Top 5 Cheap Gaming Laptops Under 400 Dollars (2021)

Last Updated on March 24, 2021 by Justin

If you are planning to buy a budget gaming laptop and finding it tough to finally choose one, then you are landed at the right spot.

As, the budget laptops are in trends nowadays, and every brand is coming out with splendid machines every day, and it has almost become impossible for a newbie to decide which laptop can fulfill his gaming needs plus another normal day to day tasks such as browsing, watching videos, listening to music, creating some assignments and much more.

The laptop is very basic needs of everyone, these days. And everyone just looks forward to hands-on a machine which could add values to their lives. Everyone wants to get a better return of his hard-earned money, and want to get the best possible results under the range.

So, we are going to reduce your headache today, as our team has penned down a list of top five cheap gaming laptops under $400.

I and my expert team checked hundreds of laptop and their configurations, quality, reviews, and ratings. After days of exhausting research, we are finally come up with the top cheap gaming machines under 400 dollars.

Are you expecting to play AA titles latest released games on your 400 bucks laptop? Or you just want to play some old Indie games, or some average loading games with basic to average settings and want to use the laptop as an average user?

The list has been made after great research, we tried from the core to providing you with a list which could probably offer you the best machine in that price range.

Before stepping out to get a brand new gaming machine, you need to have a short glance at these points. This will help you to know a gaming laptop from scratch.

Genuinely, I do not want to give you the wrong hope. You will not be playing any AA series latest released games on your 400 dollar laptop.

And if you are determined to get a gaming machine, then you might need to raise your budget. We also have listed the gaming machine under $800, which are a fine fit for any type of game.

Gaming Laptops Under $400 Comparison Table

 

1. Acer Aspire 5 Slim Laptop

 

This gaming laptop is a great value for your money. The laptop comes with powerful specifications. And this is the reason; this machine is the top choice of the users. The positive word of mouth and positive rating helps this machine to stand out in the massive crowd.

Acer Aspire E15 is our top choice for a laptop under 400 for gaming. And one more thing, this machine is the top-rated and top-selling gaming machine on Amazon.

The only machine in our list which supports eight generations Intel i3-8130U processor and 6GB DDR3 RAM. That level of the processor is going to provide you smooth sailing in undisturbed water.

This machine comes with Windows 10 Home Basic installed and One TB of massive disk storage can make you store a hell of the data without any hiccup.

The high definition display with Widescreen technology and screen size of 15.6 inches offers you the best video watching experience on every angle.

If you ask me any of the cons of this gaming machine, in that price range, I would fumble and give no answer to that.

For blogger or office use, the machine has 13 hours of battery backup, can run all day long without connecting any charger. So, this machine stands out with every aspect, and I can guarantee, no other machine in the range of 400 dollar gaming laptop compete for this.

This is the most recommended machine, and that is the reason we have placed Acer E15 on the top of the list, this is not going to disappoint you.

2. Lenovo IdeaPad 330

 

Lenovo series is quite familiar owing to its strong hardware performance. And Lenovo Ideapad 330 uplifts the brand and earned its unique place in budget laptops.

This laptop is among of the good gaming laptop under 400 bucks, and critics’ views really stood for this machine. This machine is an ideal replica of your money, why?

Because it is powered with Intel Core i3 eight generation process which is integrated with the clock frequency up to 3.4 GHz which is ideal to play your favorite games without any turbulence.

This machine is equipped with 8GB DDR3 Ram, which in fact quite a memory for even playing the latest high-ended video games. The feature which made this machine stand in the massive crowd is its multitasking. This machine can handle MS office files, a video displaying, and browsing on the internet with multi-tabs.

Its integrated Intel UHD graphics 620 has enough power to play videos and games pretty easily. With 15.5 inches HD display and 1366 x 768 resolutions run most of the settings quite efficiently.

And for storage, this machine has One TB of hard drive, which is quite good for an average user or gamer. For bloggers or travelers who use to step out with a laptop, this machine would wreak the havoc.

In the end, this machine has good value for your money, the best gaming laptop under 400 dollars.The speakers are quite capable to fill a conference room with voice and battery backup is above-average.

3. Dell Inspiron 3000 

 

Dell is an established corporation when it comes to gaming machines. Especially in Asia people please to purchase dell or HP laptop, and this entire region got the biggest consumption of Dell laptop.

But, this particular 2018 Dell Inspiron 15 3000 3565 machines got some outstanding features, which makes this machine stand out in our list of cheapest gaming laptop under 400, which is SSD hard disk space.

For the users who had been using an SSD hard would be impossible to get used to an HDD hard disk. As, the general speed of an HDD hard use to lowers, and this aspect shine this machine to become the hot favorite of most of the budget users.

Though I would not make a false claim, that laptop cannot run the latest AA series games but would be able to exercise average setting games. And for the normal day to day tasks, you would get no other better option than this.

This machine has pretty impressive hardware lineup under its unassuming exterior though. Dell Inspiron is equipped with AMD A6-9200 process with 2.06 GH clock frequencies.

The multi-tasking of this machine is pretty outstanding, 8GB DDR4 RAM can load lots of the tasks in one time. The laptop has AMD Radeon R4 graphics card, with 16.6 inch HD Display and 1366 x 768 Pixels Resolution.

When it comes to battery backup, I think on other machines can compete with Dell Inspiron. And you would have famous Dell Inspiron speakers with crystal clear Audio of the beats to fill up an entire conference room.

