If you’re looking for the best 2-in-1 laptop to boost productivity and enjoy versatile functionality, TechRadar is here to help. 2-in-1 laptops combine the power of a traditional laptop with the convenience of a tablet, giving you flexibility whether you’re working, streaming, or creating on the go.
One standout option among the best 2-in-1 laptops is the Microsoft Surface Pro 11. Known for its sleek design and powerful performance, this model offers a detachable keyboard, allowing you to seamlessly switch between laptop and tablet modes. It’s perfect for students, professionals, and creatives who need a device that adapts to their lifestyle. With a vibrant display and long battery life, the Surface Pro 11 makes a great investment in both productivity and entertainment.
For those on a budget, the Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 5 Chromebook is another fantastic option. With impressive battery life, a gorgeous OLED touchscreen, and reliable processing power, it’s one of the best 2-in-1 laptops for budget-conscious buyers.
Whether you’re looking for a high-end device or a budget-friendly choice, our team has reviewed numerous models to help you find the best 2-in-1 laptop for your needs.
The best 2-in-1 laptop in 2024
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The best 2-in-1 laptop overall
With its exceptional design, stunning display, and impressive battery life, the Microsoft Surface Pro 11 is a real standout among the best 2-in-1s.
It surpasses the iPad Pro in functionality due to its full Windows 11 OS, and though its performance might lag slightly behind the latest iPad Pro with Apple M4, it still excels in benchmark tests and has no major weaknesses for most users.
The Surface Pro 11’s design and battery life are particularly impressive, featuring an optional 2.8K OLED display with incredible color accuracy that is well worth the upgrade. In addition, you get a 1440p webcam and a solid, lightweight build. The battery life meets Microsoft’s 14-hour claim, even approaching 15 hours in our local video playback tests, showcasing the power efficiency of Arm architecture.
The Microsoft Surface Pro 11 excels in all areas, pushing the boundaries of what users expect from a top-tier Windows laptop. As more developers release Arm-compatible apps and more AI features roll out, this laptop is set to become even more remarkable.
Read our full Microsoft Surface Pro 11 review
The best budget 2-in-1 laptop
It’s actually astounding how something like the Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 5 Chromebook can exist in this market, being as cheap yet as impressive as it is. It delivers plenty of power to those who rely heavily on Google Chrome workloads and use it for the more casual workloads.
Our time with this incredibly portable Chromebook was spent sending emails, writing our articles, and naturally, streaming our favorite shows. While all that doesn’t sound taxing to the system at all, having 20 or more browsers open actually is, especially if some are streaming content. And, this Chromebook breezed through that without a sweat while lasting about 16 hours and 20 minutes during testing.
We also appreciate that it’s incredibly portable, making it easier to take with us if we want to squeeze in a little bit of work whilst traveling. This being a 2-in-1, there’s also the touch display aspect, which got upgraded to an OLED one. Its touch capability has always been nice and responsive, but now you've also got the vivid colors that only an OLED panel can offer.
Read our full Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 5 Chromebook review
The best midrange 2-in-1 laptop
The Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 8 (2023) is a testament to Lenovo’s brilliance, offering speedy performance and great features in an elevated design and for less than the price of its more popular rivals. This is an absolute stunner, with an OLED display with amazing picture quality, and a 360-degree-rotating soundbar for a more immersive streaming experience.
Performance-wise, it crushed other touchscreen laptops such as a similarly-specced and similarly-priced Samsung Galaxy Book3 Pro 360 in our benchmarks. And surprisingly, it holds its own when tackling creative workloads, taking less time than we expected to process and export 50 high-res 7952 x 4472 images from RAW to JPEG in Lightroom. It delivers on battery life as well, giving us a little over 10 hours on a full charge in our web surfing battery test.
The OLED display is not as bright as we'd hoped, averaging around 350 nits in our readings. But it’s vibrant nonetheless, not to mention responsive and intuitive to your touch commands.
Read our full Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 8 review
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The best 2-in-1 Chromebook
The Acer Chromebook Spin 514 is a fantastic touchscreen laptop to immerse yourself in. Though you’ll still need to do most of your work on the Chrome browser, you are getting an even more powerful device here without paying a premium.
Keeping up with much pricier Chromebooks during testing, it breezes through mostly browser-based workloads without a hitch, handling about 20 tabs of websites of varying graphical and processing demands while keeping things relatively cool and quiet. Sure, the battery isn’t as long as many budget Chromebooks, giving us eight hours and 20 minutes run in our battery test, but that’s still a full workday if you think about it.
The 14-inch 1080p Corning Gorilla Glass display is a stunner as well, ideal if you want to just use it for streaming Netflix all day and even play a mobile game. It also supports the USI Stylus, despite not having it included in the box. But you don’t need to buy one as the touch capability here is incredibly intuitive.
Read our full Acer Chromebook Spin 514 (2022) review
The best premium 2-in-1 Chromebook
The Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) might come with a slightly higher price tag than most Chromebooks, but that's because it packs a little extra punch. And when it comes to work, having a bit more power is often a welcome advantage.
