gets the job done well.

Now, without local dimming, black levels lack the inky depth of pricier models, and the built-in audio is only passable (plan on getting one of the best soundbars). But for a compact TV that fits just about anywhere and doesn’t skimp on the core viewing experience, the Bravia 3 II is the best all-rounder at this size and price.

• Read our full Sony Bravia 3 II review

Best 43-inch TV for gaming

Yes, this is another of the best 43-inch TVs that's actually a 42-inch TV. But even though it's an inch off, the Samsung S90F is a fantastic set with incredible contrast that makes every picture look explosively vivid and colorful.

This was particularly clear while watching dark movies, which filmmakers love. On some TVs, these varied blacks end up running into each other, making detail difficult to pick out. But the S90F handled them exceptionally well, so you could really pick out everything happening in the scene.

Samsung has carved out a niche as a gaming TV manufacturer, thanks to its dedicated gaming hub and specific settings. Plus, on this model, you get a 144Hz refresh rate and four HDMI 2.1 ports, making it a good pick for console and PC gamers.

We tested it with the Nintendo Switch and the PS5 Pro, tackling titles like Armored Core 6 and Elden Ring Nightreign, and the fast-paced action sequences with colorful highlights really stood out.

Just like the LG C6, there are some differences between the 42-inch version and the 65-inch model we tested. The main one is that the smaller variants use a WOLED panel instead of the Quantum Dot (QD-LED) on the rest of the lineup.

There are some technical differences between WOLED and QD-OLED, but the practical effect is that the image isn't quite as bright or vivid on the 42-inch version. It's a compromise that's quite universal, as the manufacturer tries to squeeze all the tech into a smaller body and has to make some design choices.

The upside is that it generally means the smaller TVs are cheaper, which could be one of your main reasons for looking into 43-inch TVs in the first place. The difference is noticeable, but not significant, so while it is a trade-off, it's not one that'll dramatically change your experience of the still-exceptional S90F.

• Read our full Samsung S90F OLED TV review

Also tested

There aren't a huge amount of 43-inch models on the market at the moment (as most manufacturers prioritize 55-inch and above), so if you need more options, here are the other TVs we tested that didn't make the mark, but could be a good pick for certain setups or use cases.

How we test 43-inch TVs

We test TVs in two parts; lab testing to get specific performance data points and in our living rooms during everyday use.

The lab comes first; we perform benchmarks with Jeti spectraval 1501-HiRes spectroradiometer, a Klein K10-A colorimeter, a Murideo 8K-SIX-G Metal pattern generator, and Portrait Displays’ Calman TV-calibration software. For gaming performance, we use a Leo Bodnar 4K Input Lag Tester as well.

This original testing data means we can compare each set objectively and consistently, which accounts for the fact that different conditions, lighting and variations in our eyesight can effect our more subjective at-home tests.

Once installed in our living room, we then use the TV, just as you would at home. We keep everything on default settings initially and then fiddle around to find the setup we prefer the most or gives the best performance.

We stream movies, TV shows and play games. We make sure to throw a diverse range of titles at each set, to really test out the vivid colors in something like Barbie or The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and the dark darks of The Batman, or pretty much any Christopher Nolan film.

How to choose the best 43-inch TV

Before you delve too far into your research, first: why do you want a 43-inch TV specifically?

Is it because you looked at our guide to choosing the perfect TV size for your room, because you're looking to keep costs down or because you're tight on space and want a high-performance TV that'll still fit into your room?

While the best 43-inch TVs are still fantastic, there are compromises (often in brightness and sound) on these smaller sets compared to their larger siblings, so you want to be sure it's a 43-inch model (or 42-inch as it is in reality) you really need.

Then you're onto what do you want to do with it? Is it for gaming, leaving on in the background or as a way to stream Netflix in bed? There are different technical or performance aspects that impact all of these use cases.

For background viewing, maybe picture quality isn't so important. And if you want to stream at night, it won't make a difference that the 43-inch models aren't quite as bright as the larger versions (though still impressively bright when needed).

If you're constrained by space, but still want a great audio experience, no TV really offers high-quality audio. So unrelated to the size, you'll want to add one of the best soundbars into your setup to get better and more detailed sound.

And often, 75-inch TVs have more ports and a higher refresh rate for gaming, improved brightness (compared to smaller models) for sunlit rooms and larger (and often better) speakers, so you get more than just a bigger screen for your money.

Our previous pick for the best TV, the LG C5, is now out of stock — so we've gone with the excellent TCL QM8L. It's got excellent picture quality, and some of the highest brightness levels we've ever seen.

But if you want to stick to a budget or not break the bank, then I can't recommend the Hisense QD7 enough. It's not quite as bright as the C5, and it has a lower refresh rate, but in all other areas it stands comfortably alongside LG's far more premium model.

The best 75-inch TVs available right now

Best 75-inch TV overall

LG has dominated the top spot for years, but the brand has finally been unseated by an upstart from TCL. We should perhaps briefly explain why the LG C6, the successor to the previous top pick, isn’t our favorite right now. Yes, it’s a great TV, but right now it’s just too expensive.

Instead, the TCL QM8L comes in at a price comparable to the C5 that used to top the list, while offering excellent picture quality and very similar performance to LG's top-of-the-line TV. And the price just keeps dropping no matter where you look, making it a very compelling buy no matter how you swing it.

We were most impressed with the black levels found on the QM8L, which are deep and dark despite the mini-LED technology that usually lends itself to brighter colors than lovely blacks. As you might imagine, the picture is also extremely bright — one of the brightest we’ve tested.

Gamers will love the 120Hz refresh rate, and it makes those fun action movies and other intensive content look smooth and uncluttered. We also really like the addition of the USB 3.0 port on the back, which is quick enough to play high-res video.

Four HDMI ports give you plenty of places to plug in all your devices from a soundbar to a PS5, and there are even legacy port options like optical for older devices. There are only a couple of things we didn’t like. First is the color accuracy. It’s not awful, but there are better options with more accurate colors out there if colors are your jam.

The brightness also comes with a small issue — unless you crank it down, it can be overwhelming in a darker room. It’s no deal breaker, however; this is still an excellent TV which makes anything you throw at it look amazing, and its our pick for the best 75-inch TV.

• Read our full TCL QM8L review

Best budget 75-inch TV

Sometimes I wonder if I made up the Hisense QD7 in a dream. It's hard to believe that something as good as this could somehow be only a little over $500, when so many of the best 75-inch TVs are over than $1,000 or while others are more than several thousand. When there's so little compromise, it's almost too easy to recommend.

One of its best attributes is the way that it handles color. The display comes with quantum dot crystals, which sound very technical but I have a good reason for telling you about them. These absorb some of the backlight and re-emit it as green and red light, which makes the on-screen picture more colorful and vibrant.

Meanwhile, the LEDs are individually controllable (by the TV, not you) so the set can adjust the contrast and brightness in specific areas of the screen. Put these two things together, and it meant that when we watched franchises like "Dune" and "Stranger Things," we could actually pick out details in all the dark and shadowy scenes.

This strength makes the QD7 a good budget 75-inch TV for live sports too. Often you have a pitch on screen where one half is in sunlight, the other in shade. The TV's handling of contrast, colors and brightness means you can still see what's going on wherever the players are.

There are only two downsides to the Hisense QD7; its 60Hz refresh rate is a little slow for fast movements or gaming (we found the motion smoothing setting helped) and that it runs Amazon's bloated and slow Fire TV operating system. This is more of an annoyance though, and shouldn't put you off this otherwise exceptional budget TV.

• Read our full Hisense QD7 review

Best 75-inch TV under $1,000

I realize it's a bit confusing to say that the TCL QM7K is the best 75-inch TV under $1,000 when the Hisense QD7 is about half that price, but TCL's impressive set deserves it's place here, and not only because it doesn't use Amazon's Fire TV software.

Instead, it comes loaded with Google TV, which is just so much better than Fire TV it makes you wonder why every brand wouldn't just opt for it. And in early 2026, the QM7K became one of the first TVs to access Gemini, Google's AI app.

It's not useful, and I'd never recommend buying a TV for these AI features (focus on hardware, software will change and get updated), but it says a lot about this TCL model that it was one of the first to get access, and I think that's down to it's performance.

It handled the deeper blacks in famously dark and brooding movies like "Dune: Part Two," and TV shows like "The Pitt" and "Andor" were as gritty and imposing as you'd hope. Of course, it's great that it can handle darker hues, but it excels at colors too.

This was particularly clear when we watched the cartoonish fun of "The Super Mario Bros. Movie," which was as bright and fun as you'd want it to be. Plus, we gave the QM7K the latest "Mission: Impossible" film and a selection of Marvel outings.

Each looked bright, exciting and vibrant and made you feel more immersed in the action. This was helped by the TV's 144Hz refresh rate, which meant that even during fast-paced action, there was never any blurring, like on the Hisense QD7.

• Read our full TCL QM7K review

Best 75-inch TV for gaming

Hisense has been on a roll lately, putting out high-performance (relatively) affordable TVs over the past few years. The Hisense U75QG continues that winning streak, with a rare combination of features at this price that make it the best 75-inch TV for gaming you can pick up without breaking the bank.

The technical performance is part of it (and it really did shine in the lab tests) but more than anything, it was just a lot of fun to use for gaming sessions. It has four HDMI 2.1 ports, and an impressive 165Hz refresh rate, so it's ideal for console sessions (as those top out at 120Hz) and for PC gamers, where the reduced lag makes a big difference.

And about those lab tests — this is a very bright TV. It's four times brighter than the TCL QM7K in HDR and four times brighter in SDR than the Hisense QD7. The only TV we've tested that gets brighter is the Hisense U8QG (which is why, surprise, I've rated that model as the best 75-inch for bright rooms).

So if you need a gaming TV that can handle sunlit rooms and the darkness of the evening, this is the TV to go for. You probably shouldn't put it in direct sunlight, though. There's an anti-glare coating, which did dampen the effect of the light, but it struggled a bit. It's not a problem for most things, but isn't ideal for details in games.

Plus, every color on the screen really popped, especially in the multi-colored and bright world of "The Super Mario Bros. Movie." And while "Blade Runner 2049" might be better known for its brooding dystopian view of the world, the bright futuristic flourishes looked vibrant in all the right places.

• Read our full Hisense U75QG review

Best 75-inch TV for bright rooms

I wouldn't call the Hisense U8QG cheap, but it certainly a punches above its price (like most of Hisense's TVs do), especially when it comes to brightness. In our lab testing, we found that it outshines (sorry) almost every other model we've tried. There's no qualifiers to that — it's just impressively bright.

What we're actually testing for is peak brightness, so you don't need to worry that this set'll be overpowering in your home. But it does make it the best 75-inch TV for bright rooms, as it can hold its own against brightly lit spaces and sunlight without much effort. So if you need a TV that'll shine, the U8QG is the one.

We gave it a pretty tricky test with Christopher Nolan's "Tenet" which is visually impressive, but full of shades of black that can be hard to distinguish. Yet details hidden in the shadows were easy to see. The same was true with "Barbarian" and "Ghost In The Shell," where the colorful and shadowy moments looked crisp.

When "Tenet" came out, there was a lot of talk about how hard it was to hear the dialogue. That's true on most TVs, but the Hisense U8QG worked its magic here too, using the set's AI Sound feature, which boosts speech and sound effects. Unusually, it's also got a sizeable 72W, 4.1.20-channel audio setup, which genuinely sounded good.

For a TV that's so generous with specs and features, it's a bit of a shame that Hisense only included three HDMI 2.1 ports (in place of the four you'd find on the Hisense U75QG), but it's balanced out by the 165Hz refresh rate (higher than the TCL QM7K's 144Hz) that makes this a great option for gaming or live sports, too.

• Read our full Hisense U8QG review

Also tested

Not every TV can be the best 75-inch TV. But some come pretty close. I recommend the five options above, but if those don't quite fit what you need, these are some other TVs that are still worth your money.

How we test the best 75-inch TVs

When you go to buy a new TV from the store, it's hard to tell what it'll actually be like away from the artificial lights or press shots online. That's why we call every set into our testing lab to put it through its paces before we recommend any TV, or tell you that it's the best 75-inch TV worth your money.

The first step is to complete our technical testing. You can read more about how we test TVs, but the TL;DR is that we use specialized industry-standard equipment to measure the TV's brightness, input lag and color accuracy for an objective view of the television's performance.

This makes it easier to compare between models or when a brand releases an upgraded version of the TV, so we can check that the manufacturer's claims really stack up. Plus, it means that we can more easily recommend use cases, like when I said that the Hisense U8QG is the brightest TV in our roundup.

Once that's out of the way and the data is securely stored in our testing spreadsheets, we start to do the fun bit of the job — using the TV. We watch movies, TV shows and sports, and play games on each set to see what it's really like to use them. This means that we get to work out how they perform in real-world conditions, like bright rooms.

How to choose the best 75-inch TVs

I know you've found your way to our best 75-inch TVs roundup, but before you go too deep in your research: why do you want a 75-inch TV over an 85, 65, or even 43-inch TV?

