Our team bought 10 prebuilt gaming PCs under $1500 to play popular games at the highest settings. We stress-test every PC by putting a heavy gaming workload and running benchmarks. Our goal was to shortlist prebuilt gaming computers that offer more than 60fps at 1440p or 4K resolution under a $1500 budget.
There’s a lot to consider when buying a gaming PC like design, power, hardware, size, etc. Investing in a high-end computer is unnecessary if your gaming taste is limited to 1080p. However, breaking the 1080p barrier and hitting over 60fps at 1440p or 4K settings isn’t possible without a powerful gaming PC.
$1500 is a decent amount to buy a gaming PC with the latest CPU and GPU to play modern games like Call of Duty Warzone, Cyberpunk 2077, Alan Wake 2, Resident Evil 4, Diablo IV, etc at the highest settings.
For searching for the best $1500 prebuilt gaming PCs, we scrolled through famous brands like HP, Lenovo, Dell Alienware, and Skytech Gaming.
With Intel flooding the market with Raptor Lake CPUs and AMD giving them a tough time with their Ryzen 7000 chips, there’s a lot for gamers in the gaming builds included in this article.
We’ve chosen gaming PCs with the latest Nvidia RTX Series GPUs so you can enjoy games that support ray-tracing and DLSS.
The Best Gaming PCs Under $1500 in 2024 By PCPartGo
| Gaming PCs | Reasons to Buy | Prices |
| HP Pavilion Gaming 15L | Editor’s Pick | $1,339 on Amazon |
| Lenovo Legion Tower TS Gen 8 | Best Value for $1500 | $1,444 on Amazon |
| Alienware Aurora R16 | Best Powerful 4K Gaming PC Under $1500 | $1,449 on Amazon |
| Skytech Chronos Gaming PC | Good $1500 Gaming PC for eSports | $1,099 on Amazon |
See more affordable options: best gaming PCs under $1000
1: HP Victus 15L Gaming Desktop – Editor’s Pick
Brand: HP | Processor Type: Intel Core i7-13700F | Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 | RAM: 32GB DDR4 | Drive Capacity: 2TB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD & 1TB HDD | Chassis Color: White | Style: Mid-Tower | VR Compatible: Yes | Operating System: Windows 11 Home
The HP Pavilion Gaming PC 15L is a powerful prebuilt gaming PC with exceptional design. It features a 16-core CPU to grind the toughest of gaming tasks. This gaming PC has an enormous amount of storage for games.
Reason to Buy:
HP has come a long way in the race of prebuilt gaming computers. The HP Victus 15L Gaming Desktop brings a lot of performance to your desk. This gaming computer is fueled with Intel’s Raptor Lake Core i7 13700F 16-Core CPU that can boost to 5.2 GHz.
Technically speaking, having a 16-Cores CPU won’t improve your gaming performance. Modern games do not occupy more than six cores on a CPU. However, the abundance of cores makes this computer future-proof for gaming.
On the graphics front, this HP Victus 15L Gaming PC is backed by an RTX 3060 12GB GDDR6 GPU. So, there’s plenty of VRAM to bump up any game title to 4K resolution.
Moving on, the HP Victus 15L surprised us with the enormous 32GB of DDR4 RAM. This amount of RAM is enough to switch between different tasks while gaming. You can seamlessly game and stream without slowing down your PC.
What I liked the most about the HP Victus 15L Gaming Desktop is the massive storage space for modern games. The HP Victus 15L PC has 2TB of NVMe SSD and 1TB of HDD space to install your favourite games.
Lastly, I liked the simple and classic white chassis on this machine. This could be a downside for gamers who like PC cases with glass side panels and RGB fans. However, a white PC case stands out in a world where everyone prefers RGB lights, tinted glass panels, and black-coloured PC cases.
The HP Victus 15L comes with all the advanced I/Os and useful features like built-in Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, RJ-45, keyboard, and mouse that one expects with a pre-built gaming PC.
This gaming PC comes with Windows 11 Home pre-installed. I recommend upgrading to Windows 11 Pro for better gaming performance.
2: Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 – Best Value Gaming PC for $1500
Brand: Lenovo | Processor Type: AMD Ryzen 7 7700 | Graphics: NVIDIA RTX 4070 | RAM: 16GB DDR5 | Drive Capacity: 1TB NVMe SSD | Chassis Color: Black | Style: Mid-Tower | VR Compatible: Yes | Operating System: Windows 11 Home
Stacked with a 16-core processor and Nvidia’s powerful RTX 4070 graphics card, the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 brings serious 1440p or 4K gaming performance with ray-tracing/DLSS 3.0 to your table.
