Lenovo Slim 9i vs. Lenovo Yoga 9i Gen 7 | Digital trends

Lenovo has one of the widest lines of 14-inch laptops. You can choose from a range of different price points and features between its ThinkPad, Yoga and Slim ranges. The Slim 9i is the company’s premium clamshell laptop and the Yoga 9i is a premium 360-degree convertible 2-in-1.

They are different laptops, but they share the same DNA. In particular, they enjoy the same new rounded design that debuted on the Yoga 9i Gen 7, which is beautiful and comfortable to hold. Is the Yoga’s 2-in-1 flexibility the only thing she has going for her? That’s what we’re going to look at here.

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Price and configuration

To be honest, Lenovo prices can be confusing and change frequently. At the time of writing, the Slim 9i starts at a premium price of $1,760 for a Core i7-1280P CPU, 32GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and a 14-inch UHD+ OLED display. If you bump this configuration up to 1TB, you’ll pay $380 more, or $2,140.

The Yoga 9i Gen 7 starts at $1,000 for a Core i7-1260P, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and a 14-inch FHD+ IPS display. The same configuration with OLED costs almost $900 more, or $1,880. There are other configurations in between, including 1GB SSD and 2.8K IPS options. The entry price is in the mid-range, but beyond that you’ll be spending a premium amount.

Design

With the Yoga 9i Gen 7, Lenovo introduced a new aesthetic that moved from the traditional design with sharp angles to a rounded design that is highlighted by tasteful chrome. It’s a sleek aesthetic while providing a comfortable feel, especially in tablet mode. Speaking of which, the Yoga is a 360-degree convertible device supporting four modes: clamshell, tent, media and tablet. The all-aluminum quality of the laptop is unmatched among Windows laptops, and its hinge opens with one hand while keeping the display firmly in place in every mode.

The Slim 9i is a clamshell version with the same gorgeous and comfortable design. It’s also solidly built with an excellent hinge. But the Slim 9i is not identical to the Yoga 9i. Its lid is covered with frosted glass that adds some density and an ultra-smooth finish that increases the elegance factor. Both are beautiful laptops, but the clamshell has a slight edge.

Both laptops use Lenovo’s reverse notch at the top of the display to accommodate 1080p webcams and infrared cameras, along with microphones that add to a great video conferencing experience. Windows 11 Hello passwordless login provides facial recognition thanks to an infrared camera, and Lenovo Zero Touch Lock and Login are supported on every PC. This feature locks laptops and puts them to sleep when users leave and wakes them up when users return.

The Yoga 9i Gen 7 has more convenient connectivity than the Slim 9i with USB-A ports for older devices. Both use the latest wireless standard.

Finally, you will find essentially the same keyboard and touchpad on both laptops. It’s a solid offering with plenty of spacing and large keys, and a light and sleek switch that isn’t as deep as the better keyboards on the Dell XPS and HP Spectre. The touchpads are the same size and offer a precise surface and quiet, confident buttons. Both laptops have touchscreens, while the Yoga 9i Slim 7 also supports Lenovo’s active pen.

Performance

Slim 9i and Yoga 9i Gen 7 are built on 28-watt Intel 12th generation processors. The clamshell is limited to a 14-core/20-thread Core i7-1280P clocked up to 4.8GHz, while the 2-in-1 offers a choice between a 12-core/16-thread Core i5-1240P clocked up to 4.8GHz. 4.4 GHz and Core i7-1260P running at up to 4.7 GHz.

Both laptops scored similarly in Geekbench 5 and in our Handbrake test, which encodes a 420MB video as H.265. The Slim 9i was significantly faster in the Cinebench R23 benchmark, thanks to more cores and threads and a higher clocked CPU. We used Lenovo’s thermal management utility to test balanced and performance mode, and both results are tabulated.

These are quickly productive machines that can handle the most demanding work procedures. Neither is particularly fast for demanding creative tasks, mainly thanks to integrated Intel Iris Xe Graphics. Gaming is also not the laptop’s strong point.

Display and sound

The Yoga 9i supports more display options than the Slim 9i, which comes “only” with a 14-inch 16:10 UHD+ OLED display. The 2-in-1 also offers FHD+ and 2.8K IPS panels that promise better battery life.

We tested both notebooks with OLED panels, and according to our colorimeter, they provided almost identical quality. You can’t go wrong with either, thanks to wide and accurate colors, good brightness and deep contrast that delivers inky black. Whether you’re doing productive work, editing photos and video (performance aside), or watching high dynamic range (HDR) video, you’ll find both laptops to deliver a spectacular experience.

The Yoga 9i Gen 7 includes the same swiveling Soundbar that Lenovo introduced on the 2-in-1 a few years ago. It features two tweeters and two 3-watt woofers that deliver quality sound no matter what mode it’s in. It’s not as good as we expected, with some distortion at higher volumes. But it was slightly better than the four-speaker setup in the Slim 9i.

Portability

The Slim 9i is slightly shallower than the Yoga 9i Gen 7, while being slightly thinner and lighter. Both are nice sized 14-inch laptops that fit easily in a backpack.

Both of our review machines were equipped with 75 watt-hour batteries and both were built on power-hungry OLED displays. The Slim 9i lasted almost three hours less in our web browsing battery test, which was surprising given its nearly identical score in the PCMark 10 Applications test. Less battery life was to be expected due to the extra cores running at a higher frequency, but the Clam’s battery life while browsing the web was surprising. Both laptops clocked in at about 14.5 hours during our local video test—another surprise given the Slim 9i’s higher-resolution UHD+ display.

The PCMark 10 test is a good indicator of battery life in a typical productivity workflow, and according to the results here, both laptops can come close to lasting a workday. However, for more demanding users, both laptops will need their power adapters handy.

Clamshell or 2-in-1, take your pick

The Lenovo Slim 9i and Yoga 9i Gen 7 are two of the best 14-inch laptops you can buy. The clamshell is slightly faster but has lower battery life, while the 2-in-1 has slightly better sound and is slightly thicker and heavier.

The biggest difference is price, with the Yoga 9i Gen 7 offering a significantly lower base price. That’s important, but if you want an excellent clamshell machine, the Slim 9i won’t disappoint either.

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