Nowadays, a laptop has become a part of the student’s body – laptops can be found everywhere in almost in all study majors. If you wish to pursue your career in the law, then the laptop can become your ultimate buddy helping you out with everything – whether it’s about taking notes or researching for the upcoming exams will be always with you.
Best Laptop for Law School Students
But here is good news you don’t need to spend a lot for an OK laptop. But if you are looking for the best one for your requirements and budget, there is only a handful of options that I can recommend.
In this article, I’ll cover everything that you need to know before choosing the best laptops for law school students: what are the crucial factors that you’ll need to consider, what needs to skip and what are my best recommendations for any law school student.
As usual, we will start with the important factors that you’ll need to keep in mind before purchasing the best laptops for law school students?
Storage
Which is the best storage option for law school laptops?
In my opinion, the SSD (Solid State Drive) is the most popular technology for the laptop storage. In the earlier days it was the most expensive one, but nowadays you can get an SSD drive even in the budget laptop. SSDs can dramatically cut down the booting and document searching time – in other words, your laptop speed becomes extremely faster. It is really a commendable evolution in terms of slow computing.
If you are living under the HDD rock and you are still not familiar with what is an SSD – I am going to break it with some upcoming words. SSD (Solid State Drive) is a different type of storage drive it is far better from the older HDD (Hard Disk Drive) technology – whether we talk about the reliability, performance or stability. SSDs don’t have any mechanical parts that’s why they are most reliable.
As I said in terms of overall speed there is a tremendous improvement as compared to the HDD and it can also evaporate some weight of the laptop. All of the modern and lightweight laptops have adopted this technology with enthusiasm.
Overall, getting an SSD over HDD is the best move to a computer performance that you could make.
There are numerous options are available to choose from, you can pick according to your requirement and budget. If you don’t want to spend much on your laptop then settle with any 128 GB or 256 GB SSD, these are sufficient in most of the cases until you’ll not want to store a large number of videos or music.
But do not get too much worry about laptop’s storage capacity. Unlike the processor or graphics chip, storage drives are easy to replace and upgrade, especially in the large laptops (15-17-inch). With smaller laptops, you need to be more cautious and try to get you preferred setup already built-in.
Laptop’s Weight
Weight is another important factor to consider before choosing the best laptops for law school students. Because lightweight laptops are easy to carry and manage.
A laptop’s weight heavily correlates with the laptop’s display size.
Weight, lbs (kg)
| Size | Min | Average | Max |
| 13-to-14-inch | 2.2 (1.0) | 3.0 (1.4) | 4.5 (2.0) |
| 15-inch | 3.9 (1.8) | 5.0 (2.3) | 7.5 (3.4) |
| 17-inch | 6.0 (2.7) | 7.5 (3.4) | 10.5 (4.8) |
As you can see the big screen laptop are higher in weight, but you can also see there can be 2x different between weights even in the same size group with exact same display dimensions. when picking a laptop make sure it should not cross the average weight line if possible, try to get a min weight laptop.
However, if the extra weight has increased due to the aluminum frame or body construction, then it’s not a big deal to buy a heavier laptop.
Processor
For Law school student, there is no need to go for the ultra-high-end processors like i7 H/HQ/HK or i9 processors. These processors are only necessary for the computer-intensive task (working with 3D modeling/audio/video) or gaming.
But I would not recommend going for an i3 processor too until you are not on the tight budget.
According to some law schools like DUKE LAW and Northwestern school of law: the minimum requirements for a laptop are the following.
- Processor: Intel Core i5 5th generation
- RAM: 8 GB of RAM
- Storage: 250 GB of SSD
- Network interface: Wi-Fi 802.11ac
- Display: Full HD (1920 x 1080), it is a personal preference.
- Operating System: Windows 10 Pro or Education, or Mac OS X10.13 with BootCamp or Windows 10 and virtual machine software.
As you can see, an Intel Core i5 processor is mostly recommended, and it pretty much sufficient also because law studies do not require a lot of powerful software. Of course, if you would like to go for the best laptop for law school – going with an Intel Core i7 machine is inevitable.
