Dell XPS 13 Portability, battery life, storage space and of course price are some of the key considerations when buying a travel laptop. When it’s a device that will be with you on the road it’s important to consider raw specs like memory and processing power, but it’s equally important that your laptop is versatile and lightweight, easy to use, and that it can easily store everything you need (as WiFi or mobile data is never guaranteed, especially if you’re travelling abroad). The following laptops are our current top picks for nomads, frequent travelers, or anyone else needing a good computer on the go. We’ll start with some affordable budget options before getting to some higher-end lightweight laptops. — by Marek Bron & Saptam Bakshi. I do a lot of travelling, and for me, a full system for work on a VPN network (MacOS or Windows are OK), is a must. The battery life is really important.

Being spill resistant is nice too (I once had an Asus transformer and spilled beer on my keyboard at the airport, which stopped working immediately). So either a spill resistant notebook or a notebook from a company that has spare parts everywhere. And then the weight and size ultra important when you travel only with carry on luggage. My choice is Lenovo Yogabook at just 700 grams in weight, its ultra portable. It has no real keyboard (the keys are displayed which makes it spill resistant, but at the same time difficult to type until you get used to it). My next notebook will be either the 12 inch Macbook (not the Pro) or stick with the Lenovo.

In fact, the laptop is one of the most favorite laptops for programmers all around the world. The MacBook Air Brings an ultra-portable build with 13.3-inch screen and is powered by an Intel Core i5 5th-gen processor.

By the way, the yogabbook can be charged using a powerbank! • Comment by Steve. @Agnes I totally agree with you. Looking for the cheapest, lightest, laptop that is not a Chromebook. When on the road travelling, I need to sometimes do word processing etc but also want to store videos, music, documents and pictures offloaded from the camera. This requires decent hard drive space and enough capacity to still be functional in areas where wifi is spotty or slow or non-existent.

I have a nice laptop at home but do not want to bring it travelling. I think about $500 is the maximum I would like to spend on a dedicated travel laptop • Comment by Gulya. Marek, thanks for this post. It informed my research in an invaluable way on what I should get for a 6-month-plus trip I’ll be starting in October. I want the Dell xps 13 but there are so many versions of it out there I have been overwhelmed.

It’s also a little expensive for my budget.howeverI found a factory refurbished Dell XPS 13.3″ Touch-Screen Laptop i7 2.2GHz 16GB 512GB SSD for $900. I’d love your opinion on that. Thank you for your awesome and informative and well written blog! I just love it and I’m buying your book this week! • Comment by Marek. I always find this kind of article a bit frustrating because it overlooks the largest part of the market: people who want a cheap laptop they can take travelling while leaving their better laptop (safe) at home. A Chromebook does that for some people, but if you need certain applications like image editing, proper offline word processing and so on (i.e.

Most people who are working on the road – like website editors) it doesn’t quite cut it. Tablets (or 2 in 1s) and high end (but light) laptops aren’t hitting that market either. You want a cheap laptop you can take that you don’t mind too much about losing, not something expensive. • Comment by Marek. I travel OS a lot with worklots of 14+ hour flights. Whether I am going away for a few nights or a few weeks, over the years I have learned the benefits of traveling super light. For all but a few of 25 OS business trips in the last 5 years, I have taken carry on only.

It makes a big diff when you hit airports with poor customs staffing. Usually, I aim to keep my carry on. Just wondered if you have any recommendations for me? I am looking to start blogging and photo editing potentially alongside travelling so I am looking for a lightweight, fast laptop that will allow me to edit photos using adobe software. I’ve had a HP chromebook for a few years but it has recently died and as much as I love my chromebook I wouldn’t be able to do the photo editing I want to do on it. So I’m looking for an alternative replacement but on a very small budget.

That counts for something. Mac preview software for windows.

Any recommendations will be greatly appreciated! • Comment by Marek. OK now, I need help.

I have a HUGE 17 inch gaming computer (i7) and I was thinking of selling it as it is 3 kg heavy. What would you recommend? Keeping it or selling it? I am travelling around the world starting this March- going to hot and cold places(- Alaska, Patagonia,) etc.