Laptop Sizes: Screen Sizes and Dimensions Chart

Laptop dimensions by screen size

Laptop sizes chart: screen size and overall dimensions

Each row lists the size as it is sold, the same size in centimeters (how European and Indian spec sheets state it), the size of the screen itself, and the footprint and weight of current laptops of that size. Footprint and weight ranges come from manufacturer spec sheets of models sold between 2023 and 2026, from budget to premium (2017 to 2018 models for the 12.5-inch size, which is no longer common).

Thickness ranges from about 0.45 in (1.1 cm) for a thin 13-inch model to 1.25 in (3.2 cm) at the rear of a large gaming laptop. Budget and gaming models sit at the heavy, deep end of each range; thin premium models sit at the light end.

11.6-inch Lenovo 100e Chromebook Gen 413-inch class MacBook Air 1315.6-inch HP 15 (15-fd)17.3-inch HP 17 (17-cn)

How laptop screen size is measured

The number is the diagonal of the visible screen area, from one corner to the opposite corner. It does not include the bezel, the hinge or the case. That is why a 15.6-inch laptop is about 14 inches wide and a 13.3-inch laptop about 12 inches wide: the width and the diagonal are different lines.

• Inches or centimeters. The same panel is listed as 15.6 in in the US and 39.6 cm in much of Europe and India. Multiply inches by 2.54 to convert.
• Rounded corners. Apple and Microsoft measure their screens as if the corners were square, so the visible area is slightly smaller than the stated diagonal.
• Body size is not standardized. Two laptops sold as 14-inch can differ by more than a centimeter in width and depth, depending on bezel thickness and hinge design. Check the spec sheet of the exact model when fit matters.

Laptop screen dimensions: width and height by aspect ratio

The diagonal alone doesn't fix the screen's width and height. That depends on the aspect ratio. Older and budget laptops use 16:9 (the shape of a TV). Most laptops released since about 2021 use the taller 16:10, and Microsoft Surface laptops use 3:2. The taller the ratio, the narrower and taller the screen for the same diagonal, and the larger its area.

For a 16:9 screen, width = diagonal × 0.872 and height = diagonal × 0.490. For 16:10 the factors are 0.848 and 0.530; for 3:2 they are 0.832 and 0.555. A 14-inch 16:10 screen has about 5% more area than a 14-inch 16:9 screen, and almost all of the gain is extra height, which shows more lines of a document or web page. Our aspect ratio guide explains the ratios in more detail.

What size is my laptop? Identify it from its measurements

If you can't find the model, a tape measure is enough. The most reliable method is to measure the screen diagonal across the lit area, corner to corner, not including the bezel. If you can only measure the closed laptop, use its width (left to right) and compare it with the table.

1. Measure the screen diagonal. Run the tape from the top-left corner of the lit display area to the bottom-right. Round to the nearest standard size: a reading of 15.5 in is a 15.6-inch screen, 13.2 in is a 13.3-inch.
2. Or measure the closed laptop's width. Measure left to right across the lid, at the widest point.
3. Check the depth as a tie-breaker. Front to back, hinge to front edge. A deep body for its width points to a taller 16:10 screen or a thick gaming chassis.
4. Confirm with the model number. The label underneath the laptop, or System Information on Windows and About This Mac on a Mac, gives the model name to look up.

A few worked examples from real searches: a laptop measuring 31 × 22 cm is a 14-inch model; 32.5 × 21.5 cm is a 14-inch model with a wide body; 39.5 × 27 cm is a 17.3-inch gaming laptop; 14.5 × 11 in (36.8 × 27.9 cm) is a large 16-inch gaming laptop.

How to choose a laptop size

Size trades screen space against weight and bag space. The sizes from 11.6 to 14 inches differ by only 1 to 2 cm of body width. The big jumps come after that: going from 14 to 15.6 inches adds about 1.7 in (4.5 cm) of width and roughly 0.5 kg (1 lb), and going from 15.6 to 17.3 inches adds another 1.6 in (4 cm) and 0.5 to 1 kg.

Weight on a spec sheet excludes the charger. A typical 65 W USB-C charger with its cable adds 0.2 to 0.4 kg (0.4 to 0.9 lb), and gaming laptops ship with power bricks of 0.5 kg to more than 1 kg (1 to 2.2 lb or more). If you will use the laptop at a desk most of the time, a desktop monitor gives far more screen area than any laptop size. If you mainly read and browse, compare with the tablet size guide.

Screen resolution and sharpness by laptop size

The same resolution looks sharper on a smaller screen. Pixel density (pixels per inch, ppi) is the resolution's diagonal in pixels divided by the screen diagonal.

A full HD (1920 × 1080) 15.6-inch screen and a 1920 × 1200 16-inch screen have almost identical sharpness, about 141 ppi. Premium laptops now mostly sit above 200 ppi, while budget 15.6 and 17.3-inch screens at 1920 × 1080 sit between 127 and 141 ppi. If text sharpness matters to you, compare ppi rather than resolution, because 1920 × 1080 means something different on a 13.3-inch screen (166 ppi) than on a 17.3-inch one (127 ppi).

Fitting a laptop into bags, desks and travel

• Bags and sleeves are labeled by the screen size they fit, but the laptop's body is what has to fit. Compare the bag's inside compartment with the body width and depth in the chart. The laptop bag size guide has the full fitting chart, and the backpack size guide covers capacity in liters.
• Desks: a 15.6-inch laptop needs about 36 × 25 cm of surface plus room in front for your wrists. With a mouse to one side, plan for at least 60 cm (24 in) of width; standard desk dimensions start well above that.
• Air travel: a slim bag holding a laptop of up to 15.6 or 16 inches fits the personal-item limits of most airlines. United's 17 × 10 × 9 in limit is an exception: its 10 in side only clears a bag holding a 14-inch laptop or smaller. Seventeen-inch laptops are more than 10 in (25.4 cm) deep on their own. See the carry-on bag size guide for airline limits.

Smallest and largest laptop sizes

The smallest laptops still in production are about 11.6 inches, mostly education Chromebooks and rugged school laptops. Microsoft's Surface Laptop Go 3 (2023) used a 12.4-inch screen; its smallest current model is the 13-inch Surface Laptop. The 10-inch netbooks of the late 2000s have no modern equivalent, and that role is now mostly filled by tablets with keyboard covers.

At the top end, 18 inches is the largest current size from mainstream brands, sold as gaming and workstation laptops. The 2025 ASUS ROG Strix SCAR 18, for example, measures 39.9 × 29.8 cm (15.7 × 11.7 in), is up to 3.2 cm thick and weighs 3.3 kg (7.3 lb). In high-end gaming laptops the 17.3-inch 16:9 panel is giving way to 18-inch 16:10 panels, while light large-screen models such as the LG gram 17 use a 17-inch 16:10 panel.

Frequently asked questions