Recommendation laptop processor for law school students:
- Low-end (under $500): i3-5010U, i3-5020U, i3-6100U, i3-7100U, i3-7200U, i3-8130U
- Mid-range ($500 – $700): i5-5200U, i3-6200U, i5-7200U, i5-8250U
- Upper mid-range ($700 – $1,000): i5-6300HQ, i7-5500U, i7-6500U, i7-6567U
- High-end ($1,000+): i7-4720, i7-6700HQ, i7-4770HQ, i7-6820HK, i7-7700HQ, i9-8950HK
RAM
As we discussed the 8GB ram is pretty good for law school student, there are very few circumstances in which you need to go above. But we are talking about the best laptops for law schools, so I must have to touch on the 16 GB options.
If you prefer to do “Ctrl+click” while browsing just like me, it means you are also a browser tab maniac, it is that place where more RAM can come into play. In this case, do not expect laptop under $900 to come with 16GB as a standard. However, there are some custom notebooks that have that much memory even for $580 but that’s a rare condition in which you won’t get quality parts in other areas.
I hope you have gotten some idea to make your choice easier. But if you still want to have a laptop with 16 GB under $800 – make sure the laptop’s memory (RAM) is replaceable, always prefer the laptop with multiple RAM slots. This is usually can be found in any detailed specification sheet of the product that provided by the manufacturer. You can simply find them using google with adding some keywords (“specs”, “full specs”, “spec sheet”) followed by laptop model number: For Example – Acer Predator Helios 300 specs.
in my opinion, upgradability is very important because it has given my laptop s second life. I have also upgraded recently my laptop to 16 GB and it feels great to know I will never run out of RAM. According to the industry trends, I can say the smaller 13″ laptops have fewer chances of upgradability they are either limited to one or 2 RAM slots (2 slots will be the best scenario). And sometime in thinner frames, you probably won’t find the RAM upgrade option. For larger laptops, this is almost never an issue.
And finally, don’t get puzzled in the DDR3 and DDR4 – both RAM has spent a long time on the market. However, DDR4 is marginally faster with a longer latency time, but it doesn’t affect too much. Rather than, it’s good to focus on the important thing.
Battery Life
You have to make sure before choosing the laptop for law school that what is your priority – a heavy laptop with the great performance or a light and compact laptop with optimal battery life.
Heavier laptops (15 or 17-inch) could be beneficial for hard-core gamers but I don’t think you need a powerful gaming rig just because you’re usually like to play some older games or newer casual release like LEGO Marvel.
Screen Quality, Size, and Resolutions
However, it is a totally personal preference but for the best laptop for law school, you should definitely aware of the best display characteristics.
Panel type
IPS panel are the best choice for display, they provide great wide view angle, great contrast ratio, and vivid & accurate image quality. However, all IPS panels are not equal – but having one is a lot better than not. It is very easy to know whether a laptop has IPS or not. Most of the time it can be easily found on the sales page or any decent spec list.
Resolution
The resolution defines that how many pixels a display has in the vertical and horizontal direction and it is represented by the width x height. For example – a full HD (1920 x 1080) display has 1920 pixels in the width area and 1080 pixels in the height area. Therefore, as much higher the resolution the sharper the picture will be. Here is another thing – the display size also affects the sharpness of the display. It means: if two different size displays have the same resolution – then the smaller display will provide much sharpness because of more dense pixels.
Brightness
Brightness is another important specification which is very useful when using laptops outside.
Here are the important things that you need to follow.
- 400 nit – very rare can only be found in the brightest screens of premium laptops (Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme, Dell XPS 15 4K, Razer Blade Stealth 4K)
- 360 nit – Great brightness level
- 320 nit – Good Brightness level – found in the average MacBook
- 280 nit – Average, can be found in most of the laptops
- 240 nit – Poor quality
Contrast and Color Gamut
These specifications are not so important for the law school students. The contrast ratio is somewhat important only for the personal experience and color gamut can be ignored. The 100%sRGB color gamut can provide accurate and rich color quality, the photo, video, and games will look more pretty. It is highly necessary for the color sensitive tasks like photo editing, web designing, and 3d modeling. You don’t need to bother checking this info for your law school laptop.
