Best Budget Laptops for Students (September 2023)

The Infinix Inbook X2 Plus is a feature-rich mainstream laptop available under Rs 40,000. Firstly, it comes with an Intel Core i5-1155G7 quad-core processor with support for up to eight threads. Secondly, the 15.6-inch laptop is thin and light and looks more upmarket than its price would have you believe. At just 14.9mm thick and with a body weight of 1.58kg, the Infinix Inbook X2 Plus can easily fit in any backpack and is easy to carry around all day.

The I/O support on the laptop is also pretty good. It comes with two type-c ports, one of which is a Thunderbolt 4 port, an HDMI 1.4 slot, two USB type-a ports, a microSD card slot and a 3.5mm USB jack. The laptop's cheaper variant, priced at Rs 36,990, comes with 8GB LPDDR4X memory. But I’d suggest you go for the 16GB RAM variant because LPDDR4X memory is embedded into the motherboard and is non-upgradable. Lastly, the laptop also has an aluminium alloy body. Meaning it will be able to easily withstand daily wear and tear which comes given with a hectic college life.

Going through a day without a laptop charger can be a difficult task but it won’t be if your laptop features smart hybrid cores that allocate workload efficiently for the best battery life. The Acer Aspire 3 fits the bill here because it is one of the most affordable Intel 12th Gen Core i3 laptops featuring the Core i3-1215U - a 6-core 8-thread chip. The six cores also include 4 efficiency cores that consume less power and thus give a major boost to the laptop’s battery life. Meanwhile, the processor's six cores give the laptop's multicore performance a decent boost.

The laptop also features plenty of ports including three USB type-a ports, a 3.5mm audio jack, an HDMI output slot and also an RJ 45 ethernet port too for accessing uninterrupted internet. Unfortunately, you won’t find a USB type-C port on this laptop. Acer Aspire 3 also comes with a 15.6-inch 1080p display and the laptop’s total weight is 1.78kg, making it decently portable.

The Lenovo IdeaPad 3 is a no-brainer default choice if you want an affordable student laptop. Powered by an Intel 11th Gen Core i3 processor and 8GB DDR4 memory, the IdeaPad 3 can handle most basic tasks like browsing the web, editing documents and streaming videos. But the Intel chip will start to struggle if you choose to run multiple demanding tasks on the laptop.

The Lenovo IdeaPad does come with a 256GB SSD for faster boot and app load times. Additional features of the laptop include a webcam shutter for increased privacy, a 14-inch 1080p anti-glare screen, which prevents reflections, especially from overhanging lights, along with Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 for better connectivity.

If you’re creative and want to practise your video editing skills while in college then going with the ASUS Vivobook K15 OLED is a great choice. The 15-inch 1080p OLED display not only has a high peak brightness of 600 nits but it also showcases a wide range of colours thanks to 100% DCI P3 colour gamut coverage. The screen also has a Pantone Validation certificate and VESA Display HDR True Black 600 certification as well. All this means that you can easily do creative work like photo and video editing on this laptop with accurate colour grading.

To give you the power to do so, the laptop comes equipped with an AMD Ryzen 5 5500U, a 6-core 12-thread Accelerated Processing Unit or APU. An APU is basically a processor which AMD makes that has the CPU and the integrated GPU cores on a single die. More often than not these APUs offer quite good iGPU performance and the Ryzen 5500U is no different. It features a 7-core Radeon iGPU which can easily let you do some light gaming as well as graphics-heavy creative work on the laptop. Moreover, since it is a Ryzen ‘U’ series chip its default power consumption is just 15W. Combine that with the OLED display and you get a laptop with seriously high battery life in its segment.

