Finding the best laptop for Photoshop requires a colour-accurate screen, enough processing power for heavy raster filters, plus ports for connecting cameras and external displays, and comfortable ergonomics for when you’re on the move.
A surprise new entry is the Apple MacBook Neo, which has topped this list because of its colourful combination of portability, power and price. The high-contrast panel ensures vivid imagery stays true to life. For users tackling heavy batch exports, the MacBook Pro 14-inch (M5) remains a powerful alternative. Its fanless, portable design democratises high-end performance for designers everywhere.
If your daily workflow leans more towards raw adjustments and complex catalogue organisation, you should also read our comprehensive round-up of the best laptops for photo editing.
Erlingur has personally tested and overseen the testing of more than 100 laptops, PCs and tablets over the last two and a half years. He has worked on extensive testing and benchmarking processes to ensure we are putting the laptops through tests that truly nail what creatives need to do their best graphic design work. His favourite laptop brand is ASUS because they push the envelope, and led the charge for OLED touchscreens on laptops.
The best MacBook for Photoshop
30-second review: The MacBook Neo is a game-changer: a fully fledged Mac for under $600/£600 that holds its own for everyday Photoshop work. Its A18 Pro chip runs macOS and Adobe's creative apps natively, with no compatibility quirks. For the tasks that define most Photoshop sessions (importing and cropping RAW files, colour correction, working across layers, running standard adjustments and filters) it performs confidently and without hesitation. Heavy neural filters and large-scale batch processing will expose the limits of the 8GB RAM and five-core GPU. But for photographers, students, and hobbyist editors who don't need to push the machine to its extremes, this is a fantastic choice.
Pricing: At $599/£599, with a 512GB storage option available for just $100/£100 more, it's the most affordable fully capable Mac Apple's ever made. Education pricing reduces it further still. For Photoshop users who have always wanted a Mac but balked at the price, this changes the conversation entirely.
Design and build: The Neo is built to exactly the same standards as Apple's premium MacBook lineup, with no meaningful evidence of corners cut. The compact 13-inch chassis weighs just 1.23kg, making it the lightest Mac laptop available, and it slips into a bag without a second thought. It comes in four colours – Citrus, Blush, Indigo, and Silver – with macOS thoughtfully matching its Finder windows and wallpaper to your chosen finish. The keyboard extends almost to the case edges and is pleasant to type on, with around 1mm of travel.
Performance: Photoshop and the wider Creative Cloud suite run natively here without any compatibility issues. In PugetBench for Photoshop, the Neo puts in a solid showing for its price tier; handling standard photo editing workflows, layer compositing, and everyday filter operations with ease. In Geekbench 6, single-core performance (3,519) sits comfortably ahead of most Intel-based laptops at this price, though it trails the pricier M-series MacBooks. Where it reaches its limits is GPU-heavy work: the five-core integrated graphics mean AI-powered Neural Filters and Generative Fill will run slower than on an M4 or M5 machine, and very large multi-layer composites may start to feel sluggish. For mainstream Photoshop use, though, it's pretty capable.
Display: The 13-inch IPS panel delivers 2408 x 1506 resolution at 450 nits brightness: genuinely comfortable for photo editing, with enough sharpness and clarity to assess detail confidently. At 79% P3 colour gamut coverage it falls short of the colour accuracy you'd get from the MacBook Air or Pro, which is worth noting for colour-critical retouching work. For general photo editing, the display is more than adequate; for professional colour grading, you may want to calibrate carefully or pair it with an external monitor.
Read more: Apple MacBook Neo review
"A Mac for just under $600/£600? The Neo is a much better prospect than previous budget attempts. It excels at being small, nippy, and lasting just about long enough to get everything done; and for most Photoshop users, it has more than enough power to be genuinely useful."
Best Windows laptop for Photoshop
30-second review: Our top pick for Windows users brings together high performance and versatility in a compact 13.3-inch package. Our reviewer found it runs Photoshop brilliantly, thanks to its powerful specs. In particular, the dedicated NPU (Neural Processing Unit) makes it ready for AI-enhanced features in creative apps.
Pricing: At around $1,999 / £1,999, the ASUS ProArt PX13 is very much a premium device. However, its combination of power, portability, and versatility may justify the cost for professional creatives.
