The sleek new MSI Stealth 16 AI+ gaming laptop now lives up to its name

Reigning in the RGB in favour of subtle styling is a growing gaming laptop I can get behind – and one MSI has taken fully on board for 2026. The firm has massively simplified its lineup and debuted a bunch of new chassis designs that’ll let you go incognito, but still pack epic amounts of GPU firepower. They’re also adding OLED displays into the mix, and doubling up on connectivity. The new Stealth 16 AI+ is the highlight of the refreshed range that also includes new Raider, Crosshair, Cyborg and Titan models.

At just 16.6mm thick and tipping the scales at under 2kg, it’s impressively portable for a machine that can be specced with Nvidia RTX 5090 Laptop graphics. Having seen one in person at a pre-CES preview event, I also think it’s about as understated as an MSI gaming laptop has ever been: the sharper angles and more prominent rear chin of the last-gen Stealth A18 AI+ have been ditched in favour of a slimmer, smoother profile.

The deep grey aluminium chassis gave me MacBook vibes, and the small MSI dragon logo on the lid shows real restraint by the design team.

It might be slimmer, but a smart cooling setup (with vents cut into the chassis above the keyboard tray and multi-directional exhaust fans) helps tame the GPU – there will be RTX 5070Ti, 5080 and 5090 versions – and latest-gen Intel Ultra 300H silicon. MSI is pushing even more power to the components now, with an extra 20W available to the graphics chip over the outgoing model. A beefy 90Whr battery should keep it ticking for hours of desktop working, and there’s a decent upgrade path with dual RAM and SSD slots.

Two USB-As, two Thunderbolt 4s, a full-size HDMI 2.1, a 3.5mm headphone port and an Ethernet port provide plenty of connectivity at the sides.

The OLED display is a visual treat, based on my brief hands-on, with a rapid 240Hz refresh rate that’s ideal for twitchy first person shooters, and a 2560×1600 resolution that’s a decent step up from Full HD without being too demanding on the graphics card. It’s still my personal sweet spot for laptop gaming. Other goodies include DisplayHDR True Black 600 certification, 100% DCI-P3 colour coverage, and a four-speaker sound setup (two tweeters and two woofers) to compliment the colourful picture.

It’ll arrive in 2026 to give the likes of Razer’s Blade 16 a run for its money.

Of course MSI hasn’t given up on gamer-grade styling altogether in 2026. The new Raider 16 Max HX continues to fly the flag for colour-changing LEDs, oversized cooling fans and potent internal hardware – but is a considerable 20mm more compact at the rear than the previous generation.

There’s still room for a triple fan setup, aided by phase-change thermal compound and five separate exhausts to keep Intel’s Core Ultra 200HX refresh cool. The combo lets MSI feed it up to 300W of total system power in top-spec form, split between the CPU and the Nvidia RTX 5080 or 5090 GPU. There’ll also be a more affordable vanilla Raider 16 with Nvidia GeForce 5070Ti graphics and a slightly lower TDP.

It’s great to see a few upgradability options, with a quick access panel at the rear for adding more RAM and storage without having to disassemble the entire bottom cover. Not that you’ll need to think about that any time soon, with top-spec models shipping with up to 128GB of DDR5-7200 memory. There’s also a beefy 90Whr battery, Wi-Fi 7 and Thunderbolt 4 connectivity, and an abundance of ports at the sides and rear.

You’ll be able to bag one with a 16in IPS panel, though I’d definitely find the extra cash to step up to the OLED option. Both have 2560×1600 resolutions and 240Hz refresh rates, but the OLED has been given the DisplayHDR True Black 1000 thumbs up by imaging expert VESA.

The new 2026 line-up is set to go on sale in the coming months, with prices still TBC.

• Related: Enter the dragon – 20 years ago, MSI invented the gaming laptop. And it’s never looked back…

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