Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 Review – Versatile Intel Lunar Lake powered convertible for work and play

We certainly live in interesting times. With soaring RAM prices impacting on other devices like laptops down the line and a general push towards sustainability, it just makes more sense to invest in more capable, multirole devices whether you’re a corporate desk jockey,  a student or someone who needs a capable workhorse for work and play.

Enter the refreshed Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 convertible that blends the transformable potential of a 360-degree hinge with the latest Intel Lunar Lake CPUs into a compact form factor.

After graciously getting a sample for field testing, here’s our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review where we suss out whether it’s a worthy investment.

Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review – Build and Design

Best known for their array of enterprise offerings, Lenovo is also a surprisingly dab hand at crafting devices for more mainstream use. Rather than dialling everything to 11, the Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 aims to be a well balanced, relatively affordable convertible laptop for the masses that aims to maximise bang for the buck with its specifications and design to cater to all but the most demanding usage scenarios like triple-A gaming or intensive video editing work. 

Out of the box, our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample has a 14-inch form factor that’s done up in a pale light cream colourway that they’ve designated as Seashell. This works out to a light brownish finish with a subtle faux leather texture on the top lid and a gunmetal grey finish for the rest of the all-metal chassis. 

As a nice touch, Lenovo has bundled in the Yoga Pen stylus with the laptop on top of the obligatory charging brick.

The whole affair weighs about 1.38kg, which is fair for a convertible if a bit on the heavy side as it doesn’t implement any weight-saving magnesium alloy materials in its manufacture. It is also a bit on the chunky side though it is still thin enough to comfortably toss into a backpack for all day carry. 

When held, the textured faux leather finish on the top lid and the embossed Lenovo branding lends the whole affair a touch of class with the finish adding a measure of grippiness when held. The faux leather finish also has the side benefit of resisting smudges and fingerprints nicely. Rather than cut corners, the top lid is surprisingly sturdy with no flex or play even when prodded in the centre portion and there’s no give on the sides. 

To make it easier to open, the top lid also has a raised lip that allows your fingers to gain purchase. However, the 360-degree hinges are a bit on the stiff side and you’ll still need both hands to open it and flip it into display mode or tablet mode depending on what floats your boat. 

While there was a bit of initial resistance, the hinges on our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit opened smoothly and more importantly, remained where it was supposed to if you use it in its tent-style display mode or if fully folded as a Windows tablet. 

On that note, the laptop ships with a Lenovo Yoga Pen stylus, which offers 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity and which interacts directly with the touch display. However, there’s no way to properly mount or store it on the laptop itself so you’ll need to constantly keep an eye on it especially when you’re taking it about for work. An integrated stylus well would have been nice though this isn’t a deal breaker by any means.

Stylus aside, the underside of our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample is otherwise unremarkable save for some rubber feet, a set of pentalobe screws keeping it secure and an additional set of grilles for the downward firing woofers. 

There’s not much reason to tinker around here as there is only one M.2 2242 SSD slot. Popping the lid open is also a complicated affair as there are several plastic pegs that require a practiced hand and care to avoid damage.

In terms of I/O, the Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 convertible has a modest but comprehensive array of ports that cover most of the bases. The left side hosts a 3.5mm audio jack,  a Thunderbolt 4 port with USB PD 3.0 and DisplayPort 2.1 support with a similar additional port on the right side, a HDMI 1.4b port, a single USB-A 3.1 Gen 1 port with ‘Always On’ charging support and a highly sought after microSD card reader. 

Rather than the usual placement in the upper right corner of the keyboard tray, the laptop instead has its power button located on the right side which makes sense if you aim to use it as a tablet. Unfortunately, there’s no fingerprint reader but it does have Windows Hello via the 5MP and infrared webcam array perched just above the display for biometrics authentication.

When flipped open, our  Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample came with a bone-white keyboard frame that offers white LED-backlighting. The keyboard is framed by a metal tray with a reasonably sized touchpad and also hosts a pair of upwards firing tweeters. Combined with the bottom firing woofers, you get a comprehensive audio setup that’s enhanced with Dolby Atmos.

The display comes in a number of configurations with our  Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit featuring wonderfully slim side bezels and a slightly thicker top and bottom bezel, lending the 14-inch WUXGA touch OLED panel a 16:10 aspect ratio.

While it has a 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut along with DisplayHDR True Black 500 and Dolby Vision support, which makes it ideal for content creators, it only maxes out at a 60Hz refresh rate which makes it less than ideal for serious gamers who require higher refresh rates. Perched up top is the aforementioned 5MP and infrared webcam combo that comes with a privacy shutter and supports 1080p video recording.

Overall build quality is excellent in every aspect from the top lid down to its sturdy hinges that are sturdy and well built. 

Of note is that Lenovo has included their free Depot Support service out of the box that allows for basic phone, chat or email support for common technical issues during business hours but if you need something more comprehensive you can pay for a subscription to higher-service level tiers up to Lenovo Premier Support Plus with 24/7 support.

Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review – Performance and Benchmarks

Available in a wide variety of configurations depending on region, our  Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit for the Malaysia market is powered by the latest Intel® Core™Ultra Processor, specifically the Intel® Core™ Ultra 5 226V processor that features a quartet of Skymont efficiency cores and a quartet of Lion Cove performance cores to balance efficient battery life and performance. 