Design and build: Despite its small size, the ProArt PX13 feels solidly built. The 2-in-1 design allows it to transform from a laptop to a tablet, making it versatile for different types of creative work. The included stylus enhances its usefulness for digital artists. Our reviewer noted that the ASUS Dial on the trackpad, while not as refined as physical dials on other models, is a welcome addition for adjusting brush sizes and other parameters in creative apps.
Performance: Equipped with AMD's latest Ryzen AI 9 processor and an NVIDIA RTX 4070 GPU, the ProArt PX13 handles Photoshop tasks with ease. Our reviewer found its performance comparable to, and sometimes exceeding, laptops with high-end Intel processors.
Display: The 13.3-inch OLED touchscreen offers excellent colour accuracy and coverage, with our reviewer measuring 100% sRGB, 96% Adobe RGB, and 97% P3 color gamuts. The 2880 x 1800 resolution ensures sharp image quality. However, the 60Hz refresh rate might disappoint; in which case, you may prefer the MacBook Pro 16-inch (M4, 2024) which offers 120Hz.
Read more: ASUS ProArt PX13 review
"ASUS ProArt PX13 is well built, comes with some of the latest chips for some excellent performance, has a fantastic OLED screen, clever 2-in-1 functionality, and manages to squeeze a respectable running time out of its battery."
Best powerful laptop for Photoshop
30-second review: The MacBook Pro 14 (M5, 2025) dominates our Photoshop performance benchmarks, delivering exceptional speed for professional photographers and retouchers. In PugetBench for Photoshop testing, the M5 chip achieved top-tier scores, particularly excelling in filter operations, layer compositing, and AI-powered features like Neural Filters and Generative Fill.
Price: At $1,599/£1,599, the MacBook Pro M5 sits at the premium end for Photoshop laptops. However, professional photographers will find the investment justified by exceptional performance and workflow efficiency gains. Adobe Creative Cloud subscribers often receive Apple promotional offers, whilst professional photographers may offset costs through business expenses.
Performance: The MacBook Pro M5 achieves exceptional results in our PugetBench for Photoshop benchmarks, ranking amongst the highest-scoring laptops we've tested. The 10-core CPU excels at filter operations, batch processing, and plugin rendering, whilst the GPU-accelerated Neural Accelerators transform AI-powered tool performance.
Design: The premium aluminium construction inspires confidence for professional use. At 1.55kg, it strikes an excellent balance—light enough for location shoots yet substantial enough to feel professional. The compact 14-inch footprint slips easily into camera bags alongside gear, making it ideal for photographers who edit on-location during commercial shoots or weddings.
Read more: MacBook Pro M5 review
"The MacBook Pro is the go-to laptop for creatives, and it remains that way in 2025. It’s a wonderful thing to use, and is unlikely to be beaten until the M5 Pro and Max versions appear."
The best value laptop for Photoshop
30-second review: The Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 is a great option for Photoshop users on a budget who still want a capable, versatile machine. You get a big, bright Mini-LED touchscreen with strong colour accuracy (99.2% DCI-P3), a sturdy 2-in-1 form factor, and enough CPU power to handle everyday photo-editing tasks comfortably. It lacks a discrete GPU, so it's not built for heavy 3D work, but for Photoshop, it hits a sweet spot between value and performance.
Pricing: The base Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 can be had for under $/£1,000, making it one of the most affordable options on this list. The 32GB RAM model with the Mini-LED screen comes in at around $1,399 / £1,299 and is the one we'd recommend for the best Photoshop experience.
Design and build: The build quality is excellent, as you'd expect from Dell. The chassis is rigid with no flex in the body or lid, which is crucial when you're flipping it into tent or tablet mode. The 360-degree hinge is sturdy yet smooth. It's not the lightest at 2.05kg, so frequent travellers should take note, but the solid construction and versatile form factor more than make up for it if you're mostly desk-based.
Performance: The Intel Core Ultra 7 258V processor delivers solid CPU performance that's on par with similarly priced Windows laptops. Photoshop performance is perfectly acceptable for everyday photo editing, and 32GB of RAM gives it extra headroom for multitasking. However, the integrated Intel Arc graphics mean GPU-heavy tasks like video editing and 3D rendering will be better handled elsewhere.
Display: The 16-inch Mini-LED screen is the star of the show. Our reviewer measured a peak brightness of 552 nits in HDR mode with 99.2% DCI-P3 colour coverage, making it more than capable for editing in Photoshop. The 2560 x 1600 resolution is sharp, and the touchscreen is responsive, adding a nice layer of versatility.
