Gaming laptops are great for those who want a more mobile solution to their gaming but want something more powerful than, say, a Nintendo Switch. Of course, high-end gaming laptops can be pretty expensive, so if you want to save a little bit, laptops with RTX 3050 GPUs tend to be on the more budget-friendly end, often coming at or below $1,000. As such, we’ve collected some of the best deals on laptops with an RTX 3050 that will save you a bit of cash, although if none of these do it for you, we do have some other great budget gaming laptop deals for you to check out.
Dell G15 Ryzen Edition – $686, was $985
The G15 has become a staple for gaming computers, offering the best bang for your buck when it comes to specs and features. Even though it’s going for less than $700, it has an RTX 3050, a great entry-level GPU, and an AMD Ryzen 5 5600H Mobile, which is a mid-level CPU and one of the reasons why the laptop is so budget-friendly. The screen is 15.6-inch, FHD, and has a refresh rate of 120Hz, which is not too bad and is shooter games friendly, although the peak brightness is 25nits, which might not be great amid bright light. RAM is 8GBs of 3,200Mhz, slightly on the lower end but OK for a budget gaming laptop, and the storage comes in at 256 GB on an NVMe SSD, so it might be worth grabbing one of our external hard drive deals to supplement it.
ASUS TUF Gaming 17.3-inch – $750, was $999
You don’t often see 17.3-inch laptops, mostly only in gaming, and even then, they are relatively rare since they tend to reduce the pixel density due to their bigger size. Nonetheless, if you prefer a bigger screen, this Asus TUF is the one to go for, with the screen being FHD and having a 144Hz refresh rate, great for those who love FPS games like CS: GO and Valorant, although the peak brightness is also 250nits, a bit on the lower end. Driving the screen is an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti, so it has more than enough power for the resolution and refresh rate, although, with newer AAA games, you’ll need to run it on lower settings. RAM is 8GBs, slightly on the lower side, but at least the storage is a relatively nice 512GBs, although if you’re planning to play something like Warzone, you’ll need a good external hard drive. As for the CPU, it’s an 11th-gen Intel Core 11400H, a mid-range CPU that won’t cause any bottlenecks and should even handle simulation games relatively well.
MSI Sword – $900, was $1,200
MSI has made quite a name for itself in the gaming laptop space in the past few years, although that shouldn’t be surprising given their work on motherboards and OEM GPUs that are considered pretty good. If you want a laptop with a bit more processing power because you do editing work or play a lot of simulation games that are CPU-intensive, the MSI sword is a good option. It comes with an 11th-gen Intel Core i7-11800H, a relatively high-end CPU, probably top 5 in the Intel lineup, so it should easily handle most stuff that needs a lot of CPU power. It runs the same Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti GPU as the Asus TUF, which is nice; although the screen is smaller, it’s an IPS panel, which gives you better colors, and it even manages a 144Hz refresh rate. RAM comes in at 8GBs, and storage is 512GBs, so it’s on par for gaming laptops.
Asus ROG 16-inch – $1,150, was $1,450
If 17-inch screens are a rarity in laptops, then 16-inch screens are even rarer, even for gaming laptops, although they are nice to see for those who want something between the larger size of the 17-inch and the standard 15.6-inch sizes. This also has double the RAM of your average gaming laptop, bringing it up to 16GBs, which means that if you want to do a lot of productivity work on the laptop or even tend to have a lot of tabs and apps open, then this laptop is going to serve you well. It’s also pretty great at gaming; as you can imagine, with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti and an 11th Generation Core i7-11800H, they should both handle most use-cases relatively well especially since the GPU is a strong mid-level one, and the CPU is a good mid-to-high-end model. Storage is still at 512GBs, though, so an additional external hard drive will probably really help push this laptop into good levels of convenience.
