The Best Animation Laptops delivers powerful performance with good storage and GPU, high RAM, and the latest generation processor. Since animators use advanced software such as Flash Animator, Adobe Illustrator, Coral Draw, Adobe Character Animator, Cinema 4D, Ton Boom Harmony, Houdini, and Pencil2D, we recommend Intel i5 or above processors. Best animation laptops should be easy to carry around (lightweight) and run complicated tasks promptly without crashing often. Whether you are a qualified professional or just a beginner, we guarantee that you will find a laptop that will cater to all your graphics and animation needs in this draft.
To help you understand better, we have also included a buyer’s guide at the bottom of this article, but for now, let’s look into the top 6 Best Animation Laptops of 2021.
Microsoft Surface Book 2 DISPLAY:15" touchscreen CPU:Intel Quad Core i7 | ||
  | Acer Aspire VX 15 DISPLAY:15.6-inch HD CPU: 7th Gen Intel Core i7 | |
  | Apple MacBook Pro DISPLAY: 15.4in CPU: Intel Core i9-10980HK | |
  | MSI GS75 Stealth Display: 17.3” 240Hz display CPU: Intel Core i7-10875H | |
Razer Blade 15 DISPLAY: 15.6 Inches 360Hz Full HD CPU: Intel Core i7-10875H | ||
  | Acer Predator Helios 300 DISPLAY: 15.6" FHD IPS CPU: Intel i7-8750H |
1) Microsoft Surface Book 2
Microsoft Surface Book 2 is professional-grade software and has a battery life of approximately 17 hours. It is a combination of portability, power, and productivity. You can ditch the keyboard anytime you like by tapping on a button and make it lightweight and comfortable for use.
Microsoft Surface Book is the best animation laptop available so far, providing high-quality performance for all your design tasks and animations. It has four modes: Laptop, Tablet, Studio, and View
Features:
- Display – 15 inches and 3260×2160 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – 8th generation Intel Quad-Core i7 Processor
- Graphics – NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 with 6GB dedicated memory
- RAM – 16 GB RAM
- Hard Drive – 256 GB flash memory solid state
- Operating System: Windows 10 Pro
- Backlit keyboard along with a Surface precision mouse, pen, and dial.
2) Acer Aspire VX 15
Acer Aspire VX 15 is here with its killer looks and hard-edged futuristic design with sleek lines and angles. It comes with advanced dual-fan cooling and stellar audio capabilities that optimize its performance.
Wait! There’s more; its illuminating iron-red keyboard and super-fast graphic capabilities keep you working late hours at night and delivers a high-quality performance making it the best laptop for animation.
Features:
- Display – 15.6 inches Full HD widescreen IPS display and 1920 x 1080 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – 7th Generation Intel Core i7-7700HQ Processor (Up to 3.8GHz)
- Graphics – NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti with 4 GB of dedicated GDDR5 VRAM
- RAM – 16GB DDR4 Memory
- Hard Drive – 256 GB Flash Memory Solid State
- Iron-red backlit keyboard
- Operating System: Windows 10
3) Apple MacBook Pro
Apple MacBook Pro is another excellent laptop for graphics and animations. It delivers astonishing streamlined performance and comes with a sleek design.
MacBook Pro provides a smooth experience, superior comfort, and speedy responsiveness. It is thin, light, and slim with super-fast graphics. Average battery life of 10 hours allows you to create the highest quality animation from anywhere you want.
Features:
- Display – 15.4 inches and 2880×1800 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – 2.9GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor with Turbo Boost up to 3.9GHz
- Graphics – Radeon Pro 560 with 4GB memory
- RAM – 16 GB DDR3 SDRAM
- Hard Drive – 512 GB SSD
- Backlit Keyboard
- Operating System: Mac OS.
4) MSI GS75 Stealth
MSI GS75 is thin and light compact with beast performance and the most vibrant visuals. It minimizes the heat and maximizes the airflow for smooth performance.
