Lenovo Yoga 7i Review: Premium Intel Evo Laptop On A Budget
As time goes on, Intel's 10-nanometer Tiger Lake processors will pounce on more laptop designs, given that it has only been a handful of weeks since the chip maker launched its latest mobile CPUs (which replace Ice Lake). Lenovo was quick out of the gate, however, and the company sent us an interesting sub-$1,000 Tiger Lake configuration from its rather plentiful 2-in-1 lineup. Specifically, the Lenovo Yoga 7i that arrived on our doorstep, and it's a flexible 14-inch convertible which is also the first to land in our lab armed with an 11th Gen Core i5-1135G7 processor in tow.
Our dalliances with Intel's Tiger Lake platform up to this point have been encounters with higher end SKUs, including a Core i7-1185G7 we benchmarked as part of a reference laptop Intel provided shortly after its Architecture Day 2020 event, as well as the Core i7-1165G7 we cozied up to in our Dell XPS 13 review. Those are the two fastest Tiger Lake processors within the UP3-series (what Intel previously called its U-series) for thin and light laptops.
The Core i5-1135G7, meanwhile, sits a peg down and presents an opportunity to offer a less expensive laptop built around the same core CPU architecture. That is what makes the Yoga 7i so intriguing. It is still a Tiger Lake chip, and even harnesses the same number of cores (four) and threads (eight), just with less cache (8MB versus 12MB) and a tamer implementation of Intel's powerful new Xe graphics core (we'll get to that later).
Intel bills Tiger Lake as being the "world's best processor for thin and light laptops," and the Yoga 7i wraps it into a relatively affordable package starting at $749.99. The config we received runs $899.99 and appears to be a SKU specific to Best Buy, though it's also now on sale at that original $749 price point and makes for a great deal. Here's all that the machine includes...
Lenovo Yoga 7i Internal Specifications And Features
This machine's 4-core/8-thread Intel Core i5-1135G7 has a 2.4GHz base clock and 4.2GHz max turbo clock (3.8GHz for the all-core turbo clock ceiling). At the upper end of the single-core turbo frequency spectrum, there is a 500MHz difference between the Core i5-1135G7 and Core i7-1165G7, and a 600MHz difference between it and the Core i7-1185G7. That means there is an inevitable performance hit in certain applications, though as our benchmarks show on the next page, the divide is not always significant.
This particular SKU also has 12GB of DDR4-3200 memory soldered to the motherboard. It is a bit of an oddball capacity, versus more commonly found 8GB and 16GB arrangements. But we suppose splitting the difference allows Lenovo to elevate this setup above the baseline amount while still keeping the price attractive for budget-conscious buyers looking to spend well under $1K. And for storage, this Yoga comes with a 512GB NVMe SSD, which is also a jump over the baseline amount (256GB) on the Yoga 7i series. For all intents and purposes, this is a decidedly upper mid-range config at a very reasonable price point.
All of these components, and especially the Tiger Lake CPU, play into this laptop's Intel Evo certification. To be Evo certified, a laptop has to meet certain criteria specified by Intel, including...
Consistent responsiveness on battery
Wake from sleep in less than 1 second
9 or more hours of real-world battery life (on laptops with a 1080p display)
4 or more hours of battery life in a 30-minute charge (on laptops with a 1080p display)
Intel anticipates certifying nearly two dozen designs by the end of the year, of which the Yoga 7i is one of them. Second-edition target specifications laid out by Intel also added Thunderbolt 4 and Wi-Fi 6 connectivity to the Evo recipe, both of which are featured on the Yoga 7i as well. So again, for about $750 - $840 at retail currently, you're getting a lot of leading-edge technology here.
Lenovo Yoga 7i Design And Display
One of the common drawbacks to more affordable laptop designs, are that they often lack the premium build quality and feel of more expensive models, a lot of times with plastic construction. They also tend to be a little thicker. Lenovo's Yoga 7i is a welcome exception to this not-so-hard and fast rule. It looks and feels more expensive than it is, with its sandblasted aluminum housing and mostly rigid build quality. For example, you can flex its display panel if you really try, but it takes considerably more force than many laptops in this price range.
It is rather attractive as well, in its simplicity. There are no artificially carved lines or extraneous pieces of flair (like RGB or single-color lighting), just a flat rectangle design with beveled corners, a single color finish, and a relatively thin waistline (0.69 inches at its thickest point) with slightly tapered geometry. There is some light branding, though it is subtle as well, consisting of the Lenovo name in one of the corners (atop a small brushed metal section), and "Yoga" carved a bit bigger in the opposite corner. Both blend in nicely with the finish here.
We received the "Dark Moss" color option, which appears dark gray with tones of green, depending on the lighting. Dark Moss does not sound all that appealing, quite frankly, but to this editor's eyeballs, it is a nice and subtle deviation from the standard silver, black, white, and gray color options that dominate the laptop landscape. Speaking of which, the Yoga 7i is also offered in "Slate Gray" for those who prefer that traditional, somewhat comparatively boring color.
The display is a 14-inch screen with a 1920x1080 resolution, with touch support. If offers 72 percent coverage of the NTSC color space, and is easily viewed from wider, off-access angles, which carries added importance for 2-in-1 devices capable of flexible form factors. Photos and videos look good on the Yoga 7i, though if you have been spoiled by an OLED panel, you are not going to get the same image quality here. In its own right, though, the display on the Yoga 7i is suitable for a variety of tasks.
