I’m mainly a console gamer these days. My daily computer is a light, speedy little MacBook Air. It can’t do much gaming, but it doesn’t really need to. As far as portable computers go, the Lenovo Legion 5i Pro is about as far as you can get from my little daily machine. It’s hefty, it’s got a stonking great battery and a powerful gaming-centric CPU and graphics combo that eats most games I throw at it for breakfast. At the same time it’s high refresh rate, high resolution screen combined with a pleasant keyboard and great trackpad make it a nice machine for productivity and time wasting as well. It’s a machine focused on gaming that won’t get in your way when you need it for other things.
This Legion is smartly designed, with just a little bit of the aggressive gamer-aesthetic you might expect from a gaming laptop. When it’s closed you could be forgiven for thinking it’s a much more boring machine. The lid has little ornamentation aside from a big LEGION logo at the top, however looking closer you’ll see the industrial looking exhaust vents that hint at the gamer focus of this machine. Open it up and turn it on, and you’ll know this is no business machine. An RGB backlit keyboard shimmers in a rainbow pattern, and a high refresh rate screen just begs to be gamed on. It’s a very attractive design, just enough notes to let you know it’s a gaming laptop without going over the top.
That screen though is quite a thing to behold. The 2560 x 1600 resolution 16-inch screen makes text and game elements look razor sharp. It’s not quite a 4K resolution, but I think this is a great middle ground where you get markedly better performance from the hardware than you would if it had a 4K screen. It’s a high refresh rate display as well, topping out at 165Hz. Everything is just *nicer* with this fast display. Playing games at high frame rates makes things just feel ultra responsive, and even just doing basic Windows things like using the Start menu and scrolling in a web browser feel ridiculously smooth. It even supports HDR400 and Dolby Vision so watching shows and movies in supported apps like Netflix looks fantastic. The speakers on the computer make for an adequate, if not spectacular experience. They’re a little thin sounding without a huge deal of presence – somehow the speakers in my ultrathin Mac sound deeper and fuller. They will do the job for Netflix in bed, but I definitely preferred a set of headphones when I could.
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Powering all these sights and sounds is a pretty capable set of hardware. The model I tested had a 12th Gen Intel Core i7 paired with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070Ti graphics chip – and it blew me away with how well it played games I threw at it. Maxed out Forza Horizon 5 and I was getting 80-90fps, between 110-190 in Deep Rock Galactic, 60fps with Fortnite maxed out and an easy 100-130fps with a couple of tweaks. The high refresh rate screen is well paired with this graphics chip since it can push frame rates well in excess of the standard 60 without sacrificing visuals in many games. While you’re doing all this gaming the fans will spin up to be audible. I’ve heard much more jarring fans in other gaming laptops for sure, this one isn’t an annoying kind of fan noise – just loud enough to be noticeable. While doing less intensive tasks like web browsing or watching videos I found the fans barely audible.
As a tool for getting things done, the Legion is pretty great in most areas. The keyboard is a pleasant kind of spongey with a pleasing amount of key travel and a nice tactile feel. The trackpad is large and feels great to use. My fingers would glide over it’s surface with just the right amount of friction, and it’s among the nicest trackpads I’ve used with Windows’ multi-finger gestures. It’s got about every port you could reasonably expect on a portable machine including a full Thunderbolt 4/USB4 port which is fantastic for docking stations, some USB C ports, USB A ports, a full-sized HDMI 2.1 for connecting to the latest TVs, an ethernet jack for wired networking and a headphone/mic combo jack. It’s even equipped with Wifi 6E radios so if you have the absolute latest in Wifi you can make full use of it here. As far as equipment goes, it has about everything you could want and then some.
About the only downside I found with the machine was its battery life. It has a whopper-sized 80 watt hour battery, but with the power demands of the Intel and Nvidia chips on board even it can’t keep them fed for all that long. Doing regular non-gaming tasks like web browsing, watching video on YouTube and playing music over Spotify drained the battery in a little over 3 hours – though using Microsoft Edge rather than Chrome or Firefox helped eke a little more time from the battery. Coming from a laptop that I can do the same things with and not need to find a charger all day, the difference was noticeable.
While gaming the system has a host of features designed to limit performance and get some more life from the battery, but having games limited to 30fps or less felt like a last resort, definitely not the way I’d like to play if I had any other choice. Thankfully the machine charges quickly with the supplied (absolutely huge) AC adapter. Lenovo claims 80% charge in 30 minutes and I found my experience to be pretty close. With the performance on battery being severly limited I consider this a laptop that is easy to move between different desks but not one I’d regularly use for gaming on battery. Even doing pretty tame tasks you’ll be looking for a power outlet by lunch time.
The battery life is really my only frustration with this otherwise fantastic machine. It’s conservatively styled but can be customised to be a bit wild with it’s lighting if you want that. The keyboard and trackpad are delightful to use for productivity and general use and the screen is fantastic. The high resolution and refresh rate elevate everything you do from high-intensity gaming to moving windows around on the desktop. It’s a damn good display. The amount of game-focused hardware Lenovo have crammed in here makes for a wonderfully capable gaming machine as well, showing no signs of struggling under any game I threw at it.
