Computer programming isn’t all about algorithms, flowcharts, and code, one must understand the hardware also. It is the ability to write codes and solve problems along with the excellent laptop is really crucial. The best way to stay ahead in the programming world is to make sure that you have the best laptop which will help you to transform your ideas into reality. In short, perfect laptop speeds up tasks and processes, which help to increase productivity. To discover a laptop that is perfect for programming, one should recognize what to search for. What are the fundamental things, that all developers should know before they purchase the laptop for coding and programming? Let’s take a look.
Check before to buy a laptop for programming in 2018
- Hard Drive: For programming, you’ll need to consider getting a 256GB SSD, yet you can likewise get great outcomes from a 1TB standard drive. Speed is critical. You’ll invest a great deal of energy filtering through different records and folders.
- RAM: For developers, RAM is like water. The standard RAM limit with regards to the general laptop is around 4GB. This configuration is generally adequate for basic tasks. In any case, for software engineers, it’s prescribed to purchase a laptop with no less than 8GB of RAM. In a perfect world, you ought to run for a laptop with 16GB of RAM. That would cost more, however, the memory limit will be completely useful.
- Processing Speed: The main thing you spare with processing power is compilation period. However, this is just an issue if your task is huge. In any case, you ought to have a machine that intently coordinates your objective however much as could be expected. Laptops which have an i5 or i7 processor are best for programming in 2018.
So, without further ado, the following is the list of the best laptops for programming in 2018.
Apple MacBook Pro MF839LL
Apple MacBook Pro has 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5 processor. The best thing about this laptop is that it has 8GB of DDR3L RAM with 128GB of PCIE flash storage and Intel Iris graphics and 13.3-inch IPS Retina display.
| Screen Size | 13.3-inch IPS Retina Display. |
| Screen Resolution | 2500 x 1600 |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1366 x 768 |
| Processor | 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5 |
| RAM | 8GB LPDDR3 RAM |
| Memory Speed | 1866 MHz |
Apple MacBook Key Features:
- Battery performance is excellent. It has a non-removable lithium-polymer battery which gives 10 hours per charge life.
- The processing power is amazing. It is best for programmers who like to work on different technologies like Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server. It can run Windows and Linux VMs swiftly and the performance is excellent.
- The retina MBP is durable, and it is ideal for programmers who work as a web designer and developer.
It can process vast documents. The new Thunderbolt technology gives programmers a chance to connect with other devices swiftly with data transfer rate of 10 Gbps. It is also capable to run API’s like Python, Visual Studio, C# smoothly. It is best Apple laptop for programming.
Lenovo ThinkPad E570 Notebook
People who are looking for the best cheap laptop for programming, the Lenovo ThinkPad E570, is one of the best choices available. The amazing thing about this laptop is that it’s one of the few best developer laptops which packs 12GB RAM + 128GB SSD + 1TB HDD.
| Screen Size | 15.6 inches |
| Screen Resolution | 1366 x 768 |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1366 x 768 |
| Processor | 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5 |
| RAM | 12 GB DDR4 2133 |
| Memory Speed | 2133 MHz |
| Hard Drive | 1000 GB hybrid_drive |
| Graphics Coprocessor | Intel HD Graphics 620 |
Lenovo ThinkPad Key features:
- A great laptop for game programming
- Integrated card along with 802.11 A/C wireless type makes its connectivity faster.
- The hard drive rotational speed is 7200 RPM and that is why the processing speed is a top notch.
- Virtual machine friendly.
- The combination of 128GB SSD and 1TB SATA hard drive is so amazing that one can keep OS in SSD and other data files in SATA hard drive.
Programmers love performance and speed. This laptop has all the best features which make it a perfect choice for people who work as a full stack programmer. The combination of Intel i5 processor and DDR4 12 GB Ram allows this laptop to handle application development, Hadoop programming including games or android coding. The storage comprises of 128GB SSD and 1TB SATA hard drive which is essential for people who work as Big data developer. In short, we can say that ThinkPad is a powerful laptop for programming in 2018.
Dell XPS15
Dell XPS15 is a brilliant piece of designing that basically has all the necessary things that any computer programmer wants in a laptop for programming in 2018. It is really an amazing product when it comes to performance and portability. It has the larger 1TB SSD for storage and 16GB of RAM with the help of which one can store large coding repositories efficiently. The performance for every I/O operation is increased by SSD especially compared to laptops that use an HDD. Along with performance this laptop boot faster. The best thing about this laptop is that programming files and scripts programs that need to read and write to disk process much faster and scripts will compile much faster than on an HDD.
| Screen Size | 15.6 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 3840 x 2160 |
| Processor | 3.8 GHz Core i7-740QM |
| RAM | 32 GB DDR4 |
| Hard Drive | 256 GB SSD |
| Graphics Coprocessor | geforce gtx |
| Chipset Brand | nvidia |
| Card Description | dedicated |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
Dell Key features:
- It has 7th Generation Intel Kaby Lake Core i7-7700HQ Quad Core Processor. With the help of this, this laptop is just perfect for people who work as a blockchain developer and cybersecurity researcher.