You may already have looked over our guide to choosing the perfect TV size for your space and found that 75 inches is the sweet spot for your room. Or maybe you know you want to be able to watch shows and movies with the whole family or group of friends and need something you can all gather around.

But in the case of TVs, bigger isn't always better. If you end up to close to the display, the picture can look blurry or disorienting. So if you can go lower, then save yourself some money and pick the smaller size if that's what'll work best.

The best 75-inch TVs are, at risk of stating the obvious, bigger than the best 65-inch TVs, and so have more space for extra ports and peripherals, and are often brighter than much smaller sets like the best 43-inch TVs, even for the same model.

In theory, the extra space also means the speakers can be larger too. Though, in our experience, the built-in TV speakers rarely sound that good anyway (unless you go for the Hisense U8QG), so you'll probably want to add one of the best soundbars to your setup whichever TV you choose.

One of the remaining holdouts is Amazfit, who launched the excellent Active 3 Premium that works on iPhone and Android. It's half the price of Apple or Google's watches, but you wouldn't know it from it's impressive fitness tracking features.

It's incredible value, but if you're looking for the closest integration you can get with your phone or smart features like emergency or health alerts, then I'd recommend the Apple Watch Series 10 (iPhone) or Google Pixel Watch 4 (Android) right now.

The best smartwatches you can buy right now

Best smartwatch overall

The Amazfit Active 3 Premium is the smartwatch I recommend for most people, and not just because it works with whichever phone you have. It's a fantastic fitness-tracking watch that easily holds it's own against the Apple Watch Series 10 and Google Pixel Watch 4, without locking you to a specific platform or phone.

It is also incredible value — coming in at around half the price of the two flagship watches — and all the features are free with no subscription (unless you need Zepp Aura, the sleep-focused AI wellness app that generates audio to relax you). It has offline maps, tracks more than 170 activities and comes with built-in GPS.

It has a smaller footprint (wristprint?) than many other smartwatches, with a 1.3-inch display, compared to the 1.6-inch Apple Watch Series 10. It's not a huge amount on paper, but it makes a big difference, as it felt smaller and less noticeable on our wrist. It's a shame it doesn't come in a few more vibrant colors, though.

While you don't get the smarts of Apple and Google's watches (emergency alerts, on-watch calls, third-party apps), fitness and activity tracking is where the Active 3 Premium really shines, with metrics to rival the best Garmin watches, like heart rate, blood oxygen, stress levels, cycle tracking, sleep quality and skin temperature.

The data all syncs to your phone and you can view it and get insights in the Zepp app, available for Android and iPhone. If you ever used a Fitbit before the Google takeover, the Zepp app is the closest thing to that now-gone experience; easy to understand, straightforward to use, and guides you through all the different metrics.

This is particularly helpful if you're just getting into running, as the running features on the Active 3 Premium are almost as detailed as those you'd find on Garmin watches, yet everything is explained clearly, even for more complex topics like your lactate threshold and ground contact time, which assess how your foot strikes the floor.

Amazfit says that the Active 3 Premium should last 12 days between charges. Like most other smartwatches, that doesn't work out in the real world; we found that it'd generally last just over a week or eight days. That's down a bit on the spec, but still miles ahead of the 18-hour battery life on the Apple Watch Series 10.

• Read our full Amazfit Active 3 Premium review

Best smartwatch for iPhone

You might be wondering why I'd recommend the Apple Watch Series 10 when the company released the Series 11 last year, but it comes down to performance and price. The older Series 10 has almost the exact same hardware as the newer model, including the same processor (S10), and runs the same software, watchOS 26.

The Series 10 was finally the moment where the most fully realized version of the Apple Watch came into the world, with the perfect blend of smartwatch features, like notifications, calls and apps on your wrist, with some of the most impressive and comprehensive health and fitness tracking you can get on an iPhone.

It launched in the fall of 2024 with watchOS 11, but was included in Apple's watchOS 26 upgrade in 2025 (it didn't jump 15 editions — it's a new year-based naming convention). This added all the features that launched with the Series 11, including the headline additions like hypertension alerts and Liquid Glass interface.

While it easily goes toe-to-toe with the Amazfit Active 3 Premium on fitness features, the Apple Watch stands out for its health focus. There's an ECG app for monitoring your heart health, cycle tracking, sleep apnea warnings, fall detection and a blood oxygen monitoring app.

The Apple Watch Series 10 also comes with all the things I like about the Series range, like the ability to download Watch-specific versions of your favorite apps, take calls from your wrist (or away from your phone if you choose the cellular version), and mirror notifications. Plus, it has a built-in speaker for playing music and podcasts.

As with all the best Apple watches, the most disappointing part is always the battery. The Series 10 is rated for 18 hours of use, so you should get through a waking day; the Series 11 can reach 24 hours, but that means charging it every day too, which is why I still recommend the (near identical, but cheaper) Series 10.

• Read our full Apple Watch Series 10 review

Best smartwatch for Android

Google's attempts at hardware have been mixed, but fortunately the company really excelled with the Pixel Watch 4, and we found that is easily the best Android smartwatch you can buy right now. It is, finally, Google's answer to the Apple Watch but for Android phones, with only a few small features locked to Pixel phones.

The headline feature at launch was access to Google's AI platform, Gemini, but I wouldn't buy the watch for that (it's not very useful). Instead, it's main strengths are that you can pair and use the watch with any Android phone, and the Fitbit-powered fitness tracking features are some of the most accessible around.

The watch has dual-band GPS for improved outdoor location tracking (this is useful in densely-packed cities or remote green spaces), and when we tested the Pixel Watch 4 against a manual step tracker and the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 (its closest competitor), the Pixel Watch 4 was just 29 steps out from the manually tracked total.

Unusually, the Pixel Watch 4 actually exceeded our battery life expectations during testing. Google reckons you get 40 hours from the larger 45mm edition, but we found it came closer to 60 hours. It's a rare, and welcome, surprise, and means it lasts almost three times as long as the Apple Watch Series 10.

The thing I really like about the Pixel Watch 4 is that Google could have tied many of the features just to Pixel phones (in the way that Apple and Samsung often do), but the only Pixel-exclusive features are: call screening, secure phone unlock and the ability to use your watch as a remote viewfinder for your phone's camera app.

And while it doesn't come naturally to me to praise Google (have you seen the Google Graveyard of all the products and services it discontinued?), I do think it's genuinely a huge step forward that the Pixel Watch 4 has a replaceable battery and display, so you can send the watch in for repair to extend its life, a first for Pixel Watch.

• Read our full Google Pixel Watch 4 review

Also consider

If you're after the best smartwatch for your phone, the three models I recommend above are going to cover most use cases, whichever phone you have. But there are a lot more smartwatches around right now.

Not every model can be the best, but some come pretty close. If you need a few more options, these are the smartwatches I still think are worth your money, and may fill a need we didn't cover in the wearables from Amazfit, Apple or Google.

How we test the best smartwatches

We reviewed the first Apple Watch more than a decade ago, and we've been testing the best smartwatches ever since. The devices have got more complex, last longer and have way more features now, but the core of our testing has remained the same: we wear the watches, just as you would, to see how they hold up in the real world.

We look at how easy it is to set up, whether it has compatibility issues with specific phones and spend hours poking around in the software, looking for settings, apps and other features that make the device worth your money. Over the years, these watches have transitioned from phone companions to health and wellbeing trackers.

So we also focus on how these tools work, whether the tracking is accurate, how it compares to the competition and whether there's value in measuring what the company says you should. We wear the best smartwatches out on runs, during workouts, while sleeping and going about our day to see how they cope.

Over the past few years, brands have added more safety features to their watches, like irregular heart beat notifications, sleep apnea alerts, crash and fall detection and hypertension alerts. These are things we can't practically test, so we can't verify that these work as intended or described.

In the U.S., health features are regulated by the FDA, so there is some degree of verification, but because we can't check that ourselves, I wouldn't recommend that you buy any of these watches specifically for these safety features. At the very least, they should be secondary to some other safety check.

It's not something you can predict, but sometimes a health issue does come along when you're testing a smartwatch. This happened to one of our writers — her Garmin watch alerted her to a potential heart problem she didn't know about, and that prompted her to go to the hospital to get checked out.

How to choose the best smartwatches

Before you go too far into your journey for a new smartwatch, first you need to work out which ones will work with your phone. The Apple Watch only works with iPhones, and some Android-focused watches have features that are exclusive to specific phones (I'm thinking of offerings from Google and Samsung here).

There are plenty of options that'll work with both platforms, but they generally aren't the flagship models that get a lot of attention every summer and fall. Just like the watch I rate as the best smartwatch right now, the Amazfit Active 3 Premium. It's more of a fitness smartwatch, but can do a lot of what the others can do for a lot less.

And that's one of the other big choices you have to make; do you want a fitness watch that has smartwatch features, or a smartwatch as a companion to your phone that can track your fitness? These sound similar — and they are — but the difference is how much of the focus is put on either the smartwatch or fitness features.

Fitness smartwatches evolved from the best fitness trackers, with larger displays and more sensors. The best smartwatches started life as Bluetooth-connected extensions of your phone and over time became devices that keep you connected to your digital life, even when you're away from your phone working out.

The Apple Watch Series 10 and Google Pixel Watch 4 are the best compromise between the two, but there are plenty of other options in our Also Consider section that also straddle that line or lean one way or the other. Though, if you need a cellular connection in your watch, those are pretty much limited to the flagship models.

Right now, the best smartwatch for women is the Apple Watch Series 11. The latest model of the Apple Watch boasts improved battery life over its predecessor and is available in two different sizes, making it one of Apple's most comfortable wearables. It only works with iPhone, though, so if you're an Android user, you're better off going for something else.

If you're looking to track fitness, the best watch for women is the Garmin Venu 4. It has pretty much all of the features found on the high-end best Garmin watches, but in a stylish and svelte package.

We've tested dozens of smartwatches and fitness trackers in order to determine the bets smartwatches for women. Here, we'll take you through them, from the best for health tracking to the best if you're on a budget.

It's smartwatch release season! Which means we have new wearables from Apple, Google and Samsung about to hit shelves. Most brands have launched new versions of their Ultra watches — large models with big displays and longer battery life. This may be what you're looking for, but they are generally pretty hefty on your wrist and often weigh twice as much as the regular models. Which is why I'd keep an eye on the Apple Watch Series 12 and Google Pixel Watch 5 instead. We'll have our full reviews out soon, but in the meantime, I'd still recommend buying last year's models, which have similar features but for less money now the prices have dropped.

The best smartwatches for women right now

Best smartwatch for women overall

The Apple Watch 11 is the best Apple Watch yet. It’s not a major upgrade over the Apple Watch 10 in terms of features, but it does finally crack the 18-hour battery life mark.

While the Apple Watch 11 looks the same as the Apple Watch 10 on the surface, the little watch is twice as tough. Apple has made the protective glass of the screen much tougher, meaning the Apple Watch 11 can withstand more knocks.

The Apple Watch 11 ships with watchOS 26, which means it features Apple's latest Workout Buddy, an AI workout coach, a sleep score, and the first-of-its-kind high blood pressure alert feature (hypertension).

On board, there are more workout modes than you can imagine, as well as the ability to track your sleep, vitals, and cycle from your wrist. The Series 11 also gets a bump from LTE to 5G, giving it better cellular range than ever before.

That's why it's the best smartwatch for women (and for most people) if you have an iPhone.

• Read our full Apple Watch 11 review

Best smartwatch for women for Android

The Galaxy Watch 8 is Samsung's newest smartwatch model, and it offers a handful of new features and wellness tools not currently found on the Galaxy Watch 7, the most notable being Google's Gemini AI voice assistant built in.

While the older model is slated to eventually get this feature via firmware (the Pixel Watch 3, too), at present, Samsung's latest and the Pixel Watch 4 are the only smartwatches that ships with Gemini preloaded.

Gemini is by far the most useful on-wrist AI assistant I've tested, capable of handling a range of tasks and reliable when it comes to providing useful responses to inquiries like, "Can my 20-pound chihuahua mix eat blueberries, and if so, how many?”

There are also a handful of new holistic and fitness features on the Galaxy Watch 8 of varying usefulness. Cardiovascular Load and Samsung's new personalized running coach both impressed me during testing. The former lets you know how your lifestyle may be impacting your overall heart health, and the latter builds a full-blown multi-week training plan based on a simple 12-minute run test and your running goals.

The Galaxy Watch 8 strikes the balance of sleek and sporty, while two display sizes and a large collection of interchangeable bands offer ample customization. But the reason it really stands out as one of the best smartwatches for women is its integration with the fertility-tracking app, Natural Cycles.

Famously, the Oura Ring works with Natural Cycles, but the data syncs from one app to the other and you need a subscription to both to make it work. Samsung's implementation is different.

Natural Cycles' algorithm powers the menstrual tracking and fertility data in the Samsung Health app. So, you buy the watch and get access to some of Natural Cycles' key features without taking an additional subscription.

