The best gaming PCs for 2023

We’re huge followers of gaming consoles just like the PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch, however there’s one thing particular a few gaming PC. Nothing beats the lightning-fast body charges, ultra-high decision, and lifelike graphics you get from a specced-out desktop. And, with some know-how, you’ll be able to repeatedly improve your gaming PC’s inside elements, permitting you to sport for years to return.

While constructing a strong pc from scratch may be rewarding, it’s not accessible to everybody. Buying a prebuilt gaming PC just like the fashions on this record simplifies the daunting job of placing one collectively piece by piece. And these machines can rival some customized builds and mean you can play the most recent AAA titles on the highest settings. Whether you’re new to the world of PC gaming otherwise you’ve been doing it for years, this record of the best gaming PCs can have you taking part in some nice video games very quickly.

How we selected the best gaming PCs

Since getting my first desktop within the early 2000s—round when Counter-Strike was simply turning into in style—I’ve had an timeless love of PC gaming. On high of gaming, I’ve written about computer systems and peripherals for over a decade on websites like Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, and CNN Underscored. I’ve additionally examined all method of PCs and laptops to search out the newest and biggest units. To discover the best gaming PCs, I used my prior expertise and researched the most well-liked fashions from trusted manufacturers. I then chosen the person picks primarily based on third-party critiques and shopper suggestions.

The best gaming PCs: Reviews & Recommendations

While shopping for a prebuilt gaming PC is extra easy than constructing one, you’ll nonetheless have some selections to make. Many of the choices on this record come in numerous configurations, and selecting the correct mix of inside elements can influence your quick and long-term expertise. That stated, we selected choices that supply the best steadiness between efficiency and worth, with picks that run the gamut from graphical powerhouses to finances choices. If none of those choices are in your finances, try our information for the best low cost gaming PCs or laptops.

Best total: Lenovo Legion Tower 7i

Specs

• Price: $2,989.99
• CPU: Intel Core i7-13700KF
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080
• Memory: 32GB
• Storage: 1TB

Pros

• Understated, upgradable design
• Caters to newbies and fans
• 4K-ready

Cons

• Bloatware is a bit of a lot
• No USB-C ports within the entrance

The Lenovo Legion Tower 7i supplies a wonderful steadiness of efficiency, worth, and upgradability, making it a best choice for newbies and fans. There are 4 completely different configurations, with the top-of-the-line mannequin that includes an Intel Core i9, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080, 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. We suggest going with a configuration that lands within the center: it consists of an Intel Core i7 processor, Nvidia RTX 4080, 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. The mannequin additionally has a strong cooling system to assist stop your machine from overheating.

The Lenovo Legion Tower 7i additionally incorporates a extra understated design—one thing that comes down to non-public preferences. The tower has a 3D mesh entrance bezel and a rail-side clear glass panel, so you’ll be able to admire the elements inside (together with an RGB fan that’s a part of the cooling system). Meanwhile, the Legion Tower 7i presents a couple of open slots, permitting you so as to add extra storage when the inventory SSD inevitably runs out. All stated, the pc presents glorious gaming efficiency and is available in completely different configurations, permitting you to decide on the one that matches your finances.

Best finances: NZXT Player: One

Specs

• Price: $949
• CPU: Intel Core i5-124OOF
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060
• Memory: 32GB
• Storage: 500GB

Pros

• Affordable boutique expertise
• Excellent 1080p efficiency
• Great guarantee choices

Cons

• Not overly highly effective
• Some could really feel the design is bland

If you’re on a finances and don’t thoughts a gaming PC with much less highly effective elements, the NZXT Player: One is a superb starter choice. For lower than $1,000, you will get an Intel Core i5, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060, 16GB of RAM, and 500GB of storage. That’s sufficient energy to get 170 frames per second whereas taking part in GTA V at 1080p decision, in keeping with NZXT. The firm supplies a boutique expertise by offering knowledgeable meeting, customer support, and a guaranty that covers product repairs, failure safety, and extra.

The Player: One additionally helps overclocking the GPU to unlock increased body charges and real-time ray tracing. You may also improve the machine with much more RAM (as much as 32GB) and storage (as much as 2TB), permitting you to maintain up with the calls for of AAA gaming. The tower that homes the elements options an understated design specializing in airflow to maintain temperatures low. NZXT additionally presents a tailored PC monitoring app to assist handle efficiency, temperatures, and extra.

