A Chromebook only does your kid good if it can survive living with them.
Kids love getting shiny new technological toys to play with, and if you’re going to give them something technological for Christmas, giving them a Chromebook is a pretty good choice. Chromebooks have keyboards, so it’ll be easy to type out homework assignments, and Chromebooks can play some casual games through Google Play apps and web clients. Your kid won’t be able to easily play Fortnite, Overwatch or Minecraft on a Chromebook, and that’s honestly okay because that means that they won’t be tempted to try playing at any and all hours of the night when they should be resting.
Many Chromebooks are made specifically for a busy, accident-prone classrooms — after all, there are few people harder on their technology than children — and even if you intend for your child to leave their new laptop at home, an education Chromebook is a worthwhile investment for a more rugged machine, and the only good deal I’ve seen on an education Chromebook I’ve seen this Cyber Monday is the Lenovo 500e Chromebook (2nd Gen).
Great gift laptop
Lenovo 500e Chromebook (2nd Gen)
For your kids or your accident-prone partner
This Chromebook has the same internals as our favorite Lenovo C340, but it’s been given a rugged exterior to better endure the chaotic world we and our computers live in. The built-in stylus comes in quite handy when doodling or trying to precision-tap through Reddit AMA feeds.
$249 $369 $120 off
See at Lenovo
This gives you the same internals and stylus as our favorite Chromebook for Students, the ASUS Chromebook Flip C214, for $150 less while still giving you Lenovo’s great build quality, better keyboard, and an EMR stylus. The stylus is what separates the 500e from the 300e, a Chromebook I reviewed and adored earlier this fall, and that stylus is a small upgrade that can make a huge impact when performing tasks like interacting with small touch targets on a website, doodling in Chrome Canvas, or interacting with educational games.
Lenovo’s educational laptops are very much in the spiritual vein of the ThinkPad line, with reinforced ports and hinges, drop-resistance, rubberized edges, and a decent keyboard that is both spill resistant and pick-resistant, if your little angel has a bad habit of trying to pry out keys. I love that this second generation of the 500e has two USB-C ports — one on each side, so that if your kid breaks the port on one side, you can still charge and use the laptop — and the stronger processor should let your kid keep open more apps and tabs as a time.
While $250 isn’t the cheapest Chromebook on sale today, cheaping out on a non-durable laptop won’t really save you money in the long run if your kid breaks it in a month.
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