• Read our full Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 review

Best smartwatch for women for fitness

The Garmin Venu 4 has received some huge upgrades, making it well worth considering if you’re looking to upgrade your smartwatch. It comes with a price hike compared to its predecessor, the Garmin Venu 3, but it has a redesigned case, more accurate GPS, and more advanced health and fitness tracking features on board.

he Venu 4 has some of Garmin’s most premium health and training features, as well as a bunch of new ones built in, including the new sleep consistency and sleep alignment features, lifestyle logging, and health status.

From a safety perspective, the Venu 4 has a flashlight, which can change color as you're running at night, adding visibility to your workouts. It can be turned on by holding the back button down for a couple of seconds, and you can change the brightness by swiping up and down on the watch.

During testing, I was blown away by the design of this watch. It looks beautiful. The all-metal casing, rather than just the metal bezel on the Venu 3, gives the newer watch a more premium feel on the wrist. The watch has a bright, AMOLED touchscreen, as well as two physical buttons to allow you to navigate around the watch while wearing gloves or with sweaty hands.

• Read our full Garmin Venu 4 review

Best smartwatch for women for health tracking

The Fitbit Sense 2 is the company's premium smartwatch that comes with more advanced health and wellness features than the Versa line. Not only does it have an FDA-cleared ECG sensor and blood oxygen reading, but the Sense has the ability to measure electrodermal activity and skin temperature, too.

An update to the stress-detecting EDA (electrodermal activity) sensor plays a large role in the device’s success: now called cEDA ('c' for continuous,) the sensor monitors stress levels or heightened responses throughout the day, prompting the user to take action on mood monitoring with Body Response notifications.

During testing, we were impressed by the Sense 2's long battery life and attractive design, as well as the huge number of health tracking options. The Sense 2 works with both iOS and Android, and comes with onboard GPS, Alexa, and more.

• Read our full Fitbit Sense 2 review

Best budget smartwatch for women

The Xiaomi Smart Band 10 Pro is excellent for those looking for a great fitness tracker on a budget. It's $310 cheaper than the Apple Watch 11 with 20 times better battery life and effectively identical functionality.

At $89, it's by far the cheapest smartwatch on this list. There is a slightly more expensive Ceramic Edition that costs $109, the main draw of which is that it comes with a fluororubber strap instead of a TPU one on the base model. This strap is more resistant to UV rays, oils, harsh chemicals, and dust, as well as overall just looking more sophisticated. In testing, we found it to be more comfortable than a silicone strap, too.

You should note, however, that at the time of writing, the Xiaomi Smart Band 10 Pro isn’t officially available through Xiaomi in the U.S. It is available through certain third-party retailers, although you should be aware that doing so carries some risks.

When it comes to fitness tracking, the Xiaomi Smart Band 10 Pro uses a range of different sensors, including an accelerometer, gyroscope, and more, to accurately measure and track over 150 workouts, physical activities, and even board games, as well as passive metrics like steps, stress, and more. In testing, we found its metrics to be very accurate. It gives you an in-depth breakdown of your heart rate, aerobic or anaerobic activity, workout performance, calories burned, and more.

Beyond fitness, it also offers a range of breathing exercises, guiding you through activities like box breathing in times of stress or anxiety.

In terms of smartwatch functionality, you can receive notifications; however, it does not have a built-in mic or speaker, meaning you cannot answer calls via the Xiaomi Smartband 10 Pro. It does allow you to set custom text-based message responses for when you can’t answer calls, though.

If you do want to track every metric you can, you'll need to download the Mi Fitness app and enable permissions manually. Stress tracking, for example, is disabled by default. You should also keep in mind, however, that enabling continuous stress tracking (which can give you in-depth stress analysis and help you determine stress triggers and unhealthy habits to avoid) will impact battery life. In testing, this reduced the promised up to 21 days of battery life down to 13. Despite this, this is still the best battery life of any smartwatch on this list.

You can also use the Band 10 Pro to measure blood oxygen levels and blood pressure, as well as your menstrual cycle and log things like pain and moods, negating the need for a dedicated period tracking app. The Band 10 Pro notifies you when you’ve been stationary for too long, too, prompting you to stretch or walk around.

It will also tell you your sleep efficiency or quality by citing metrics like average heart rate, average sleep HRV (heart rate variation), and how long it took you to fall asleep. It will then assign you a Sleep Animal (we were assigned a koala, for example), and assign you a sleep schedule based on your animal. This is cute, but not as helpful as the sleep tracking offered by other smartwatches.

Overall, if you're looking for a stylish yet inexpensive Apple Watch dupe, the Xiaomi Smart Band 10 Pro is a great option. There are some add-ons that make it more expensive, but these aren't strictly necessary.

• Read our full Xiaomi Smart Band 10 Pro review

Best screenless smartwatch for women

The Fitbit Air is the latest offering from Fitbit, and it joins the likes of the Whoop band, the Helio strap, and the Polar Loop in a number of new, screenless fitness trackers, which are great if you want to just focus on your fitness goals with no other distractions. While it is less of a smartwatch and more of a fitness tracker, I felt it deserved a place on this list regardless, for being a distraction-free way to track your health and fitness.

At just $99, it offers excellent value for money, and while there is a subscription model for personalized AI-backed health and fitness insights and deeper dives into your holistic trends from Google Health Premium, it isn't necessary, as you can still access the Fitbit Air's core features without it via the Google Health app. Still, if you do want to access it, it's fairly inexpensive compared to other fitness subscriptions at $9.99 a month or $99 a year.

In terms of tracking, the Fitbit Air offers sleep tracking insights on par with the best fitness trackers and best smartwatches, and even has an app for tracking holistic trends, including resting heart rate, average calorie burn, step count, heart rate variability, menstrual cycles, and daily readiness. Its fitness tracking is reliable, too — we tried it out in a comparison test with the Garmin Forerunner 70, and found that Fitbit Air tracks your heart rate with similar reliability to the Garmin smartwatch.

On top of this, it's comfortable to wear, too. Overall, we found it to be smaller and lighter than alternatives from Whoop, Amazfit, and Polar, which is excellent news if you find these models to be a bit too clunky on the wrist.

It's not perfect, however — as with most other screenless wearables, there's no onboard GPS or altimeter, which means you can't track your location or elevation data without carrying a smartphone. Additionally, during testing, we discovered that its automatic workout tracking only kicks in after 15 minutes.

Plus, if you do want to input a workout manually on the Fitbit app to make sure it actually logs it, you'll likely find the amount of activities lacking as compared to that of the Apple Watch Series 11, for example.

Still, if you're looking for an attractive, screenless fitness tracker that won't break the bank, the Fitness Air is an excellent option.

• Read our full Fitbit Air review

Best smart ring for women

Ok, I know this isn't a smartwatch, but I'd be remiss to speak about female health tracking tech without mentioning the Oura Ring. The latest model (the Oura Ring 5) has been released, and we were definitely impressed by its performance in testing.

Oura is consistently one of the best when it comes to tracking your cycle — my Oura Ring 4 worked out that I was pregnant before I did. Plus, it's cleverly disguised as a piece of jewellery, meaning you don't have to worry about a clunky smartwatch ruining the vibes of your outfit.

Still, you may have thought the Oura Ring 4 was a little too bulky to be discreet. Oura has taken these critiques on board, and the Oura Ring 5 is 40% smaller than the Ring 4. It's just 2.28mm thick and weighs as little as 2 grams, depending on ring size.

However, the Oura Ring 5 has slightly fewer sizing options than the Ring 4 — sizes 6-13 versus Ring 4's 4-15. So, if you have smaller hands, you may find the Ring 5 simply doesn't fit.

From a tracking perspective, Oura helps you keep an eye on your recovery and sleep, but also the impact of the day's stress on your body. Its companion smartphone app makes it easy to see daily insights, long-term trends, and an overall picture of your health, as well as more in-depth, impressive analysis if you want to get under the hood with your health, as it were.

There is one major downside, however, and that's that on top of the $399 price tag ($50 more than the Oura Ring 4), the Oura Ring 5 also requires a monthly subscription of $5.99 to use the ring. This may be a step too far for some, especially considering how pricey the hardware is.

However, if you want a discreet fitness tracker that offers you a better understanding of your overall health, it's a great option.

Read our full Oura Ring 5 review

Also tested

How we test the best smartwatches for women

Whenever an attractive smartwatch for women is released, we fully charge it up, then strap it on our wrist for about a week or so to test out all the features.

We gauge how it feels on our wrist throughout our day-to-day, as well as how easy (or not) the interface is to navigate when we need to read notifications, set timers or change other settings.

Next, we look at its fitness features, such as heart rate readings, blood oxygen readings, step counts and, when applicable, GPS. How accurate are all these readings? Does the smartwatch offer female-specific features for menstrual cycle or pregnancy tracking?

Finally we consider battery life claims and compare it to our actual use. Some features like continuous GPS use, playing music or enabling an always-on display chew up juice faster than others. We understand that not all smartwatches last two weeks — we just want our experience to match up with the expectations set by the company.

How to choose the best smartwatch for women

Among the best smartwatches for women, you have a bounty of options to match your needs and style. That said, if you have an iPhone, you’ll probably appreciate the ecosystem experience of the Apple Watch 11.

The same goes for those with Samsung smartphones, your best choice is a Samsung-made Galaxy Watch, but if fitness tracking or working out is your priority, a Fitbit or Garmin wearable might be better for reaching your goals. Plus, both those companies offer diverse design options.

When picking any smartwatch, you’ll also want to get one that fits your wrist comfortably. Those with smaller wrists may find larger smartwatches bulky and cumbersome. All of the smartwatches above have 40mm or smaller size options, though the 38mm Garmin Lily is by far the most compact. The Amazfit Active 3 Premium is also a great choice, with a 1.3-inch screen.

Some of the best smartwatches for women look like high-tech fitness trackers, while others look like traditional timepieces, too. If you want something sporty, stick to sleek materials with fewer embellishments. If you want something you can wear on nicer occasions, look for bezels or other eye-catching accents.

To test these watches, we go running in them! Several members of the team run regularly, and we even have a resident marathon runner who puts these watches to the test during training and longer endurance sessions.

After combining all of our experiences, the best running watch you can buy right now is the Garmin Forerunner 570. It's not the most feature-packed Garmin, but it has everything you need to comprehensively track your runs and improve your performance, and it won't break the bank.

If you're working on a budget, our favorite cheap running watch is the Coros Pace 3. It offers a Garmin-like training experience, but jettisons that brand's smartwatch features, to make a watch that is truly focused just on helping you train.

But these are not your only choices. We've rounded up the five best running watches we've tested from Garmin, Polar, Coros and Apple to help you find the right one to hit your goals. And if these don't quite hit the mark, check out all the other running watches we've tested too for more options.

Best running watches available right now

Best running watch overall

Our pick for the best Garmin watches is also our top running watch: the Garmin Forerunner 570. It comes in two sizes (44mm, 47mm) with a bright and vibrant AMOLED display that we found you can easily see, even in sunny conditions, while out running. And it's lightweight and comfortable enough to wear all day.

Garmin watches are a popular choice for runners, and you could make the argument that the whole range could appear in this roundup. But what makes the Forerunner 570 standout is its features-to-price ratio. It's not the most premium watch (that'd be the $1,100 Fenix 8) but it also has more insights and data than the Forerunner 55.

Central to the whole experience is the Elevate V5 heart rate sensor, which is the most recent and accurate in Garmin's range, and the dual-band GPS that creates detailed records of your runs, even on busy, dense city streets or twisting, wood-lined trails.

Plus, the Forerunner 570 comes with Garmin's Incident Detection and LiveTrack safety features. If the watch detects that you fall while on a run, it'll alert your emergency contacts. While LiveTrack lets you share your location with specified contacts during your workout once you activate it by holding down the light button on the watch.

We found that the heart rate readings were as accurate as a chest strap and the battery lasted around five days with heavy use and daily runs (and was partly run down by the bright display). It is a little disappointing that the 8GB of onboard storage is only for music, though, and not offline maps (which are available on other Garmin models).

Finally, not that it makes a difference to the running experience, but the Forerunner 570 is also one of the most colorful in Garmin's lineup. The company isn't known for bold or vivid designs, but the 570 comes with several color options for the bezel, helping it standout among the (slightly boring) rest of the range.

• Read our Garmin Forerunner 570 review

Best budget running watch

Coros isn't as well-known as Garmin, but it should be, because the Coros Pace 3 is easily the best budget running watch you can buy right now. It comes with reliable tracking, accurate multi-band GPS and near week-long battery life in real-world settings.

Like the Polar Vantage V3 (which we feature later on this guide), the Pace 3 is a multi-sport watch that has dedicated (and useful) running modes, and is comfortable and lightweight to wear throughout the day and during workouts.

To support your training analysis, there's an optical heart rate sensor, pulse oximeter for measuring blood oxygen levels and a barometric altimeter to track elevation. You can also connect a Bluetooth heart rate chest strap, but the (relatively) common ANT+ standard isn't supported here.