Best fanatic: Corsair Vengeance i7400

Specs

• Price: $3,799
• CPU: Intel Core i9-12900K
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090
• Memory: 64GB
• Storage: 2TB

Pros

• High-end specs
• You get knowledgeable meeting
• Great guarantee and buyer help

Cons

• Pricey
• Side door may be tough to take away

Enthusiasts who need the best ought to try the Corsair Vengeance i7400. This gaming PC has top-of-the-line specs: Intel Core i9-12900K, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090, 64GB of RAM, and 2TB of storage. That’s loads of energy to take pleasure in at the moment’s most demanding titles—and sufficient energy to play on the highest settings for a couple of years. The Vengeance (what a cool title) comes expertly assembled, supplying you with top-notch efficiency with out the headache of placing it collectively.

What’s most spectacular about this mannequin is Corsair backs it with a two-year guarantee and 24/7 help by telephone or on-line. It’s good understanding the corporate is assured in its merchandise and protected against sudden malfunctions. Despite being overkill for most avid gamers, the Vengeance in all fairness priced in comparison with different high-end prebuilt rigs.

Best for newbies: Alienware Aurora R16

Specs

• Price: $1,749
• CPU: Intel Core i7-13700F
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070
• Memory: 16GB
• Storage: 1TB

Pros

• Well-balanced specs
• Small dimension
• Great for on a regular basis use

Cons

• Just a little dear as a newbie gaming PC

Dell’s line of Alienware units is known in gaming, and the Aurora R16 is without doubt one of the newest entries. What makes this a stable choose for newbies is you get current-generation specs in a small bundle—40 % smaller than its predecessor—and it comes at an inexpensive worth. And the rig does greater than sport; it’s additionally a wonderful machine for getting work finished.

Despite its smaller dimension, the Aurora R16 options specs that present glorious efficiency, together with an Intel Core i7-13700 processor, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060, 16GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage. There are different configurations, however the base construct will present loads of energy for newbies. The Aurora R16  additionally presents what Dell says is a thermal technique that may maintain your rig cool and quiet, even throughout intense gaming classes. Dell’s machine checks all the suitable bins relating to {hardware} and efficiency, making it a wonderful selection for newbies.

Best below $1,000: Steam Deck

Specs

• Price: $399
• CPU: AMD Zen 2
• GPU: AMD 8 RDNA 2
• Memory: 16GB
• Storage: 256GB

Pros

• Powerful handheld gaming
• Customizable controls
• Portable design

Cons

• Poor battery life
• Still buggy

The Steam Deck isn’t a gaming PC within the conventional sense; as a substitute, it takes the idea of the Nintendo Switch and ups the stakes. The handheld Linux gaming PC has advanced into one of many best methods to take pleasure in top-tier titles, and it’s solely $399. If you’re extra of an informal gamer, the Steam Deck is a superb technique to spend a couple of hours taking part in Elden Ring or futzing round with an emulator.

A yr after its launch, the Steam Deck continues to supply spectacular efficiency because of its highly effective {hardware}, customizable controls, and software program. What’s nice is the Steam Deck retains bettering, because of Valve’s updates, so no matter issues exist at the moment could also be gone tomorrow. And help for new video games is at all times being added, with help for titles like Cyberpunk 2077 and GTA V. Basically, it might do practically every part your PC can—however in a way more manageable and inexpensive bundle.

What to think about when shopping for a gaming PC

PC gaming isn’t for the faint of coronary heart—most of the best prebuilt fashions are costly, with costs upwards of $1,500. Unless you will have a vast finances, you might have to compromise when selecting elements, whether or not by deciding on a much less highly effective graphics card or much less RAM. That’s why you could know what to look for so the machine you purchase meets your expectations. Of course, the elements in your prebuilt gaming PC are solely a part of the equation—you must also contemplate components like peripherals, guarantee, and upgradability.

Graphics Card (GPU)

The graphics processing unit, or GPU, is an integral part in your gaming PC and is accountable for rendering graphics and pictures. The GPU is the element we suggest upgrading if you would like high-quality visuals and quick refresh charges. Keep in thoughts the price of your PC can rise considerably in case you splurge for a extra superior GPU.

Two corporations make devoted graphics playing cards for desktops, Nvidia and AMD, every providing a spread of GPUs catering to completely different efficiency ranges and budgets. You’ll need a graphics card from the present technology for the best attainable efficiency. Nvidia at the moment presents RTX 40 and RTX 30 sequence of graphics playing cards, with the 40 Series providing the newest developments, together with a extra superior ray tracing characteristic generally known as real-time path tracing. Meanwhile, AMD presents the RX 7000 and RX 6000 sequence of graphics playing cards.