So, what you more expect from a 400$ gaming laptop?

4. Acer Aspire E5-575-33BM

 

Acer Aspire series has really taken down the budget gaming laptop market with Acer Aspire E15, and Acer Aspire E 15 E5-575-33BM is an older version of the same.

This laptop is a great value for your money and equipped with the latest and best specification not only for the gamers but for normal day to day tasks for a college going student. This is one of the best gaming laptops under $400 list. And this laptop is also ranked as one of the top selling machines on Amazon.

Acer Aspire is equipped with the Latest 7th Generation Intel Core i3 processor with 4GB of DDR4 RAM and One TB of hard disk storage.

For those who love to watch videos on the laptop and are addicted to watching web series, the 15.6 inches Full HD display with 1920 x 1080 pixels resolution can double up the amusement.

And you can also play your favorite old PC video games with the best setting and some latest video games with basic settings, as it is supported by Intel HD 620 HD graphics card.

Not only this laptop fine fall for your gaming needs but for browsing the web, preparing the assignments, and other application users.

The battery life of this machine is impressive, you can have this machine running for at least 12 hours with no charger needed, the best gadget to carry along with you on traveling or in office.

I would say, Acer has put in lots of effort to bring up this machine, and this series has uplifted the Acer in budget devices.

If you are so concerned about the connectivity, this machine comes with all required ports, along with an optical drive. Acer’s TrueHarmoney audio system instilled in this machine going to offer you an engaging multimedia experience.

You are going to get a great value for your money, and a gaming laptop for $400, you are not going to get better than this for sure.

5. Lenovo IdeaPad 320

 

Once you get your hands on this piece, Lenovo Ideapad 320, you would not believe that how on God’s Holy earth one can offer that level of features in a gaming laptop under $400.

This laptop is powered with AMD Quad-core A6 processor which has a clock speed of 2.50 GHz and 8GB of RAM going to take care of all of your multi-tasking.

The laptop has great multitasking and would operate the process within no time and will show the elegant performance for sure.

This machine like other Lenovo machines also comes with a 15.6 Inch LCD with a 1366×768 resolution display. The display of this machine is going to shock you from the core, and you will get addicted to watching movies and web series on this tiny screen for sure.

The graphics of these machines are handled by AMD Radeon R4 graphics which makes it play the low Indie games to average today’s games. The hard disk space is enough to make you store the hell of the personal and professional data with One TB.

The connectivity ports also going to hit you, with Essential ports HDMI, 1x USB 2.0, 1 x USB 3.0, 1 x headphone or microphone jacks.

The battery backup is not that good, and this machine also eats lots of your precious time to get the charging at full throttle. The laptop can last long 4-5 hours on normal usage, and 2-3 hours on intense gaming hours. Plus, you might need to take care of its heating issues, as it takes lots of heats within few hours of its user.

 

What to look for when choosing a $400 Gaming laptop?

In $400 it would be hard to get a pure gaming machine. But, the question is which types of games you love to play? Are they Indie series of game you desire to play or want to give a shot to AAA series latest High-ended video games?

If your desire goes for the former, you are welcome to buy a cheap laptop that can run games under this range and for later, it would be hard for you to disgust as you cannot have a gaming machine in this range.

CPU

For a gaming laptop under $400, you need to look for the laptop processor generation. If it belongs to seventh-generation or eight generations with core I3, it would be fine to get that machine. Though you cannot expect i5, i7 level of speed but the speed will be well suited when to see the price range.

GPU

Second would be the GPU, you should not expect a dedicated graphics card though. Though a 620 HD Intel graphics card is what you should expect in the GPU department. GPU of a machine lowers down the processing process from a CPU and speed up the visual processing.

RAM

The RAM size should be at least 4GB, and if you get higher than this, accept a real treat. Genuinely, a good RAM size can make you feel less pressure while performing more than one task simultaneously So, it would be ideal if a machine comes up with a good size RAM, as it really boosts up the speed.

Screen size

For a gaming machine screen size and screen resolutions matter, and you might have seen pro gamers putting extra effort in hunting a good sized screen.

You should expect a screen size of at least 15.6 inches with Full HD 1366 x 768 Pixels Resolution, and most of the machines under this range offer this level of the screen.

What Are The Minimum Specs I Should Accept?

First of all, if you had been running a machine with SSD hard, you need to raise your budget. As, there will be few to none machines offering SSD hard in this range, and for an experienced user the HDD speed sucks.

Now, let’s come to the point…!

You need to accept at least one TB HDD hard, and core i3 eight generation processor with no dedicated graphics card, or built-in graphics card Intel HD Graphics 620.

The RAM size should be offered at least 4GB to 8GB, and screen size 15.6 inches. If a gaming machine follows this criterion, within the price range of 400 bucks, you need not to think twice.

Is it possible to upgrade it later?

Yes, it is possible; you can upgrade your machine to higher hardware specifications. In fact, nowadays, the latest machines are coming with the extended spaces. You would have seen in many laptops that extra SSD spaces are given, or extended RAM space has been given.

In later times, when you have money, you can upgrade to your machine specification, there will be no need to remove the already specifications.

Such as you can run an HDD and SSD hard nowadays, get your OS installed in an SSD hard and other data stored in HDD hard, one ticket trouble amusement.