Best Handheld Gaming Consoles 2025: Portable Gaming Units, Pricing

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If you’re of a sure age, you in all probability have fond reminiscences of handheld online game techniques. The know-how has modified rather a lot, however handheld gaming consoles stay as widespread as ever — due to each a wave of nostalgia and an elevated demand for transportable play.

Nintendo has dominated the hand held console market since 1989, when the Game Boy was first launched, and the gaming firm continued with numerous updates to the Game Boy household till the gaming line was discontinued in 2003.

At a Glance: The Best Handheld Gaming Consoles in 2025

These days, a brand new technology of avid gamers are taking their gaming on the go. We’ve rounded up a few of our favourite handheld gaming consoles from high manufacturers that we’ve examined and performed. Here are our high picks under.

In This Article

What Are the Best Handheld Gaming Consoles?

If you’re seeking to decide up a brand new handheld gaming console, listed below are 9 of the perfect handheld units to get, based mostly on hands-on use, graphics, portability, and number of video games to play.

Priced at $449 at Walmart, the Nintendo Switch 2 is the gaming firm’s newest handheld, but it surely comes with a twist. The Switch will be linked to a 4K TV through its dock that comes with the system, so it’s a hybrid between a conveyable system and conventional residence console.

Games like Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza are staples, the Nintendo Switch 2 comes with 256GB of inside storage which is sufficient to maintain a dozen or so video games — even some unique Switch titles, like Super Mario Bros. Wonder, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and others.

The Joy-Con 2 controllers are removable, and the Switch 2 has a mighty kickstand, so you’ll be able to mitigate hand and arm fatigue by propping it up on a desk and taking part in with one controller on every hand. Nintendo has a extra conventional gaming controller known as the Switch 2 Pro Controller, which we will’t advocate extremely sufficient.

The Switch 2 allows you to play full-sized console video games portability on a 7.9-inch 1080p LCD show. It’s by far the best handheld gaming console launched in 2025.

The ASUS ROG Ally X — which is priced at $799.99 — is a handheld gaming PC that’s surprisingly light-weight with a premium really feel within the hand, particularly in terms of its clicky inputs. But don’t let its transportable measurement idiot you. This factor is a beast with a robust and speedy AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme Processor, 7-inch touchscreen show, 24GB of reminiscence paired with as much as 1TB of on-board storage (expandable with microSD card), 4 motion buttons, two analog sticks, 4 set off buttons, two again buttons and extra.

It even runs the total model of Windows 11 for a number of gaming platforms, comparable to Steam, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, Epic, RetroArch and way more. Now you’ll be able to play nearly any PC or Xbox sport on-the-go.

Take a blast from the previous with the ModRetro Chromatic. It’s a handheld gaming machine that has a variety of indie video games, in addition to being totally appropriate with Nintendo Game Boy and Game Boy Color cartridges. If you may have previous Game Boy video games laying round your own home, then is the perfect handheld gaming console for you. It’s a contemporary tackle the basic gaming console.

At $199.99, the ModRetro Chromatic is available in a two show varieties, sapphire and gorilla, whereas it is available in seven enjoyable colours, comparable to cloud, bubblegum, wave, inferno and others. It even comes with the enduring puzzle sport Tetris for hours of gameplay. Learn extra in regards to the ModRetro Chromatic right here.

Starting at $759.99, the Lenovo Legion Go S is a large handheld PC gaming console with a huge 8-inch FHD touchscreen show — by far the largest handheld on this listing. It runs full Windows 11, so that you just about have entry to any gaming platform, like Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, Nvidia GeForce Now, Steam, and way more. The handheld is powered with the AMD Ryzen Z2 Go with AMD RDNA 2 graphics chip with 32GB of RAM paired with as much as 1TB of on-board storage.

