If you want to do some gaming on the go, you may prefer a tablet over a traditional laptop, which can get cumbersome and expensive. However, deciding which tablet to go with can be confusing. Looking at the best tablets around or, perhaps, the best Android tablets out there is a good starting point, but not every good tablet is a good fit for playing video games. Plus, you'll also want to consider the best convertible laptops that are both tablet and laptop. This can become overwhelming quickly. Luckily, we've gone through tons of tablets to give you our top picks.

Get playing with these great gaming tablets

iPads have been some of the most popular tablets in the world for years now, and that's for good reason. The iPad Air 5 is no different, offering a sleek, premium design, a beautiful display, Apple's powerful M1 chip, and a slew of features and conveniences built into iPadOS. What's more, the App Store and Apple Arcade contain an almost endless list of games you can play, spread across many different years and genres.

The iPad Air 5 may not have the best of the best tablet performance, but you won't have any trouble running even demanding games like Genshin Impact or PUBG at solid framerates, while older, less intensive games will look great and run smooth as butter. Plus, there's a lot of versatility on iPadOS, and you can play with the touchscreen or a controller in many instances. All told, the iPad Air 5 is an excellent all-around choice for tablet gamers.

If you're looking for the best gaming experience you can find on an iPad, there's no other tablet worth considering than the iPad Pro. Apple's most premium tablet sports its powerful M2 chip, which is used in some of its recent laptops, a gorgeous Mini-LED display, as much storage as you want, and a bevy of luxury features like a solid camera setup, 5G support, FaceID, Apple Pencil support, and lots of productivity potential.

While the iPad Air 5 can handle a wide variety of games, the iPad Pro pushes that even further. High settings and framerates are possible with just about any game. Plus, with a 120Hz display, this is Apple's most responsive, lowest latency tablet. If you like the convenience and user-friendliness of iPad (as well as the App Store and Apple Arcade's huge library of games) but you want serious power, too, the iPad Pro is a great choice, albeit an expensive one.

For some, gaming on a tablet is a necessity because of the cost of a gaming PC or a console like the PS5. If you're on a budget, that doesn't mean you can't game well on a tablet. Amazon's most-premium Fire tablet, the Fire Max 11, offers an eight-core 2.2GHz MediaTek chip, 4GB of RAM, and some useful features like Wi-Fi 6, 8MP front and rear cameras, and a 10,000mAh battery. You also get Amazon's Fire OS instead of stock Android, which means you'll be cut off from the Google Play Store.

The hardware here is relatively limited, so you may well be best served by looking into cloud gaming options like Nvidia GeForce Now or Xbox Cloud. That doesn't mean you can't play games natively on the Fire Max; just don't expect top-tier performance. It may also be worth sideloading the Play Store, which isn't supported by default, so you can open up the Fire Max to a larger app and game selection. With a little work, the Fire Max is an extremely affordable way to play video games.

If you've got some serious cash to drop on a tablet but aren't a fan of the Apple ecosystem, the Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra is just about the best of the best. This premium device features a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip, up to 16GB of RAM, up to 1TB of storage, an OLED display, an impressive camera array, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.3, and Android 13 on top of a microSD slot and an 11,200mAh battery. Put simply, this has some seriously premium hardware.

Whether you're looking to run modern games at high settings and framerates, play cloud games, emulate a classic console, or just play your average tablet games off the Play Store at the best possible quality, the S9 Ultra can handle anything and everything. What the iPad Pro is for Apple tablets, the S9 Ultra is for Android tablets, which means it's one of the best, most powerful, and most expensive options. If you've got the money and prefer Android, you can't go wrong with a Galaxy Tab.

The iPad Air and iPad Pro may be worthwhile tablets, but not everybody has that much cash to blow on one. Thankfully, the ninth-generation iPad exists and can be had for under $330. It features an A13 Bionic chip, an IPS display, and a host of useful tech, like a decent camera setup, stereo speakers, support for FaceTime, optional cellular connectivity, and more. It may not be cutting-edge, but there's still a lot to love.

This iPad might not push out the highest framerates in the most demanding games, but you can still play some big titles smoothly. Simply drop a taxing game like Genshin Impact down to medium settings, and you've got a playable experience, and when it comes to older or simpler games, you won't have any issues. Plus, you won't be running out of App Store and Apple Arcade games anytime soon, making this a great option for tablet gamers on a budget.

If you're looking for an iPad Air Android alternative, the Galaxy Tab S9 FE is a worthy tablet you should consider. This machine sports an Exynos 1380 chip, up to 8GB of RAM, a 90Hz LCD panel, and an 8,000mAh battery. This isn't the best hardware you can get in a tablet, but it'll get a lot done. You also get some nice-to-haves, like a solid camera array and years of software update support, which isn't always a guarantee when it comes to Android tablets. This isn't outcompeting an S9 Ultra, but you can get it at a fraction of the price.

The hardware here isn't cut out for the most demanding experiences out there, so game streaming is definitely a viable option, but that doesn't mean it can't play games natively. You may not get the highest framerates out of a game like PUBG or Genshin Impact, but you can certainly play them on the S9 FE if you tweak the settings. Where this tablet really shines, though, is if you're looking for an emulation machine or to play older titles, which you can do without issue, and it won't cost you too much.

If tablet-tier hardware isn't enough for your video game needs, Asus' ROG Flow X13 2-in-1 might be perfect for you. This powerful machine comes with Windows 11, a Ryzen 9 7940HS eight-core CPU, up to an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, up to 32GB of RAM, and a 165Hz IPS 2560x1600 display. If you can't tell, this hardware can outpace even some full-fledged desktop gaming PCs, depending on the configuration you pick.

With Windows, you have full access to all kinds of modern AAA games, as well as classics, and a huge plethora of emulators for games on all kinds of platforms, including Android. Thanks to a Ryzen chip and a 4070, you can run anything you want, too. If you can stomach a weight that clocks at a little under 3 pounds and don't mind spending a princely $2,500, the Flow X13 is a fantastic way to play video games in the context of a tablet form factor.

Best tablets for gamers: The bottom line

The biggest and most obvious factor for your decision is whether you prefer Apple, Android, or Windows. Once you've decided on that and then your budget, the choice is a lot easier. However, it's tough to beat the iPad Air 5's combination of features, performance, and price.

Thanks to its powerful M1 chip, thin and sleek design, and robust game library available on the App Store and Apple Arcade, the iPad Air is a great choice for gamers. Plus, at just $500, it's hard to find a much better tablet at this price point in general. Of course, though, if you're an Android fanatic or have more to spend, there may well be another candidate above that's more worth your while.