The CPU is paired with Intel Arc Graphics 130V integrated graphics, 16GB LPDDR5X RAM and a dedicated NPU that’s rated for up to 40 TOPS, which makes the laptop compliant for Copilot+ AI requirements and helps unlock AI experiences. Connectivity is comprehensive with fast WiFi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.

Here’s how our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample stacks up on paper:

 

Price	From RM4,156.10
Display	14-inch WUXGA Multitouch OLED, 1,920 x 1,200 pixels, 400 nits, 100% DCI-P3, 60Hz, Dolby Vision, DisplayHDR True Black 500, TUV Low Blue Light (Hardware)
Processor	Intel® Core™ 5 226V
Graphics	Intel Arc Graphics 130V
OS	Windows 11 Home
Memory	16GB LPDDR5X RAM / 512GB M.2 2242 PCIe Gen4 SSD
Battery	4-cell Li-Ion 70Wh w/ 65W Rapid Charge Express
Size/Weight	317 x 228 x 15.45mm / 1.38kg

Much like other Lenovo laptops, the  Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 has their Lenovo Vantage app that lets you see critical diagnostics for the laptop at a glance, get updates and perform basic troubleshooting. More importantly, it lets you modify power settings with your choice of Auto that lets it adjust it based on your usage, Battery Saver that reduces clock speed for quieter performance and greater battery life and a Performance mode that makes the fan sound louder and the laptop runs hotter for greater performance.
When subjected to synthetic benchmarks, our  Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit in Performance mode and plugged in scored the following:

3D Mark Speedway	449
3D Mark Steel Nomad	461
3D Mark Steel Nomad Light	2,435
3D Mark Port Royal	1,580
3D Mark Solar Bay	13,312
3D Mark Time Spy Extreme	1,523
3D Mark Time Spy	3.142
3D Mark Night Raid	22,003
Geekbench 6 Single core	2,534
Geekbench 6 Multi core	10,015
Geekbench 6 OpenCL	26,394
Geekbench 6 Vulkan	26,950
PCMark 10 (Extended)	6,417
Cinebench 2024 (Multicore)	394
Cinebench 2024 (SIngle core)	109 x3.61x MP ratio
PCMark 8 Battery Life (Work)	8 hours 26 mins

In terms of benchmarks, the laptop acquitted itself in a pleasantly competent fashion with decent performance overall for general computing duties like paperwork, spreadsheets, video calls and the like.

Even under heavy load, the laptop managed to keep noise levels relatively low with minimal fan noise. It also ran warm but did not hit uncomfortable heat levels such that it can still be used on your lap with the keyboard remaining cool throughout.

Even better,  the Intel Arc 130V integrated graphics actually allowed our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample to tackle a modicum of non-competitive light gaming too thanks to support for XeSS supersampling which uses AI-enhanced upscaling, rendering games at a lower resolution and then upscaling them in real time with AI for smoother animations and gaming onscreen.

In Cyberpunk 2077 on low settings and native 1,900 x 1,200 pixels resolution as well as XeSS enabled, it managed to get 25.79fps without too much tweaking. In an older game like Shadow of the Tomb Raider with XeSS enabled and set to Ultra Quality, it managed a nippier 69fps on average.

If XeSS is supported, you’ll generally get smoother and higher frames per second. To be fair, the fact that a convertible laptop for general computing can even play games of recent vintage at all is already an impressive feat in and of itself. If you stick to XeSS enabled games which include many of the more popular ones in the market, or older games in your library, you’ll have a good time. 

On that note, the OLED display on our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review sample is among the better ones out there, serving up deep blacks and lifelike colour rendition onscreen thanks to its 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut which makes it ideal for video editors and content creators. It’s also a dab hand for catching up on your Netflix backlog especially when the laptop is deployed in its tent-style display mode. Unfortunately, its 60Hz refresh rate means that it isn’t ideal for competitive gaming but it’s not an issue seeing its intended role as a general purpose workhorse. 

Visuals aside, the display proved to be a capable digital easel when used in tandem with the provided Yoga Pen stylus, allowing sketch artists to doodle and draw though the chunkiness and weight of the laptop means that it’s not ideal for usage on the go.

The quad speaker setup with twin woofers and tweeters is among the better ones in the market, offering a fair bit of sound staging and good detail for casual music listening, movie watching and gaming alike.

In terms of battery life, our Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit with its 70Wh lithium-ion battery offered surprisingly good endurance. With WiFi on, 50% screen brightness and a normal workload of spreadsheets, text documents and web browsing with a bit of YouTube, it was able to last a full working day with a top-up needed near sundown.

In PCMark 8’s Work battery life test, it managed to get a respectable 8 hours and 26 minutes. If you’re in a hurry, the laptop has a Rapid Charge Express setting that offers 3 hours of normal usage with a 15-minute charge.

Should you buy the Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1?

Taken as a whole, the Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 can capably tackle general computing and light creative tasks and even a modicum of casual gaming too. If you need a solid and versatile workhorse that can function as a tablet, display and laptop while offering good battery life, a decent OLED display and solid performance, this is well worth a look.

Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 review unit courtesy of Lenovo Malaysia. For more details please visit their official page here