Table of Contents
Our Top Tested Picks
Best All-in-One Windows Desktop for Most Users
HP Envy Move
Best Basic Budget All-in-One Desktop
Dell Inspiron 24 AIO (5430)
Best Premium All-in-One Windows Desktop
Lenovo Yoga AIO 9i Gen 8
Best All-in-One With the Biggest Screen
HP Envy 34 All-in-One (2022)
Best Overall Mac All-in-One Desktop
Apple iMac (2024, M4)
Best All-in-One Desktop for Business
HP EliteOne 870 G9
Buying Guide: The Best All-in-One Computers for 2025
So, you fair in progress shopping for an AIO. The initial thing to expression at (no pun envisioned) is the display—the focus of any AIO. While approximately less-expensive AIO PCs will originate with panes lesser than 23 inches, those are improved suited to extraordinarily cramped places such as classroom labs or dormitory rooms. (Go much slighter than that, and your valor as well just purchase a big-screen laptop.) What you need is a presentation at least 23 inches on the diagonal—and greater is well if you can do it. The main all-in-ones we’ve realized to date have curved 34-inch canopies.
With a screen 23 inches or greater, you’re nearly surefire a native determination of at least 1,920 by 1,080 pixels (aka, full HD), and greater screens will go even advanced. In numerous cases, that’s up to 4K—3,840 by 2,160 pixels—for a conservatively shaped screen or 3,440 by 1,440 pixels on an ultra-wide exhibition. High resolves of that kind let you to view manifold windows side by side or opinion a spreadsheet 3 to four pages wide. Certainly, if you’re a multitasker, the additional screen room, the improved.
Though it’s not a worry to those with 20/10 vision, a greater screen and an advanced native determination will let you rise the font size on your Word documents or Excel spreadsheets while unmoving keeping a lot of info on the screen at one period. Desktop screens tend to be cheerful than laptop displays in over-all, as well. Aspect for in-plane switch (IPS) technology for the greatest screen excellence. IPS screens are integrally well at off-axis watching, so you won’t have to sit effortlessly positioned to see correct colors and all the part in your images.
In the direction of touch-screen or not to touch-screen—that is an examination of personal predilection. Up-to-date Windows functioning systems were planned with touch panes in mind, which brands cooperating with your numerous applications as relaxed as ever. Though these can be fun and useful for families, a dash screen isn’t 100% essential for everyone, particularly if your strategy to use the all-in-one like an old-style computer. If you’re observing at an Apple iMac all-in-one, on the additional hand, the conclusion is made for you: macOS doesn’t take benefit of touch screens, and no Macs comprise them.
Don’t fret moreover way. Scrolling with a mouse or a touchpad will still be as rapid as or faster than on a touch screen because, with an AIO, you have to range up to the screen, pleasing a hand off the control panel or mouse. Choosing text for replication and pasting is relaxed with a mouse, too. If you block out forms online and shift amid text-entry boxes, pull-down menus, and checkboxes, you can rapidly enter data with a keyboard and mouse.
If you’re preparation on via the touch screen at least 50% of the time, aspect for one of the one or two of systems with screens that can lounge down to parallel or nearly horizontal. These occupancies you use the system like a great tablet, so you don’t have to grip your arm out continually to usage the touch screen. Deliberate about by means of an ATM: The perpendicular screen is fine for a 90-second deal, but it would become strenuous after 10 minutes or additional. It derives down to modest ergonomics.
Speaking of perpendicular alignment, the irregular AIO will come with a stand that rents you pivot the screen into a representation alignment. Portrayal mode tenancies you view gratified such as webpages and suitably shaped pictures without worsening space on the sides of the screen. It’s a benefit for web designers and layout performers still working on print magazines. If portrait means is something you’d be attentive in, brand sure the system features auto-rotate; deprived of it, you’ll essential to switch parade settings each time you pivot the show. Portrait turning is far additional common in stand-alone desktop displays than in AIOs.