Reason to Buy:
The Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 is powered by AMD Ryzen 7 7700 octa-core CPU with a base clock speed of 3.8 GHz. Built on AMD’s Zen 4 architecture, the Ryzen 7 7700 chip puts the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 ahead of the competition when paired with a powerful graphics card like the RTX 4070 12GB GDDR6X.
I’ve played games on many sub-$1500 prebuilt gaming PCs, but the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 beats most of them in gaming at 1440p or 4K resolution. Lenovo has chosen the best gaming parts to build this machine.
What makes the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 good at gaming is the RTX 4070 12GB GDDR6X graphics card and 16GB DDR5 RAM. The RTX 4070 has advanced memory and vast VRAM. It also brings added features like second-generation ray-tracing and DLSS 3 for an immersive gaming experience.
Where the older versions of RTX struggle with the ray-tracing and DLSS enabled, the RTX 4000 Series card shows better visuals and performance in AAA and eSports games. The RTX 4070 has 12GB of GDDR6X memory, so you can easily scale any modern game to 4K resolution without losing FPS.
The combo of AMD Ryzen 7 7700 processor and RTX 4070 graphics card would result in a strong performance score in every benchmark test. No matter which resolution you play at, you can expect a powerful gaming performance on this PC,
The Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 only has 1TB of storage to install games. Unlike the HP Victus 15L, which comes with 2TB of SSD and 1TB of HDD, the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 only has four M.2 slots on the motherboard for storage upgrades.
Moving on, the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 boasts an eye-catching gaming aesthetic when viewed from the front. Two massive RGB fans are concealed behind the mesh panels for a steady flow of fresh air inside the case. Additionally, the side glass panel offers a clear view of the inner workings of your PC, adding a dynamic visual element to your setup.
Lastly, the Lenovo Legion T5 Gen 8 Gaming Desktop comes with all the needed I/Os like the Type-A USB, USB-A 3.2 Gen 1, USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, and USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 ports.
Like many prebuilt gaming PCs, you’ll get your hands on built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on this machine.
3: Alienware Aurora R16 – Best Aesthetics Gaming PC Under $1500
Brand: Dell | Processor Type: Intel Core i7-14700F | Graphics: NVIDIA RTX 4060 | RAM: 16GB DDR5 | Drive Capacity: 512GB NVMe SSD + 1TB HDD | Chassis Color: Black | Style: Mid-Tower | VR Compatible: Yes | Operating System: Windows 11 Home
With the Alienware Aurora R16, Dell continues to offer what pro gamers want, “Pure Performance”. Equipped with Intel Raptor Lake’s best gaming CPU, the Core i7 14700F, the Alienware Aurora R16 elevates your gaming to the next level.
Reason to Buy:
The Alienware Aurora R16 is a powerful gaming PC under a $1500 budget to play modern games at 1080p, 1440p, and even 4K settings. The Aurora R16 offers a significant improvement over the previous Alienware Aurora R15 version in cooling and gaming performance.
Powered by the Intel Core i7 14700F processor having 20 cores (8 P-cores and 12 E-cores), the Aurora R16 is ready to grind any heavy gaming or content creation workload. Although the base clock speed on cores is lower, each core can boost up to 5.4 GHz when under heavy workload.
I was surprised to see 8GB RTX 4060 paired with a powerful CPU in the Intel Raptor Lake Series. It would have been better if Dell had opted for the RTX 4070 or RTX 4080, which would pave the way for 4K or 8K gaming.
The RTX 4060 in this sub-$1500 gaming machine can handle modern games at 1440p 60fps settings. But for playing games at 4K settings, you may have to lower some in-game settings like Shadows, Textures, etc.
In terms of storage, the Alienware Aurora R16 comes with two options just like the HP Victus 15L. There’s one 512GB NVMe SSD and 1TB HDD on this gaming PC for storing data. From a gamer’s perspective, this is enough space for storing modern games that swap more than 100GBs to install properly.
The most eye-catching feature of Alienware Aurora R16 is its design. This is one of the most aesthetically appealing gaming PCs on the list. At the front, an RGB strip encircles the air intake that pulls in fresh air. A gigantic RGB fan at the back pulls the hot air outside to maintain an optimal temperature inside the chassis.
The Alienware Aurora R16 comes with all the handy I/Os like USB-Type A, USB-Type C, etc for connecting advanced peripherals.
The only downside of this gaming machine is its limited upgradability. Dell has used a proprietary motherboard, which makes it difficult for users to add beefy hardware to this gaming PC.