All of this data feeds into Coros' EvoLab, which gives you an overview of your weekly training load, and analysis of your longer term training and fitness level, so you can work out if you're doing the right amount of exercise to hit your fitness goals.

The EvoLab analysis is available on all Coros watches, even the more expensive ones, so the Pace 3 is a more affordable way to get these insights. And, like the Garmin Forerunner 570, you also get a recovery advisor and race time predictor, which are useful if you're training for a specific event.

We tested the Pace 3's heart rate accuracy against the Polar H10 chest strap during warm conditions, where the optical readings are generally better than in cold weather, but it was impressively close to the Polar strap's readings. It's still worth pairing a strap with the watch, but even if you don't, you'll still get accurate insights.

• Read our full Coros Pace 3 review

Best running watch for beginners

If you're just starting to get into running, there's no need to spend hundreds of dollars on watches that have more features than you really need. What'll serve you best is something that is a step up from a fitness tracker, focused on running and won't break the bank. In short, you need the Garmin Forerunner 55.

It is designed to be an entry-level Garmin and it replaced the Forerunner 45, which served a similar purpose. The watch looks quite a lot like other Garmin watches, but with less flourish, which is partly why it's also a fraction of the price of the Forerunner 570.

You still get many essential Garmin features though, like the PacePro training tool, which gives you gentle speed and cadence suggestions on your run. And the more you track, the better the watch's recovery recommendations become. This kind of coaching it what separates the Forerunner 55 from the best fitness trackers.

What you won't find here is third-party apps, music storage (for phone-free runs) or mobile payments through Garmin Pay. Plus, the display is relatively small at just 1.08 inches. So long as those aren't dealbreakers for you, the Garmin Forerunner 55 is an excellent way to ease yourself into running.

• Read our full Garmin Forerunner 55 review

Best adventure running watch

The Polar Vantage V3 is probably the best value running watch (not the cheapest, but with the most features for your money). We were impressed by the range and diversity of activities you can track and the volume of sensors packed into a watch that is half the price of the Garmin Fenix 8, but offers a similar experience.

It's an outdoor adventure watch at heart, which is why you can record more than 150 activities, including things as varied as badminton and jazz dance. Each of these modes are actually customized for the activity, as we found when we tried the Vantage V3 on a snowboarding trip, and it showed distance, speed and session maps.

All of this is sort of par for the course with sports watches, but what makes the Vantage V3 really stand out is its training metrics. This is an area Garmin used to dominate, but it lost a lot of goodwill from the running community when it launched a paywall for some digital features.

Polar puts them all out there for you to access, and the training plans and metrics are easy to digest, while the recovery insights are genuinely actionable and helpful. There's the Leg Recovery test, which tells you how long to wait until your next tough run. And it factors in things like your sleep to create more personalized recommendations.

The only drawback on the Polar Vantage V3 is that it's not a smartwatch. You can't store music, use it for mobile payments or download a wide range of third party apps. But Polar seems to be happy not to compete with Apple here, and was comfortable designing an incredibly impressive sports watch at a good price.

• Read our full Polar Vantage V3 review

Best running watch for iPhone

The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is the best running watch if you're after a multi-functional option that can track your runs, keep tabs on your health and integrate well with your iPhone. Unlike Garmin, Coros and Polar devices, which are running watches with smart features, the Ultra 3 is a smartwatch that can track your runs.

Of course, many of the best smartwatches can do that, but the dual-band GPS here pits it against the top Garmin models and makes it reliable enough to run out in wooded areas and dense urban areas like cities.

Plus, the customizable Action button can be used to take laps, which puts it ahead of the standard Apple Watch 11 (which was released at the same time in late 2025). The main thing you miss out on compared to Garmin et al is the detailed training analysis. Apple's is fine, but it's surface-level, and doesn't give you in-depth insights.

And you may have heard that Apple watches have terrible battery life, and most of them do, only lasting around a day between charges. The same isn't true of the Ultra 3, which makes use of its larger body to increase the battery capacity to up to 42 hours. Still a fraction of the weeks you can get elsewhere, but it's better.

So it depends what you need from a running watch. If you have an iPhone, like the sound of an Apple Watch, and do some runs (but aren't aiming for elite tracking/training analysis), then the Ultra 3 is a fantastic option that can support your daily activities and outdoor workouts.

• Read our full Apple Watch Ultra 3 review

Also tested

There are a lot of running watches out there, and even from those we test, not every model can be the best. So these are the models that didn't quite hit the mark, but are worth considering if you're after more options.

How we test the best running watches

We take our testing seriously because runners rely on accurate, reliable data to train smarter, stay healthy, and improve performance. Even today’s entry-level running watches pack in features like GPS, heart rate monitoring, and step tracking, but we go deeper than the spec sheet.

Our reviewers are experienced runners who put each watch through its paces in real-world conditions, including open parks, urban streets with tall buildings, and forested trails. We look at core performance factors like GPS accuracy, heart rate tracking, and battery life, and also assess advanced features such as VO2 Max estimates, recovery time, sleep tracking, and music storage.

To ensure heart rate data is accurate, our tester Nick tests the watch against a chest strap monitor, which is widely regarded as the gold standard for heart rate accuracy, and includes this comparison data in his reviews.

We also consider how intuitive the watch is to use mid-run, how comfortable it is to wear for long periods, and how well its companion app presents and stores training data.

How to choose the best running watch for you

The type of running watch you need largely depends on how often you run and your running goals. Casual runners should find they have all they need in a simpler model with GPS and heart rate tracking, while runners and athletes training for marathons or triathlons may need advanced features like interval training, VO2 max monitoring, and recovery suggestions to aid their training.

For beginners, basic tracking of distance, pace, and heart rate should be enough to monitor progress and stay motivated. Those who consider themselves as a more intermediate runner looking to improve performance may want watches with metrics like cadence, stride length, and heart rate zones to help fine-tune their training.

Meanwhile, for those training for races or aiming for specific fitness goals, advanced features such as lactate threshold, VO2 max, and interval training support can offer more detailed insights.

Battery life is key if you’re running long distances or doing multi-day events. Watches designed for ultra runners or adventurers can last for days on a single charge, while others may need daily charging if you use GPS and other features regularly.

FAQs

You might expect me to say that the best Apple Watch is the most recent model, the Watch Series 11. But I actually recommend the Apple Watch Series 10 to most people instead. It has the same software as the newer watch, almost all the same features and the main difference is that the battery is slightly improved on the Series 11.

So while Apple would probably love for you to buy the latest release, I think the cheaper Series 10 is the better option at the moment. If you want to keep the cost down more, then I'd say you should check out the 2025 Apple Watch SE 3. It's the best budget Apple Watch and has most of the core smart, health and fitness features.

Apple announced two new watches at it's 2026 Fall event: the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4. The biggest changes are a new, more frequent heart rate sensor and the inclusion of Apple's new AI-backed Siri. We've only had a short time with both watches, but my early impressions are that last year's models remain good value for similar features. But I'll update this guide once the full reviews are in.

The best Apple Watch models you can buy right now

Best Apple Watch overall

The Apple Watch Series 10 is not the newest in the range, but it remains the best option at the best price almost two years after it's release. There are two reasons for this; the newer Series 11 has almost exactly the same hardware, including the S10 processor, and the Series 10 can upgrade to the newest software, watchOS 26.

Combined, this means that the watch is almost identical to it's newer and more expensive sibling. To my mind, the Series 10 was the culmination of several years where Apple refocused the watch from a wearable companion for your iPhone, to a far more useful and comprehensive activity, health and wellbeing tracker.

Of course, it still does all the smartwatch things I love about the Series, like being able to take calls from your wrist, mirror notifications and download Watch-specific apps. And it was on the Series 10 that Apple finally added a speaker which you could use for calls and listening to audio, like music or podcasts, out loud from your watch.

It launched in September 2024 with watchOS 11, but has since been upgraded to watchOS 26 (Apple switched to year-based naming conventions for software in 2025), so it has the same software experience, the latest Liquid Glass elements (a visual design that makes the background look like blurred glass) and new features.

The most exciting upgrades that came with watchOS 26 are the wrist flick gesture for dismissing notifications, and hypertension alerts. This feature won't tell you if your blood pressure is high, but uses heart rate data to infer when you might want to talk to a doctor about your blood pressure.

The biggest letdown of any Apple Watch is always the battery life. The Series 10 officially clocks in at 18 hours, but you may find it lower in practice. Technically, the Series 11 can reach 24 hours, but even though that's a hugely welcome increase, it still means charging it every day, which is one reason I still recommend the Series 10.

• Read our full Apple Watch Series 10 review

Best budget Apple Watch

Unlike with the flagship watch, Apple only releases a new version of it's more affordable model every few years, leading to a three-year gap between the Apple Watch SE (2022) and it's successor, the Apple Watch SE 3. And this newer version has more sensors, an improved processor and the most recent software and features.

So this time, I'm not going to suggest buying the older one, because the Watch SE 3 is a fantastic value option in its own right, bringing much of what we loved about the Series 10 into a cheaper watch. In fact, unless you need (or want) some of the Series' health-focused features, I'd be tempted to recommend this watch above all others.

The SE 3 uses the same S10 processor as the Series 10 and Series 11, runs watchOS 26 and lasts up to 18 hours between charges. It is one millimeter thicker than the Series 10, but it's not especially noticeable. If you spend a lot of time outside you may notice that the display is not as bright, and that can make it tricky to see in direct sunlight.

The biggest difference between the SE 3 and Series 10/11 are the health features. The SE 3 uses Apple's second-gen optical heart rate sensor, last found on the Apple Watch Series 5 back in 2019. Using older hardware keeps the price down, but it also means that the more complex health features can be locked to the more expensive watches.

So the SE 3 doesn't support ECG readings for keeping tags on your heart health, blood oxygen measurements, watchOS 26's hypertension alerts or sleep apnea monitoring. The second-gen sensor does mean it can track your heart rate, including while working out, and combine that with other data for cycle tracking.

Those features are advisory-only, so they can't diagnose conditions, just suggest when you should discuss them with your doctor. If you think you'd find those alerts useful, then you'll want the Apple Watch Series 10 or Ultra 3. For everyone else, you can save a lot of money for almost the same experience with the incredible value SE 3.

• Read our full Apple Watch SE 3 review

Best Apple Watch for battery life

The biggest criticism of the Apple Watch has always been its battery life. Until last year's Series 11, the rated battery life of pretty much every model has been 18 hours, so you have no option but to charge it every day. It stings, as the Android alternative, the Google Pixel Watch 4, lasts up to 60 hours, almost three times as long.

The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is the exception. It is marketed as Apple's version of a rugged outdoor watch with a larger display, and it is, primarily, but it also has the best battery life of any Apple Watch, hitting 42 hours. In the real world, you'll get less than this, especially if you're outside in the sun and need brightness on full.

Still, it's a huge jump up from the Series 10 and Series 11, and an improvement on the 36 hours Apple estimated for the older Ultra 2. While I was definitely excited to see an Apple Watch that can actually last more than a day, and there's a lot to love about the Ultra 3, it's not quite as straightforward as 'you should buy this for the battery.'

There's no getting around the fact the Ultra 3 is a large watch. It's wider and thicker than the others in the range, and it weighs almost twice as much as the Series 11 (61g versus 37g for the 46mm Series 11). So it's bigger, heavier and, well, more noticeable on your wrist. Whether this is a problem depends on what you want to use it for.

The Ultra 3 is Apple's adventure watch, and it's closest alternative to one of the best Garmin watches hardware-wise. Away from the physical design, it runs the same software as the other Apple watches, so it has similar features. But there are a few outdoor-focused exclusives that you can currently only get on the Ultra 3.

This model added satellite connectivity so you can send emergency alerts when you don't have cell coverage, and it supports 5G connections (the first Apple Watch to do so) allowing for faster connections when you're away from your iPhone. And my favorite one: it has a customizable physical button on the side.

• Read our full Apple Watch Ultra 3 review

Also consider

How we test the best Apple watches

We've been testing smartwatches for more than a decade, and even reviewed the first Apple Watch back in 2015. As the watches have changed, so have our testing methods, but the core has stayed the same; we wear them.

Often we get our first hands-on time with the new Apple watches each year at the Apple Event in September. This gives us a sense of what the watches feel like, how the company has changed the bands, and the types of materials used in the design.

We give our first take during or just after the event, and then spend the next week (at least) with the watches. Since none of them last more than a few days between charges, this gives us plenty of time to see how the battery holds up in the real world.

Once the watch is paired to our iPhone, we try out the smart features, existing and new. We check to see if the performance of things like notifications, call handling and third-party apps is different (hopefully improved) compared to older models.

Since the Apple Watch Series 6, the company has turned the watch from an extension of your phone to a fully-fledged health and fitness tracker. So that's where we put a lot of our time too, testing out the workout features and health notifications.

