HP is a brand that stands out because of its high-performance, outstanding design, and all-around build quality. HP is one of the oldest computer manufacturers known the world over.
However, something that isn’t known the world over is their ability to produce very good gaming systems. Most of the time, when you think about gaming laptops, the brands that come to mind are the likes of ASUS, ACER, and even Razer.
Most of the time, HP is seen as the best when it comes to producing business-class laptops, and while that might be true, they do still develop some really good laptops. In this article, I will be discussing some of the best HP laptops for gaming.
The Top Five Best HP Laptops for gaming
1. The HP Omen X 2S
Design
The HP Omen X 2s laptop has a dual-screen setup that allows you to both work and play seamlessly without having to take change between either. This was made possible by installing a 6” 1080p touch screen mounted above the keyboard, so you don’t have to miss a beat when gaming on twitch.
The overall build quality is superb, and it has a nice aluminium finish to it all while maintaining a solid overall ultra-thin and light build design as well as using that centre mount that makes the display has that cool monitor aesthetic. Keeping with the display, we find a nice 15.6” diagonal UHD IPS rated 60Hz, anti-glare, with up to 300nits max brightness. So, you know that the display would always give you the best images out there.
Performance
This is where the Omen X2s shines; it has an impressive 9th generation core i7 9750H processor while also pairing up with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Max-Q design all to bring you one of the most impressive gaming experiences out there, all while having Ray-tracing and particle effects on to give that immersive gaming experience.
Under our gaming tests, it ran through a respectable 64fps on Shadow of the Tomb Raider at very high settings capped at 1080p, and we got to hit 111fps at ultra-high settings on 1080p on Hitman 2.
These tests are good indicators for showcasing the laptop’s ability to handle some of the latest games out there. It has a 2TB NVME SSD and a 32GB DDR4 RAM, so clearly, there is an excess amount of storage space on the laptop, and you would be able to store as many games as you want.
You can get this laptop on Amazon for $2000, which is a good price and should even though it’s a bit on the high side; for what you are getting, I feel it’s completely worth it.
2. The HP Victus 16 Gaming Laptop
Design and Display
The Victus 16 is a solidly designed laptop, although it’s an all-plastic design. Which is not bad, but I would have liked it in aluminium, but hey, that’s just me.
The display is quite good; to be honest, it’s not spectacular, but it’s good. We are working with a 16.1” 1080p screen with a 144Hz panel and an IPS rating which all in all it’s not bad, and the model we have has a max brightness of 300nits, although you can get a lower specced model with 200nits.
Performance
The Victus 16 model we have has some good specs as it comes with an AMD RYZEN 5800 (8C/16T) processor and an NVIDIA RTX 3060 GPU, which is very impressive. Personally, I have always felt that AMD and NVIDIA always have the best combos between them as both companies’ GPUs and CPUs all work well together, and it shows.
Under our gaming benchmark tests, we got a solid average of 99fps on performance mode for Shadow of the Tomb Raider at 1080p on high settings. We also got an average of 51fps on Cyberpunk 2077 with high settings active, and it was also capped at 1080p, which is good enough for a single-player GPU-intensive game like this. We also were able to hit a respectable 74fps on Red Dead Redemption 2.
Also, it has a 512GB NVME M.2 SSD and a 16GB dual-channel DDR4 RAM. This model costs about $1200 on newegg.com, and we could get it for $1000 on Amazon.
3. The HP Pavilion 15T
The HP Pavilion 15T is a more budget-friendly option for gaming laptops on the market and at $700 on Amazon, what you are getting isn’t the worst package out there.
Display
It has a 15” screen with a 1080p resolution and a 144Hz panel. All of these are pretty standard when it comes to gaming and should be suitable for all your visual needs when you’re gaming. It’s not the greatest, but it gets the job done.
Performance
The HP Pavilion 15T has got a respectable core 15-7300HQ CPU and a solid NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 Max Q GPU which is not the greatest, but it’s not the worst, and it is by far better than the Iris Xe card. So, for games like Cyberpunk 2077, it won’t hold up as well, but for games like CSGO, we were able to get over 120fps, and on warzone, we were able to hit 60fps which is respectable but not competitive. While on Shadow of the Tomb Raider, we got a low 44fps which was not the best, but we somehow managed to get it going without any significant dips in frame rates. The memory is good with a suitable 32GB DDR4 RAM and a 1TB SSD.
4. The HP Omen 17t
The HP Omen 17t is a 17” gaming laptop and it’s got a few good things going for it.
Display
The HP Omen 17t has got a solid 17” FHD 1080p display, and it is not lacking in the refresh rates department as it can hit 144hz easily, which is good, especially for tactical and fast-paced shooters like CSGO and Rainbow Six Siege.
Performance
The HP Omen 17t has an intel core i7-11800 CPU and a solid NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, which is on a high scale made to give you an incredible gaming experience, and it shows. Under our gaming test, we were able to comfortably hit up to 111fps on the shadow of the Tomb Raider and we were also able to hit similar numbers on control and even surpass that on games like Doom Eternal and Call of Duty Warzone, for which we were able to hit a massive 130fps without even coming close to bottlenecking it.
Couple that with its solid 32GB RAM, and you have yourself a solid gaming machine, although I was a bit disappointed with its meagre 512 NVME SSD.
We were able to get this model for about $1700 on xoticpc.com, which is not cheap, but for what you are getting, this is clearly a superior machine.
5. The HP Omen 16z
Display
The HP Omen 16z has a 16’ screen with a 1080p resolution and a 144Hz panel. All of these are pretty standard when it comes to gaming and should be suitable for all your visual needs when you’re gaming, it’s not the greatest, but it gets the job done.
Performance
The HP Omen 16z is powered by AMD’s RYZEN 5 5600H processor and NVIDIAs GeForce GTX 1650 GPU, which is not the greatest, but it’s not the worst, and it is by far better than the Iris Xe card.
So for games like CSGO, we were able to get over 120fps, and on warzone, we were able to hit 60fps which is good but not for competitive shooters, and on Fortnite, we were able to hit upwards of 75fps, but it wasn’t stable until we took it to pro settings which scaled back the graphics and pushed the GPU and CPU to the max then we were able to hit a solid 90fps but then again that for Fortnite were some people can hit upward of 150fps.
While on Shadow of the Tomb Raider, we got a low 44fps which was not the best, but we somehow managed to get it going without any significant dips in frame rates. It costs about $1200 on amazon, but we were able to get a discount of $1099 in the HP store.
Conclusion
HP has a good catalogue of gaming Laptops; although their laptops aren’t the greatest, they are still quality laptops. HP has a wide range of gaming laptops going from high-end to mid-range and budget sets of laptops.
I feel HP still has some way to go to get the kind of name recognition that ASUS and ACER have, but I do believe HP isn’t too concerned with the gaming market because they have the know-how and financial clout to pull it off.
Image Gallery – Which HP Laptops Are Good for Gaming?