- It is reliable, robust and efficient for all the virtual machines.
- Great battery life with multi-task programming.
This laptop has all the best features and it is highly recommended for people who work as blockchain developers, information security researcher, gaming programmers or people who wish to code with Swift and Java.
Acer Aspire E15
If you want to work on Android Studio, Visual Studio or PostgreSQL then Acer Aspire E15 is the best laptop for programmers in 2018. This laptop has 12 hours battery life and 7th generation i5 processor along with 8GB RAM and a lightning fast Solid State Drive of 256 GB capacity. Not only this, it has NVIDIA GeForce 940MX GPU with DDR5 2GB of video memory to handle any graphics demanding apps. This laptop is like water for programmers. It is essential for C# developers and also for web designers/web developers because of all these amazing features.
| Screen Size | 15.6 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1920 x 1080 pixels |
| Processor | 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5 |
| RAM | 8 GB DDR SDRAM |
| Hard Drive | SATA |
| Graphics Coprocessor | NVIDIA GeForce 940MX |
| Chipset Brand | nvidia |
| Card Description | Dedicated |
| Graphics Card Ram Size | 2000 MB |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 2 |
| Average Battery Life (in hours) | 12 hours |
Acer Aspire Key features:
- It has Core i5-7200U Processor 2.5GHz and it is expandable up to 3.1GHz. This makes it one of the most powerful laptops for Microsoft Visual Studio and Android studio programmers.
- The best thing about this laptop is that it has two slots for SSD making it possible to install an additional SSD.
Whether you are just a beginner or an advanced programmer, this laptop is going to be your programming buddy for the foreseeable future.
Microsoft Surface Pro (Intel Core i7)
Microsoft has given a perfect laptop with catchy display and excellent configuration. The surface pro laptop is the best choice for advanced Java and MongoDB developers. What is more, it also has 13.5 hours of battery life and a powerful Intel Core processor which can run full desktop software easily, ensuring a smooth and efficient workflow.
| Screen Size | 12.3 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 2736×1824 pixels |
| Processor | 4 GHz 8032 |
| RAM | 16 GB |
| Hard Drive | 1 TB Flash Memory Solid State |
| Graphics Coprocessor | Intel Iris and HD graphics |
| Card Description | Integrated |
| Wireless Type | 802.11B, 802.11G, 802.11n |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 1 |
Microsoft Surface Pro Key features:
- 1 TB Flash memory solid state along with i7 processor is a deadly combination for people who write Android, Swift (for iOS), Objective C, HTML5, Java, C# programming code.
- The 16 GB RAM is useful for programmers who are data scientists and heavily use MATLAB and Python
- The intel iris and HD graphics coprocessor are useful for coders who develop mobile games or mobile applications.
In this laptop, the fingerprint reading on the touch keyboard is pretty much faster and very accurate. In short, Microsoft surface pro is the complete all-round package for programmers in 2018.
ASUS P-Series P2440UQ-XS71
This laptop is very stable. It can run for multiple days without a reboot, and the operating system is very crash proof. Asus P-series is ideal for programmers who write C and C++; Linux scripting for Cron; also MySQL, dBase and Oracle database programming code and API development. It has the best battery life of 18 hours and it can process large files swiftly.
| Screen Size | 14 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1920 x 1080 pixels |
| Processor | 2.7 GHz None |
| RAM | 12 GB |
| Hard Drive | Flash Memory Solid State |
| Graphics Coprocessor | NVIDIA GeForce 940MX |
| Chipset Brand | nvidia |
| Card Description | Dedicated |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 1 |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 3 |
ASUS P-series Key features:
- This laptop is the combination of 7th Gen Intel Core i7 7500U 2.7GHz and dual-core “Kaby Lake” processor with 12GB of RAM, 512GB SSD, along with Nvidia GeForce 940MX discrete graphics and with the help of this data warehousing applications can be programmed easily.
- It has total 4 USB ports. These are 3 x USB 3.0, 1 x USB2.0. 1 x HDMI, 1 x VGA port.
This is the best laptop for programmers who like to write code for API development. APIs are created for particular platforms or functions, and every API will have the coding language of the platform/device/site/service it’s created for. The ASUS P-series is an excellent laptop for API development.
