The words ‘affordable’ and ‘gaming PC’ aren’t often found in the same sentence.
The PC is the most expensive way to get into video games - you’re much better off with a Switch or the Xbox Series S if you’re looking to spend the least amount of money, but it is possible to get a PC capable of playing the latest games without needing to strike oil in your back garden first.
So what does an affordable gaming PC look like? There's been an explosion lately, led by Valve’s Steam Deck portable, in PC gaming machines that are small enough to hold like a Switch, and often come with lower price tags thanks to the ultraportable components they use. They’re great for gaming, but you won’t be able to play the latest games at their highest settings. Then there are gaming laptops which can be reasonably priced, but often come with the same compromises as the gaming decks. Desktop PCs are still a big part of PC gaming, and while building your own from parts means you can control the budget closely, it’s also possible to purchase a ready-built machine that won’t raise your bank manager’s blood pressure.
The beauty of PC gaming is that its games have various settings for graphics, sound, gameplay and sometimes other things too. These allow you to tailor the performance of a game so it runs well on the PC you’re playing it on. Unlike consoles, which are all the same, there's no guarantee that two different PCs will have anything like the same internals.
Different companies can supply processors and RAM sticks to different designs and with different performance expectations, so being able to tone down a game’s graphics detail so it’s less hungry for processor time opens up PC gaming to more modest computers.
Best affordable gaming PC at a glance:
- Best for cheap thrills: Steam Deck - £349, Amazon
- Best for a proper laptop: HP Victus 15 - £649, HP
- Best for a step up from the basics: Gigabyte G5 KF - £1,099, Currys
- Best for a potent portable: Asus ROG Ally - £599, Amazon
- Best for sit-down gaming: Scan Gamer RTX - £1,090.99, Scan
- Best for a future upgrade: Acer Nitro N50-650 - £1,099, Amazon
- Best for DIY retro gamers: Raspberry Pi 5 - £74.70, Amazon
- Best for an alternative approach: Acer Chromebook 516 GE - £849.99, Acer
Shop below
Steam Deck
Best for: cheap thrills
The Steam Deck is from Valve, the creators of the Steam digital marketplace and the Half-Life games. Unusually for a PC, it doesn’t run Windows (though it can) defaulting instead to a version of Linux and using console-like custom AMD processors.
Its gaming abilities are better used to play older games, or the less technically demanding, and there's a programme in place to show you which games will run well on your Deck. A few variants are available, some with a newly upgraded OLED screen, but the original Deck represents exceptional value as long as you’re not expecting too much.
Buy now £349.00, Amazon
HP Victus 15
Best for: a proper laptop
A laptop with a separate graphics chip is what you’re really looking for in PC gaming, and HP’s Victus supplies that in the form of an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050. The entry-level chip is one generation behind the current models. Its 8GB of RAM is the minimum you should look for in a gaming machine, and the 512GB SSD will get full quickly if you download too many games at once.
However, HP’s portable is well-specced enough to tackle many of the latest titles (an upgraded version is also available for a few hundred more) and its 1080p, 144Hz screen means you’ll be able to play at high frame rates too.
Buy now £649.00, HP
Gigabyte G5 KF
Best for: a step up from the basics
A distinct step up from the HP Victus, this laptop from Gigabyte has an Intel Core i5 and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060, as well as 16GB of RAM and should keep you gaming happily for years to come. It has a 1080p, 144Hz screen, and as the graphics chip feeding it uses the latest technology and is a step up from the entry-level model, you’ll be able to play games with higher detail settings than with lesser chips.
At over £1,000, it doesn’t sound much like a budget model, but gaming laptops are incredibly useful things that can be put to many uses, including photo and video editing, so they’re good all-around purchases.
Buy now £1099.00, Currys
Asus ROG Ally
Best for: a potent portable
A Steam Deck-alike that attempts to outdo Valve’s machine in every way, the Ally sports an AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor with 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD, with MicroSD expansion cards available for offloading rarely played games onto. It runs Windows, which means the game library is even broader than the Steam Deck’s, and as an all-in-one PC gaming system, it’s hard to beat.
Buy now £599.00, Amazon
Scan Gamer RTX
Best for: sit-down gaming
Desktop gaming PCs get expensive fast, but they’re the best way to get really good processors to power your games along, as they don’t have to worry about the cooling envelopes and power budgets of the portable machines. This desktop, built by XS Systems for Scan, offers an Intel Core i5 12400F and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 graphics chip, along with 16GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD.
It comes with Windows installed, and as long as you’re able to provide it with a suitable monitor, mouse, keyboard, gamepad, headset, desk, chair and plug socket, it’ll keep you happy for a long while.
Buy now £1099.99, Scan
Acer Nitro N50-650
Best for: a future upgrade
This desktop is a bit of an oddity, in that it combines an up-to-date Intel Core i5-13400F with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 that’s starting to look old. As this is a desktop PC, there's nothing stopping you from ripping out the graphics card (carefully) and replacing it in a year or two, bringing the machine back to life.
Alongside those processors you get 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD, plus Windows 11 and a case that looks like an angry robot. We’ve seen it reduced by around £300 too, which makes it an even better deal.
Buy now £1099.00, Amazon
Raspberry Pi 5
Best for: DIY retro gamers
Ridiculously cheap, this single-board computer that runs Linux appeals to tinkerers, home automation obsessives and retro gamers. It’s not going to play the kind of games you’d expect from a modern gaming laptop, but it can be built into a retro-gaming machine that’s surprisingly capable.
Dedicated operating systems are available to create a friendly front-end for you to scroll through lists of games, you can get a case that looks like an NES, there are USB or Bluetooth controllers that imitate the gamepads of yesteryear, and with its 4K HDMI output it will look great connected to your big-screen TV.
Buy now £74.71, Amazon
Acer Chromebook 516 GE
Best for: an alternative approach
You wouldn’t often think of a Chromebook as a gaming PC, but there's a method to our madness. Acer’s machine is ideal for two things: one is using game streaming services such as Xbox Cloud Gaming, GeForce Now or Amazone Luna. The other is playing Android games, the Chromebook’s often-overlooked ability to bring mobile gaming to a slightly bigger screen opening up a lot of game experiences.
This laptop contains a full Intel Core i5 processor and 8GB of RAM, with a 256GB SSD for offline storage, and presents one of the best experiences you’ll get from a Chromebook, whether you’re gaming on it or not.
Buy now £849.99, Acer
Verdict
It can be tricky to find a gaming PC to fit a tight budget, something the cheaper tiers of game consoles have benefitted from. The beauty of a PC, though, is that it’s a more versatile device, and you can use one for office work, photo editing, web browsing and video calling as well as headshotting dudes and plotting the takeover of a neighbouring empire.
The machines on this list, from the Steam Deck handheld to the HP Victus laptop to desktop PCs and the humble Raspberry Pi can all give a good account of themselves in the gaming stakes, and you’ll be able to spend as much time playing with them as you will the other boring stuff.
