The best Black Friday laptop deals we can find

Enlarge / Surface Pro 8 from Microsoft. Andrew Cunningham

Black Friday laptop deals are as American as pumpkin pie. But finding great options can be tricky. Every model has variants, each of those variants has configurations with too many model numbers that look alike (thanks, Intel), and a lot of the model names are immemorial names.

We spend a lot of time reviewing laptops and writing about them at Ars. So we've gone through the offerings and highlighted the most notable options, based on the laptops we've reviewed and are familiar with. Here are some laptop deals we think are worth checking out.

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More Black Friday 2022 coverage All the best Black Friday deals we can find The best Apple Black Friday deals

Enlarge / The 2022 MacBook Air. Samuel Axone

2022 MacBook Air for $1,050 ($1,200) at Amazon

It's not a mandatory upgrade over its M1-based predecessor, but the M2-powered MacBook Air is the best laptop for most types of Mac users. Thanks to Apple's impressive M2 processor, this entry-level model can do a lot with just 8GB of RAM, though the 256GB storage might push storage-hungry types over to the Pro (also on sale in this moment).

Best Buy has a matching deal on the same model, and Apple is offering a $150 gift card if you buy the latest MacBook Air from their store. You can also buy a 512GB MacBook Air for $1,299 at Best Buy and $1,499 at Apple (with the $150 gift card).

Enlarge / Two 2021 MacBook Pro models side by side. Samuel Axone

2021 14-inch MacBook Pro for $1,600 ($2,000) at Amazon

The 2021 MacBook Pro is the hardware hard fork we've been waiting for, a return to usable ports,...