The Average College-Laptop Shopper Prioritizes Price, Speed, And Brand

Walk into most college classes, and you'll be struck by a sea of sticker-covered Macs and care-worn Dells (and, of course, the dead-eyed students slumped behind them). Laptops are as much a fixture of college life as bad dining-hall food and lousy fake IDs—81 percent of students depend on a laptop. That isn't to say every student is sitting at attention, speedily taking notes or churning out papers; most are watching Netflix, some are shopping, and a handful of the boldest slackers are deep into a Fortnite match.

But good computers capable of all that distraction and procrastination come at hefty prices, and college students aren't exactly swimming in cash. Also, different majors and interests require different features—my Macbook Pro doesn't factor into my writing classes much, but for my audio production assignments, it's essential.

A PCMag survey (conducted via Google Survey) asked 1,000 college students what they valued when buying a new laptop for school and how much they were willing to spend. Only 4 percent of students cared about screen size, and equally surprising, just 11 percent considered weight when they shop for laptops (clearly, their campuses don't have hills). Capacity was valued at 14 percent, coming in below brand, at 20 percent—the cult of Apple thrives on artsy campuses. Speed came in second, at 22 percent. And price was our respondents' highest priority, with 27 percent citing it as their chief concern.

On average, college kids are willing to shell out an average of $761.32 on a new computer for school. On the high end, 8 percent of students looked into products with $1,500 plus price tags and 13 percent were looking at devices between $1,200 and $1,500. Numbers skyrocket at $900 to $1,200—cheap Macbook range—with 22 percent of respondents willing to look for computers at in that range. The percentage drops again at the $600 to $900 range (13 percent) but leaps up between $300 and $600 (20 percent) and jumps again for computers below $300 (24 percent).

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If you're looking to pinch a few extra bucks, check out PCMag's best budget laptops, none of which cost more than $599.99.

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