The Best Size of a Laptop | Hacker News Reader

The Best Size of a Laptop

gokmengorgen.net

20 pointsgokmen71 comments

…is 14”. It is the perfect balance between portability, weight, and screen real estate.

I’ve tried 13”, 14”, 15”, and 16”. 14” is where it’s at.

Agree, but you gotta be careful to measure both the laptop size and the screen size though. Some of them have a lot of passing around the screen.

If there was 14.5" I would prefer it though. Although I wish they focused more on the keyboard than the display.

agree, 14' MBP is the best - has the most ports, and better memory than MBA, but without the bulk of the 16' MBP

I made the mistake at a job once of getting a 16”. They offered both, and I figured why not go big? Except most of the time, it’s docked, so not like I need the screen, and when I have to travel, it’s difficult.

Learned my lesson; never again.

I've got an LG Gram 17-inch laptop that weighs about the same as a 13-inch macbook air.

Having a huge screen on a super-light, super skinny laptop is so handy for portability and all the extra screen real-estate is great for a developer. Its difficult to go back to a 14-inch.

I wish more laptop manufacturers would make ultra-lights with large screens.

I was recently helping someone shop for a laptop and stumbled upon the LG gram. I was really impressed with the build quality and how light it was. I think it was a 16in though. I prefer smaller screen 13/14 but I was very tempted to get one myself.

That is impressive, but I’m also extremely sold on ARM viz. Apple Silicon. I haven’t touched a Windows laptop in years. The only thing that feels as snappy is my gaming desktop, and I would wager that my M4 Pro could probably beat it in pure computational power.

Sounds nice but how's the durability. I'm just afraid that width and that skinny just a random misstep may break it.

Having used a few different sizes, I agree, for portability 14" is perfect, but I would add 1 thing. The screen should be 16:10, not 16:9.

I have a Thinkpad T61 and its screen size is 16x10, to me that is the perfect Laptop.

One more thing, no number pad. It should have a keybord like the old thinkpads.

The MBA (MacBook Air) easily beats the MBP in my opinion. 32GB ram, M4 CPU really is enough for the vast vast majority of tasks. I use mine to process video and 40 megapixel RAW images, and it flies. And the portability is significantly better than the MBP.

It has no fan, but it rarely even gets warm, with no noticeable throttling.

I used an MB or MBP for the entirety of the Intel era, but these days I have a really hard time seeing any meaningful benefit of its increased size and bulk over the MBA.

I'm all down for 14" laptops too. My two favorite laptops are the 14" MacBook Pro I use for work now, as well as my personal 14" Thinkpad X1 Carbon. They have the best combination of performance and size, for me at least. I get as-close-as-makes-no-difference desktop performance out of something with a days worth of battery that can fit into the small backpack I use for bike commuting.

I disagree. Bigger laptop screens will always be nicer to use and what actually matters is the total package I have to carry around so different laptops are perfect in different scenarios. For me personally, my framework16 just fits in my slimfold backpack and my daily needs also just fit in that tiny and light and super comfortable backpack so that is my daily driver. For the couple times I travel in a year I have my old framework13 I end up bringing because I need a bigger backpack and more auxiliary junk for travel

The MacBook air 11" in 2012 was my favorite laptop by far. Maxed out with an i7 and 8GB RAM it handled everything I needed to including multiple InteliJ projects. The resolution today seems obscenely low, but it was completely usable and the compactness was of great utility, practical for use while traveling.

I've bought tablets multiple times thinking it could replace it, it just isn't the same. It's a real shame that particular form factor has been lost, as we could probably easily have an m4 air in that size. I'd buy one in a heart beat now that Apple has remembered how to make good keyboards again.

Even though it was tiny,

I had one, and I really liked it, but the 13" MBA just edged it out for me due to the added comfort and visibility. I've had various MBPs, but I continue to prefer a 13" MBA over a decade later. Any other laptop I try just feels inferior.