MSI is the best laptop for animation and graphic designs that comes with a two-year carry-in warranty, with MSI covering only manufacturing defects. It also comes with hi-resolution audio and CoolerBoost5 technology.
Features:
- Display – 17.3 inches LCD and 1920×1080 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – 10th Generation Intel Core i7-10875H
- Graphics – NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Dedicated Graphics.
- RAM – 16 GB DDR4 SD RAM, expandable up to 64 GB.
- Hard Drive – 512GB NVMe SSD.
- Steel series RED Backlit Keyboard.
- Operating System: Windows 10 Home with lifetime validity.
5) Razer Blade 15
Animators, are you tired of carrying around big and bulky animation laptops? Don’t worry; we have just the solution for you. Razer Blade 15 means comfort with power and ultra-speed. It is one of the world’s smallest laptops that is easy to carry around for animators like you.
This best (compact) laptop for animation is quite a blessing in disguise with ultra-powerful features and extended connectivity.
Features:
- Display – 15.6 inches LED and 1920×1080 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – The 8-Core 10th Gen Intel Core i7-10875H processor (up to 5.1GHz Max Turbo)
- Graphics – NVIDIA’s 2nd Gen GeForce RTX 3070
- RAM – 16 GB of DDR4 SDRAM expandable up to 64 GB
- Hard Drive – 1 TB SSD
- Customize Backlit Keyboard with Razer Chroma
- Operating System: Windows 10 Home
6) Acer Predator Helios 300
Acer Predator Helios is taking animation to the next level with the blisteringly fast display and powered-up performance. It supports all your animation and design along with a high-tech sound system and in-built stereo speakers.
Helios 300 is the best animation laptop that overdrives response of 3ms and makes your visual experience seamless, lag-free, and fluid. It also comes with a one-year international travel warranty.
Features:
- Display – 15.6 inches LCD with 144Hz refresh rate and 1920×1080 pixel resolutions.
- Processor – Intel i7-8750H processor
- Graphics – NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB
- RAM – 16 GB of DDR4 2666 RAM expandable up to 32 GB
- Hard Drive – 1 TB HDD and 256 GB SSD
- Backlit Keyboard
- Operating System: Windows 10 Home
Buyer’s Guide
CPU:
The most notable CPU feature to look at in animation laptops is a high base clock and great Turbo-Boost clock.
RAM:
The second most important feature is RAM or Memory. Speed isn’t much of the significance here, but the size of the memory is. Keep 8GB as an absolute minimum while looking for the best animation laptops.
GPU:
The Graphics card displays an in-built screen, any attached display device, textures, shaders, and real-time effects. However, GPU is not a crucial factor in the animating process. But this changes if one is using GPU render engines.
Render engines use graphics cards instead of CPU with rapid speed. Hence, render engines require better GPU.
Storage Device:
In the past few years, storage hardware has seen quite a lot of updates. Now, almost all the laptops come with SSDs (Solid State Drives). SSDs are comparatively faster at reading and writing data than HDDs (Hard Disk Drives).
Go for 500 SATA SSD or larger for desirable speed in animation laptops.
HDD:
HDDs may not provide you better speed, but they are still a good option for storing your data long term as they are cheaper per Gigabyte. After working a day’s work, you can switch to external HDDs and backup your data.
Expandability:
After spending so much on animation laptops, the buyer wants to use it for at least a few years. That is why the best laptop for animation should have the ability to upgrade because of the fast technology progression. Hence, try to get one with some unused RAM slots and a larger SSD.
Conclusion
You won’t find a single laptop that’s perfect in every sense and cater to all your needs when it comes to animation. It is going to lag here and there. Therefore, what we can do is find an animation laptop that has maximum advantages with minimum disadvantages. Do extensive specs research and choose the best animation laptop to your liking. Don’t compromise with the quality and performance.
We hope that this list helps you make an informed decision regarding your purchase. And that your budget doesn’t limit the choice you want to make because as a professional animator vibrant visuals and smooth performance is the decisive factor.
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