Lenovo IdeaPad Pro 5i 14" QHD 2.8K 120Hz i5-13500H RTX 3050-6GB 16GB RAM 512GB SSD Laptop £799.99 @ Lenovo

I received mine this morning. I've finished setting it up and have been playing with it a fair bit. Thought I'd offer a bullet point review!

- Very well-built, feels light for its size and specs (i.e. discrete GPU, big battery, robust cooling apparatus), solid chassis with no flex or screen wobble, passes the one-hand opening test.
- Lovely typing experience; decent key travel, snappy and responsive strokes, relatively quiet, sensible layout.
- Performance has been very impressive, and certainly an upgrade on my 2020 IdeaPad 5i with the i5-1035G1. I don't do any heavy editing/database work, but it's kept up with a lot of parallel setup stuff (installing large applications, migrating files, updates, whilst I'm working simultaneously).
- The display is very nice. Sufficiently bright (I've tested it in bright sunlight and it's clearly visible), sharp, pleasing colours. The 120Hz makes a big difference and this is a rare example of an IPS panel with negligible glow and no backlight bleed. YMMV.
- Most of the time the fans are very quiet. I've had it mostly on both the Windows and Lenovo performance modes and plugged in, and though the fans have kicked in at times, I certainly wouldn't call it loud. Right now I've got several apps running, plugged in/performance mode, and the fans are barely audible. Oh, and no coil whine!
- I've only managed a bit of gaming (stock GPU settings), but I could run Resident Evil 2 remake at native resolution, mostly high settings (80% image quality, some textures turned down to medium) and get 50-60fps. Not bad. That of course cranks up the fans big time!

A few minor criticisms:
- Despite lots of the marketing materials stating that this comes with an HDMI 2.1 port, having tested it, it is in fact 2.0. That's a shame as I can only run my UWQHD monitor at max. 100Hz via HDMI rather than its native 144Hz. Will have to make do or find a suitable Thunderbolt 4 dock!
- There is a whole row of media and extra function keys at the top of the keyboard. Why they omitted a pause/play key is beyond me. I'd swap any one of several (e.g. display extension, task switching, the stupid Lenovo Smart Key) for a pause/play button.
- The keyboard backlighting is certainly bright enough, in fact at a normal use angle the under-key LEDs are clearly visible and beam out at you which, in a dim environment, is a bit distracting. They could have concealed them better.
- There is no fingerprint sensor under the power button like in many other Lenovo laptops (including my 2020 IdeaPad 5). It would have been a nice, and surely very cheap, addition. It has Windows Hello but fingerprint is more convenient in some circumstances.
- There is a bit too much pre-installed Lenovo bloatware out of the box for my taste, but thankfully it's all removable and some of it is useful (e.g. the Vantage app with Lenovo Bridge functionality for easy driver/BIOS updates).
- The speakers are nice and loud, but not particularly fulsome i.e. treble are OK, but mids and certainly bass are lacking.

Supports "rapid-charing technology". Interesting.

I like the spec, including battery size, except for the screen resolution. I don't need such a high resolution and would be happy with 1080P. Anyone know of a similar spec laptop with a lesser screen?

Can't find any decent reviews for this 2023 model...

Looking for something similar to this but 16", any recommendations?

Are there any downsides to soldered ram, apart from not being able to upgrade?

Thanks to everyone who has helped. Just bought this, can't wait to get it.

QHD on a 14" screen is surely not worth it? It'll just zap your battery without providing much benefit. (edited)

Amazing deal thanks for posting. I have ordered.

It has the latest gen 13 intel processor, dedicated graphics card & 16gb ram. The complete package.


So much better than the gen 11 or 12 deals with sometimes only 8gb ram for this price. (edited)

Good price but honestly what is it like gaming on these high res laptops? This is 40% more pixels than even 1440p, yet a mobile RTX 3050 6GB is supposed to push that?

How does it compare to this for £100 more? - https://www.lenovo.com/gb/en/p/laptops/ideapad/ideapad-500-series/ideapad-pro-5i-gen-8-(14-inch-intel)/83al0011uk?orgRef=https%253A%252F%252Fwww.google.com%252F&clickid=2BeQqQV%3AGxyNWIM33CQeS15vUkAQiWWmSWAs3w0&Program=3766&pid=43360&acid=ww%3Aaffiliate%3A74clty&cid=uk%3Aaffiliate%3Ark5fv4&utm_source=Impact&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_campaign=BAU#features

Also you can get 10% off if you sign up to their newsletter (or even get a code when visiting Lenovo.com - it appears as a pop up at the top of the page)

I'd be all over this if it was an OLED

Seems like a great spec for the money. I'd had my eye on the new Yoga Pro 9i 14, which has a more premium build, can be specced with a 40 series GPU, a mini LED display and has super fast (6400MHz) RAM and HDMI 2.1, but is significantly more expensive and the mini LED options and GPU above a 4050 don't seem to be available yet. It's also not really a Yoga as it's not 2-in-1! So I'm tempted by this.

Could someone compare this with hotukdeals.com/dea…142 please? Same price but I think I prefer this Lenovo, thanks!

Thanks for the response UKSD. No gaming/programming but possible video editing would be the most intensive program I would use (albeit, rarely). Knowing this would it change your recommendation?

Could you use this for gaming? e.g. Fifa, Red dead redemption etc

Is there anyway to get this as windows pro and not windows home ?

Did anyone who ordered get theirs? Mine was due for delivery on Friday, then it become today, then it became tomorrow. UPS is terrible.