Ports
- 3 USB ports are ideal, but for smaller laptop 2 ports have welcome. To get a better grasp of how many you’ll need – find out how many peripherals (if any) you are using now.
- The USB Type-C port is slowly becoming standard for the laptops along with many devices. It’s really a future-proof port and despite premium laptops, it can be found in some budget laptops
- HDMI or DisplayPort is essential
Additional Features
Dedicated graphics card only recommended for the gamers. Even for those, a mid-range Nvidia GTX 960M should be pretty enough in most of the cases. While 970M and 980M would be a great choice only if you want to play the latest release on the optimal graphics setting (also depends on resolution).
For the most part – law school is about writing, and for that, a backlit keyboard would be a nice addition. However, if you are a touch typist you won’t get much affected with or without it.
Personally, I like to work with a full-size keyboard which comes with the number pad (I have got used to it). However, it’s not a big deal to get a compact size keyboard but full size would be a tiny bit better.
Also read: Best laptop for typing work
Convertible laptops are ideal for those who don’t have a tablet and they use their laptop for watching movies. In my opinion, there is not any special use of a convertible laptop. One of my law studying mates uses it for watching YouTube while making food. Also, he did not find any use for it for studies.
Best Laptops for Law School Students Reviews
1. Acer Aspire E 15 (Most Affordable Laptop for Law school)
5.27 lbs | i3-8130U | HD 620 | 6GB | 1 TB HDD | 15.6-inch 1920 x 1080 | 13.5-hours | Win10
The Acer Aspire E 15 is the most affordable laptops for law school student in the current market that can fulfill your most of the computational needs without burning your bank account. Trust me, I have compared more than 140+ laptops and this one is the best value for money products. However, Chromebooks are even cheaper, but I would not recommend them for law school students over Windows or MAC OS X. ChromeOS is also good but it has a lack of functionality somewhere as compared to these major OS platforms.
On the other hand, if you go with some other brands like Lenovo or Dell then you might need to pay around $100 to get exactly these features. For example – Lenovo IdeaPad 330 and Dell Inspiron 3567 both are having some high price, but still, they lack display resolution and RAM.
Well, the Acer Aspire E 15 comes with the latest budget range processor Intel Core i3-8130U which is ideal for most of the situation, if you are a light user then it would be the best bat for you.
Despite cheap price, it is a full HD laptop, you can also use it for watching movies if you ever want to. Moreover, it offers 6 GB of RAM which is pretty good for browsing the internet and working with some text editing or office programs simultaneously.
Because it is a budget laptop, therefore you might not get the SSD support here, and laptops configurations also proving that. Though, 1 TB hard drive is not terrible either and allows you to store tons of files. But there is still a great thing despite HDD storage – the battery life, which is 13.5 hours on the standard browsing with Wi-Fi connection and really commendable.
Aesthetically, it might look traditional or ugly for some users, but in my opinion, this is a beautiful product in this aggressive price range.
Overall, the Acer Aspire E 15 is the cheapest laptop for law school students, which provide amazing some amazing features like good performance, full HD display, and great battery life.
If you are looking for the most basic laptop for law school then Acer Aspire E 15 is a great the laptop that you might like.
2. Lenovo Yoga 730 (Standard Laptop for Law School Students)
2.65 lbs | i5-8250U | UHD 620 | 8 GB | 256 GB SSD | 15.6-inch Touch 1920 x 1080 | 11-hours 30-min | Win10
If you are looking for something even better then so you have to slightly increase your budget too. And, you definitely deserve something superior for those extra bucks – here Lenovo Yoga 730 is the best pick for you.
The Lenovo Yoga 730 is a 360-degree convertible laptop which features a full HD 15.6-inch IPS panel. So, you can also use it as a tablet for numerous applications.
In terms of performance, I can say this – you will rarely find a laptop for this price that can beat this laptop. Why did I say that? This laptop is powered by Intel Core i5 8th generation processor (i5-8250U), and that is the best processor for the mid-price range. Also, the PCIe based 256 GB of storage works like a catalyst to ensure the optimal performance. The 8 GB of RAM is quite good for most of the law school’s applications including some multitasking capability.