The bezel size on the 2011 11" air vs the current 13" air with its Retina display makes that upgrade a no-brainer. 2011 11" was my prior fav, but 2024 13" air is the new king.

I recently spent 2 hours working on an airplane in economy class on a 16" pro, and all those extra specs didn't help me ssh to a cloud instance, and that large size made it extra tough. Air is the best.

The new 13” Air isn’t quite a replacement for the old 11”. It’s just enough bigger and heavier that I notice and it affects the handiness of it. The center of balance isn’t as good either, it was close to the hinge on the old wedge shaped Air which was perfect for carrying it.

I miss that little computer. It was just about perfect and I wish they had kept that form factor.

Really was a brilliant machine. I still have one on a desk paired with a Cinema Display. Weighed nothing when out and about and turns into an iMac at home. Mine is in its dotage now because the battery only lasts about an hour so it never leaves the house or does much heavy lifting, and it’s been replaced with a 14 inch MacBook Pro M3 alongside an 11 inch iPad Air. So pleased that Apple got rid of that pointless Touch Bar and returned to function keys. My M3 is like a platonically good laptop even though I wish it was a touch lighter. I managed to type out a 140,000 word book on my iPad when travelling. Having started on 8-bit home computers I’ll never stop being amazed by the world of computing hardware perfection we now live in.

Why not just go for the MBA instead of the MBP? The MBA is lightning fast and can have 32 gb RAM. It seems like exactly what you want - a touch lighter (.7 lbs lighter!) and smaller but still crazy good.

The 12" MacBook (not air, not pro) from 2017 was my dream machine... Except for the thermals limiting the performance. That issue could easily be solved with an M-series machine in a similar chassis, but alas.

The current 13" M-series Airs seem a little confusing to me -- the two largest dimensions are practically the same as the current MBP, so for my use-case (i.e.: not carrying a backpack) I basically have to carry a bag the exact same size as if I were going to carry the MBP, and the extra 300g (or 0.7 lb) is meaningless in terms of portability.

It feels like the Air is no longer really so Air-y, which is a shame.

I agree that the 12" MacBook form factor is what I'd go for. I have a 13" M1 but it's a bit heavy as I carry it around all day. 12" with a M processor and at least 2 usb ports.

I had a Lenovo S10 netbook too back in the day. I have fond memories of it, but I definitely don't 'miss that tiny size'. It was so tiny that they had to shrink the key size on the keyboard to make it fit, and the trackpad was also so tiny as to be barely usable.

Nowadays, I'd say 14" is the sweet spot. Compact enough to easily fit in a bag and be taken basically anywhere, without having to sacrifice much if anything in terms of functionality/capability.

With screen bezels reduced to almost nothing, a modern 14" is pretty comparable in size to a 12" model from yesteryear.

i really think iPad nailed the perfect combination of screen size and aspect ratio. i just wish they'd still make it in a proper laptop version, i don't want iPad OS.

i had a netbook back in the day, and it was okay but the 16:9 aspect ratio really let it down. on a screen that small, 4:3 makes a big difference.

that and the sim slot. I've always wondered why they can't bodge one into the sd slot in software, as from what I remember the interconnects are similar (?). Or maybe they could just make personal hotspot more reliable

Regarding really tiny laptops - there actually are some on the market now. All chinese and based on the Pentium N100 or similar. There is the Chuwi Minibook X (10.51"), it gets quite good reviews, and two Topton devices (I think they are the original brand, of the Aliexpress models at least, but I might be wrong), a 7 inch device that looks a little bit like a miniature ThinkPad (model name might be L4) and a newer 8 inch laptop with a rotating screen (P8). If I got that right the Chuwi goes up to 12W, the others only to 6W, which should make a big difference for the processor. But it might be enough anyway for browsing, Youtube, some SSH when a server needs a restart and maybe even some very light coding?

Sadly all of them have spotty Linux support, and a Windows device is no use to me as a travel companion, for which they might be great solutions otherwise.