Read more: Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 review
"The Dell 16 Plus 2-in-1 is a versatile convertible laptop from this famously reliable computer giant. The big, bright touchscreen is equally great for photo-editing as it is for watching films, and you get a capable, big laptop for both work and play for under £/$1,000."
Best Photoshop laptop for portability
30-second review: As essential for mobile photographers as a lens hood and a LowePro backpack, the MacBook Air M5 is the gold standard for mobile photo editing, packing the power of Apple’s latest silicon in a wafer-thin and feather-light chassis. The Liquid Retina display offers the pro color representation required for serious color grading in Photoshop and Lightroom, while the silent, fanless design means you can edit in the wilderness without disturbing the wildlife.
Pricing: Starts at $1,099 / £1,099 for the 13-inch and $1,299 / £1,299 for the 15-inch. While 16GB of unified memory is standard, it's a good idea to upgrade to 24GB or 32GB of RAM if you regularly work with massive PSB files or hundreds of RAW image layers.
Design and build: The ultra-thin design is classic Apple—premium, rigid, and balanced; compact when packed away but expansive when in use. The finely tuned keyboard and large, highly accurate Force Touch trackpad make on-the-go editing possible without a mouse. Photographers should note the lack of an SD card slot (which remains exclusive to the Pro models), so you’ll need to connect wirelessly or pack a USB-C dongle in your camera bag.
Performance: Photoshop’s AI-powered features, such as Generative Fill, Neural Filters, and Object Selection, are where the M5's upgraded Neural Engine truly shines, processing complex requests in seconds. The GPU smoothly handles GPU-accelerated canvas panning and scrubbing effortlessly. The fanless design can induce thermal throttling, but you'd have to be absolutely punishing the machine to trigger it.
Display: A great screen is a must-have for on-the-go creative work, and the MacBook Air M5's Liquid Retina display is one of the best. With 500 nits of brightness and native support for the P3 wide colour gamut, the screen displays millions of vibrant, highly accurate colours straight out of the box. This pro colour fidelity ensures that photo editors can grade tones and retouch subtle details with absolute confidence, even when they're within feet of the North Pole.
Read more: Apple MacBook Air M5 13-inch review
"The MacBook Air is a low-end MacBook Pro in all but name. If the MacBook Pro seems like too much for your needs, the MacBook Air is compelling."
The best 2-in-1 laptop for Photoshop
30-second review: If you're looking for a tablet-laptop hybrid for Photoshop, the HP Omnibook X Flip 16 is a compelling choice. The 360-degree hinge is sturdy and smooth, and the large 16-inch touchscreen is a delight in tablet mode. It ships with a stylus, making it ideal for artists who want to draw and paint directly on screen. And the nearly 15-hour battery life means you can work all day without hunting for a power outlet.
Price: At around $1,179.99 / £1,049, the HP Omnibook X Flip 16 is competitively priced against its Dell, Lenovo, ASUS and Apple rivals. It's frequently discounted below $1,000 in the US too, making it an appealing budget-friendly 2-in-1 option.
Design: The HP Omnibook X Flip 16 transforms seamlessly from laptop to tent to tablet mode via its firm, well-engineered hinges. The aluminium chassis is sturdy with no flex, and at 1.88kg it's manageable for a 16-inch device. Port selection is solid, with Thunderbolt 4, HDMI 2.1, and multiple USBs. The included stylus is rechargeable via USB-C.
Performance: The Intel Core Ultra 7 256V processor with AI Boost NPU delivers decent everyday performance, placing it alongside similarly priced Windows laptops in our benchmarks. It handles Photoshop well enough for general photo editing and does particularly well with AI-assisted photo resizing tasks. However, without a discrete GPU, heavier creative workflows like video editing and 3D work will push its limits.
Display: The 16-inch IPS touchscreen is wonderfully responsive and a joy to use in tablet mode, particularly for drawing and painting apps. The 1920 x 1200 resolution is adequate, and brightness measured at 400 nits. However, the colour gamut is a weak point at just 62.5% sRGB coverage, which limits its usefulness for colour-critical professional work. For casual photo editing and digital art, it performs well.
Read more: HP Omnibook X Flip 16 review
"The HP Omnibook X Flip 16 is merely a decent laptop, but it's as a tablet where it becomes an attractive option. A really useful one that works well for those who love drawing, painting and artworking on one."