When we talk about the design, this laptop looks so premium and amazing. Additionally, the fingerprint reader, backlit keyboard are some features that you won’t find in most of the mid-range laptops.
This display quality is just fantastic, it means you can use this display for some photo editing or designing task ideally. Also, it provides a wide view angle and great contrast ratio to ensure optimum picture quality.
The video calling is the most common use for the convertible laptop that’s why it offers a great quality inbuilt webcam and microphone.
Also read: best video calling laptop and tablet.
The Lenovo Yoga 730 is a balanced laptop for law school student which provides almost all features for the best price- whether we talk about the performance, usability, design or battery life.
If you don’t want to spend more on your laptop, trust me this is a perfect laptop for the law school students, except you haven’t planned to play games on your laptop.
Don’t worry, the upcoming laptop is going to fill the gamer’s need gap for sure.
3. Acer Predator Helios 300 (Powerful Performance for Gamers)
5.95 lbs | i7-7700HQ | GTX 1060 | 16GB | 256 GB SSD | 15.6-inch 1920 x 1080 | 7-hours | Win10
As I promised, the Acer Predator Helios 300 is the perfect laptop for those law students who also want to play games on their notebooks. Before talking about the feature, I want to tell you this laptop has been awarded as best-seller by Amazon a long ago. And definitely, that should be – if you will know about the feature, I bet you’ll need to say it too.
Well, this is not the most high-end laptop for gaming but there’ll be only some rare condition that can dominate this beast. This powerful machine can easily handle all of your law school needs, but the real question is that – how efficient is that to play games.
In terms of performance, this laptop offers an Intel Quad Core Processor with 16 GB of RAM and 256 GB SSD.
Here I want to clarify, the Intel i7-7700HQ processor is a very powerful processor with the 3.4 GHz of clock rate, so there will be a huge cut off in the battery life. But there is no compromise in the performance for your money that you paying for.
The dedicated graphics card is the main hero for the gaming laptop story – this laptop has a powerful Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 video card, and that has 6 GB of vRAM. So, you don’t need to worry about, it means, you can play most of the games on the full graphics setting without any lag.
Yes! you are right, I forgot to discuss the display. But there is nothing special here – a full HD IPS panel with 15.6 of size. However, you are getting some extra feature like Backlit keyboard, and a spare slot for your future hard disk upgrade.
Because for handling such high performance and gaming rig underneath, it has the metal chassis body with fantastic durability. If you’ll ever hold it your hand then you’ll realize what I am talking about.
Overall, the Acer Predator Helios 300 is the best laptop for those law school students who have hobbies to play games on the notebooks besides the work.
Also, keep in mind it is slightly heavier laptop with average battery life (These compromises are acceptable for such a great performance at the best price).
However, if you want the great battery and lightweight laptop without compromise in the performance then you can jump to Microsoft Surface Book 2 or Apple MacBook Pro 15.
4. Dell XPS9360-3591SLV (Good Performance with Rich Display)
2.7 lbs | i7-7500U | HD 620 | 8GB | 256 GB SSD | 13.3-inch 3200 x 1800 | 8-hours | Win10
The Dell XPS9360-3591SLV is popular for its great display quality and portability. It is a 13.3-inch laptop which offers higher resolution (3200 x 1800) than the Apple MacBook Pro 15, the display quality as much great that you might won’t believe. Moreover, it has a very lightweight – only 2.7lbs almost similar the LG Gram.
The best thing about this laptop is – it is available in two version i5 or i7, you can pick according to your budget and there’ll be not any difference in the display resolution.
This laptop is mostly liked by those law school students who watch a lot of streaming shows, videos or movies. Because it is a portable and rich display laptop – and what else does need for watching videos, you can take it everywhere with you. Also, don’t worry about the performance it can easily handle all of the tasks that you’ll need to do as a law student.
For specs seekers, this laptop has an Intel i7-7500U processor, 256 GB of SSD and 8 GB of memory. Moreover, in the connectivity department – It has 2x USB 3.0 ports, headset jack, SD card slot with most important ThunderBolt 3 port (which supports video, audio, data signal transmitting simultaneously with the power signal on the single cable).
