Lenovo offers one of the widest ranges of laptops, rivaling Dell and HP in everything from budget machines to exotic gaming laptops. Choosing from such a variety can be a challenge, with a lot of overlap between lines that can blur the distinction between individual models.
To help you make an easier decision, we’ve broken down Lenovo’s lineup, including everything from the budget and mid-range IdeaPad to the professional ThinkPad and the Legion gaming series. Chances are you’ll find what you’re looking for in one of these lines.
IdeaPad
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The IdeaPad is Lenovo’s mainstream, budget line, offering a wide variety of affordable, well-built laptops to meet the needs of most users. The line goes from $230 IdeaPad Flex 3 with an 11.6-inch Full HD 16:9 (1920 x 1080) IPS display and an AMD Athlon Silver 3050e processor up to $1,450 IdeaPad Slim 7 Pro with a 16-inch 16:10 WQXGA (2560 x 1600) IPS display and an AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor.
Intel’s 12th Gen line of processors are available as you go up in price, and AMD’s Ryzen 6000 line is also making an appearance. You’ll also find discrete GPUs up to the Nvidia RTX 3050 Ti.
IdeaPad construction ranges from an all-plastic chassis to an all-metal chassis, with a variety of color combinations and aesthetic designs. The IdeaPad line includes clamshell laptops like the IdeaPad 5 Pro360-degree convertible 2-in-1s where the screen rotates all around, like the IdeaPad Flex 5i and entry-level gaming laptops like the IdeaPad Gaming 3i.
Shop carefully and you’ll find high-quality screens with solid colors, brightness and contrast, plus build quality, keyboards and touchpads that rival high-end laptops. The IdeaPad lineup overlaps the high-end Yoga lineup below a bit while still offering some great budget options at very low end.
Yoga
The Yoga is Lenovo’s high-end mainstream 2-in-1 convertible line, meaning it’s laptops with 360-degree hinges and touchscreens. Currently, they are made up of several models, including the Yoga 6, Yoga 7i, and Yoga 9i. Each model plays a particular role within the line.
The Yoga 6 is the smallest with 13.3-inch screens, and it’s the cheapest. It’s also AMD-only, currently offering the AMD Ryzen 5000 series, specifically the Ryzen 5 5500U and Ryzen 7 5700U. You get Radeon graphics, up to 16GB of RAM, up to a 1TB SSD, and a 13.3-inch 16:10 WUXGA (1920 x 1200) IPS touchscreen. The Yoga 6 features an all-metal chassis with an optional fabric top cover, which is 0.68 inches thick and weighs 3.02 pounds. Its price ranges from $675 to $1,100 depending on the configuration.
The Yoga 9i sits at the top of the lineup, offering a unique 2-in-1 design with a 360-degree hinge-integrated soundbar that plays sound regardless of the laptop’s orientation. It’s built incredibly well and offers a stunning 14-inch 16:10 OLED display at WQHD+ (2880 x 1800) resolution. It strongly competes with the best 2 in 1 on the market.
The Yoga line offers Lenovo’s best build quality and innovation. You’ll find beautiful designs, great performance, and great battery life, plus industry-leading privacy and security features in Lenovo Yoga machines.
Thin
The Slim is Lenovo’s premium line of clamshell laptops. It’s a bit confusing because you’ll find models labeled as “IdeaPad Slim”. We are talking here about the Slim 7 and Slim 9 which serve the same audience as the Yoga range, but without the 2-in-1 flexibility.
The Slim 7 is available in multiple versions, including Intel and AMD versions and 13.3-inch, 14-inch, and 16-inch varieties. The lowest price you will find is $1,300 Slim 7i Carbon with a Core i7-1260P and a 13.3-inch WQXGA IPS display. At the high end is the $1,640 Slim 7i 16with a 45-watt Intel Core i7-12700H processor, Intel Arc A370M GPU, and a 16-inch 2.5K (2560 x 1600) IPS 120Hz display.
The Slim 9 is the most premium Slim laptop, with the same rounded design as the $2,070 Yoga 9i Gen 7. It sports an Intel Core i7-1280P processor and a 14-inch WQUXGA (3840 x 2400) OLED display, along with 32GB of RAM and a 512GB or 1GB SSD.
ThinkPad
The ThinkPad line was inherited from IBM and Lenovo has retained the line’s signature look and feel, rugged design and professional features. It’s also a massive range with 347 models currently listed on lenovo.comranging from $569 ThinkPad E15 (AMD) at the low end of the $4,175 scale ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 5 at the high end.
