The Lenovo Yoga brand is quite popular among consumers as it's one of the better-known 2-in-1 laptop convertibles. This year, Lenovo Malaysia introduced the 7th-Gen Lenovo Yoga 7i with a 12th-Gen Intel Core processor. Without beating around the bush too much, let's head on to the review of what we think of the laptop.
Starting with the design, the Yoga 7i retains the professional-look design in Storm Gray with a matte finish without any special design. That's pretty straightforward and fine, as the Yoga 7i is usually meant for a corporate setting. That's not the only colour, though, there's also a Yoga 7i Stone Blue which looks quite cool too.
Storm Gray theme
Nice to see a microSD card slot there
No sharp edges at the corners
Weighing 1.4kg with a 1.74cm in body thickness, the body is built entirely with aluminium and it has a solid but rather artificial quality. However, it doesn't have any protection or water-resistance ratings. On that note, it's super lightweight and one little thing we like about this laptop's design is the Comfort Edge feature. If you refer to the photo, you can see that it doesn't have any sharp corners at all which is a nice touch.
As a 2-in-1 laptop, the Yoga 7i is flexible and you can turn it into a tablet if you wish. There's also the usual tent mode for watching videos or movies, and its hinge is strong enough to hold an angle firmly. The power button is also placed on the right side which may be strange for a laptop, but then again, it can be transformed into a tablet so the placement makes sense. However, it's odd that there was no fingerprint sensor to be found on the laptop so it lacks some firm security features there.
Tent mode
Semi-folding mode
Tablet mode
Moving to the display features, the Yoga 7i has a 14-inch OLED screen panel with a resolution of 2.8K (2880x1800 pixels), a 16:10 aspect ratio, a 90Hz refresh rate, a 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut and a brightness of 400 nits. With OLED, any colour displayed in videos and pictures will look very bright and condensed. You should be able to enjoy watching high resolution movies as well as editing images.
While it sounds great on paper, the 400 nits brightness isn't enough so you may encounter some difficulty seeing the display outdoors. It's even worst when you bring it out on a sunny day. On the bright side, the display can be used as a touchscreen too in tablet mode. To enhance the experience further, a Lenovo Digital Pen stylus can be purchased but you will need an AAAA battery which is quite difficult to come by on its own.
The score on PCMark 10
It played Rebel Galaxy Outlaw that was launched in 2020, but only in low-graphics settings
In terms of performance, it comes with a 12th Gen Intel Core i7-1260P processor, Intel Iris Xe graphics 16GB of RAM and 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD storage. With these kind of tech specs, this is the kind of laptop that you use for daily office work and not much else. Yes, you can play some modern video games too but only in lower-end graphics settings.
Throughout reviewing this laptop for the past two weeks, the fan never got loud and the temperature nearly always felt under control. Typing on the Yoga 7i keyboard is comfortable too and the trackpad size is huge. The sound performance is satisfying enough thanks to the Dolby Atmos speakers (but lacking a bit in terms of bass), and finally, the battery can last up to seven or eight hours which is great. It takes two hours to charge fully.
The webcam can record FHD resolution with an infrared sensor. You can close the camera with a lens cover too
Photo sample from the webcam
The battery usage from 100% to 3% takes 6 hours 47 minutes (1:03 pm to 7:50 pm)
Overall, we didn't have too many complaints about using the laptop as a working device. The Yoga 7i is an attractive 2-in-1 laptop with good performance for work and nothing more, but consumers may think twice about getting one due to the starting price of RM5939. Note - that's just the starting price for the model that we reviewed.
If this is too expensive for you, Lenovo also offers another variant starting from RM4809, featuring a 12th Gen Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD storage, but without a stylus. Apart from Lenovo, there are other 2-in-1 laptops such as the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 9315 at RM5999 or the Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 7420 at RM3399. The choice is yours.
Lenovo Yoga 7i tech specs and features:
- 12th Gen Intel Core i7-1260P processor
- Intel Iris Xe Graphics
- 14-inch OLED (2.8K resolution, 16:10 aspect ratio, 400 nits, DCI-P3 colour gamut 100%)
- 16GB of RAM
- 1TB Gen 4 PCIe SSD
- Measures 316.66×220.25×17.35mm, weighs 1.4kg
- Port: 2x USB-C 4.0 Thunderbolt 4, 1x HDMI 2.0, 1x microSD card scanner, 1x USB-A 3.2 Gen 1, 3.5mm audio jack
- 71Wh Battery with 65W USB-C Charging
- 1080p webcam with cover, Dolby Atmos sound system, tablet and tent modes
- WiFi 6E 2×2 AX Support, Bluetooth 5.2
- Windows 11 Pro operating system
Pros and Cons
Pros: Solid build quality for a 2-in-1 laptop with a professional design
Cons: Unusable for outdoor work with strong sunlight, no fingerprint scanner for security
Conclusion: A complete 2-in-1 laptop for work (and entertainment)
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