4: Skytech Chronos Gaming PC – Top-Rated $1500 Gaming PC for eSports Enthusiasts
Brand: Skytech | Processor Type: Intel i7 12700F | Graphics: NVIDIA RTX 4060 | RAM: 16GB DDR4 | Drive Capacity: 1TB NVMe SSD | Chassis Color: Silver | Style: Mid-Tower | VR Compatible: Yes | Operating System: Windows 11 Home
The Skytech Chronos takes your gaming to the next level. You can expect more than 60+ FPS, thanks to the RTX 406 GPU and Intel Core i7 12700F chip. Oh and what a beautiful PC case this has been!
Reason to Buy:
Skytech Chronos is tailored for eSports titles, which means it brings more to your desktop when playing popular games like Apex Legends, Roblox, PUBG, and Overwatch 2 with your online mates.
This Skytech Gaming machine is crowned with Intel’s Core i7 12700F CPU with 12 cores and 20 Threads. The Intel Core i7 12700F is paired with Nvidia’s RTX 4060 8GB GDDR6X graphics card for higher gaming performance.
The CPU and GPU combo on Skytech Chronos ensures high compatibility, delivering superior performance in games at 1440p or 4K settings.
As far as the hardware is concerned, Skytech has included mid-range parts to build this gaming machine. You can easily upgrade this machine with high-end parts later on in future.
Skytech Chronos Gaming PC has 1TB of NVMe SSD storage to download or install your favourite games. NVMe drives are cheaper and you can install a higher-capacity SSD if you need to expand your storage space.
In terms of design, the Skytech Chronos Gaming Desktop is truly a masterpiece. There are three powerful fans at the front of this machine, allowing it to pull in more air for better cooling. One exhaust fan rests at the back of the chassis to pump out hot air.
The Skytech Chronos Gaming machine comes with a transparent side glass panel. The side panel on Skytech Chronos allows you to see what’s cooking inside your chassis.
Skytech Chronos is powered by a 600W PSU, ensuring reliable power delivery for demanding gaming sessions. This Gold-certified PSU supports high-performance components and enhances system stability and energy efficiency.
Like most prebuilt gaming machines, the Skytech Chronos also features advanced ports, built-in Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth connectivity to keep you connected. Skytech has included an RGB keyboard and mouse to match your build with the rest of the gaming setup.
Things to Know Before Buying A $1500 Prebuilt Gaming PC
Though the gaming PC brands make everything ready for you to use, there are some important factors to know before you go for a gaming PC.
- Don’t Overthink Between Intel or AMD: Let’s be specific, there’s not much difference between the latest generation of Intel and AMD CPUs in gaming. Intel tends to perform better in gaming because of its better single-core performance. AMD on the other side is highly efficient in content creation tasks like video editing, 3D animation, etc. Lastly, don’t fall for more than 8 cores on a CPU if you are restricted to gaming.
- Think Twice About RAM: A good gaming PC should have at least 12GB of RAM. 16GB of RAM is for serious gamers.
- Go with SSD: An SSD can significantly reduce game loading time and make your computer run faster. Consider buying a gaming PC with at least 512GB SSD storage space.
- Ports: Always look for advanced I/O ports (USB-C, USB Type-A, USB 3.2 Gen 1, etc) to connect modern peripherals. Ports at the front of the case are handy for connecting peripherals like flash drives, headphones, mic, etc.
Additional Tips for Buying A PC Under $1500
Here are some quick tips to follow:
- Look out for Deals: The best time of the year to buy a gaming PC is around Cyber Monday or Black Friday. This is when you’ll find cheaper deals on gaming PCs from reputed brands.
- Warranty & Support: Always go for a brand with customer support or warranty. Don’t buy a prebuilt PC if there’s no warranty from the seller.
- Future-proofing: Buy a gaming PC that you can easily upgrade later on. Don’t go for a prebuilt gaming PC with a proprietary motherboard or limited space for adding more hardware.
Verdict
Investing in a $1500 gaming PC can let you play any modern game at the highest settings without breaking a sweat. You’ll enjoy smoother gameplay, faster load times, and better graphics. There’s a big difference between playing a game and experiencing it.
Spending a bit more upfront means your gaming PC will be future-proof. A $1500 PC typically includes high-quality components that can handle upcoming games.
So, if you ask me which $1500 gaming machine is worth buying from the list, I will go for the HP Victus 15L Gaming Desktop. The Victus 15L has a fast processor, a powerful GPU, and up to 3TB storage for installing games.
Editor’s Recommendation
Mosaab Jamal Ahmed is a seasoned technology enthusiast with a passion for gaming and PC upgrades. His journey began in 1998 with a Pentium 1 PC, igniting his lifelong fascination with computer hardware.
Over the years, Mosaab has honed his skills in upgrading and optimizing PCs with the latest components, ensuring peak performance for gaming and other demanding applications.
Through his insightful articles, Mosaab shares his extensive knowledge on building and enhancing gaming PCs.