Some of most significant features, like irregular heart beat notifications, hypertension and sleep apnea alerts and crash detection aren't things we can practically test. So we can't verify that these work every time as intended.

Of course, health features are regulated by the FDA, so you can have some reassurance that those will function as advertised, but we can't confirm that. Though, sometimes a health problem comes along when you're reviewing a watch.

One of our writers had a heart issue while testing a Garmin watch, which promoted her to go to hospital for investigations. It's rare, but if this happens, we'll always talk about it, so you know how the feature works in the real world.

How to choose the best Apple Watch

If you're trying to decide between Apple Watch models, it's because you want a smartwatch for your iPhone that closely integrates with Apple's devices and services. The company keeps the range pretty slim, with certain models designed for specific use cases or prices.

The flagship device is always part of the Series range. The most recent is the Series 11, although it's nearly identical to the Series 10, which is why I currently recommend the older model. But it's the best all-round and most versatile Apple Watch.

It has the health-tracking features you don't find on the budget SE 3, but is lighter and smaller than the adventure-focused Ultra 3. All three have similar smartwatch features, though the Ultra 3 has improved 5G connectivity if you choose the cellular variant.

So the main differences between them generally come down to size, health features, battery life and brightness. The Ultra 3 is brightest, followed by the Series 10/11 and then the SE 3. If you're outside in sunshine a lot, the SE 3 is a tricky choice.

The Series 10/11 and Ultra 3 all have Apple's health-focused features like an ECG, blood oxygen monitoring, hypertension alerts and sleep apnea warnings. The SE 3 has an older heart rate sensor, so doesn't have these features.

If you need the longest-lasting Apple Watch, that'd be the Ultra 3, which almost doubles the battery of the others. The compromise is that it's quite a lot bigger and twice as heavy as the Series 10.

While the Apple Watch is incredibly popular, and a fantastic choice if you have an iPhone, it's not your only option. Many of the best smartwatches work with iPhones too, so if none of the models quite hit the mark, you do have other choices.

What is watchOS 26?

Apple's smartwatches run watchOS, a customized operating system designed for the wrist-worn wearable, just like the company has iOS for iPhones, iPadOS for iPads and macOS for Mac computers and laptops.

Each year, the company releases a refreshed version of each platform. The newest hardware will launch with the latest software, and several generations of older devices are often eligible to upgrade to the newest version.

The Apple Watch Series 10 launched with watchOS 11 in 2024, while the Series 11, SE 3 and Ultra 3 all shipped with watchOS 26. Despite the naming, Apple didn't release 15 editions of watchOS in a year, but changed naming conventions in 2025.

The aim was so align software numbers with the year they'll be primarily used in. So watchOS came out in late 2025, and most of its useful life would be in 2026, so it was called watchOS 26. But it wasn't just newer devices that got this version.

Almost as soon as the 2025 watches were available to buy, anyone with an Apple Watch back to the Series 6 (released in 2020) could upgrade to watchOS 26 and get access to the Liquid Glass design overhaul and a range of new features.

Generally, the latest version of watchOS brings the same experience to all watches. The only exception is if a new feature has a particular hardware requirement, like we saw with the Apple Watch SE 3, which has an older heart rate sensor.

So although it ran watchOS 26 at launch, you can't get health-focused features like the ECG app or blood oxygen readings on the watch. The SE 3 is pretty much the only outlier though, as all watches (except the SE (2022)) launched since 2020 have the compatible third-gen sensor.

Apple launches new watches every September, and the update cycle starts again with older watches gaining access to the latest software. This year, the company will officially launch watchOS 27, but only for six models; the Series 9 and above.

Other features that stand out to me in a GPS sports watch are handy smarts like music storage and navigation tools that sometimes include offline maps. Having tested almost all of the top sports watches on the market I know which ones will suit different types of athletes and adventurers, and the advice below should help you find the perfect training partner.

I’m primarily a runner myself and my top pick for runners is the Garmin Forerunner 570, which is an attractive and accurate sports watch. My pick for those who want a more affordable device is the Coros Pace 4, which is an excellent multisport watch with a lightweight design. If budget is no problem and you just want the very best watch you can get, then the Garmin Fenix 8 Pro offers the most impressive array of features in a durable and good-looking design with long battery life.

It's smartwatch release season! Which means we've had announcements from Google, Samsung and Apple and although we haven't worn them for long enough yet to bring you our full reviews, we've had hands-on time with the Apple Watch Series 12, Apple Watch Ultra 4, Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 and the Google Pixel Watch 5. Each of these could be a great sports watch, but until we've tested them, my general advice is to stick with last year's models — they're generally cheaper but have most of the same features.

The best sports watches available right now

Best sports watch for running

The Garmin Forerunner 570 offers both style and substance as an excellent running watch that comes in a variety of colors with a dazzlingly bright AMOLED display.

I found both the GPS and heart rate tracking on the watch to be accurate during my runs, and it has all the tracking and training analysis tools you need to prepare for an event, or just to help you get a little fitter and faster.

The Forerunner 570 also comes in two sizes and the smaller model is better for thin wrists than most other top Garmins. The lightweight design is comfortable to wear 24/7 too.

If you want offline maps then it might be worth looking at upgrading to the larger Forerunner 970, and if you don't need the very latest watch on your wrist the older Garmin Forerunner 265 is also excellent, and often in sales.

• Read our full Garmin Forerunner 570 review

Best budget sports watch

The Coros Pace 4 is the perfect option for any runner or triathlete on a budget, or who simply prefers to wear a smaller sports watch. Its lightweight design is comfortable and fits my skinny wrist well, and the Pace 4 packs a lot of impressive features into its small case.

It offers reliably accurate tracking and detailed training analysis, and for a small watch with a bright AMOLED display its battery life is impressive. It lasted me five days on a charge when running every day with the screen always-on, and it lasted over 10 days with the screen set to raise-to-wake.

While it's not as feature-rich as more expensive watches, lacking maps for one, the Pace 4 does a great job of offering the essentials you need from a sports watch at a reasonable price.

• Read our full Coros Pace 4 review

Best beginner sports watch

While it lacks some of the bells and whistles you get on newer, pricier Garmins, the Garmin Forerunner 55 is the best option for beginners. It's an affordable, accurate, GPS watch that tracks distance, speed and pace, and it also has useful extras for new runners like suggested workouts and some basic training analysis.

It’s a small watch but the battery life is pretty good, with the Forerunner 55 usually lasting me a week even when running every day. It also tracks your daily activity and sleep, and links to your phone to show notifications.

You don’t get a triathlon mode on the watch, so beginner multisport athletes will be better off with the Coros Pace 3, and if you want a better-looking device then upgrading to the Garmin Forerunner 165, which has an AMOLED screen, would be worthwhile. However, I found the Forerunner 55 certainly covers all the bases beginner and intermediate runners really need, and is often in sales now because it’s an older watch.

• Read our full Garmin Forerunner 55 review

Best sports watch for triathletes

The Garmin Forerunner 970 is my personal favorite sports watch, because even though the Fenix 8 Pro has a few extra connectivity features and a more durable case, the 970 is sleeker and lighter.

This lightweight design makes the Forerunner 970 perfect for triathletes who don't want the bulk of the Fenix on their wrist. It offers reliable tracking for running, cycling and swimming (both pool and open water), and will even provide suggested workouts and training plans for multisport events.

All this tracking is backed up by extensive training analysis that can help you manage the considerable training load that triathletes deal with so you avoid burning out.

In addition, the Forerunner 970 is the most hardy Forerunner yet thanks to its scratch-resistant sapphire crystal display, and it also has a built-in flashlight as a handy extra.

The older Garmin Forerunner 965 is also a great option for triathletes, but doesn't have as durable a design or the latest sports tracking features you get on the Forerunner 970, including running economy analysis.

• Read our full Garmin Forerunner 970 review

Best sports watch for hiking

The Polar Vantage V3 is built for multi-sport athletes but it's also a top-notch option for hikers, trail runners and mountain sports enthusiasts looking to keep track of their adventures.

Whether you love to take to the outdoors on foot or via a set of skis, a bike, a snowboard, or something else altogether, the V3 has more than enough battery life to last you through a full day and is built tough enough to survive slips and falls. It also boasts dual-band GPS that I’ve found to be consistently accurate, even when you’re in the middle of nowhere, and offline maps so you don’t get lost in the great outdoors.

For sports like mountain biking and skiing, a Hill Splitter function parses riding data from time spent on the lift and does so with remarkable reliability. The bright AMOLED screen also makes it easy to see pertinent data, like pace, distance and duration at a glance, even in bright sunlight.

At the end of your adventurous day, the Polar app provides a handy post-adventure route map of your efforts with detailed stats. Plus, the V3 offers insights into rest and recovery to help get back out into nature and ready for another day of outdoor epicness.

• Read our full Polar Vantage V3 review

Best sports watch overall

The Garmin Fenix 8 Pro is the brand's flagship GPS sports watch and while its price is prohibitive, if you simply want the best sports watch you can get then it’s the one to go for.

There are two models in the range, of which I've tested the AMOLED Fenix 8 Pro. The MicroLED watch is even more expensive and has shorter battery life, so the AMOLED watch is the one I'd recommend, because it still has an impressively bright display.

The Fenix 8 Pro packs all of Garmin's industry-leading sports tracking and navigation features into a rugged, diveproof design with a titanium bezel and sapphire crystal display.

While most of its features can also be found on the cheaper Garmin Fenix 8, the Pro model has the key upgrade of LTE and satellite connectivity, making it especially good for those who train without their phone or often hike in areas without cellular coverage.

The Forerunner 970 offers a cheaper, smaller and lighter option with the same key sports tracking tools, but the Fenix 8 Pro is a step up in durability and battery life, as well as having the extra connectivity features.

• Read our full Garmin Fenix 8 Pro review

Best smartwatch

As long as you have an iPhone to pair with it, the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is the best sporty smartwatch you can get, offering accurate tracking, some training analysis and, of course, all the outstanding smart features you expect from an Apple Watch.

The hardware makes it better for sports that the Apple Watch Series 11. You get a more durable titanium case and sapphire crystal screen, plus the Action Button which you can use to take laps and pause your workout. The Ultra 3 also has dual-band GPS tracking and its battery life has proved a major improvement on past models, lasting me a marathon weekend without needing a charge.

Apple has also continually improved the software on the watch for sports use over recent years. The native Workout app now has all the customization you need to show the data you want during training sessions, and the new training analysis feature will keep you on track to get fitter without risking burnout.

Another new feature on the Ultra 3 is satellite connectivity, which can help you stay in touch with the world when you're out of cellular range, with a key safety feature being free SOS messages if you get into trouble in the wilderness.

While the battery life, training analysis and navigation features still don’t match the best Garmin watches in particular, the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is much smarter and access to the wealth of excellent sports tracking apps in the App Store can make the watch even more useful to keen athletes.

• Read our full Apple Watch Ultra 3 review

Best sports watch for Android

The Galaxy Watch Ultra is Samsung's toughest-built, longest-lasting smartwatch and the best GPS sports watch for Android smartphone users. It's also one of the best smartwatches overall.

The ultimate Android wearable for outdoor excursions, the Galaxy Watch Ultra uses the same impressive BioActive sensor as the Galaxy Watch 7 with advanced sleep, workout and recovery tracking. It also boasts accurate dual-band GPS location tracking, monitoring for health conditions including sleep apnea, and useful AI-backed wellness insights and tips.

Built from titanium alloy, the Galaxy Watch Ultra has a large, easy-to-view AMOLED touchscreen that maxes out at 3,000 nits, the same as the Apple Watch Ultra above. This makes it easy to view in direct sunlight, even when on the move. There's also a customizable 'Action' button and a protective bezel around the screen.

Price at $650, the Ultra is considerably more expensive than its sibling, the Galaxy Watch 7, which offers essentially the same features in a less robust package.

• Read our full Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra review

Best sports watch for battery life

The Instinct 3 packs Garmin’s excellent sports tracking features into a durable and distinctive watch that’s ideal for adventurous activities in particular. It has many fine qualities, but the battery life is what really stood out to me during testing, with the 45mm Instinct 3 AMOLED lasting me a week of use.

Now bear in mind that’s the Instinct 3 model with the shortest battery life in the range, and I had the AMOLED screen set to always-on and tracked outdoor workouts every day. If you opt for the larger 50mm AMOLED model, or one of the solar-charging Instinct 3 models with a memory-in-pixel display, the sky’s the limit for battery life.

I mean that semi-literally, because the Instinct 3 Solar can last indefinitely in smartwatch mode in sunny conditions thanks to the solar panels on its watch face. Even in dull conditions you’ll get four weeks of use in smartwatch mode with the Instinct 3 Solar, and 24 (45mm) or 34 (50mm) hours of GPS tracking in the most accurate multi-band mode.

The Instinct 3 in general is a more affordable alternative to the Garmin Fenix 8 range, and though you lose some key features like offline maps, music storage and other smarts, it is a great all-round sports watch and some will prefer its eye-catching design compared with the more conservative Fenix and Forerunner styles.

