When you’re searching for a new laptop , there are plenty of factors you need to consider. Not only do you need to assess the laptop’s specs, memory, and hardware, but you also have to determine whether you require a regular non-touchscreen laptop, a high-performance gaming model, or a newer model with a touchscreen. Touchscreen laptops have their advantages and disadvantages, just like any other laptop feature, so it’s important to weigh them carefully.
In this article, we’ll explore the advantages and disadvantages of touchscreen laptops and provide some recommendations for both touchscreen and non-touchscreen laptops.
Touchscreen laptops can offer many key benefits. Let’s explore what makes touchscreen laptops stand out from the rest.
The main goal of having a laptop with a touchscreen is to streamline navigation. Compared to trackpads and mouse devices, users can accomplish tasks on their laptops with more efficiency, and it’s simpler to launch and shift between applications. Additionally, you can also use the touchscreen feature to get your work done if the trackpad or keyboard stops working.
Graphic designers and artists often prefer a touchscreen feature. Many touchscreen laptops also come equipped with stylus options, so creative users can draw and paint on their device and get closer to that pen-to-paper feeling. A touchscreen and stylus display combo can be a highly convenient feature package for students, as it eliminates the need to have to carry around several heavy notebooks for classes. It also enables artists to work on the go, whenever and wherever inspiration strikes next.
Touchscreen laptops tend to come with fantastic brightness and superior color vibrancy, accuracy, and reproduction compared to non-touchscreen displays. The majority of touchscreen models feature displays with higher resolution. Pro tip: Glossy touchscreen displays respond better to touch than matte ones. Whether you’re an artist creating vibrant paintings or a project manager building slide decks, with a touchscreen laptop you can find the color brightness and accuracy you need to stun your audience.
While there are many benefits to having a touchscreen laptop, it’s not always a smooth experience. Technology advances quickly, but there are still some faults with the systems that we use. Here are some cons about having a touchscreen laptop that you should be aware of.
Touchscreen features require a touch panel–which means that the computer’s hardware has another set of processing tasks to take care of. If you’re planning on frequently using the touchscreen feature, you may need a spare battery or have to charge your device more often.
Having a touchscreen feature will add to the price of the laptop. Some manufacturers offer higher-resolution touchscreen displays, which can elevate the cost further.
Adding extra technology to the computer means it takes up more bulk and space, making the laptop heavier. Even though the difference is in grams, a small amount of weight can be noticeable in laptops.
Laptops with touchscreen displays are great for dimly lit areas but can be difficult to use in direct lighting. The glossy finishes on touchscreen models respond faster to touch, but this kind of finish also easily attracts fingerprints, smudges, and the like.
This 2-in-1 laptop is one of the best gaming laptops on the market today, with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti GPU, 16 GB of RAM, and 1-TB SSD for short load times, ample storage, and stunning visuals. This laptop’s powerful processor and 360-degree hinge make it an easy favorite to work hard and play hard.
Size: 13.4 inch touchscreen display
Reference Price: $1,599.99
This HP laptop is back with more powerful components like built-in Amazon Alexa, 12th Gen Intel Core i7 processor, and Intel Iris Xe Graphics. It also comes equipped with new security features, including a camera shutter and an IR camera for facial recognition. With a 360-hinge and a 3:2 aspect ratio for a taller screen, this touchscreen laptop is for those who care about aesthetics as much as overall quality and performance.
Size: 13.5 inch touchscreen display
Reference Price: $1,749.99
The Dell XPS 13 Plus is the next generation of the well-loved Dell XPS 13, and an overall fantastic tool for productivity. With a precise glass haptic touchpad and stunning 3.5K OLED display, this laptop is great for creative work—and a TV break. This laptop is known for its fast and reliable speeds as well as its minimalist and streamlined design.
Size: 13.4 inch touchscreen
Reference Price: $1,249
The C434 might be the best touchscreen laptop that you can get on a limited budget. Don’t expect it to do everything, but this portable and compact laptop can get quite a lot done. This Chromebook features Asus’ new NanoEdge 14-inch display, full G Suite and Google Play Store access, and a 10-hour battery life, so it’s perfect for projects big and small.
Size: 14 inch touchscreen
Reference Price: $519
The number of people working from home increases every single day. Remote workers need a laptop with a minimum of 8GB of RAM, a powerful processor, and solid battery life—and since touchscreens eat up battery rapidly, going with a non-touchscreen display may be the better choice for working and teaching remotely .
Let’s check out your best options.
MacBook Air
We’re big fans of Apple’s 2022 MacBook Air, built with the new M2 chip and packed with 512GB SSD Storage. The laptop features a fantastic 13.6-inch Liquid Retina display with True Tone, a built-in HD camera, and—finally—the return of the MagSafe connector , so you can move around without worry about damaging your charging cord. However, as it goes with most Apple products, this laptop’s flashy features and sleek design come at a hefty price.
Size: 13.6 inch screen
Reference Price: $1,499
Asus Zephyrus G14
Engineered for both work and games, the Asus Zephyrus G14 offers a robust structure and build. If you’re looking for a powerful laptop, this laptop comes with an AMD Ryzen™ 7 processor with 8 cores and 16 threads for optimal speeds and performance.This laptop also offers a luxurious 512GB SSD that provides storage for all your files and works great in a dual-monitor set up.
Size: 14 inch screen
Reference Price: $1,149
For touchscreen laptop users, the majority report that the touchscreen feature assists with productivity since it helps them work more fluidly and streamline tasks. Touchscreen models also help you think more creatively and work more naturally. Suddenly, taking meeting notes and sketching feels more like drawing on a whiteboard and less like fighting with a lagging trackpad or clanky keyboard. Using your fingers to navigate the display is intuitive and interactive. Moreover, touchscreen models are aesthetically pleasing and offer exceptional color brightness and accuracy, which is excellent for all kinds of users.
