For a long time, I avoided buying a laptop. That might sound strange for someone who writes for a living, but if your interests include PC gaming like mine do, a desktop tower is always going to be the most economical option. It costs more to get miniaturized specs with any performance, and you can upgrade many desktop parts at will, instead of just storage or RAM. Ultimately, the best performance is only possible with a desktop, since there's far more room for memory, processor cores, and cooling.
One of the frustrations I've encountered when shopping is the tendency for some laptop makers to minimize the amount of ports and slots they offer -- or even take some away that used to be in previous generations. I understand why they're missing, but I'd also argue that now more than ever, they should be a selling point.
Where have all the ports and slots gone?
Long time passing
If you do care about ports, a gaming laptop may actually be the best way to go. There's an assumption that you're going to have a lot of peripherals to connect, and at the prices companies like Dell and Razer charge, it's not like they need to cut corners. The mid-range Lenovo Legion I bought this summer isn't the best for ports (more on that in a minute), but it still has HDMI, Ethernet, 3.5mm audio, three USB-A connections, and two USB-C ports, one of which supports USB 4 and Thunderbolt 4. I use that one to connect my Razer Thunderbolt dock.
Once you step outside the gaming space, though, ports can be in short supply. The MacBook Air has a whopping three (excluding its MagSafe connector): two USB 4/Thunderbolt 4 ports and one 3.5mm jack, both of those USB ports being on the same side. Good luck to you if you need a wired mouse on the opposite end. You'll encounter similar limitations on other minimalist models, like Microsoft's Surface Laptop, and woe unto you if you want a cheap laptop that has a full-sized SD card slot.
Things aren't always that much better if you increase your budget. The current Dell 16 Premium, for instance, includes just three USB 4 ports and nothing else, no matter what configuration you choose. If you don't buy a Thunderbolt dock or USB hub, that's only enough ports to connect a mouse, a keyboard, and a monitor -- and you'd better have an adapter for your monitor unless it supports DisplayPort over USB.
If you're content using your laptop's built-in display and control options, there may be no reason to connect anything else, unless perhaps it's a phone that needs to be charged.
Why is it like this? One reason is that laptop makers have seized an opportunity to boost profit margins in an increasingly wireless age. If you're content using your laptop's built-in display and control options, there may be no reason to connect anything else, unless perhaps it's a phone that needs to be charged. Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and the cloud have replaced technologies like USB sync and Ethernet for many people. Heck, while I make use of a lot of wired connections myself, I can't remember the last time I synced music from my PC to my iPhone, which used to be a major bulletpoint for Apple.
On top of that, laptop makers have also seen wireless as an opportunity to make devices thinner and lighter. That was the raison d'être for the original MacBook Air way back in 2008, and many companies have been chasing those bragging rights ever since. There's some legitimate value to slim dimensions, of course -- if you've a frequent traveler, a thinner laptop is not only easier to pack, but easier to race across the airport when your flight boards in 30 minutes and you're two terminals away.
The only question mark in my mind is how many manufacturers scale back ports for the sake of aesthetics. It's probably few if any, but if one were to have that as a focus, it would be Apple. This is the same company that recently put out the iPhone Air, a product that's $200 more than the iPhone 17 despite having one less camera and inferior battery life.
Why we need more ports now, not fewer
Or at least, smarter layouts
The fact is that, going into 2026, many of us depend on a laptop for our livelihoods. Remote work isn't just for writers like myself anymore. It's been entrenched for a lot of jobs since the pandemic, despite pushback from executives clinging to the importance of shared office spaces. And even if you don't work from home all the time, there's a decent chance you need a laptop to take your work on the road or complete overtime. A laptop should have enough ports to serve as a workstation without dragging a hub or dock everywhere, which is mighty inconvenient, speaking from someone who's had to work out of a hotel or coffee shop on many occasions.
Professionals can justify more expensive, better-equipped laptops, but there's a business case to be made for throwing the average person a bone too. When a port is missing, Joe PC or Lisa Mac might be able to fix that with an add-on -- but assuming they can afford to, they might still resent a manufacturer for skimping. Ports and slots may not be a huge selling point versus things like processor power, yet they're something people continue to consider when they're browsing. Flexibility counts -- maybe all the more so when you can only buy a new machine every five years instead of three.
A laptop should have enough ports to serve as a workstation without dragging a hub or dock everywhere, speaking as someone who's had to work out of a hotel or coffee shop on many occasions.
Really, smarter port layouts would be enough for a lot of people, I think. Returning to my Lenovo model as an example, it's kind of ridiculous not just that both USB-C ports are on one side, but that there are three USB-A ports, over a decade after USB-C's launch. I would've been happier with two USB-C ports on either side -- preferably, all of them compatible with USB 4, as on MacBooks. No one should have to consult a manual or web guide to gauge the best port for charging or data transfers.
The layout situation should, hopefully, improve as USB 4 becomes cheap and USB-A continues phasing out. I'm not holding my breath for a return to gigantic port arrays, though -- the prevailing market trends are very powerful, and there's a lot of money to be had selling us hubs, docks, and adapters. In several years, some manufacturers might be aiming to hook us on portless devices, which could be very lucrative if every accessory needs to be wireless.