If you're headed off to college soon, a gaming laptop can be a wise investment. You'll not only have enough power to study or handle coursework, but you'll also have a machine that can tackle your game library out of hours.

Finding a decent deal is a little tough these days with the cost of components like RAM skyrocketing — there are still bargains, however. Both Walmart and Best Buy are in the final stretch of the back-to-school sales season, meaning students, teachers, and just about anyone can take advantage of various discounts.

I've been scanning retailer pages today, and I found five good value gaming laptops with varying prices for different budgets. While there are quite literally hundreds of laptops on sale this weekend, these are the handful that I'd consider personally.

A particular highlight has to be this heavily discounted Gigabyte A16 for $1,249 (was $1,849) at Walmart. A little pricey, perhaps, especially as a machine with an older chipset, but in terms of bang for the buck, this one takes some beating right now with its RTX 5070 graphics card and 32GB of RAM.

Another great choice is this Acer Predator Helios Neo 16S at Best Buy for $2,089 (was $2,199). You'll need seriously flush pockets to get this deal, but this configuration features an RTX 5070 Ti graphics card, OLED display, and a Core Ultra 9 chipset, meaning it's very well-specced for the price. You can read more about this deal and other cheaper options just below.

This weekend's best gaming laptop deals

Graphics card: RTX 3050Processor: Intel Core i5-13420HRAM: 8GBStorage: 512GB

This HP Victus is a cheap (and I mean cheap) gaming laptop, so don't expect too much in terms of performance. It's got an older chipset, graphics card, and only 8GB of RAM. With that said, you can play some basic games with this machine, including relatively recent titles if you're willing to tweak your settings. I'd highly recommend spending more, but this one will play most popular esports titles, 2D games, and less graphically demanding Indie titles.

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Graphics card: RTX 5060Processor: Intel Core 5 210HRAM: 16GBStorage: 512GB

This MSI Cyborg is a nice compromise between budget and power. It's not a super high-end configuration with its Intel Core 5 chipset and 512GB SSD, but it does have a mid-range RTX 5060 graphics card, which should give you a nice bump in performance versus the cheaper machines on the market. As an all-in-one machine for study and gameplay, this is a good value.

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Graphics card: RTX 5070Processor: Intel Core i7-13620HRAM: 32GBStorage: 1TB

In terms of sheer bang for the buck, not much can touch this Gigabyte A16 at Walmart today. It's not only one of the cheapest machines in recent months to feature a powerful RTX 5070 graphics card, but you also get 32GB of RAM right out of the box. The chipset is a little older, and this machine is pretty weighty for a laptop, but this is a very good option indeed if you want to play the latest games smoothly.

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Graphics card: RTX 5060Processor: Intel Core i7-14700HXRAM: 16GBStorage: 1TB

This Lenovo Legion 5i is on the pricey side for a machine with a mid-range RTX 5060 graphics card, but this particular model features a stunning high-end OLED display. If you can afford to spend a little extra, then you'll appreciate the display for both gaming and content. Annoyingly, this configuration only comes with 16GB of RAM, which is the sacrifice you have to pay to get such a nice display at this price.

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Graphics card: RTX 5070 TiProcessor: Intel Core Ultra 9-275HXRAM: 32GBStorage: 1TB

For a no-compromise option, I'd recommend this Acer Predator Helios, which is currently on sale with the Best Buy 60th Anniversary sale. The savings aren't huge, but I think the price is right here considering you get an RTX 5070 Ti, Ultra 9, 32GB of RAM, and a high-end OLED display. You'll have no issues with all the latest titles with this machine - and everything will look fantastic thanks to the OLED display.

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Alex is TechRadar's retail editor, specializing in buying advice and general tips on how to save our readers as much cash as possible. He's covered major retail events in some capacity for over seven years now; both in editorial and other ecommerce adjacent roles on TechRadar, T3, GamesRadar, and other Future PLC sites. Alex's expertise touches on most areas, but he has a particular love for phones, laptops, and cameras, being an avid photographer.