Which Core Components Do You Need in an AIO Desktop?
PC constructers are mostly slower to bring up-to-date AIOs than their additional products, so some of the components here are still consecutively older CPU generations, similar Intel’s 11th Generation (“Tiger Lake” mobile or “Rocket Lake” desktop-grade) chips. Greatest systems have, by 2024, accepted Intel 12th Generation (“Alder Lake”) or 13th Generation (“Raptor Lake”) CPUs.
Any up-to-date processor will help edit photos or videos or run exhaustive media procedures in the background while you work on numerous tasks in the forefront. We’ve up till now to see an AIO with 1 of Intel’s or AMD’s new AI-ready Core Ultra “Meteor Lake,” “Lunar Lake,” or “Strix Point” chips. Additional types of AIO, like ChromeOS desktops, may use less authoritative chips, similar those from Intel’s Pentium line.
AMD’s Ryzen chips have seemed in an insufficient all-in-one, in the form of Ryzen 5 and lower-powered Ryzen 3 processors. Approximately of our past top picks have been Ryzen replicas, and the company’s chips are rotating up in highly stared influential laptops. But in over-all, Intel CPUs lead the AIO PC marketplace.
In the meantime, among Macs, Apple’s 2021 24-inch iMac was created on the Apple M1 CPU, which was a forerunner of the iconic iMac’s upcoming. Indisputable enough, the 2023 iMac came prepared with the M3 chip, 2024’s iMac debuted with the M4, and these AIOs (and all Apple processers) will remain to run on Apple’s homebrewed silicon for the predictable future.
When watching at and comparing CPUs in AIO PCs, a key dissimilarity to work out is whether the AIO usages a full-desktop CPU or a portable one. Altogether else being equivalent, a full-desktop chip is choice. How to tell: Mobile chips from the be fond of of Information will have “U,” “Gx” (where “x” is a number), “H,” or “HQ” attached to the end of the chip perfect number. A desktop CPU will have no letter at the finish, or perhaps “K” or “T.” (As stated, most desktop AIOs will usage Intel chips, as opposite to ones from rival AMD.)
An 8GB serving of DDR4 or DDR5 RAM must be the least amount of system recollection you settle for. Though 4GB will work fine for the greatest rudimentary tasks, you’ll sensation the pinch of such a low-spec CPU. Having 8GB or 16GB will let you keep lots of tabs open on your browser and motionless have room left over for a challenging program such as Photoshop. Plus, 16GB is the optional minimum for specialized content-creation use.
How Much Storage and Which Ports Do You Need in an AIO?
You won’t see them in new-fangled replicas, but avoid old-style spinning hard drives, which are comparatively slow at kicking and loading apps. Contend on an AIO that usages a solid-state drive (SSD) as the thigh boot drive. (Nearly all nowadays do.) If you preserve all your files on a dominant network-attached storage (NAS) device or stowed in the cloud, just around any SSD 500GB or greater should be adequate. That’s sufficient for the working system and a trickle of frequently cast-off programs. Look for a walking boot drive of at smallest 1TB volume if you store loads of video on your PC. Videos patten up hard drives quicker than just around any additional file type.
You can have the greatest of both ecospheres with an all-in-one PC that thigh boot from an SSD but has an extra spinning hard drive for storing, though that preparation is rare today. If you’re a influence user, appearance for at least a 256GB SSD boot drive and 1TB of additional hard drive storing. You’ll want additional storage (2TB to 4TB) if you preserve your whole video, music, and photo gathering on your AIO.
Adding an additional terabyte or so is also relaxed with an outside drive. SSDs cost additional per GB than steady spinning hard drives, but SSDs boot up and awaken from sleep so much quicker than steady drives that we extremely mention them as boot drives. Inappropriately, nearly AIO PCs are rigid or incredible to promotion yourself, so brand sure you get what storing you essential at the start.