The best Photoshop laptop with a large screen
30-second review: Many people like a larger laptop screen for using Photoshop since it makes it easier to work across multiple panels and to see layers tabs. I've included 16-inch laptops on this list, such as the Asus Vivobook Pro 16, but there are larger devices still. A 17-inch laptop is generally the largest size available among devices aimed at Photoshop users. There aren't many to choose from, and this one easily tops the list.
Pricing: The Dell Precision 7780 isn't cheap. The base model costs £3,118.82 while storage upgrades are possible all the way from an extra 512GB for £155.22 up to 4TB for £989.82.
Design: This laptop's chassis is classic Dell; with a metallic finish to the outer and a dark grey plastic finish to the interior. In other words, it's well-designed but isn't going to be turning any heads. At 3.05 kg, it is also rather heavy and therefore not suitable for mobile working and better suited for desktop use. Also note that the trackpad is positioned off-centre, which may be annoying to some.
Performance: In our tests, the Dell Precision 7780 performed incredibly well on almost all fronts, thanks to its Intel Core i7-13850HX CPU, which has a 30 MB cache, 28 threads, and 20 cores (8P+12E) up to 5.3 GHz. All this means that it's certain to cope with the most demanding of Photoshop tasks, and should run everything quickly and smoothly too.
Battery: The battery life isn't very good at all. The 93 Wh battery only managed around three hours of creative work. For this reason, I wouldn't recommend this laptop if you need to be on the move a lot; it's best to think of it mainly as a desktop powerhouse.
Read more: Dell Precision 7780 review
"The 17.3-inch display is really the star of the show. It is huge and pretty much the largest screen you can get on any laptop. Creatives who don't have a dedicated monitor or want a laptop that can act as a secondary monitor will be more than pleased by the size."
The most versatile laptop for Photoshop
30-second review: This is a cleverly compact machine that transforms from a fairly standard-looking laptop into a twin-display productivity monster. The keyboard lifts off to reveal the second screen, which can be positioned vertically or side-by-side thanks to the built-in kickstand. In short, ASUS has made something quite unique here. Two 14-inch OLED touchscreens, stacked or spread depending on your mood, a detachable Bluetooth keyboard, and an Intel Core Ultra 9 chip; this thing is wild, wonderful, and actually useful.
Pricing: This kind of innovation doesn’t come cheap. At around £2,099/$1,799, the Zenbook Duo is a premium pick; but for some, it’s worth every penny. It’s rare to find a laptop that feels genuinely different and actually useful. If you regularly find yourself wishing for more screen space, you won’t regret it.
Design and build: It’s a bit heavier than you'd expect from a 14-inch laptop, but that’s the price of innovation. Build quality is solid, with a chiclet keyboard that’s surprisingly nice to type on despite its portable form factor. The whole thing feels impressively thought-through; the only real caveat is the lack of keyboard feet, which makes propping it at an angle a bit of a DIY affair. Still, if you’re coming from a dual-monitor setup and dread working on just one screen while away from your desk, this will feel like a breath of fresh air.
Performance: The Intel Core Ultra 9 285H inside is snappy, capable, and more than enough for your creative apps. Whether you’re working in Photoshop, multitasking across browser tabs and documents, or bouncing between Illustrator and After Effects, it keeps pace without complaint. However, the Achilles heel remains: no discrete GPU. The integrated Intel Arc graphics handle most 2D creative tasks just fine, but start throwing video editing, 3D rendering, or neural filters into the mix, and performance drops off. It’s not unusable — far from it — but power users may start to chafe at the limits.
Display: The dual-screen setup is the main event. Both OLED displays are gorgeous, with deep blacks, vibrant colours (98% DCI-P3), and a 2880 x 1800 resolution at 120Hz. They’re a bit reflective and prone to fingerprints, but the included stylus makes them ideal for sketching, painting, and note-taking. Windows still treats them as two separate screens with a physical gap between, so they don’t work like one big canvas. But that’s no bad thing — you can keep your tools or reference material on one and your main work on the other. It’s like having a portable desk setup in your bag.
Read more: Asus Zenbook Duo (2025) review.
"If your work needs regularly spill over onto a second monitor, then having an extra one you can take with you makes a whole lot of sense. You can always use it in standard laptop mode if you’re feeling shy."