The Dell XPS9360-3591SLV laptop could be a great choice for those law school students who watch a lot of videos and prefer portability. Besides 400nit bright and high-resolution display, this laptop provides commendable performance and the good battery life.
If you mostly prefer the display quality of the laptop then it could be the most considerable deal for this great price.
5. LG Gram (Longest Battery Life with Great Portability)
2.07 lbs | i5-8250U | UHD 620 | 8 GB | 256 GB SSD | 13.3-inch Touch 1920 x 1080 | 22.5-hours | Win10
The LG Gram is totally different species for the laptops. It is a very lightweight laptop and offers such a longest battery life that no one can achieve. According to the manufacturer, it can last up to 22.5-hours on the basis of MobileMark 2014 Standard. The top battery life and lighter body are the most crucial reason for considering this laptop for law school students.
It is the Tesla Model S 100D for the laptop that could last longer – If you use your laptop outside often then it would be the perfect pick for you.
Like previous Dell laptop, it also has the same 13.3-inch display but it is a touch display having full HD resolution. Moreover, it is having Intel Core i5-8250U processor with 256 GB SSD and 8 GB of RAM.
Despite portable and light body, it is a most durable laptop which offers carbon magnesium full metal body and has passed seven industry -standard to prove the military-grade durability.
Additionally, the USB Type-C, backlit keyboard are some expected features that should be in the premium laptop and it has.
Overall, The LG Gram is a premium and lightweight laptop for law school students that offers the most durable body, longest battery life, and great performance. If you are looking for something portable, powerful and reliable, please give me a favor – go for it.
However, if you are looking for even higher performance while maintaining portability then with the next laptop you can also take advantage of the convertible design.
6. HP Spectre x360 (Convertible Laptop with Great Performance)
3.28 lbs | i7-8550U | UHD 620 | 16 GB | 512 NVMe | 13.3-inch Touch | 1920 x 1080 | 16-hours 45-min | Win10
The HP Spectre x360 will be your choice indeed if you are looking for a portable convertible laptop which should deliver a great performance too. This laptop has a 13.3-inch touch IPS panel with full HD resolution. Because having a small screen size, this resolution is sufficient for amazing picture quality.
This laptop is having NVMe based 512 GB of SSD and 16 GB of RAM, this SSD technology makes it an expensive laptop. But it is one of the best laptops that offers top performance while maintaining the battery life. Moreover, under to hood, it has installed an Intel Core i7-8550U processor, which is a great processor and consumes less battery life with maintaining performance.
If you already familiar with the NVMe, you probably know – this technology it the fastest in the Solid-State Drives. And only found in the expensive laptop like this.
The convertible laptop with the stylus is very useful for taking notes on the go, that’s why these are liked by most students. Additionally, this portable notebook provides a great battery backup of 16-hours 45-min, your laptop can last a whole day.
Overall, the HP Spectre x360 is the most portable laptop for the law students which offers convertible design, high performance, great display, and long battery life.
Our upcoming two laptops are the ultimate choice for the law school student, they can handle the most computer-intensive task and high-end gaming easily even without notifying you. Read further to know more.
7. Microsoft Surface Book 2 (Overall Top Laptop for Windows User)
4.2 lbs | i7-8650U | GTX 1060 | 16 GB | 1TB NVMe | 15-inch Touch 3260×2160 | 17-hours | Win10 Pro
Finally, this is the laptop that I was talking about – the Microsoft Surface Book 2 is the best laptop for law school students. It is available in different variants (different display size, processor, storage and memory) you can pick according to your budget and requirements, but here I am talking about the most higher specs variants. Microsoft Surface 2 offers a latest 8th generation Intel Core i7-8650U processor, which is the top processor in the Ultra Low power range. Moreover, the 1 TB of NVMe storage and 16 GB of large memory could deliver extraordinary performance.
This version I am talking about has a 15-inch size display with the 3260×2160 pixels of resolution, which is just amazing – you can do everything with that whether web designing, photo edition or even gaming.
