I’m curious about what gaming laptops really have the best battery life when playing resource-intensive games like Skyrim and Red Dead Redemption 2. What kind of performance can I expect in terms of hours of gameplay on battery power?
4 Answers
If you’re looking for long battery life while gaming, consider something more like a business laptop with lower power graphics, like a Dell XPS with an Iris XE or a GTX 1050. You might get 3-4 hours playing Skyrim on lower settings, but Red Dead Redemption 2 might not even run—definitely not a recommended setup for gaming.
Expect around an hour of gameplay on max performance, but it’s quite generous. If you really want to game, just be aware that you’ll have drastically reduced performance compared to when plugged in.
Honestly, for most gaming laptops with a separate GPU, you won’t be able to run the GPU on battery at all. When using battery mode, the CPU throttles down to save power, and you’re looking at maybe an hour tops, if you’re lucky.
Laptops with Intel Ultra chips or AMD models (just avoid the 7845HX) are among the best for battery life. The ASUS ROG Zephyrus (especially with the RTX 4070) is top-notch right now. The Alienware X16 or M16 R2 with the same GPU is also solid, but I’d steer clear of the RTX 4080/4090 for better efficiency. The Razer Blade 14 might work, but don’t expect to game on battery unless it’s something really light.