Also tested
Some of the laptops we have reviewed come very close to beating out the laptops above when it comes to performance and fit for Photoshop. As you'll see from the linked reviews, they often score high in our tests. So here are some other great options, should you not find what you're looking for above...
How to choose a laptop for Photoshop
While Photoshop isn't the most demanding software available, it does require decent hardware to run efficiently. Start by focusing on the processor—both Intel and AMD CPUs are rated numerically, with higher numbers indicating better performance; the same goes for Apple's M1-M4 chips. At minimum, aim for a 9th generation Intel i5 or AMD Ryzen 5 3600, though newer generations will offer improved efficiency.
Memory is crucial for Photoshop performance. Though Adobe lists 8GB RAM as the minimum requirement, 16GB is recommended, especially for complex projects. A dedicated graphics card can also enhance some Photoshop operations if your budget allows.
Display quality is essential for accurate Photoshop work. Look for screens with 100% sRGB coverage and as much Adobe RGB coverage as possible. OLED displays typically provide superior contrast and deeper blacks, which can benefit photo editing. For storage, choose an SSD rather than a slower hard drive. Adobe recommends at least 100GB free space for Photoshop, but a 512GB SSD is ideal for most people.
Finally, consider how important portability is to you. Larger 15-inch displays provide more workspace for Photoshop's numerous panels, while 13-14 inch screens make the laptop smaller and easy to carry. If you primarily work at a desk, you might prefer a smaller laptop paired with an external monitor.
How we test laptops for Photoshop
When we test laptops for Photoshop, we first carry out a series of benchmark tests to measure the laptop's overall performance.
• Cinebench R23/2024 - this assesses the performance of a computer's CPU and GPU using real-world 3D rendering tasks
• Geekbench 5/6 - this tests the CPU's processing power, both by using a single core for a single task at a time as well as all the CPU's core to see its ability to multitask
• PCMark 10 - this test assesses a computer’s ability to run all everyday tasks from web browsing to digital content creation, testing app launch speeds, 3D rendering and even battery life
✅ We are solely focused on what creatives need
✅ Benchmark tests based on real workflows
✅ We consult actual designers and creative pros
✅ Over 100 laptops tested over 10,000 hours in the last two years
We also use a calibrator to test the display of the laptop, checking colour gamut, colour accuracy, brightness, contrast and uniformity. We also tests storage performance and assess each laptop's general ergonomics, build and usability, including keyboard quality, chassis rigidity, trackpad response and battery life.
Finally, we test each laptop in real-world use cases by performing various tasks in Photoshop itself in order to check how it performs in a real workflow. We carry out basic photo editing using adjustment layers and masks and create digital art using various brush tools. We also test new AI tools and the GPU-accelerated tools, which can cause some laptops to struggle.
FAQs
What are the minimum requirements for Photoshop?
Most Windows laptops and MacBooks can run Photoshop with modest specifications. Adobe's minimum requirements include 8GB RAM, 1.5GB GPU memory, and 20GB storage, though they recommend 16GB RAM, 4GB GPU memory for 4K displays, and 100GB storage.
While most modern laptops (except Chromebooks) meet these minimums, specific Photoshop features demand more power. Neural Filters and GPU-accelerated tools like Smart Sharpen perform better with dedicated graphics, and additional RAM helps when working with multiple layers.
Note that Photoshop isn't available for Chrome OS. Chromebook users can access Photoshop on the Web, but it offers limited functionality compared to the desktop version.
Does Photoshop require a graphics card?
No, a dedicated graphics card is not strictly necessary for Photoshop. The software runs adequately on laptops with integrated graphics, provided they have sufficient CPU power and RAM. In most cases, processor speed and memory are more critical factors for general Photoshop performance than dedicated graphics.
What laptop do professional photographers use?
Professional photographers' laptop choices vary based on personal preference. Many opt for MacBook Pros, which offer optimisation for creative work, excellent battery life, quality displays,and sleek design. While MacBooks don't have specific Photoshop advantages over Windows laptops, they remain popular in the photography community. Ultimately, the choice often comes down to operating system preference and workflow needs.
Can you run Photoshop with 8GB of RAM?
Yes, you can run Photoshop, and other photo editing software like Lightroom, with 8GB of RAM, but it may struggle. Adobe lists 8GB as the minimum to run the desktop software but recommends 16GB. I have used Photoshop on laptops with 8GB of RAM, and it's certainly possible, but they often start to struggle if you build up a lot of layers or apply filters.
