VGA is an analog protocol. Its signal degrades with longer cables and poor quality cables result in poor quality (e.g. in ghosting). Having said that a good quality VGA cable will work just fine for normal laptop-> monitor distances. VGA is old tech though. It should have been replaced a decade ago but it was kept around because its successor (DVI) required licensing fees and because there were so many old devices with a VGA/DB15 connector.
Still, if your laptop and your monitor support it, feel free to use it. It works. It is simple. It is cheap. (You just need a VGA to VGA cable)
Now HDMI is different.
HDMI is a digital signal. You can not just connect VGA and HDMI with a cable and expect it to work. You will need a device which actively translates between these two. That will be more expensive than just a simple cable. Signal quality will not improve unless you have really long and/or poor VGA cables which you now replace with a HDMI cable.
tldr; Just use a VGA cable.