• Read our Garmin Fenix 8 vs. Garmin Instinct 3 comparison

Best sports watch under $100

Amazfit makes some of the best value sports watches available, and the Amazfit Active 2 offers an astonishing array of features for under $100. It tracks over 160 sports, as well as your daily activity and sleep, and even offers features like offline maps and NFC payments.

The watch itself is also attractive, with a bright 1.32in AMOLED display and a slim design that doesn't stick out from the wrist as much as most sports watches.

There are some downsides compared with more expensive watches, of course. My colleague Dan Bracaglia, who tested the Amazfit Active 2, found the UI to be a little clunky, and the HR and elevation data wasn't always reliable.

The mapping features are also less impressive than those of pricier watches, and the smart features are lacking compared with the best smartwatches, with very few apps and a limited voice assistant.

A lot of the negatives are forgivable given the low cost of the watch, however, and the Amazfit Active 2 is certainly a great sporty smartwatch for beginners or those working with a tight budget.

• Read our Amazfit Active 2 review

How to choose the best GPS watch for you

There's a huge variety of sports watches to pick from, and a fine line between smartwatches and the best sports watches, as many smartwatches come with fitness tracking features built-in. So, how do you decide on the best sports watch for your training?

Firstly, it's important to consider the activities you'll be doing and the features you really value. Runners will need accurate GPS tracking as a priority, and triathletes need a multisport mode, and everyone wants a bright screen that's clear to read in all conditions.

More adventurous types will need a durable watch with a waterproof case made from hardier materials than plastic. Long battery life is important for those tackling endurance sports, and if you're heading for the great outdoors then offline maps are also very useful.

You also have to judge how important smart features are for you, and whether you want a sporty smartwatch like the Apple Watch Ultra 2, or a specialist sports watch with some smart features like the Garmin Forerunner 265.

How I test the best GPS watches

I've been testing sports watches for a decade and have tried almost all of the models in Garmin, Suunto, Coros and Polar's ranges, along with every Apple watch and variety of watches from other brands. So I know what makes a watch stand out from the crowd, and I usually have at least two strapped to my wrists for testing during workouts.

I'm mainly a runner myself, and usually running 70-80 miles a week while training for a marathon, which gives me ample opportunity to test sports watches. I also test the watches with other sports like cycling and strength sessions.

I spend hours poring over GPS tracks and race measured courses to check the GPS accuracy, and compare heart rate readings to those of an external monitor like a chest strap or armband to check the accuracy of the optical sensor on a watch.

Along with accuracy I check how comfortable watches are for 24/7 use, which is especially important with very large sports watches like the Garmin Fenix 8, as well trying out the smart features and navigation tools to see if they're actually helpful and easy to use.

Features compared

Although plenty of cheap TVs get released every year, that's not what I'm going to recommend that you buy. Instead, the best budget TVs are actually models from the past few years that have dropped enough in price that they're actually affordable now.

Interestingly, the budget TV I recommend to most people bucks this trend. The Hisense QD7 launched for $500 last year but is frequently even cheaper now. And it's a fantastic and versatile TV that performs well across films, gritty TV shows and games. But you can also now buy the model I think is the best budget gaming TV, the Hisense U75QG, for almost half its original launch price. And it is incredible value, with four HDMI 2.1 ports, a 165Hz refresh rate and great contrast.

That's not all, as we have more wallet-friendly TVs we've tested that are worth shopping for. This guide will help you find the best budget TV that's fit for your home, with in-depth reviews, lab results and hands-on testing.

Best budget TVs available right now

Best budget TV overall

The Hisense QD7 is easily the best budget TV we've tested, and it's also the best TV under $500 right now. Going on specs alone, it's hard to gauge cheaper TVs, as you can never be sure what the performance will really be like. But the QD7 is an exceptional TV that you pick up without breaking the bank (with just one small flaw).

During our testing, we were most impressed with how the set handles colors. Hisense equipped the QD7 with quantum dot crystals, which absorb some of the backlight and emit it as green and red light. This improves the vibrancy of the image, and we liked how the colors in movies, TV shows and games really popped.

The LEDs in the display are individually controllable (not by you, but by the TV), which means that the set can adjust the colors and brightness in specific areas to adapt to the picture. This really helped when we watched shadowy things like "Stranger Things" and "Dune," which have a lot of darkly colored scenes.

Plus, it wasn't just that the image looked colorful and dark in all the right places, but you could actually pick out the details happening in the shadows. For some TVs, this is a struggle, but the QD7 handled these different shades of black well. This should also mean the TV lends itself to sports viewing.

And in terms of vibrancy and color, it does. In live matches, you often have parts of the pitch in shade and others in sun, and the QD7 can handle that. Where it struggled a bit was with fast movements, which tended to blur due to the set's 60Hz refresh rate. We switched on motion smoothing while testing, and this helped, though.

Sadly, Hisense installed Amazon's Fire TV software on the TV. It's slow, loaded with ads and hard to navigate. It's not the worst problem to have, but it's a shame since international versions have Google TV installed, which is a lot better. But if you can get over that hurdle, the Hisense QD7 is easily the best budget TV right now.

• Read our full Hisense QD7 review

Best budget gaming TV

I know this guide is all about budget TVs, but when we're talking about products that can reach several thousand of dollars, many of the best TVs under $1,000 also generally fall into this range, even though that's still on the pricier side. But the $700 Hisense U75QG (we've found one for as low as $579!) really works hard for your money, especially its impressive gaming features.

Budget TVs are generally getting better for gaming, but it's still rare to find something as well-equipped as the U75QG. There are four HDMI 2.1 ports, which improve bandwidth for console gaming, and this set even has a 165Hz refresh rate, comfortably above the 120Hz needed for consoles, making it an excellent choice for PC gaming.

We tested it with a PS5, playing Armored Core 6 and Silent Hill f. It was on fast-paced Armored Core 6 that the TV really excelled, as the 9.6ms input latency came close to the performance you'd find on the (much more expensive) best OLED TVs. Meanwhile, Silent Hill f looked fantastic, thanks to the TV's handling of colors and contrast.

Quite literally, this TV outshines the competition, as it is more than four times brighter in SDR than the Hisense QD7 and almost three and a half times brighter than the Hisense U65QF in HDR. Not that those TVs aren't bright; it's just that the U75QG punches well above what you'd expect at this price.

These brightness levels mean that it's the best budget TV for brighter or sunlit spaces too. The only thing we found was that there was a bit of glare in direct light, which isn't necessarily an issue, but might make you consider where in your room you want to place the TV or if there's a way to keep it out of the sun.

The colors look great too. We had a fun time watching the cartoonish chaos in “The Super Mario Bros Movie," and although it's mostly known for its bleak dystopian view of the future, the colorful elements of "Blade Runner 2049" really stood out too. And, incredibly, we could pick out details in the all-consuming darkness of "The Batman."

• Read our full Hisense U75QG review

Best budget 55-inch TV

If you're working on a budget, one of the best ways to keep the cost down is to choose a smaller TV. Before you go for the smallest and lowest-priced option, you should take a look at how to pick the right TV size. If you happen to land on a 55-inch model, then the Hisense U65QF is going to be the best budget TV for you.

Like the Hisense QD7, this model is also under $500, and we felt it lands the right balance of features, performance and price. Not least of all because it comes with a 144Hz refresh rate and two HDMI 2.1 ports, making it a fantastic pick for gamers or if you want to watch live sports over the summer without breaking the bank.

The refresh rate is particularly interesting at this price, as we found that you don't get the slight blurring during fast-paced scenes or action that you find on the Hisense QD7. And unless you play PC games, it's a better value option for gamers than the U75QG, as consoles can only output at 120Hz anyway, so 144Hz is plenty.

So when we used the TV to play Indiana Jones and The Great Circle with the set's Auto Low-Latency Mode (ALLM) enabled, which turns off any of the TV's resource-heavy features to reduce lag, it was like gaming on a much more expensive TV.

Like with the QD7, the only real downside to the set is Amazon's Fire TV software. It's our least-favorite TV operating system, as it's slow, hard to navigate and filled with ads. But once you have your favorite streaming apps installed, you won't need to use it much, thankfully.

• Read our full Hisense U65QF review

Best budget TV for sports

When a match is on, there's nothing better than watching every goal, basket, throw, swing, hit and more in stunningly sharp detail with a flood of color. That's exactly what the Hisense U6SF Pro delivers, all for well under $700 even for a sizeable 55-inch Mini-LED TV. Sports fans on a budget, this one's for you.

Everything from glossy dramas to live sports looks vibrant and clear, and the built-in 2.1-channel, 40-watt speaker system (with subwoofer) adds a heft that's mighty impressive for a TV that costs this much.

Picture quality is where the U6SF Pro really earns its spot. The Mini-LED panel produces vibrant colors and impressive contrast, backed up by low lab-measured color accuracy and a wide color gamut range. In everyday viewing, this translates to rich, lifelike images whether we're catching up on NFL highlights or watching the latest Premier League matches.

This also stays punchy in a bright living room, which makes it ideal for those mid-day games. We measured an HDR peak brightness of 1,265 nits, so highlights pop even during daytime viewing, and the anti-glare screen coating genuinely keeps glare from washing out the picture. So, no need to pull the curtains just to see what’s happening on screen.

For sports and gaming, the U6SF Pro’s native 144Hz refresh rate means fast action stays smooth. A key feature specifically for sports, though? The U6SF Pro boasts an AI Sports Mode, which, for example, highlights a pitch and jersey colors in soccer, and even cranks up the noise from crowds and drowns out commentary (if that's what you want). In our testing, it made it easier to track players with no motion blur, and there was no oversaturation either.

If you’re willing to accept a bit of blooming in dark scenes (light from bright objects spilling over) and don’t mind basic Fire TV software, the Hisense U6SF Pro is a fantastic, low-cost pick for sports fans.

• Read our full Hisense U6SF Pro review

Best budget 43-inch TV

Don't need a massive TV screen but still want those flagship-level features without paying a fortune? The Sony Bravia 3 II is our top pick as the best budget TV for its size, especially since you can pick it up for under $600 at 43 inches (and only $100 more for every size up, ranging from 43 to 100 inches).

Essentially, the Bravia 3 II is a massive step up from the original Bravia 3, and you're getting premium performance without emptying your wallet. Out of the box, we measured impressive color accuracy and coverage across the board, meaning colors look lifelike and balanced, not muddy like on similarly priced TVs in this range. That played out in our movie testing: in the opening scenes of "Project Hail Mary," the Bravia 3 II managed both deep shadowy moments and sparkling highlights, keeping skin tones looking natural and metallic details crisp, even in tricky lighting.

Cartoons and live sports look just as good. Spongebob’s yellow was so vibrant, our TV expert, Arif, honestly hadn’t seen it pop like that before, not even on some OLEDs. Blues and reds came alive in the Krusty Krab’s kitchen, and the overall effect was a picture that felt vivid without ever crossing into oversaturated colors.

This is a "Sony" TV, after all, so the Bravia 3 II won’t hold you back when it comes to gaming. In Game Mode, we measured low input lag at 9.8ms, and with four HDMI 2.1 ports delivering 4K at 120Hz, you’ll have plenty of bandwidth for modern consoles or a gaming PC. This also means you can leave a streaming box, soundbar and your favorite console all plugged in at once.

The day-to-day experience is smooth as well, thanks to Google TV. However, audio is not its strong point, so you'll want to invest in one of the best soundbars to make the most of this screen. Plus, this is still an LED TV, so it struggles to bring much depth when it comes to darker scenes or colors (blacks can look more dark grayish

But if you want a smaller-sized TV that nails the basics, with great picture and a premium feel for the money, the Sony Bravia 3 II is the smartest buy for most people.

• Read our full Sony Bravia 3 II review

Also tested

How to choose the best budget TVs

The first thing I'd say when you're looking for the best budget TVs is not to focus solely on price. Of course, it's totally reasonable to keep the cost of the TV in mind, but I recommend keeping some other factors and considerations close at hand, too.

The first decision you should make is what size TV you really need, using our guide on how to choose the perfect TV size for your room. I wouldn't drop down below what you need, but you can save money by only paying for the size that works for your space.

I generally recommend 65-inch models, as that's the most popular size and is usually what we test. But the 55, 50 and 43-inch models often give similar performance for less. The only real difference as you drop down is often that they're not as bright since the pixels are closer together and get lower power to avoid overheating.

Lots of TVs get released every year with the latest features and improved specs, but each annual upgrade is incremental, and last year's models are very similar performance-wise but often at much lower prices. So you can get more for your money by not buying the latest TVs.

Then you want to think about what you actually want to use the TV for. If you'll be putting it in a bright space, then you need a set that'll be able to handle that without getting washed out or too much glare. Or maybe brightness isn't that important to you if you want to watch late at night in a cosy room.

But in that scenario, the quality and vibrancy of the color might override everything else. Those aspects are helpful for gamers too, especially if paired with a higher refresh rate and HDMI 2.1 ports so you can plug in your console or gaming PC. Vivid colors, good contrast and a high refresh rate are also crucial for sports viewing, too.

