Ranking: Best business laptops reviewed by Notebookcheck

It only just became available and yet it gets the top position in our ranking: Lenovo's Lenovo ThinkPad X9-15 Aura Edition looks like a 10 out of 10 system. A high-quality product top to bottom, it is the first ThinkPad laptop to have an OLED screen on all SKUs. With the Lunar Lake platform, the notebook in the still rare 15.3-inch format may not win any performance trophies, but its efficiency is very high.

Although Lenovo saves on some business features such as 5G/LTE or a matte display surface, with the HDMI and USB-A ports onboard, the X9 at least meets some basic connectivity requirements and thus leaves behind the MacBook Air, a laptop that Lenovo aims to compete with. The lack of a TrackPoint on a ThinkPad is certainly a bummer, but the touchpad and keyboard are reasonably good overall, so the ThinkPad X9-15's very good rating in our testing is truly indicative of what you should expect from it.

New name, but not much else: HP has relaunched its EliteBook 1000 series as HP EliteBook X. The new HP EliteBook X Flip G1i is the convertible version of HP's premium laptop for business customers. In our testing, the Intel Lunar Lake-powered laptop was impressive in many respects, including its very good efficiency. Most things are done pretty well here but then again, the price is pretty high, too.

Dell is overhauling its business laptops: The established Dell Latitude series is being turned into Dell Pro. The higher-end Dell Pro Premium models directly replace Dell Latitude 9000 models. Interestingly, Dell is still relying on the increasingly rare 13-inch form factor with the Dell Pro 13 Premium. This compact business laptop offers enterprise customers high-quality everything including the most important business features, such as optional 5G/LTE connectivity. Its battery life is excellent thanks to the efficient Lunar Lake platform. The asking price is high, as expected.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon has long been the flagship of the ThinkPad lineup, catering to executives and professionals who need a premium work laptop.

With the latest ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13, Lenovo delivers a top-tier device featuring Intel's Lunar Lake platform, which significantly improves battery life while keeping temperatures lower than what we saw when testing its predecessors. Despite these upgrades, Lenovo has also managed to make the X1 Carbon lighter, now weighing under a kilogram. The only real downside is the rather underwhelming webcam, but otherwise, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon fully justifies its high price.

HP is dividing its premium EliteBooks into two segments: The EliteBook X is to compete against Lenovo's ThinkPad X1 with a more classic design, while the EliteBook Ultra is to challenge the ThinkPad X9 with a consumer-oriented design. The HP EliteBook Ultra G1i is the Lunar Lake version of the EliteBook that impressed us way more than the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite-powered version. This is an all-around high-quality laptop which, mated to the high efficiency of Lunar Lake results in a user experience that leaves very little to be desired.

Completely different on the outside, the same on the inside: the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 10 Aura Edition is a close relative of the X1 Carbon G13, but swaps the black carbon fiber chassis for a full metal chassis made of aluminum. As a 2-in-1 ThinkPad, it has all the convertible features, such as a touchscreen and stylus, as well as the flip-down screen. This year's variant benefits greatly from Intel Lunar Lake, as the new Core Ultra 200V CPUs deliver significantly better efficiency and longer battery life. Although the weight of the X1 2-in-1 is significantly higher than the X1 Carbon, the casing is also more resistant to dirt. However, the high quality comes at a price: The X1 2-in-1 is the most expensive ThinkPad outside of Lenovo's ThinkPad P-series workstation laptops.

It's a ThinkPad X9 again: Yes, Lenovo sells its new business notebooks in two sizes. The 14-inch Lenovo ThinkPad X9-14 G1 Aura Edition is the smaller of the two and competes directly against the 13-inch Apple MacBook Air as well as the HP EliteBook Ultra G1i. Its more modern visual design sets it apart from other ThinkPad laptops and just like its larger brother, it comes exclusively with OLED displays which is a rarity in the business segment. The biggest weakness is probably the lack of proper business features; on the flip side, the product is not quite as expensive as some other laptops on the list.

HP takes a different approach to many other business laptops with the HP EliteBook X G1a. In contrast to the Intel version of the EliteBook X, HP is focusing primarily on performance as a selling point for this model. As a result, it is somewhat thicker and heavier, but at the same time impresses with the very high performance of AMD's Strix Point series.

Even in 2025, not everything is running smoothly for Intel, but at least the US chip manufacturer can claim to have launched an outstanding product on the market with Lunar Lake. The efficient CPUs are particularly suitable for business laptops.

Another example of this: Lenovo's Intel-powered ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 which delivers over 20 hours of battery life in its Lunar Lake version. In addition, the compact and high-quality business laptop with its great features remains quiet and cool - an excellent companion for office use.

HP has thoroughly renovated its EliteBook laptops for business customers this year. The result is a new name and a new design for all models, including the HP EliteBook 8 Flip G1i 13. This is the successor to the HP EliteBook x360 830, a compact 13-inch convertible laptop for business use. The EliteBook shines with its integrated pen, comfortable input devices and good performance, although this comes at the expense of heat development.

HP will once again be offering its EliteBook laptops with AMD or Intel CPUs in 2025. The HP EliteBook 8 G1a 16 is based on AMD's Ryzen processors, whereby we tested a version with Krackan Point or Zen 5. The HP EliteBook laptop cuts a fine figure as a work device, offering a large display and a full-size keyboard with numeric keypad. The metal casing is very sturdy, the input devices are comfortable and the HP laptop does not run loudly. It is a pity, however, that there is no display resolution higher than WUXGA (1,920 x 1,200).

The Dell Pro 14 Premium is the larger 14-inch version of Dell's flagship business laptop. Compared to previous Latitude laptops, the update to the Intel Lunar Lake platform stands out in particular. As a result, this compact business laptop achieves a long battery life and runs quietly and cool, but without really improving the CPU performance compared to before. Another criticism is that Dell only installs small M.2 2230 SSDs.

It's not every day that Lenovo adds a new model variant to its legendary ThinkPad T series - with the Lenovo ThinkPad T14s 2-in-1 Gen 1 and this model is quite something, as it is the first convertible in the T-series. The quasi-successor to the ThinkPad X13 2-in-1 Gen 5 with a larger 14-inch display has many of the typical ThinkPad qualities, but it is relatively heavy for a convertible and the performance could also be a little better. That is why it ultimately only achieves a "good" instead of a "very good" in our rating.