2026 is proving to be the best and, absolutely, the worst time to buy your next big back-to-school laptop. Your choices are more limited than ever if you hope to stick to a sub-$1,000 budget. Thankfully, the laptops on offer at this price point are some of the best in years.
At the same time that both Apple and PC makers are pushing lightweight laptops that don’t feel cheap, the ongoing memory shortage has spiked the cost of all RAM and SSD components. That has had a knock-on effect for components like discrete GPUs—the kind necessary for any more intensive task young engineers or data scientists may require.
Even in the process of writing this list, we found several of our choices of laptop suddenly balloon in price. We can’t guarantee many of the laptops on this list will remain below your budget maximum. However, with some careful shopping, you may be able to find a staple MacBook Air or other high-quality PC for less. If you’re looking beyond this list, I suggest you follow deal-hunting accounts like Wario64 on Bluesky or Twitter. Otherwise, feel free to use this list as a jumping-off point as you look for the one laptop that will treat you well for the next several years.
MacBook Neo