Gaming has reminded me about the GPU, it has Nvidia GTX 1060 dedicated graphics card with the 6 GB of vRAM. Yes! it is the same GPU which has been used in the Acer Predator Helios 300.
You may already know the Microsoft Surface Book 2 is a detachable laptop, it means it can be separated from the keyboard and could be used as the tablet. It is a really cool concept for portability – having the capability of ejecting keyboard according to the style of usage.
Overall the Microsoft Surface Book 2 is one of the best laptops for law school students that offers top performance, richest display quality, high-end gaming capability, portability, optimum battery life, and commendable durability.
But keep in mind it is the premium and expensive too, however, you can choose something lower configuration variant – I promise that would also be the best.
Yes! I can feel it, you might be wondering why there is no any laptop from Apple is listed for the law school. Don’t worry, here is a below for you.
8. Apple 15″ MacBook Pro (Overall Top Law Student Laptop)
4.02 lbs | I7-7820HQ | Radeon Pro 560 | 16GB| 512 GB SSD | 15-inch 2880×1800 | 10-hours | MAC OS X
The Apple 15″ MacBook Pro is the superior laptop among all whether we talk about the performance, display quality, durability or even portability.
Despite the 15-inch size, it is the lightest laptop of our rundown and provides maximum durability.
Behind the top performance, the Intel Core I7-7820HQ processor, 512 GB SSD and 16 GB of memory are responsible. And the Radeon Pro 560 – 4GB graphics cards has a brilliant capability to handle such a complicated graphics-intensive task like gaming.
If you have used any Mac machine before like me then you definitely aware of the quality and durability of them. Many MacBook users who have just used them for several years, they still want to use them longer. MacBook is really a big investment in the laptop but it’s worth it, you just don’t need to think about anything at least for 5 years.
If you have heard before this 15-inch MacBook Pro offer a Touch Bar and Touch ID, these features are very useful to increase productivity and making thing easier.
If you are not familiar with the Mac OS till yet, I want to tell you it is the most secure and easy to use and more polished OS compared to the Windows. If you one gets used to it, you likely won’t go anywhere.
Overall, the Apple 15 MacBook Pro is the best laptop for law school students it has everything that you need, just I don’t want to say more about it.
However, if you are a Windows user then you need to check out the previous best law laptop indeed.
Wrapping it up
Now, picking the best laptop for law school should not be hard for you. Hopefully, I have succeeded in clearing most of the doubt. But, still, you didn’t get it what are you looking for. Here is the quick summary for you.
First of all, if you are on the tight budget then there is no better option than the Acer Aspire E15 according to the current market flow. It can provide most of the essential features those you’ll need as a law student.
The second one is the Lenovo Yoga 730, this is also a budget laptop and it is capable to fulfill almost all of your law school need, plus it is a convertible laptop too. In most of the cases, you don’t even need to go above until you don’t have any special requirements like gaming capability, high-end display, longest battery life, extreme portability or lightest weight. If you need such any these special features then you need to pay more for it. How? let’s have a look for these other laptops with these special features.
The Acer Predator Helios 300 laptop is specially designed for decent gaming performance, also it can handle all of your educational need. But remember, this laptop is heavier and has a lack of battery life. While Dell XPS9360 is mean to deliver the richest display experience ever along with portability, good battery life, and lightweight design.
The LG Gram is the most unique laptop in terms of battery life – its battery is capable to juice up for 22.5-hours, which is unbelievable. Moreover, it also has a lighter body, military-grade durability, and nice portability.
The HP Spectre X360 could be understood as the most portable laptop of our list because it has a 13.3-inch display. Additionally, it can deliver high performance, with better battery life.
Lastly, the Microsoft Surface Book 2 and Apple 15 MacBook Pro are the best laptops for law school students in every aspect – whether we talk about the weight, performance, gaming capability, durability or display quality. Both have top quality internal hardware that can handle any critical task and process without any issue. But you have to decide between the Windows or Mac OS X, which one do you like the most.
Hopefully, till yet you have already found your ultimate buddy which is going to help you all your law studies sessions. Still, No! Please let me know in the comment below, how can I help you.
By the way, thank you very much for having your crucial time.