The ThinkPad lineup is full of great machines, many of which feature on our list of the best business laptops. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10, for example, is an excellent 14-inch business laptop that offers a sturdy, thin, and light chassis with solid performance and battery life. The ThinkPad X13s is a recent laptop that harnesses Qualcomm’s ARM Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 processor for great battery life in a tiny chassis. The ThinkPad is known for its all-black chassis with red accents, its excellent keyboard, touchpad and TrackPoint, and its solid business features.
Fortunately, the ThinkPad lineup is broken down into easy-to-digest chunks:
- C-Series: ThinkPads running Google’s Chrome OS, especially the $1,019 Thinkpad C14 Chromebook Enterprise.
- L-series: These are entry-level professional machines. Prices range from $571 ThinkPad L13 Gen 3 (AMD) to $2,010 ThinkPad Yoga L13 Gen 3 with Intel inside.
- X-Series: These are the smallest ThinkPads, including machines like the ThinkPad X12 Detachable and the ThinkPad X13s.
- T-series: Featuring performance laptops with simpler designs and high performance, the T-series offers a wide range of machines, starting at $755 ThinkPad T14 Gen 2 up to $3,999 ThinkPad T15g.
- Z-series: This is the newest line of ThinkPads that strives for sustainability through recyclable materials. The Z series includes two models, the ThinkPad Z13 starting at $1,355 and the ThinkPad Z16 starting at $1,975.
- E-Series: As a more affordable range of ThinkPads, it starts with the ThinkPad E15 Gen 4 (AMD) mentioned above, which is the cheapest ThinkPad, and goes all the way up to $1,000 ThinkPad E15 Gen 4 Intel version.
- P-Series: This is the line of ThinkPad workstations aimed at scientific, engineering and creative users. The P-series uses the fastest 45-watt 12th Gen Intel Core processors like the Core i9-12900HX and pro-grade GPUs like the Nvidia RTX A5500. The entry-level ThinkPad workstation is the ThinkPad P16s (AMD) at $1,319 and the line tops out at $5,059 ThinkPad P1 Gen 5.
- X1 series: ThinkPad’s ultra-premium lineup with clamshell and 2-in-1 form factors has standout machines that include the aforementioned ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10 and ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 7. ThinkPad X1 prices start at $949 for the 3rd Generation ThinkPad X1 Tablet and maximum at $2,513 ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10.
Navigating the ThinkPad lineup can be a challenge, but suffice it to say that if you do your research, you’ll find a business-class laptop that accomplishes every possible goal. Few manufacturers offer such a diverse range of business laptops.
ThinkBook
The ThinkBook line is Lenovo’s nod to small businesses. It offers features that business people will appreciate, such as solid build qualities, privacy and security, and innovative features. Speaking of the latter, the ThinkBook platform hosts a few unique models in the ThinkBook Plus Gen 2 with an e-ink screen on the lid and ThinkBook Plus Gen 3 with a large second screen to the right of the keyboard.
Otherwise, ThinkBooks are well-designed laptops with great performance and battery life, and great connectivity. The line ranges in price starting at $842 ThinkBook 15 Gen 4 to the ThinkBook Plus Gen 2 at $2,609. You can choose between 12th Gen Intel and AMD Ryzen 6000 processors, and display options range from Full HD to UHD+.
Most ThinkBook models are clamshell laptops, but the line includes a few convertible 2-in-1s. The ThinkBook Plus Gen 2 is one, of course, and the other is the $1,400 ThinkBook 14s Yoga Gen 2. If you’re a business person who wants the right business features but doesn’t need enterprise security and management, the ThinkBook lineup is a great option.
Legion
Finally, Lenovo has its Legion line of gaming laptops. The company’s cheapest gaming machines fall into the IdeaPad range, and so Legion starts in the midrange and goes up from there. The range is a mix of conservatively designed, thin and light laptops and gaming machines with a more playful aesthetic, although Lenovo avoids creating the kind of outlandish designs like some other gaming laptop makers.
The entry level is represented by the $1,100 Legion 5 Gen 6 with an AMD Ryzen 5 processor and an RTX 3050 GPU, which is equipped to run modern titles at 1080p and average graphics. At the high end is the $4,120 Legion 7i Gen 7 with an Intel Core i9-12900HX and an RTX 3080 Ti which is more than capable of running games at 4K resolutions and high graphics.
The full range of Intel and AMD processors and Nvidia GPUs are mixed into the lineup, with displays sporting high refresh rates at 165Hz and above. We found Lenovo’s Legion line of gaming laptops to be quite competitive with the rest of the market.
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