For a extra in-depth rationalization of why a graphics card is so important, PopSci’s information offers you the knowledge wanted to make the best choice for your state of affairs. While most present and last-generation playing cards can present a wonderful gaming expertise, newer fashions mean you can play the best, most graphic-intensive titles for longer.

Processor (CPU)

The central processing unit, or CPU, performs a basic function within the total efficiency of your gaming PC and works together with the GPU to ship clean, high-fidelity visuals. Without a CPU, your pc couldn’t make the computations essential to run applications, preserve steady body charges, or deal with networking duties.

The best technique to gauge a CPU’s energy is to examine its computing cores and clock pace. Compute cores give your processor the flexibility to deal with a number of duties on the identical time. More cores imply higher multitasking, particularly with processor-intensive duties like video encoding. Meanwhile, clock pace, proven in Hz, measures the variety of computations or “cycles” the processor could make every second. For instance, a CPU with a clock pace of two.8 GHz executes 2.8 billion cycles per second.

As with graphics playing cards, there are two main producers for processors: Intel and AMD. Similar to GPUs, CPUs break down into efficiency tiers. Intel processors embrace Core i3, Core i5, Core i7, and Core i9. On the opposite hand, AMD consists of Ryzen 3, Ryzen 5, Ryzen 7, and Ryzen 9. We suggest selecting Core i5 or Ryzen 5 CPUs and above if it’s in your finances.

Memory and Storage

Random entry reminiscence, or RAM, permits your purposes to quickly retailer knowledge and rapidly re-access it if needed. We suggest 16GB for a gaming PC in case your workflow includes utilizing a number of purposes concurrently, because it straight impacts the efficiency and responsiveness of your machine. The excellent news is that almost all gaming PCs, prebuilt or in any other case, will mean you can improve your RAM down the highway and sustain with the calls for of recent video games and purposes.

Your pc’s storage determines how a lot knowledge you’ll be able to retailer, together with purposes, media, and paperwork. While 500GB of storage seems like quite a bit, at the moment’s video games require extra storage than ever. For instance, Call of Duty Warzone takes up practically 200GB of storage, and different trendy AAA titles are equally massive. Your best wager is to choose for extra storage when it’s inside your finances.

There are a number of forms of storage choices to think about: laborious disk drive (HDD), solid-state drive (SSD), and NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) SSD. You’re most likely most acquainted with HDD, a mechanical storage system that makes use of spinning disks to retailer knowledge. HDDs are in style as a result of they provide excessive storage capacities at inexpensive costs. However, they ship slower knowledge entry speeds and are extra liable to mechanical failure as a consequence of their transferring elements.

SSDs have roughly changed HDDs in gaming because of faster knowledge entry and shorter boot occasions. They are additionally much less liable to failure since there are not any transferring elements. When selecting a gaming PC, we suggest you get one with an SSD. Similar to RAM, some machines will mean you can add further storage. NVMe SSDs supply the quickest efficiency however may be the costliest choice on this record.

Peripherals

Prebuilt gaming PCs typically don’t embrace peripherals like a mouse, keyboard, monitor, headphones or audio system—however that’s not essentially a foul factor. Accessories included along with your gaming PC or provided as add-ons are often low-quality and received’t mean you can get the best out of your gaming expertise. Something is best than nothing, however we suggest getting peripherals geared towards fast-twitch gaming, particularly in case you play first-person shooters. There is a whole business of equipment and peripherals with dozens of choices, so that you’ll should do a number of analysis earlier than choosing one thing up. 

FAQs

Final ideas relating to the best gaming PCs

A succesful gaming PC unlocks entry to a complete world of video games and experiences console gamers simply don’t have. You can run customized mods, max out settings for unmatched visuals, and tweak your setup precisely the way you prefer it. And, whereas sometime you could need to construct your personal machine, the best gaming PCs on this record present an unbelievable expertise proper out of the field. No thermal paste expertise needed.

Why belief us

Popular Science began writing about know-how greater than 150 years in the past. There was no such factor as “gadget writing” after we printed our first concern in 1872, but when there was, our mission to demystify the world of innovation for on a regular basis readers means we’d have been throughout it. Here within the current, PopSci is absolutely dedicated to serving to readers navigate the more and more intimidating array of units in the marketplace proper now.

Our writers and editors have mixed a long time of expertise overlaying and reviewing shopper electronics. We every have our personal obsessive specialties—from high-end audio to video video games to cameras and past—however after we’re reviewing units exterior of our rapid wheelhouses, we do our best to hunt out reliable voices and opinions to assist information folks to the very best suggestions. We know we don’t know every part, however we’re excited to dwell by means of the evaluation paralysis that web procuring can spur so readers don’t should.