HP Notebook 15-ay011nr
This HP notebook has pretty much everything programmer would want for basic application development. If you do “lighter” software coding that doesn’t require too much graphics card or fast hard drive operations then this laptop is perfect. In short, this laptop is ideal for programmers who write mostly HTML, CSS, and basic coding.
| Screen Size | 15.6 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1920×1080 pixels |
| Processor | 2.3 GHz Intel Core i5 |
| RAM | 8 GB DDR3L SDRAM |
| Memory Speed | 1600 MHz |
| Hard Drive | 1 TB SATA |
| Graphics Coprocessor | shared |
| Chipset Brand | intel |
| Card Description | integrated |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 2 |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 1 |
| Average Battery Life (in hours) | 7.15 hours |
HP Notebook Key features:
- It has 5-6200U Processor 2.3GHz with turbo boost up to 2.8GHz and it is useful for working on WordPress or Shopify app development along with HTML, CSS, and Liquid programming languages.
- It has 1TB 5400RPM Hard Drive which is sufficient for small-scale application development.
In short, this laptop is perfect for any programmers who also do WordPress/Shopify development and need to work with HTML/CSS only.
Apple 13″ MacBook Air
This laptop is best for programmers who are developing iOS apps and it is also useful for programmers who write C++ and liquid codes. MacBook Air includes 256 GB SSD, SD card opening, Thunderbolt 2 port and pre-introduced with most recent Mac OS. The equipment is sufficient for ideal execution while coding and iOS app development.
| Screen Size | 13.3 inches |
| Processor | 1.8 GHz Intel Core i5 |
| RAM | 8 GB DDR3 SDRAM |
| Hard Drive | flash_memory_solid_state |
| Graphics Coprocessor | integrated_graphics |
| Chipset Brand | intel |
| Wireless Type | 802.11abg, 802.11 A/C, 802.11 a/b/g/n, 802.11A |
Apple 13″ MacBook Air Key features
- The battery is enclosed in thin 0.68-inch case. It weighs only 2.96 pounds and lasts up to 12 hours.
- The 1600MHz LPDDR3 memory is enough for optimum performance while coding and developing iOS apps.
- 8GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor gives security analysts enough power and processing speed to run Kali Linux operating system in VMWare.
It is a simple yet powerful laptop that can handle almost everything you throw at it.
Asus VivoBook M580VD-EB54
Powered by Intel Core i7 and 16GB RAM with 256G SSD+1TB HDD, this top of the line specced laptop can run all programming virtual products pretty effortlessly and can likewise play all the most recent gaming. Aside from this, it is additionally an exceptionally keen and ergonomically outlined laptop. Its shrewd double fan configuration gives powerful cooling to keep this laptop dependably at ordinary temperatures while gaming and overwhelming multitasking.
| Screen Size | 15.6 inches |
| Screen Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Max Screen Resolution | 1920 x 1080 pixels |
| Processor | 2.8 GHz 8032 |
| RAM | 16 GB DDR4 |
| Hard Drive | 1000 GB Hybrid Drive |
| Graphics Coprocessor | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 |
| Chipset Brand | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 |
| Card Description | Dedicated |
| Graphics Card Ram Size | 4 GB |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 2 |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 1 |
ASUS Vivo Book Key features
- It has dual-band 802.11ac Wi-Fi which makes sure that laptop is connected through any congestion or interference
- It has balanced speed and storage capacity which is essential for programmers who are Salesforce developers.
Asus M580VD-EB54 is really a gaming laptop with effective elite equipment which is additionally reasonable for programming and coding. That is why it’s here in the top picks of best developer laptop in 2018.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon 20BTS1V900
The Lenovo X1 is an incredible laptop that can run Linux well for people who work with Oracle and Linux. Its 16GB DDR3 memory gives programmers multitasking power and they can work on various coding repositories.
| Screen Size | 14 inches |
| Max Screen Resolution | 2560 x 1440 |
| Processor | 2.6 GHz Core i7 5600U |
| RAM | 266 GB DDR3 SDRAM |
| Hard Drive | 16 GB flash_memory_solid_state |
| Graphics Coprocessor | integrated_graphics |
| Chipset Brand | intel |
| Card Description | Intel HD Graphics 5500 |
| Wireless Type | 802.11 A/C |
Lenovo X1 Carbon Key features:
- It has 256 GB – M.2 SSD TCG Opal Encryption which gives features like security which is really crucial for programmers in 2018.
- The graphics is well supported by full HD and WQHD resolution.
In the event that memory is a test for programmers, this laptop offers 16GB of RAM and a 256 GB SSD hard drive. This laptop is coder’s delight.
