Best 17-inch laptops: Top rated large laptops we’ve reviewed

As a general rule, the bigger the screen, the heavier the laptop and the bulkier they usually are. The LG Gram 17 (2021) is a rare exception, offering a massive 17-inch screen in a 1.35kg shell. For reference, that weight is equivalent to most 14- and 15-inch laptops.

Having a 17-inch laptop so light made it incredibly portable, which we found to be super convenient to sling into a bag for the commute to work. With the slim chassis and lightweight form in mind, the port selection is great with USB-C/Thunderbolt 4, USB-A HDMI and microSD all represented. For such a lightweight laptop though, some corners have been cut, as the Gram features a magnesium-alloy case that flexes under pressure.

During testing, the 17-inch display, complete with its 2560×1600 resolution, proved to be excellent, offering sharp imagery. With it also came a great contrast ratio of 1518:1 and superb colour accuracy, with our colourimeter measuring the panel to hit 100% of the sRGB coverage, and 81% and 96% for Adobe RGB and DCI-P3 respectively. This means you could use this LG laptop for colour-sensitive design work as much as for general use.

Inside, it packs an Intel Core i7-1165G7 processor, the same as the smaller 16-inch model that we found to breeze through productivity tasks. With that being said, we found it to lag behind competitor’s models with the same chip inside, as well as laptops that were smaller in size. The SSD read and writes here were also quick, making loading your files on and off the 512GB drive incredibly easy.

The battery present here is the same 80Wh capacity as in the 16-inch model too which, during our PC Mark 10 benchmark, managed to last 11hrs and 20 minutes. For a laptop this size, it’s a respectable result, although lasted just under 4 hours less than the LG Gram 16.

So if you fancy a 17-inch laptop that’s also portable enough to bring to the office or the university lecture hall, there really is no better option than the LG Gram 17.

Reviewer: Ryan Jones
Full review: LG Gram 17 (2021) review

The Alienware x17 R2 (2022) is a jaw-dropping, large-screen gaming laptop.

This comes especially thanks to the 17-inch 1080p IPS panel that, on its own, may not sound like much. But combine it with the powers of a 1ms response time and a 360Hz refresh rate, and you get one of the most powerful panels on a laptop today. We found it to offer a responsive gaming experience alongside some marvellous image quality thanks to a contrast ratio of 1153:1, and great colour space coverage with 98.1% sRGB represented.

During testing, the x17 R2 proved to be an immensely powerful laptop with its benchmark scores and results sitting very near to the top of the tree. In testing AAA titles such as Horizon Zero Dawn at max settings in 1080p, the x17 R2 mustered up a result of 120fps, and offered up a jaw-dropping 226fps in Rainbow Six Siege. Those high-flying results are taken care of thanks to some beefy internal components including a high power Intel Core i7-12700H processor and an Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti GPU.

We also thought this Alienware laptop looked fantastic with some impeccable build quality that high-end gaming laptops have become known for. At 21mm thick, it’s a nice middle ground between the thinner Razer Blade 17 (2022) and the Asus ROG Strix Scar 17. The keyboard here is also a notable plus point with crisp and responsive keys, complete with full NKRO too, so inputs will be as precise as possible.

So if you’re looking for ultimate gaming laptop with a 17-inch screen, look no further than the Alienware x17 R2.

Reviewer: Mike Jennings
Full Review: Alienware x17 R2 (2022) review

With an asking price of four grand or so, it’s easy to see why the Razer Blade 17 (2022) makes it onto our list as the most powerful 17-inch laptop we’ve tested.

That power comes courtesy of an Intel Core i7-12800H processor, an Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti and 32GB of RAM, which is one of the most powerful configurations money can buy today. As a result, it should come as no surprise that Razer’s large screen candidate romped our tests, offering unmatched scores in the benchmarks, and excellent results in AAA titles, with Horizon Zero Dawn averaging at 119fps in 1080p, and 99fps in 1440p.

The power of the Blade 17 also extends into its display, with our sample shipping with a 240Hz 1440p panel, which sits in the middle of the available options. We found its colours to look bright and vivid, which came thanks to above-average brightness and a respectable contrast ratio of 1140:1. As well as being vivid, those colours were especially accurate with our colorimeter measuring 99% in sRGB, 83% in sRGB and 97.50% in DCI-P3. This means you could comfortably use the Blade for professional workloads, and offers a comparable experience to Apple’s MacBook Pro.

With regards to design, the Blade 17 looks fantastic with a professional aesthetic afforded by the black, anodized aluminium chassis. Its sturdiness is backed up by the 2.75kg heft, although at just 19.9mm thick, it’s relatively slim, too. We also found the port selection to be top class with HDMI, Ethernet, USB-A and Thunderbolt 4 all represented.

In running our benchmark test for battery life, the Blade 17 performed poorly, only managing to last for just shy of three hours, so this will be a laptop to use while plugged into the mains pretty much exclusively.

There really isn’t much separating the Razer Blade 17 from the Alienware x17 R2, but with a wealth of configurations available, you’re able to purchase one of the most powerful portables on the market with the Razer.

Reviewer: Ryan Jones
Full review: Razer Blade 17 (2022) review

Dell’s XPS line of ultrabooks have remained some of the best laptops that money can buy, and the 17-inch XPS 17 is the best option in the range for those who crave the biggest panel possible.

The XPS 17 looks excellent with thin bezels helping it to look modern, while offering the same sturdy construction as the rest of the XPS range. In addition, the keyboard offered a consistent keypress and the trackpad was responsive, complete with clever gesture controls to boot. The port selection here will suffice for modern workloads with four Thunderbolt 4 ports and a Micro SD card reader.

The 17.3-inch display proved to be vibrant with a measured 500 nits of brightness, as well as being able to produce detailed images thanks to that 3840×2400 resolution. We also found the 16:10 aspect ratio here to work a treat for day-to-day working, with the increased amount of vertical space working well in tandem with modern workloads. The large panel on the XPS 17 (2021) is also pretty much perfect for content creation given the high colour accuracy – we measured it to have 100% Adobe RGB as well as near 100% DCI-P3.

To run all of this, the XPS 17 features a fair bit of grunt inside with an Intel Core i7-11800H processor that achieved superb benchmark scores during testing. The addition of an Nvidia RTX 3060 GPU also helped to provide some extra graphics power, and will be welcome to anyone who needs a discrete GPU for more intense workloads.

Its 9 hours and 23 minutes of battery life is reasonable for a laptop this powerful, with it being able to last a working day with some time to spare. If you do push it any further, then this charge will drop off, but for a big-screen laptop, it’s pretty good. We do think you’ll find better value with the Dell XPS 13 OLED and Dell XPS 15, but we can’t discount the XPS 17 if you’re desperate for a super-sized screen.

Reviewer: Mike Jennings
Full review: Dell XPS 17 (2021) review