There is also the GPD Pocket 4 as a high class option, 8.8″, but that's too expensive for me for the few days a year the device might be in use. Similar for the One-Netbook 5, besides that being not in stock. Both of these look like the models the three above copy.

Old netbooks seem to be a no-go, they are all too chunky and weak and can't even play videos in proper resolutions (reviews of the time suggest that Intel managed to equip the later netbooks with a "better" processor that lacked hardware support for video decoding). MacBook Air 11" sounds like a good option at first, but with the huge bezels it's not actually that small, not smaller than a modern 13" Macbook Air, is it? And I'm unclear on how well the old Macbook would work with Linux now.

If I missed a great option, or one of the cheap ones is actually fine with Linux now - though the Chuwi gets new revisions regularly, so that's hard to guarantee - please let me know.

I really wish they would bring 12 inch MacBook with new M series chip and better keyboard! I’ve tried iPads to see I could get it to work for light browsing and writing when I’m out and about but they feel too limiting.

17" historically has been my ideal.

I am more than happy to lug something bigger and heavier about for performance sake because whatever it is I am doing when I get that laptop out is going to be development or sysop work based and there is a good chance I will need some performance and screen space to get the job done. I can live with something smaller if the laptop can be docked to a couple of screens and keyboard and mouse but historically I have always preferred bigger laptops when that isn't possible.

On the 10" size, I think few can beat the design of an IBM 701 [1] with its butterfly keyboard. I would be cool if this were to make a comeback: a 10" screen couple with a 12" keyboard. The Sony Vaio P laptops were also cool with their 8" wide screens, but their keyboards were somewhat cramped. [2].

At the 8" size category, a Pixel 9 Pro Fold coupled with a decent foldable keyboard, perhaps something like [3], is a killer combination. My personal favorite keyboard in the foldable category was the TextBlade [4], which, sadly, never materialized.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThinkPad_701

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Vaio_P_series

[3] https://www.amazon.com/ProtoArc-Ergonomic-Foldable-XK03-Blue...

[4] https://www.fastcompany.com/91249548/waytools-textblade-pock...

The best size of a laptop is the one you would pick if they all cost zero dollars. We all know that subconsciously we are adjusting our choice for price, and that is driving most 14" answers in this thread. That's what most people has actually experienced and it is a "safe" answer".

If money were no object I would pick 16" or bigger laptop, under 2kg. Bigger screen is always better for me.

Kinda depends. My first own laptop was 15.4" brick - but I didn't constantly move it around, just randomly to uni 2-3 times a week.

My work laptops have generally been 14" and it's fine with external monitors (current is a 16" mac because it was there), and I hate carrying it to the office because my panniers are too small.

My favourite on-the-go laptop was the x230 with the smaller battery and if I bought a laptop for traveling today (I used to back up my photos from SD to a laptop every night) I'd prefer the smallest and lightest 11"-13" again. Maybe I'll grab a 2016 Intel macbook and put linux on it, or buy a used x290 or something if I feel I need one.

That said, I am not a laptop person at all, I have a workstation at home and only use hand-me-down laptops for the sofa and surfing the web and stuff.

I have recently bought an Asus Zenbook 14 (inch) OLED with Intel 9 Ultra CPU and ARC graphics. It's the best laptop that I've ever had - fast, light and decent battery life (though I'm not so worried about that). And it was quite cheap - less than 900 GBP.

I agree 14" is the best size, unless you want a desktop replacement, to keep the wires out of the way, in which I would go for 16" or 17".

Notice any burn-in issues with the oled?

Based on reviews I’ve watched and read its display is also exceedingly glossy, to the point that it’s questionable if it has any antiglare coating at all, which has been a major factor keeping me away. Asus should really have an antiglare option of some kind.

It is very glossy (which makes the touchscreen nice to use), but also very bright and high-contrast - personally, I have had no problems at all with readability (rather the reverse) but I don't use mine outside. It's a great display.

> Notice any burn-in issues with the oled?

