Laptops are versatile and portable devices that have increasingly become thin and light as they’re modernized, usually at the expense of upgradeable internal hardware. The two most common areas where upgrades are still possible include memory (RAM) and solid-state drive (SSD), as laptop processors and graphics cards are almost exclusively soldered to the mainboard.
A majority of modern laptops offer at least an SSD that’s accessible for upgrades, though some — like the MacBook Pro — keep everything wrapped up to the point where you can’t perform DIY updates at all. Memory is another story. Unless you’re looking at, say, a high-end workstation laptop with a chunky body, it can be very hard to tell if your laptop’s RAM can be upgraded after purchase. Permanently incorporating memory into the mainboard is a popular choice for manufacturers looking to save space, but it’s not a guaranteed decision.
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