As we discussed above, these models also offer certain disadvantages. They are heavier, more expensive, and use more battery power than regular laptops. When it comes to buying a new laptop, you should consider your personal needs and priorities in a workspace to ensure a touchscreen laptop meets those needs.
A laptop with a touchscreen is precisely that. It refers to a computer with a keyboard, mouse settings, and portslike a standard laptop, as well as a touch-sensitive screen.
In contrast, a 2-in-1 or hybrid laptop is more similar to a standard tablet. Many of these will also feature standard ports like USB, but the device is more interactive and compact for easy portability. Often the keyboard is hinged or detachable for ultimate versatility.
Related: The Best Time to Buy a Laptop and Other Office Essentials
[Editor’s note: this post was originally published on January 26, 2021 and updated on March 7, 2023.]
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Touchscreen desktops are a surprisingly controversial subject. While the high tech community, like Microsoft, adopted a ‘yes we should because we could’ reasoning, many users strongly disagree. This has somewhat contributed to the sweeping dissatisfaction with Windows 8. Transitioning to touchscreen desktops is going to be a difficult process.
It is an understatement to say it won’t be worth it. Touchscreen technology, as any innovation in input technologies, has the potential to change and expand the way we interact with technology. The conflict seems to be about whether touch has the potential to replace other input devices. Ironically, this is actually not the primary goal or purpose of touch technology.
There are a number of specific issues raised with touchscreen desktop computers. The inevitable flaw of using your display as an input device comes to mind immediately. Your hands block your view.
The main issue one sees when looking through tech blogs, however, is the dreaded “gorilla arm”. This particular issue is extremely common, and can be seen anywhere from the lowliest tech blog to the Scientific American.
Screens are vertical and usually located farther away, making it harder to use them. Clearly, humans will never overcome this obstacle, thus making touch technology pointless for laptops and computers. Steve Jobs himself said “Touch surfaces don’t want to be vertical”. But that didn’t stop Steve Jobs from using touchscreens, and it won’t stop Microsoft, or HP, or anyone else from jumping on the bandwagon.
The fallacy is at the heart of the idea that gorilla arm is some sort of major obstacle to the introduction of touchscreen technology for desktops and laptops. This is of course, if your display has any reason to be vertical. This is what a modern touchscreen desktop looks like…
…problem solved!
Obviously, a touchscreen computer will not be designed the same way as older models. Both the hardware and the software will be tailored to it. Manufacturers are already adapting the combined input and display device. This essentially means that you won’t be dealing with a raised screen that is parallel to your face. With Windows 8, Microsoft has adopted, perhaps a little prematurely, the stance that operating systems should assume all users will have a touchscreen interface.
We are moving away from the awkward phase of the first experimental touch screen surfaces. The user friendliness of touch will not be ignored.
So when is it time to get touchscreen computers for your business? This question really depends on the nature of your business. If you have a company full of employees primarily dealing with spreadsheets and databases, this probably won’t help you at all.
Any less data-centered, less keyboard heavy work, however, can benefit from touchscreen computers. Perhaps the most obvious of these is the retail industry, which has already largely adopted it as a standard.
If your company relies heavily on young employees, you will find that, after growing up with iPads and iPhones, they will expect, and work better with, this type of technology. We’re not quite there yet, but when you find yourself teaching the masters of new technology to use your old tech, it’s time to upgrade. It will be a matter of a few years at most.
Most pressingly, however, is the simple fact that the industry is going to force you. Consumers want touchscreen technology, and unless you intend to start fiddling with Linux, operating systems will leave you behind.
Windows 9 is not going to be less touchscreen oriented than Windows 8. Running old programs on an old computer using an old operating system is no recipe for business success.
In your business you can install touchscreen desktops which are highly likely used by everyone in ways that a traditional workstation is not suited for. Touchscreens are far more intuitive to use, and do not necessarily require a mouse and a keyboard. This means that you could set up a few touchscreen desktops for your customers to browse merchandise without putting your entire selection physically on display.
A digital display can provide detailed information to your customers without going through the extra cost of employing a knowledgeable sales representative, and at the same time, avoiding dissatisfied customers who have had a bitter experience through the sales representatives themselves.
Information can be made available to your customers on the spot. For example, the display will provide information such as which sizes or colors are in stock, and best of all, price comparisons with major competitors. This information can all be displayed to your customers at a tap on a screen.
Touch technology is not just for businesses though.
Touch is efficient. Surely you can currently do everything that computers do with a mouse and a keyboard. However, from a negative standpoint you have ten fingers whereas there is only one mouse pointer. Back in the 80’s when the mouse was first introduced, many people wondered why they would want that. Operating systems at the time were built so you could do everything with a keyboard, so why invent a mouse? It sounds like an absurd line of reasoning looking back.
How many people run a DOSBox out of disdain for the mouse? Operating systems and computers integrating touch will have new capabilities and programs designed to do awesome things, opening up a new frontier in our technology. So don’t panic. Because integrating touch will not mean removing other inputs unless they naturally fall by the wayside as our technology moves beyond them.
Are you interested in the intersection between UX and UI Design? The online courses on UI Design Patterns for Successful Software and Design Thinking: The Beginner’s Guide can teach you skills you need. If you take a course, you will earn an industry-recognized course certificate to advance your career. On the other hand, if you want to brush up on the basics of UX and Usability, try the online course on User Experience (or another design topic). Good luck on your learning journey!
(Lead image: Depositphotos)