Not yet. As I said, I only bought it recently, and Asus have all sorts of settings in their rather good MyASUS app to mitigate this. Hopefully I won't see any problems for a couple of years at least.

For me, laptop size is about the screen size that suits what I am doing. For software development I am happy with a 15" MacBook Pro.

It’s task-dependent for me as well. For development I think the current 16” MBPs are really about perfect, but for the use case of studying, web browsing, etc something in the range of 12-14” and as light as reasonably possible without negatively impacting battery life is about right.

For those smaller machines, I think a squarish (5:4, 4:3, 3:2, or 16:10) aspect ratio with a body exactly as wide as a full-size laptop keyboard (as seen in 12” PowerBook G4, 12” MacBook, and ThinkPad X220) is particularly good, but nobody makes those anymore.

17" gives enough room for a numpad (some 15" have it too but it's pretty universal at 17"). It seems to be where screen space is comfortable for long term use

But if I'm going into a small airplane (ex: Spirit Airlines), such a laptop is impossible to use.

It really depends on what your on-the-go space is. 15" seems like the overall standard to me however.

I respect the requirement some have for a numpad. However, at this point, I don't even have a numpad for my desktop workstation. I like the shorter reach between the home keys and a mouse on the right.

Best of both worlds in my opinion is an external numpad, which can be placed to the left of your laptop/keyboard (which if you’re right-handed, also enables simulatanous numpad and mouse usage) and when it isn’t needed, tucked away.

I personally find that the limiting factor for a laptop on airplane is how much I have to angle the screen to be able to see it, which is how far forward the laptop has to be for the screen to go that far back. At that stage, the laptop is so far forward for me that it is uncomfortable for me to use the keyboard.

Tengentially: Since a lot of us are hybrid workers now, can't we have a better solution than having to constantly schlep our laptops to work and back? I want an easily pluggable SSD that doesn't dangle precariously out of the side of my laptop. Something like the old PCMCIA form factor. Then I could have a work laptop and a home laptop.

At that point, why not have a home desktop and a work desktop? You've been able to have external hot-swap SSDs in a relatively small form factor for years. They make m.2 hot swappable frames[0].

[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/comments/j4ilsa/m2_ssd_in_a...

I would not be able to move a desktop between offices easily, and also it would not be comfortable on my lap.

You mean like the Framework laptop modules?

I don't know, maybe! I just did a half-arsed google and got an M.2 adaptor that doesn't look like it's designed for daily swappage? But maybe you're talking about something else.

They have "expansion cards" which fit flush in the body of the laptop. One of the available expansion cards is an SSD (comes in various sizes)

https://frame.work/products/storage-expansion-card-2nd-gen?v...

Thank you, that does look interesting! I haven't really considered the Frameworks so far because of my secondhand Thinkpad habit, but I do like the idea so I should probably think more seriously about it.

I bet if you're handy it should be possible to repurpose an optical slot in an old Thinkpad for those.

Given how powerful phones are nowadays it's a shame that we can't just dock our phones into a keyboard & monitor and run a full desktop OS on them.

or have a keyboard case for them like with the pinephone. Bonus points for enumerating usb-2/usb-4 and a headphone jack

maybe consider a uhs-ii or uhs-iii sd card? they're very fast and will work on any modern macbook

13 inch Mac book air.

After years of large MBp I switched to 15 inch MB air. Then the 13 inch. It’s moment of inertia is closer to the palm holding - i.e., it feels very light.

Screen is a bit tight. So all I do I crank up the size (setResX), put on pair of 0.5 readers and voila instant large screen. I can go all the way to 2560x and still read and work.

I want my lunch tray back! IYKYK.

"Why the Macbook Pro 17" was the greatest laptop ever made" - https://themostbeautifulworld.com/blog/macbook-pro-17-vs-16-...

"The Best Size of a Laptop"? Sounds like nerd-bait to me. Its exactly the thing that causes scads of comments about what people prefer. It's like whenever there's a comment about 4k monitors comes up, people have varied opinions.