How we test the best budget TVs

When we start testing the best budget TVs, what we really want to know is whether each set is worth your money and represents good value with the right mix of performance and features. So we split our testing into two parts: detailed lab measurements to gather performance data and real-world testing.

You can read more about how we test TVs in the lab, but the short version is that we take a bunch of industry-standard tools and use them to measure color output, brightness and lag. This objective data makes it easier to compare TVs when every room and set of eyes might judge things in a more subjective way.

Plus, we use it to inform our recommendations when suggesting specific models for gaming, sports or particularly bright spaces. But the data is just one part of the puzzle, as it's just as important what the actual experience of using the TV in the same way that you would at home feels like.

So, we set them up in the usual way and watch things on them. We spend time with the software, apps and different settings and picture modes. We play games, plug in consoles and connect gaming PCs. And we sit back and cast a critical eye over the colors in vivid movies and the darker blacks in shadowy TV shows.

To be completely open and honest with you, this guide is very similar to our best phones guide. After all, most phones are available contract-free. But it's still worth noting the best unlocked phones you can buy today. We're particular fans of the Pixel 10 and the iPhone 17 if you're looking for something premium, and we love the Motorola Moto G (2026) if you want something cheaper.

The most important thing is to look for an unlocked phone that supports all networks rather than just a few — otherwise you won't be able to swap out for the best-priced plan later on down the line.

The best unlocked phones you can buy today

Best unlocked phone overall

Google's Pixel 10 is the best unlocked phone you can buy. Not only is it sold by many wireless carriers and through Google directly as an unlocked model, but it also has support for many LTE and 5G bands — including 5G mmWave + Sub 6GHz Model GLBW0.

Google switched to all eSIM with the Pixel 10, but the phone offers dual eSIM support that allows for two active eSIMs and it can store up to 8 eSIMs. Beyond that, the Pixel 10 also sets the benchmark for nearly every other phone in the $799 price range large thanks to its triple camera setup, super bright screen, and AI features.

Those AI tools make the Pixel 10 more versatile, with features like Magic Cue and Voice Translation using AI in a practical way. The Pixel 10 has a proper telephoto camera with 5x optical zoom, while new AI-editing features like Camera Coach, Ask Photos, and Auto Best Take will up your photography game.

• Read our full Google Pixel 10 review

Best budget unlocked phone

After the 2025 version of the Moto G impressed for delivering long battery life in a surprisingly attractive package that didn't break the bank, the Moto G (2026) is here to knock its predecessor off its perch as the unlocked phone to get when you don't want to spend more than $200.

Make no mistake — you have to make some trade-offs to get that price, especially since the 2026 model makes few changes from last year's version. That includes a disappointingly dim display, which isn't always easy to see in bright sunlight.

But the Moto G (2026) improves in some key areas, like battery life. With a slightly larger battery than its predecessor, the new Moto G lasted more than 19 hours on our battery test — the best time we've recorded for a budget device.

And our reviewer noted that the upgraded selfie cam on the Moto G (2026) captures more detail than before, as the camera setup on this budget phone continues to punch above its weight by producing better photos than you might expect from a low-cost device.

• Read our full Moto G (2026) review

Best unlocked iPhone

The iPhone 17 is the middle of the 2025 range; not the cheapest, not the most expensive, but easily the best cost-to-features ratio of the lineup. It comes with upgrades that make it feel awfully like the iPhone 17 Pro.

For starters, it's the best unlocked iPhone because of the amount of cellular bands it supports — with eSIM-only models giving more room for the battery. Beyond that, Apple upgrades the display in two major ways.

The first being that it's now a larger 6.3-inch OLED, up from the previous 6.1-inch one, while also reducing the bezels around. The second, and more important upgrade, is that it now finally has a 120Hz refresh rate. This makes the screen look way more fluid than ever before.

Other iPhone 17 upgrades include 256GB of starting storage, up from the previous 128GB. There's also the upgraded 48MP ultrawide camera and new 18MP Center Stage camera that makes snapping a breeze no matter if the phone's held in portrait or vertical.

And finally, there's the awesome power of the new A19 chip. It makes it handle graphically intensive titles a breeze. The best part of all of this? Apple keeps this model's price at $799, which goes back six generations now starting with the iPhone 12.

• Read our full iPhone 17 review

Best budget unlocked iPhone

The iPhone 17e is now the cheapest way into Apple's world, and doubles the starting storage to 256GB over previous entry models. That makes it especially appealing if you're after the iOS experience but want to avoid monthly carrier plans or paying premium prices up front.

With the same A19 chip as the standard iPhone 17 under the hood, we found the 17e handled everyday tasks and demanding apps with ease. Its single 48MP Fusion rear camera delivers sharp photos with 2x optical-quality zoom — so you can confidently capture memories without stretching your budget.

Still, you do give up a few luxuries compared to pricier iPhones. The iPhone 17e is more budget-friendly than the iPhone 17, but it lacks the 120Hz refresh rate and dual camera setup of its sibling. That trade-off makes sense if your main goal is to own a new iPhone outright without overspending.

If you're buying unlocked to stay flexible, the 17e remains one of the most future-proof options at this price — especially given its improved storage and up-to-date hardware.

• Read our full iPhone 17e review

Best budget unlocked Android phone

The Pixel 10a stands out as the best value in unlocked Android phones, holding its price at $499 while remaining a phone that feels more expensive than that.

Battery life is a clear highlight: we measured 15 hours and 16 minutes in our battery drain test, and after a week of hands-on use, our lead tester still had around 15% charge left at the end of most days. If you want a phone that won’t leave you hunting for a charger before bedtime, the 10a delivers. Charging is effective too, with a 64% refill only 30 mins of plugged-in time away.

You’re getting a 48MP main camera and 13MP ultrawide camera combination like last year’s Pixel 9a, and even the same Tensor G4 chipset.

But the new Google AI features help to keep the phone feeling modern and capable, even if camera upgrades are incremental rather than revolutionary. Plus, image quality and video stabilization both punch above typical mid-range expectations.

Compared to the pricier Pixel 10, you lose out on advanced camera options and dual eSIM support, but for most value-focused buyers, these are easy trade-offs. If you want the best real-world Android for the money and are happy with a classic, reliable design, the Pixel 10a is the safe pick.

• Read our full Google Pixel 10a review

How we test unlocked phones

In order for a smartphone to make our best phone list, it needs to excel on several tests that we run on every handset. We perform some of these tests in our labs and some in the real world.

When it comes to performance, we rely on such synthetic benchmarks as Geekbench 5 and 3DMark to measure graphics performance. These tests allow us to compare performance across iPhones and Android devices.

We also run a real-world video transcoding test on each phone using the Adobe Premiere Rush app and time the result. (We unfortunately have to skip this test on some phones due to app compatibility issues, but we attempt this benchmark with each device we get in to review.)

To measure the quality of a phone's display, we perform lab tests to determine the brightness of the panel (in nits), as well as how colorful each screen is (DCI-P3 color gamut). In these cases, higher numbers are better. We also measure color accuracy of each panel with a Delta-E rating, where lower numbers are better and score of 0 is perfect.

One of the most important tests we run is the Tom's Guide battery test. We run a web surfing test over 5G (or 4G if the phone doesn't have 5G support) at 150 nits of screen brightness until the battery gives out. In general, a phone that lasts 10 hours or more is good, and anything above 11 hours makes our list of the best phone battery life.

Last but not least, we take the best phones out in the field to take photos outdoors, indoors and at night in low light to see how they perform versus their closest competitors. We take shots of landscapes, food, portraits and more, and also allow you to be the judge with side-by-side comparisons in our reviews.

How to choose the best unlocked phone for you

• Find a phone that works on your carrier: The vast majority of unlocked devices operate on GSM networks in the U.S. These include AT&T and T-Mobile, as well as discount carriers that run on those networks, such as Cricket Wireless, Metro by T-Mobile and Straight Talk.
• Make sure the coverage map fits your needs: In terms of coverage area, there's less discrepancy between networks than ever before, but there are still gaps, especially in less-populated areas. "Make sure [the phone you're buying] works on a carrier that offers good coverage in your area," advised Avi Greengart, research director for consumer platforms and devices at market research firm Current Analysis.
• Shop around, and don't be afraid to go used: Because some unlocked phone makers skip the carriers to sell their devices, they can often pass those savings onto you. However, don't be afraid to entertain buying a used or refurbished device, which can be just as capable as a brand-new device but without the premium of being box-fresh.

Finding the best mix of these traits in a well-priced laptop is hard, but that's where we — reviewing hundreds of laptops to help point you in the right direction — and you come in, helping us know what engineering students need in a laptop with your expert advice. The good news? There are plenty of machines that will match what you're looking for as an engineering student.

Whether it be the highly customizable Framework Laptop 16, our top pick with its upgradeable design and plenty of horsepower, or a more value-focused option like the HP HyperX Omen 15, boasting an OLED display and packing enough performance to run through workloads, you'll find a laptop an engineer can make the most of. For your next machine made for engineering work, our pick of the best laptops for engineering students will do just the trick.

The best overall laptop for engineering students

Being able to upgrade and configure a laptop as you see fit is a huge advantage for engineering students, as you can adjust your budget and upgrade down the line. That's why the Framework Laptop 16 is our top recommendation for most, as it keeps pace with demanding coursework while still being practical to carry across campus.

It's one of the only laptops around that makes repairability and upgradeability easy. And you can get some serious engineering muscle under the hood: up to an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor, with the flexibility to add either an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 laptop GPU or an AMD Radeon RX 7700S (depending on your workflow for 3D work). I'm a huge fan that RAM is user-configurable depending on your DIY configuration — meaning you can start small and upgrade as projects (and memory requirements) scale up.

Another big draw here is its 16-inch, 165Hz display, offering ample space for CAD models, technical diagrams and multi-window multitasking, all in a size that strikes the right balance between desk space and backpack-friendliness. Brightness isn't the best, but in a classroom, technical drawings or color renders will offer up plenty of visual detail.

On the downside, the customizable keyboard deck can be a tad wobbly, seeing as it's a module that can be shifted around to wherever you want on the deck. Not a dealbreaker, but worth noting if you’re picky about build quality. Thermal performance and battery life are fine (just over eight hours to get through a day of classes), but not best-in-class. Still, for most engineering students who need power, flexibility and a big display in one package, this is the laptop I’d reach for.

• Read our full Framework Laptop 16 review

The best laptop for value for engineering students

If value is your top priority, the HyperX Omen 15 delivers serious real-world performance without the premium price tag. Well, when it's at the right price. The RAM crisis isn't making laptops any cheaper, but seeing as we've found this laptop starting at just over $1,000 and bringing plenty of power, this can go a long way for engineering work.

For a taste of its power, we measured 79 fps in Forza Horizon 6 (Extreme, 1080p), backed by an Intel Core Ultra 9 386H and RTX 5070. These are numbers that translate directly to smooth CAD, simulation and rendering workflows for engineering students who need dependable horsepower on a budget.

In our hands-on time, the laptop’s vibrant OLED made anything on screen look livelier than ever. For complex modeling or data analysis, this combination of memory and graphical muscle puts it comfortably ahead of most midrange Windows options at this price.

That said, there are trade-offs for the value. The Omen 15’s striking OLED display and power can drain that battery, as we saw it last for 8 hours and 30 minutes in testing. Plus, with fans peaking at 74 decibels during gaming, you should expect some noise when running simulations or rendering under load.

If your campus day involves lots of unplugged work or quiet study sessions, keep a charger and headphones on hand. Otherwise, for most cost-conscious engineering students, this is the best-value machine for balancing performance and budget. Just make sure to grab it when prices dip.

• Read our full HP HyperX Omen 15 review

The best premium laptop for engineering students

Let's get the obvious out of the way: The Razer Blade 16 (2026) is one pricey laptop, especially at its highest configuration with an Intel Core Ultra 9 358H chipset, RTX 5090 and 64GB of RAM. But this kind of power packed in an incredibly sleek, premium design goes a long way for engineering software, and it's a laptop that's fit to last you throughout your studies and beyond.

While it's primarily made for gaming, this machine is purpose-built for sustained, heavy-duty workloads, making it an ideal digital companion for complex CAD, simulation or rendering tasks. In our hands-on testing, the Blade 16 delivered consistently high frame rates in AAA games with settings cranked up, and that reflects how well it can push through GPU-intensive rendering tasks for engineering work.

It's all made better with the laptop's vivid 16-inch (2560 x 1600) OLED panel. This vibrant, color-accurate display makes it a strong fit for CAD work, so students who rely on visual clarity for technical drawings or 3D modeling will get a kick out of what this screen can show off.

Aside from its price, there is a trade-off for this strong performance in a thin, compact machine. Under heavy workloads, our reviewer, Tony Polanco, noticed the Blade 16 can run hot, and the fan noise ramps up. If you're taking this to class, keep in mind that it can get loud.

