The Lenovo Yoga 9i is one of the best-designed 2-in-1 laptops we’ve seen this year – in our opinion just lost to the Dell XPS 13 – and yet it’s a close call.
Design
Keyboard keys areas are well-spaced and responsive as trackpads. While the two are no exception, as far as laptop keyboards and trackpads go, they certainly make our experience feel more comfortable and functional than others – especially those on cheap laptops.
The webcam isn’t that great (it’s only 720p) but the bezels around it are fairly thin, except for the noticeably thick bottom bezel. The XPS 13 2-in-1 has a much thinner bezel around it that helps it deal with 16:10 FHD + displays, so Lenovo could do better here.
The Yoga 9i has a stunning 14-inch, 1080p display that made me think 4K at first. While watching Ryer’s trailer, the colors were lively and beautiful. The green, pink, yellow, and orange tones of the lantern were lively as Raya walked through the market. Meanwhile, the thatched roof, even Ray’s hair, was sharp and well defined.
Performance
Performance is where the Yoga 9i really shines – especially the Iris Xe graphics. All but one of our benchmarks beats each competitor 2-in-1 and usually by a huge margin.
Not only is the Yoga 9i equipped with the latest 11th Gen (Tiger Lake) Intel Core chip, it also flaunts the top-tier Core i7-1185G7 CPU, which gives it a slight performance edge compared to the Core i7-1165G7 processor. Paired with 16GB of RAM, the CPU flashed through my rigorous real-world testing, pulling 30 chrome tabs to carry a wrestler’s bottom pillow.
Buttery Life
Yoga 9i sweeps the field of any excellent competition. Of course, the Lenovo Flex 5G’s battery lasted an average of 29 hours, but it was only able to run the HD movie benchmark (while the Yoga 9i recorded 15 hours and two minutes of battery life) and its compatibility issues kept us away from everything except Geekbench 5. , And there the Yoga 9i score is twice that of the Flex 5G.
| Processor | Intel Core i7-1185G7 Processor (12M Cache, 3.00 GHz up to 4.80 GHz) |
| Display | 14″ UHD (3840×2160) IPS 500nits Glossy, Glass, 90% DCI-P3, VESA HDR 400, UHD (4K) Display Touch. |
| Memory | 16GB DDR4 4266MHz RAM |
| Storage | 1TB SSD M.2 2280 PCIe NVMe SSD |
| Graphics | Intel Iris Xe Graphics |
| Operating System | Windows 10 Home 64 |
| Audio | Dolby Audio with 3D Sound Rotating Sound Bar with Dolby Atmos® Speaker System |
| Optical Drive | N/A |
| Webcam | 720p with Privacy Shutter Webcam |
| Wi-Fi | 11ax (2×2) Wireless LAN |
| Bluetooth | Bluetooth 5.1 |
| USB (s) | 2x USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 / Thunderbolt 4 (support data transfer 1x USB 3.2 Gen 2. 1x USB-C 3-in-1 Bundled |
| Audio Jack Combo | 2x, Array Microphone |
| Extra M.2 Slot | N/A |
| Supported SSD Type | M.2 2280 PCIe NVMe |
| Dimensions (W x D x H) | 319.5 x 216.7 x 15.3-16.5mm (12.57 x 8.53 x 0.60-0.64 inches) |
| Weight | Starting at 1.37 kg / 3.02lbs |
| Color(s) | SHADOW BLACK |
| Manufacturing Warranty | 02 years International Limited Warranty (Terms & Conditions Apply As Per Lenovo). |
Conclusion
The Yoga 9i can be perfect in a college or work setting, as typing in big and chunky keys has proven to be silent. While testing the keyboard in the 10fastfingers online typing test, I was able to fill in my average of 53 words per minute.
The 4.1 x 2.7-inch touchpad has a silky smooth feel to the touch, which sets it apart from the rest of the laptop’s palm. The touchpad has proven to be quite reliable when swiping and clicking and works well with Windows 10 gestures like two-finger scrolling.