Since an all-in-one is, at its core, a computer, it should have altogether the harbors you imagine to want through your day-to-day actions, chiefly USB ports (in easy-to-access spaces, if at all conceivable). You may also need a devoted Ethernet jack, though all-in-ones nowadays all come with Wi-Fi provision built-in, so you can simply hook up the system to the receiving set network you by now have in your home or workplace.
Also nearby is an HDMI input port, which lets you to usage the AIO as a separate display for a discrete PC, game console, or video basis. These elasticities an AIO with a sharp exhibition some possible practicality years down the throughfare as a stand-alone display when the PC helping inside becomes superseded.
Why Is It a Good Idea to Buy an All-In-One PC?
On the greatest elementary level, single of the main details for selecting an AIO is that you don’t want to buy distinct parts in calculation to your computer barbican, like a display and speakers. All-in-one Processors represent accurately what the name implies: a whole desktop computer in one bundle, transporting a plug-and-play practice. Your screen and mechanisms are all tied up in one expedient, like a laptop, which receipts up less of your desk or bottom space than a desktop keep and display grouping.
Uniform if you bargain a laptop you like with a spacious 16- or 18-inch screen, you’ll essential a strong back to carry it wherever; 6 pounds and up, plus an AC adapter, is representative for machineries like these. We doubtful you won’t travel with a factual desktop-replacement mechanism like that entirely that much, and that might make even a small-screen AIO a feasible stay-at-home alternate. And for the reason that AIO desktops are persevered in, you won’t ever route out of battery authority.
For the reason that AIOs tend to use additional powerful CPUs than numerous laptops do, all-in-one PCs will execute CPU-intensive tasks additional quickly, on the entire. Some 3D games will run well, too, thanks to the separate graphics chips in about A-grade AIO PCs. To bargain AIOs with separate chips, appearance for one of the actuals few (Microsoft’s Surface Studio line is the occasional example) graphics answers dubbed GeForce RTX, as opposite to Intel Iris Xe, UHD, or HD Graphics, or AMD Radeon (no “RX”) combined graphics.
Other compensations? You can part the PC among family associates, and usage it to stock centrally available photos, music, and videos. And a great, widescreen AIO PC brands for a fine videoconferencing system. Slightly than having the household crowd everywhere your iPad or a little laptop screen, pew them in anterior of a 27- or 34-inch AIO desktop so you’re not subconsciously embracing together to “fit on the shade.
” Plus, a great AIO screen is ideal for viewing a movie from 5 or 6 feet absent, so a duo in, say, a studio room could use a big-screen AIO as a TV in front of a minor sofa or love seat. Or, if you home the system in a vital location, such as your kitchenette counter, you can display your children when they’re online.
But these PCs aren’t just fit for production. A few periods back, Apple carried the AIO extra into workstation terrain with the iMac Pro. The preliminary price for this enormous machine at unveiling was high at $5,000, but it packed a jaw-dropping amount of muscle: It had a 27-inch 5K screen and was configurable with up to an 18-core CPU, 128GB of memory, and 4TB of solid-state storing. (Memo that it is silent for sale at this script from non-Apple bases, usually cast-off or as a renovated model, but as of March 2021, Apple obsolete it.)
This kind of influence is frequently originated only in elite-grade keep PCs, but the best AIOs can opposing a high-end desktop. Apple’s homebrewed M-series chips in the newest iMacs declared prior are attractive fast. Although numerous Windows AIOs trend in the direction of the inexpensive side, you’ll discover some replicas with potent dispensation options, similar the Lenovo Yoga AIO 9i Gen 8.
Why Is It Not a Good Idea to Buy an All-In-One PC?
Of sequence, all-in-one projects come with some substantial limits. If rather goes incorrect with the show, it’s not as easy as exchange out the screen, as your strength with a typical PC tower setup. The screen is portion of the bundle; the similar goes for any section here. This is much earlier to the laptop knowledge: When one-part energies, it usually brands the system less practical overall. You’re much additional probable to buy a completely new laptop or AIO when a portion (or multiple portions) stops employed well.