If you're looking to keep costs low, the Blade 16 comes in a wide range of configurations, starting from an RTX 5060 (although this can still set you back upwards of $2,000). Regardless, if your priority is maximum performance and all-day productivity (battery life lasts nearly 13 hours, which is surprising for a gaming laptop), the Razer Blade 16 has you covered.

• Read our full Razer Blade 16 (2026) review

The best MacBook for engineering students

Let's just have a look at our benchmarks for the 16-inch MacBook Pro M5 Pro: a 4,306 single-core and 28,586 multi-core result on Geekbench, transcoding a 4K video to 1080p in 1:45 seconds and a PugetBench score of over 15,000 for Photoshop. If these numbers don't mean much, just know that it outperforms the strongest offerings in laptops to date.

The MacBook Pro with Apple's M5 Pro chip is an insanely powerful laptop, with its 18-core CPU, 20-core GPU and up to 64GB of RAM. That means running programs for simulation and analysis will be a cinch, and AutoCAD can be used to easily power through drafting, design and modeling more than ever.

This is the MacBook Pro you'd be familiar with, and the 16-inch model boasts a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR (3456 x 2234) display with a 120Hz refresh rate, along with that sleek, portable and premium design. Again, since this runs macOS, be sure to check whether the engineering apps you require are Windows-only before you buy.

Now, we will say the base MacBook Pro M5 is still a mighty pick, as it impressively catches up to the M4 Pro! It's more affordable, but don't expect the multitasking prowess of the M5 Pro with nearly double the CPU and GPU cores, and more base unified memory. That's all based on the number of engineering-based tasks you need the laptop to handle, but regardless, for the ultimate performance, the MacBook Pro M5 Pro 16-inch is your best bet.

Apple has officially raised the price of its MacBook lineup, meaning the MacBook Pro M5 Pro is now far more expensive. Originally $2,199/£2,199, it now costs $2,499/£2,499, which is a $300/£300 price hike. While we still recommend it as one of the most powerful machines for engineering work, it's quite a pricey purchase. If you're looking to save, the MacBook Pro with M5 is still a good option (unfortunately, that has also seen a $300 price increase, though).

• Read our full MacBook Pro M5 Pro 16-inch review

The best Windows laptop for engineering students

The Dell XPS 14 is like the company's apology for trying to cut its long-favored XPS lineup, and with its speedy Intel Panther Lake performance, premium design and absolutely stunning 14-inch 2.8K (2880 x 1800) OLED touch display, we accept that "apology."

There are multiple configurations the XPS 14 comes in, but for top-tier power to manage your workflow for demanding engineering work, the higher-end model is well worth the investment. Sporting an Intel Core Ultra X7 358H, which comes with very impressive integrated graphics good enough to play the latest PC games with a boost from Intel XeSS frame generation and upscaling, and 32GB of RAM, this laptop is a beast at handling heavy workloads.

All that power is wrapped up in a compact, 14-inch design that's practical as it is lightweight (just three pounds) and sleek, and its OLED touchscreen will make those 3D engineering projects shine on display and easy to interact with.

It's a steep price at $2,199, so we recommend keeping an eye out for discounts (Dell has sales frequently). And there are lower-priced configurations if you're after more affordable power. Plus, without OLED, this laptop's battery life can last over 20 hours, which is always a nice perk for a day of classes! The Dell XPS 14 is Windows at its finest. After a bigger screen? The Dell XPS 16 (2026) is equally impressive.

• Read our full Dell XPS 14 (2026) review

The best compact laptop for engineering students

You'll regularly find the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 at the top of our list of best gaming laptops, and the latest model sporting an RTX 50-series GPU is no different. Not only does its power under the hood make it an ideal choice for engineering students, but it's also wonderfully portable.

Along with its AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 CPU and the 64GB of RAM that came with our review unit, the Zephyrus G14 can chew through transcoding a 4K video down to 1080p in under 3 minutes, multiple Chrome tabs and apps, and play demanding games at 120 FPS and more.

Being just 3.5 pounds, it's a great laptop to take around to class and blast through research or work. One problem is its battery life, which can last around 5-6 hours for daily tasks. That may decrease when using demanding, engineering-focused apps, so it's worth taking its power brick with you for a quick charge between classes.

Regardless, as a laptop that offers all the key elements an engineering student needs (and for a long while to come), it's hard to go wrong with the Zephyrus G14. Oh, and its 14-inch (2880 x 1800) OLED display? It's a beauty.

• Read our full Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2025) review

The best 2-in-1 laptop for engineering students

At first glance, the Asus ROG Flow Z13 might seem like an odd choice for engineering students — a tablet-style 2-in-1 without a dedicated GPU? But don’t be fooled by its slim Surface Pro-like design. After a month of testing, it proved to be a seriously capable mobile workstation.

The secret lies in AMD’s Ryzen AI Max 390 chip. Even as the lower-end variant, its integrated graphics deliver performance comparable to an RTX 4060 (without ray tracing), making it ideal for running CAD tools, 3D modeling software, and simulation platforms like SolidWorks, ANSYS, or MATLAB.

Because the APU shares memory with the system RAM, the 32GB model effectively gives the GPU up to 24GB of VRAM — far more than most mid-range dedicated GPUs. Upgrade to the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 with up to 128GB of RAM, and this machine can easily handle large datasets, FEA simulations, and demanding multitasking.

Battery life is another big win. With no power-hungry discrete GPU, the Flow Z13 delivers strong endurance for all-day use on campus. It's pricey at over $2,000, but if you're after serious power in an ultra-portable form factor, this could be the ideal laptop for engineering students who need both mobility and muscle.

• Read our full Asus ROG Flow Z13 review

Expert comments from you

To get up-to-date, real-world advice from current engineering students, we asked you (i.e., actual students) what you value most in a laptop made for engineering work.

From our poll, the two most important factors that stand out are RAM and compatibility with CAD and other software. But fast processing via a strong CPU and powerful graphics with a discrete GPU are also key in choosing a laptop fit for studies. As for storage? It's not a major consideration, as there are the best external SSDs if you're looking for more space, after all.

We also have advice from our forum, with commenter COLGeek saying a "discrete GPU is a must for a workstation-class laptop that is ideal for engineering students. The ability to easily upgrade memory, storage, etc is a major plus." You'll find many gaming laptops in this guide sport an RTX 50-series graphics card, like the HP HyperX Omen 15 and Razer Blade 16, but if you're looking for upgradeability, the Framework Laptop 16 has you covered.

Following this, COLGeek also brought up battery life in gaming laptops: "One thing I would not recommend (as a general recommendation) is a gaming laptop for an engineering student laptop. While they tend to have plenty of CPU and GPU horsepower, they generally have poor battery life.

"Battery life is definitely something student engineering laptop purchasers should consider. It is not always convenient to plug a laptop in while attending class."

That's especially true with the HP HyperX Omen 15 and Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 we recommend, with battery life dipping below six hours for both in our testing. However, for their price and power, if you do tend to keep your laptop closer to a charger and plug, these are options worth checking out.

As per commenter Faisalhillsmap, here's what to look out for:

"A balanced laptop is more important than just lots of RAM. I'd prioritize:

• A fast multi-core CPU
• A dedicated GPU (especially for CAD and simulations)
• 32GB RAM
• A 1TB SSD
• Good cooling
• Long battery life
• A comfortable keyboard and plenty of ports

"For most engineering students, CPU + GPU + 32GB RAM make the biggest difference."

Interestingly, Intel Panther Lake processors come with a new league of integrated graphics, with Intel Arc B390 bringing performance similar to Nvidia's entry-level GPUs. For 3D work, this is a great advantage, and the Dell XPS 14 demonstrates this well. Otherwise, if you are looking for plenty of RAM, the MacBook Pro and Asus ROG Flow Z13 can offer more than you could want to hit 32GB and beyond.

Have advice you want to share? Let us know in our forum!

Performance benchmarks compared

To help you get a better sense of which laptops perform better, I've included a table of all the results from these laptops in our CPU benchmark tests.

For these tests, we run the Geekbench single-core CPU and multi-core CPU tests and report the scores for each. By comparing these scores and seeing which is higher, you can get a general sense of which is more capable.

As you can see from the results below, the MacBook Pro M5 Pro is the clear performance leader on this list. However, even a more value-focused laptop like the HP HyperX Omen 15 can put up very decent numbers in terms of raw performance.

Best Laptops For Engineering Students Performance Results

Slide through to benchmark scores for
Geekbench single-core and multi-core

< Prev

Geekbench 6 (single-core)

Next >

MacBook Pro 16-inch (M5 Pro)

3646

Asus ROG Flow Z13 (AMD Ryzen AI Max 390)

2965

Razer Blade 16 2026 (Intel Core Ultra 9 358H)

2872

Dell XPS 14 2026 (Intel Core Ultra X7 358H)

2867

Framework Laptop 16 2025 (AMD Ryzen AI 7 350)

2878

Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2026 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370)

2929

Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10 (Intel Core Ultra 9 386H)

2857

01,0002,0003,0004,000

Geekbench 6 (single-core) Data

Product	Value
MacBook Pro 16-inch (M5 Pro)	3646
Asus ROG Flow Z13 (AMD Ryzen AI Max 390)	2965
Razer Blade 16 2026 (Intel Core Ultra 9 358H)	2872
Dell XPS 14 2026 (Intel Core Ultra X7 358H)	2867
Framework Laptop 16 2025 (AMD Ryzen AI 7 350)	2878
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2026 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370)	2929
Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10 (Intel Core Ultra 9 386H)	2857

MacBook Pro 16-inch (M5 Pro)

28586

Asus ROG Flow Z13 (AMD Ryzen AI Max 390)

18475

Razer Blade 16 2026 (Intel Core Ultra 9 358H)

16971

Dell XPS 14 2026 (Intel Core Ultra X7 358H)

16927

Framework Laptop 16 2025 (AMD Ryzen AI 7 350)

12453

Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2026 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370)

15280

Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10 (Intel Core Ultra 9 386H)

15916

07,50015,00022,50030,000

Geekbench 6 (multi-core) Data

Product	Value
MacBook Pro 16-inch (M5 Pro)	28586
Asus ROG Flow Z13 (AMD Ryzen AI Max 390)	18475
Razer Blade 16 2026 (Intel Core Ultra 9 358H)	16971
Dell XPS 14 2026 (Intel Core Ultra X7 358H)	16927
Framework Laptop 16 2025 (AMD Ryzen AI 7 350)	12453
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2026 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370)	15280
Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10 (Intel Core Ultra 9 386H)	15916

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Battery benchmarks compared

Battery life is a key concern for students since you don't want a laptop to die in the middle of class. With that in mind, we've collected all the results from our battery tests of these laptops to show you how long each lasts.

As you can see, the MacBook Pro M5 Pro is the current clear winner in terms of long battery life at over 21 hours. However, a fair number of laptops on this list will last you around 8 hours on a full charge, which should be enough to get you through a day of classes.

Unfortunately, as you can see from our testing, gaming laptops typically have terrible battery life, and no gaming laptop on this list (except for the Razer Blade 16) will actually last you through a full 8-hour day at school without plugging in.

Best Laptops For Engineering Students
Battery Life Test Results

In our battery test, we set the laptop's display to 150 nits of brightness and have it endlessly browse the web via Wi-Fi until it runs out of juice.

Battery life (hh:mm:ss)

MacBook Pro 16-inch

21:10:00

Dell XPS 16 2026

20:41:00

Razer Blade 16 2026

12:46:00

Asus ROG Flow Z13

10:14:00

Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10

08:30:00

Framework Laptop 16 2025

08:20:00

Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2025

05:45:00

07.51522.530

hours

Battery life (hh:mm:ss) Data

Product	Value
MacBook Pro 16-inch	21.166666666666668
Dell XPS 16 2026	20.683333333333334
Razer Blade 16 2026	12.766666666666667
Asus ROG Flow Z13	10.233333333333333
Lenovo Legion 5i Gen 10	8.5
Framework Laptop 16 2025	8.333333333333334
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2025	5.75

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Also tested

Many of the laptops we test can be fit for engineering students, especially if they come equipped with powerful specs under the hood. Our top recommendations will point you in the right direction of the machines worth putting in your shopping cart, but if you're after more options that are close to making the cut, check out all the other laptops worth your attention.

Best Laptops For Engineering: Frequently Asked Questions

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How we test laptops for engineering students

To find the best laptops for engineering students, we run every laptop through a series of benchmarks, along with real-world tests. From the results we get, and a general fell of using a laptop daily, we can see how good a laptop is for students.

In our testing, we measure the average brightness and color quality of each laptop's display using our in-house light meter and colorimeter. For general performance, we run our machines through tests that include Geekbench 6 (CPU performance), as well as machine learning performance via Geekbench AI tests — essential for the on-device AI tasks that some of these engineering apps require.

Plus, we run the graphics benchmark tests such as CrossMark and 3DMark. A strong GPU is needed for CAD work, and these are a great way to measure that.

For an in-depth look at how we test laptops, we've got you covered.

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