HP Omen 16 Valorant design isn't half bad, but there's one annoying flaw

Gaming laptops with "special edition" skins or wraps can often look gaudy or overdesigned. However, the recent HP HyperX Omen 16 Valorant Edition is an uncommon exception to the rule where the special skin is arguably better than the base design even for those who don't play the popular shooter. As noted in our review of the system, the minimalist iconography and superficial marks represent the game well while being easy on the eyes.

Unfortunately, the smooth dark gray surfaces suffer from a noticeable flaw shared with most other dark colored laptops: fingerprints. The issue is even more egregious on the Omen 16 Valorant Edition as fingerprints build up extremely quickly and become visible almost instantly on the outer lid, palm rests, keyboard keycaps, and more. The unsightly accumulation is tougher to forgive on special edition gaming laptops that tend to sell on aesthetics.

It's worth mentioning that HP offers a white color option for its Omen 16 series which circumvents the fingerprint issue almost entirely. The problem, however, is that the color is only available for select configurations which unfortunately happens to exclude the Valorant Edition SKU. A white option would have potentially looked just as good or even better than the existing black SKU.

We recommend checking out our review on the HyperX Omen 16 Valorant Edition for performance benchmarks beyond our skin deep complaints about the system.