A few years ago, I bought a Chinese-made Ebayfan. The brand sounds relatively niche, but I still bought it to give it a try. The 14-inch laptop they designed feels pretty good to use.

Back in the day, I had a Fujitsu Lifebook P-1120 with an 8.9" screen. It was perfect, but eventually fell behind the times. Even then, I kept using it for writing until it completely died.

I replaced it with a X200 and then X220 Thinkpad, which is still what I use for everyday computing needs. At 12.5" it works well for me, and even that is a tad bit large. I would happily go with a laptop with the same performance specs with a 9" screen. (Although, I doubt anything else would support the same onboard storage options my current X220 has: mSATA, SATA, SD card, and NVme in the ExpressCard slot are a very convenient mix for me.)

I am a rare breed people say, but my friends have the same weirdness; I thought the best air was the 11.6 inc one. I find even anything over 13 inch massive; I do a lot of dev before/during/after hikes in nature and I find it not helping to have to be inside for coding, so I need long battery life and light package. I found it in AR glasses connected to a phone; 2 working day battery life + option to make it 3 working days with a battery, super light (carrying a phone anyway) and fits anywhere.

Currently I'm either docked or fully portable, for that a 14" MBP is just right.

It's big enough to work as a second (or third) display when docked and also small enough to be used and carried pretty much anywhere.

It's also chonky enough to be sturdy to carry and have enough ports for everything I need.

in my opinion the best laptop could be an A4-sized Macbook Air.

So you want a 13" Air. Go buy one. They're pretty good, I've been doing all my work on a succession of them since like the second revision.

13" Air: 11.97 × 8.46". A4: 11.7 × 8.3".

The actual screen is only slightly smaller than an A4 page.

> A monster machine in our homes and a tiny laptop that connects to it..

I am definitely going this route with my homelab setup. More people should do this, but a lot of techies even are happy to use a cloud platform.

What is the best size? This is a distribution with a multi modal solution.

But the netbook size mode seems to be underrepresented. Huge fan of the Air 11.6" or the MacBook 12" with an M chip.

13in MacBook Air (new M4, with 24GB RAM) and Mac Mini as desktop the best setup I’ve ever had. I debated between the 13in and 15inch MacBook Airs and am so glad I went with the 13.

I'm using a 10 year old 15" MBP right now, and while I have several other smaller models, nothing feels as right to me as this large screen and solid keyboard on my lap.

I guess I'm the only one that wants a 17" with a 2k+ screen because the more I can fit on the screen at once, the more I can do while mobile.

I miss my jornada so much. If only someone made an apple keyboard for iphones. All I need now is my home server

Silly post conflating resolution with dimensions, and the three dimensions with each other.

I’d commit 5000$ for a 20 inch macbook

Laptop size doesn't matter. Laptop weight is what matters.

Weight is probably more important overall, but size can make or break usability in specific situations. A 16” laptop is not fun to try to use in an economy airplane seat for example, but a 12”/13” (especially if it has a trackpoint to cut down necessary arm movement) works great in the same circumstance.

> Laptop size doesn't matter. Laptop weight is what matters.

Depends what you do with them. For years I have used laptops in development simply to avoid all the wiring associated with desktops, and for doing things like running the JetBrains tools, screensize and CPU does matter.

I don't do dev anymore, so my priorities have changed.

Weight doesn't really matter with modern laptops. They are almost universally lightweight.

I'm from a generation that walked to the school with a backpack full of books. I also enjoy hiking, which often involves carrying a backpack much heavier than your typical office backpack. When I take my office backpack, I have to double-check that the 16" MBP is there, because I can't tell it reliably from the weight. While I prefer small backpacks and avoid carrying unnecessary stuff, the laptop just doesn't contribute that much to the weight.

Physical dimension, on the other hand, matter. A 16" laptop can be inconvenient in tight spaces such as train/plane seats.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com