Projected with the laptop contrast: While AIOs have better screens, you’re charitable up a lot of movability versus a laptop. AIOs are additional moveable than tower PCs, but you’re improbable to move your AIO once it’s in dwelling, separately from purpose-made replicas like the sole (and appropriately named) HP Envy Move, shown underneath.
Associated with average desktops, PC keeps tend to have an advanced power upper limit than AIOs. Utmost all-in-ones employment higher-end laptop CPUs, assumed their thinner design and incomplete cooling, so old-style desktops contain more control potential. High-end keeps are a much better fit for exhaustive work, like CAD/CAM or technical data dispensation, and this is especially true on the visuals front. AIOs absence desktop-equivalent visuals cards because of size and current concerns; the actual few that have separate graphics at all opt for laptop-level itinerant graphics chips. PC gamers will get far extra value and approval from a stand-alone keep (where they can switch out an illustrations card) than after a fixed-config AIO PC with far weaker combined graphics.
Fatefully, all-in-one PCs absence the expandability of greatest towers, which is over connected to their dieter, additional space-limited projects. This transports us to the following point.
Can You Upgrade Parts in an All-in-One PC?
Usually speaking, this is an extremely restrictive feature of owning an AIO likened with an old-style tower desktop. AIOs have far more in shared with laptops; together may let you promotion the memory or storing, at best. For approximately users, that’s sufficient, but it’s motionless not all that shared for these typically sealed designs. Similar with laptops, recall or the SSD may be directly combined or fused onto the motherboard, sense you’re stuck with what you consume. And computer chip and visuals upgrades are a failure.
End-user promotions are just not an importance with AIO projects. Even if an AIO framework does open up effortlessly and its mechanisms are not fused down, it’s extra like promotion a laptop. An AIO whitethorn usage mobile SO-DIMM RAM (possible to obtain, but not the similar size as desktop RAM), and M.2 SSDs may be size-limited versus the ordinary slits on utmost desktop motherboards.
With an old-style desktop tower, installation a graphics card into a scheme you initially purchased without one is at smallest an option (providing it has the planetary, the slot, and a travelable power source). You’ll not ever appropriate one in an AIO’s inside, however. If considerable future promotions are an importance or even an anxiety, an AIO is not the right pick. Get a tower-style desktop.
What Is the Lifespan of an All-in-One PC?
As declared above, AIOs purpose on additional of a laptop lifecycle, since it’s one whole package rather than separate parts. Irrespective, at least, you should still get some years of usage out of your mechanism. As far away as rapidity and presentation do, modern CPUs are snappy as a reference point, so you must be set for the close future and should imagine to get a smallest of three years out of your mechanism.
For details outlined, though, it’s often stiffer to fix when roughly goes incorrect with an AIO’s hardware than with a keep. (If your AIO exhibition goes evil, it’s not as informal as buying a newfangled monitor, so with any luck, it’s motionless under guarantee if this happens.) With AIOs absorbed on business users, you’ll bargain more support and extended guarantees, like the three-year attention for the HP EliteOne 870 G9. One- or two-year guarantees are additional common else.
If you’re fortunate and you don’t hurt constituent fault or damage, it originates back to rapidity and disapproval. If you’re an influence user, you may see sedentary presentation after a insufficient years, and if you grip on to an AIO for a truthfully long time—imminent a decade—the CPU may no extended receive safety patches, or Microsoft may droplet provision for the elderly Windows version the PC shipped with.
What Is the Best Alternative to an All-in-One Computer?
The following time you’re online and thoughtful that you essential a bigger curtain than your present laptop or tablet, appearance at an all-in-one desktop. You might be astonished how far screen and power they bring for the cash versus a like-priced laptop. If you’re not traded on an AIO, be indisputable to checked out our top desktop picks general, as well as our favored desktops for effort and PC backing.