During our tests, this Chromebook's 13th-Gen Intel Core i5 and 8GB of RAM effortlessly handled running 20 Chrome tabs, including three streaming ones, without a hitch. This added power not only supports the 1920 x 1200p touch display but also enhances the quality of the 1440p webcam, providing stunning clarity.
While the speakers could be improved for richer sound, and the keyboard could offer a more pleasant typing experience, the Chromebook excels in battery life, lasting a commendable 12 hours during our benchmark tests. Its solid hinge ensures stability, making it versatile in various modes, whether in tent or display mode.
In summary, the Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) justifies its higher price point. It offers a premium look, feel, and performance that sets it apart from many of its alternatives.
Read our full Acer Chromebook Spin 714 (2023) review
How to choose the best 2-in-1 laptop for you
With so many great options available, picking out the best 2-in-1 laptop for your own personal needs can be tricky. If you're not particularly clued in on what the internal components mean, don't worry: we're here to help.
Ultimately, you need to consider exactly what you're planning on using your new 2-in-1 laptop for. If it's just going to be for simple office work (say, spreadsheets and word processing) or it's a simple entertainment laptop for a child, you don't need a top-tier processor or tonnes of RAM.
Most of these 2-in-1 laptops feature at least 8GB of RAM, which is plenty for the average user. If you're going to be performing more intensive tasks, like video editing, digital art, or running complex mathematical programs, you might want 16GB or even more than that. When it comes to confusingly-named CPUs, bigger numbers in the name generally mean a more powerful chip that will make the laptop run faster - though these will cost more.
If you want to use your laptop for maximum productivity, consider one with a 16:10 or 3:2 screen aspect ratio. This means that the screen is taller than 'widescreen' aspect ratios like 16:9, so you can fit more of a long text document on the screen without needing to scroll!
Lastly, pay close attention to the amount of storage a laptop has. If you're planning on mostly working off the cloud (like using Google Drive), you won't need as much storage. But if you want to install lots of programs to your device or store a tonne of photo or video files, you're probably going to need more than the 256GB drives found in many of the best 2-in-1 laptops.
How we test 2-in-1 laptops
Testing 2-in-1 laptops looks a lot like testing traditional clamshell laptops, only with a few extra steps. After all, we also need to test these hybrids’ 2-in-1 form factor as well as touchscreen functionalities, ensuring that everything works swimmingly and the touchscreen is as responsive as it should be.
We take a look at a 2-in-1 laptop’s design, first of all, checking to see how robust its build is, just how portable it is, how comfortable its keyboard and trackpad are to use, how good the display is, etc. We check the availability of ports and biometrics sign-in technologies. We check out the webcam, speakers, and mic as well, since video conferencing has become such an integral part of our daily lives. Naturally, because its 2-in-1 form factor is a major selling point, we inspect the hinges, the different modes, the touchscreen functionality, and the stylus, if included, to make sure that it’s delivering a seamless experience.
Of course, we test its performance as well. Since most 2-in-1 notebooks are designed for productivity, school, or everyday use, we utilize the laptop in our daily workloads as well as for entertainment and casual use. We use the most commonly used Windows 10 (or Chrome OS on Chromebooks) apps to see how fast they load and run. We perform synthetic benchmarks as well, including PCMark 10 (Home Test) and GeekBench 5 so we can get you those exact numbers to compare to its rivals.
Battery life – or rather, great battery life – is an integral part of laptops, especially premium ones. So, we also test its longevity, using it at full charge to see just how long the battery lasts when doing everyday workloads, as well as running both our looped 1080p movie test and the PC Mark 10 battery life benchmark.
Finally, we gather all that information we collected about the laptop and compare it to its price tag to gauge whether it’s a great value to consumers - or at the very least, worth the money.
For a more in-depth guide on our testing process, see how we test.
The best 2-in-1 laptop; FAQs
Why are 2-in-1 laptops great for students?
2-in-1 laptops make a great choice for students due to their versatility. Being usable in both standard laptop mode and tablet mode makes them effortlessly convenient as study aids.
They offer excellent battery life and are lightweight and portable, so transporting them from campus to your dorm is a cinch. Their relative affordability also makes them a sensible choice for cash-strapped students, and there’s plenty of power there to handle all your important assignments.
What are the disadvantages of a 2-in-1 laptop?
Despite their many benefits, 2-in-1 laptops are not without their faults, and it’s worth knowing where they could fall short of your expectations before you hand over your money.
While a 2-in-1 laptop is likely to have more processing power than a tablet will, it’s also likely to have less power than a more traditional laptop, so you should be careful to check the specs prior to making a purchase.
In addition, they can be a little lacking when it comes to durability, due to their lightweight and hinged designs, so a bit more care may be needed when transporting them. And lastly, the keys on a 2-in-1 tend to be smaller than on a regular laptop, which may inhibit users with larger hands.
Today's best 2-in-1 laptop deals