The Realme Book Slim is an ultra-compact and versatile laptop that can be considered one of the most budget-oriented premium laptops for under Rs 50,000. So no surprise it is also one of the best student laptops you can buy. An Intel 11th Gen Core i5-1135G7, a 4-core 8-thread processor, sits at the heart of this laptop along with 8GB DDR4 memory and 512GB SSD. Featuring a 3:2 aspect ratio, a high-resolution 2K display, and Thunderbolt 4 support, the Realme Book Slim is one of the only laptops in this segment to offer this combination. The 3:2 aspect ratio is better than the usual 16:9 screens you usually see on laptops primarily because it offers more screen height allowing you to see more of what you’re working on be it your video editing timeline, a document, a spreadsheet or something else.

And with the Thunderbolt 4 support, you can output to an external display and also charge your laptop at the same time. Additionally, the laptop has USB Type-c charging so you can carry just one charger for your laptop and smartphone. Just make sure it's 65W or above because the laptop supports it. To complement the 2K display, the speakers on this laptop are also very good. They’re crisp, loud and also offer a decent base for a device of this size. Furthermore, the laptop’s all-metal body will also make sure that it lasts for a long time without any major wear or tear issues.

The ASUS Vivobook 15 is probably the best combination of a tablet and a laptop that you can get on a budget. Powered by an Intel 11th Gen Core i3-1115G4 processor and featuring a 13-inch 1080p touchscreen display, the ASUS Vivobook Flip 14 can be a great device if you like to draw and design. Don’t expect an iPad-level latency while drawing on this screen. But you are getting a full-fledged computer and also a tablet you can draw on in a single package here, so the compromise is worth it in my opinion.

But you won’t have to compromise in terms of performance because the Vivobook Flip 14 comes with 8GB LPDDR4X RAM and around 512GB of internal storage, which should be enough to store all your files and then some. Being a creative device, the Vivobook 14 Flip also features very healthy I/O support including two type-a ports, a USB type-c Thunderbolt 4 port, a microSD card slot, an HDMI port, a 3.5mm audio jack and a DC charging port. The Thunderbolt 4 port is a blessing here as you can use it to showcase live drawing tutorials on a big screen as well. Lastly, the laptop also gets Wi-Fi 6 for faster and seamless connectivity.

The Acer Aspire 7 is probably the best budget option for students who want a gaming laptop for college. And it features some really good specifications for the price point. For instance, an AMD Ryzen 5 5500U Hexa-core APU along with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 power Acer Aspire 7. Also, in terms of memory, the laptop comes stacked with 16GB DDR4 memory and 512GB SSD. The Acer Aspire 7 does miss out on a high refresh rate display but if you plan on playing AAA games then the 60Hz refresh rate would be enough for a GTX 1650 to use, as it won’t be able to push that many frames in most modern games.

Plus, you can also use an external gaming monitor with your laptop if you want to play eSports titles at a high refresh rate. The laptop also gets plenty of I/O ports including three USB type-a ports, one of which is a power-off charging port that can charge your device even if your laptop is in hibernation mode or is turned off. The laptop also comes with an HDMI port, a USB type-c port and an ethernet slot as well.

If you’re looking for a budget laptop for coding and media consumption then the Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5 is a device you should definitely consider. Weighing in at just 1.39kg it is quite portable and with 17.9mm thickness it can also easily fit in a small backpack. But the real star of the show is the AMD Ryzen 7 4700U, an 8-core 16-thread chip, paired with 8GB DDR4 memory and 512GB SSD.

Granted that the chip is a bit old in 2023 but its 8 high-performance cores offer really good performance for multitasking. One of the best features of the laptop is the upwards-firing speaker grille as it makes your content consumption experience very immersive. Additionally, the laptop also comes with a webcam privacy shutter, a fingerprint sensor integrated with the power button and rapid charge technology which charges the laptop up to 80% in 60 minutes. The laptop’s 14-inch anti-glare display also has a peak brightness of 300 nits so you won’t have a problem working in a well-lit environment. And for better connectivity, the laptop also has Wi-Fi 6 and relatively better Bluetooth 5.1 as well, which provides better data transfer speed and security compared to Bluetooth 5.0.