One of the firsts to market remains to be the most effective. The Valve Steam Deck OLED is designed for the Steam platform of PC video games. On board, you’ll discover a 1TB solid-state drive with pristine 7.4-inch OLED show with as much as 90Hz refresh charge for clean efficiency and expertise. It has as much as 12 hours of battery life, which is kind of spectacular for a conveyable PC. The Steam Deck even comes a carrying case for simpler portability.

Priced at $299.99, Logitech G Cloud is a wallet-friendly handheld PC gaming console that may run Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, Nvidia GeForce Now, Steam and numerous Android cellular video games and emulators. And due to its sharp 7-inch Full HD 1080p touchscreen show with 60Hz refresh charge and as much as 12 hours of battery life per cost, you’ll haven’t any issues taking part in your favourite video games nearly wherever you’d like — particularly because the handheld weighs in at nearly one pound.

Some transportable gaming consoles run Windows 11 and numerous them simply have the working system in its purest type. While Windows 11 is nice for laptops, it’s not the perfect for navigating on a 8-inch touchscreen with a D-pad, analog sticks, and motion buttons.

However, the MSI Claw 8 AI+ has a clear and intuitive menu interface that makes gaming throughout a number of platforms — together with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, Steam, Ubisoft, Epic, and others — a breeze. Menus are large, daring, and colourful, whereas they’re simple to learn and perceive. The MSI Claw is good for switching backwards and forwards between your favourite video games, even when they’re from completely different apps.

You may not notice it, however you’re in all probability utilizing an amazing handheld gaming system proper now: Your smartphone. Whether you’re utilizing an Apple iPhone or Android machine, each the App Store and Play Store are stuffed with unimaginable video games. Some video games are even ports (a gaming time period for model) of video games obtainable on devoted gaming {hardware}.

The downside is that gaming in your telephone’s contact display screen doesn’t supply the identical constancy as a standard controller, however you’re in luck. Both Apple and Android telephones allow you to pair your telephone with the Backbone One Mobile Gaming Controller — which works for $99.99 — over Bluetooth.

Yes, this requires you to hold a further accent with you, which is a bit more annoying than hitting the ability button on a devoted handheld, however you have already got the most important piece of {hardware}. Smartphones have lots of storage, big digital sport libraries and glorious battery life. You’ll burn extra energy taking part in video games, however you’ll get a comparable quantity of play time per cost.

It’s designed for avid gamers, so it’s ergonomic, and feels comfy to carry for prolonged durations of time. Just slide in your iPhone or Android smartphone, join through USB-C, and pair with Bluetooth to get gaming. It runs off the ability from the cellular machine itself, so it would final so long as your telephone will let it. However, it does have energy cross although, so you’ll be able to plug it right into a wall outlet and sport on the identical time, whereas additionally charging your telephone too.

Buying Guide; How to Pick a Handheld Video Game Console

There are many elements to consider when selecting the best handheld sport system for you; under are a very powerful ones, which we thought-about whereas we have been researching this listing.

Size: The time period handheld is goal as a result of everybody’s fingers are completely different, so what we imply is that these sport techniques are completely transportable, and may run on battery energy. We took ergonomics into consideration, and have options if we really feel just like the picks we selected may get fatiguing to play over time.

Game library: You’re shopping for a sport system to play, effectively, video games. Our picks all have big libraries, so that you’ll be happy whether or not you want first-person shooters, platformers, function taking part in video games, or all the above.

Storage: Modern handheld gaming consoles can all obtain video games from digital storefronts, however when you’re increase an enormous library, you’ll want house to retailer these video games. We took a handheld’s inside storage capability into consideration when creating this information, but in addition picked techniques with storage that may be upgraded after you get it.

Battery life: One of the perils of handheld gaming within the fashionable period is that transportable sport techniques run on rechargeable batteries. That’s nice for the atmosphere, and handy for us, but it surely means it’s arduous to cost your machine on a visit. We’ve provided options the place relevant, however our recommendation is to maintain your machine totally charged earlier than your subsequent journey.