This display is not ultra-bright, though. Specifically, we measured around 315 lux at the maximum brightness setting. That is enough for a vibrant presentation, though far away from an daylight defying luminosity. On a related note, HDR reproduction is absent on this laptop's display.
Lenovo Yoga 7i External Features, Ports And Keyboard
One of the main reasons to buy a Yoga 7i is for its flexibility, and that comes by way of Lenovo's sturdy 360-degree hinges. This means you can use it in four different ways: as a traditional laptop, in tent mode to play a presentation or perhaps watch content in the kitchen, in stand mode (where the keyboard is the base), or fold it all the way back to use it as a tablet. Windows 10 of course adapts and orients the screen appropriately automatically.
One feature that could easily go overlooked if you do not know it is there, is the privacy shutter for the built-in webcam. The Yoga 7i is equipped with a 720p HD webcam positioned at the top of the display, and there is an inconspicuous slider scrunched in the hairline gap between the bezel and edge of the panel. It is fairly easy to slide with even short fingernails, and offers peace of mind that the camera cannot expose anything you do not want it to (so long as you remember to close the shutter). And it is certainly more elegant than draping a piece of tape over the camera sensor.
The port selection is a little limited on this 14-inch laptop, however. With this Yoga model, Lenovo has taken the opportunity to nudge users into the land of USB-C/Thunderbolt 4 connectivity—you will find two of those ports on the left side, either of which can charge the laptop with the include power adapter, along with a 3.5mm headphone/microphone combo jack.
On the other side of the Yoga 7i is a single USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port. This is basically a USB 3.0 port with the updated jargon, meaning the maximum theoretical bandwidth is 5Gbps (whereas Gen 2 goes to 10Gbps, and Gen 2x2 goes to 20Gbps). It is a bit of a bummer that Lenovo opted for the slower version, though in lieu of added speed, it is a power share port, so connected devices can still draw power even when the laptop is shut down.
The Yoga 7i's six-row keyboard is distinctly Lenovo, to an extent. Its key caps have a curved bottom instead of a more rectangular shape, but this really amounts to an aesthetic choice, not so much an ergonomic one. They are not slightly concave or quite as comfortable as the keys found on Lenovo's ThinkPad laptops, which we feel are best in class for ultralight machines.
In contrast, the keys on the Yoga 7i are flatter (lower profile) and a bit softer. They are serviceable, though, with consistent key action and good spacing, without feeling cramped on a 14-inch form factor. There is also an LED backlight with two levels of brightness.
Underneath the keyboard is a fingerprint reader on the right side, and a precision 10-point multi-touch trackpad slightly off center to the left. It is smooth and responsive, and gave us no issues during testing.
A pair of 2W speakers flank the keyboard, and pump out some decent volume. We fired up AC/DC's new Power Up album, and the Yoga 7i did a good job filling the room with the raspy vocals and electric guitar riffs. Disabling Dolby Atmos actually results in even more volume, albeit at the expense of some of the audio tuning and EQ controls.
As is usually the case, lower end bass response is mostly absent, and the overall sound quality is not going to make you chuck your reference speakers or fancy earbuds. But it is another area where the Yoga 7i punches a little above its price point.
Lenovo Yoga 7i Software Utilities And Experience
The pre-installed Lenovo Vantage utility is your hub to a variety of resources and maintenance, like looking up driver updates, viewing your warranty details, and other housekeeping. It is broken up into four sections—Dashboard, Device, Security, and Support—each with their own sub-sections, and you will want to spend some time getting familiar with the layout.
One area in particular is the Device > Power section. While not exactly intuitive (it took us a bit to figure this out), this is where you can adjust the "Power Smart" settings to balance noise and cooling with performance. Your options are Extreme Performance (configured by default), Intelligent cooling, and Battery saving.
Here is how these settings are explained...
Extreme Performance: This mode enables the maximum system performance. In this mode, the fast fan speed might cause big noise.
Intelligent Cooling: This mode enable the best experience with fan speed and system performance balanced. For example, when in gaming, it optimizes the performance. While in the office, it reduces the noise.
Battery Saving: This mode enables the maximum battery life by automatically adjusting the brightness, changing the power settings, disabling features on advanced image processing, etc.
This utility is also where you can enable/disable things like Rapid Charge, Always-on USB, and more.
Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-In-1: Evaluating Performance
Before running our selection of benchmarks, we apply the latest Windows and driver updates to the system we are testing (in this case, the Yoga 7i). Other than that, we do not change any settings. Our goal is to test the system as it ships, but after auto-updating, to accurately reflect what buyers can expect from an out-of-box experience.
ATTO Disk Benchmark
Peak Sequential Storage Throughput
The ATTO disk benchmark is a fairly quick and simple test which measures read/write bandwidth and IOPS across a range of different data sizes. We get a pair of results at each data point: bandwidth measured on MB per second (or GB per second if the result is that high), and input/output operations per second (IOPS).
Our system arrived with a 512GB Samsung PM991 NVMe SSD, which is rated to deliver sequential reads of up to 2,200MB/s and sequential writes of up to 1,200MB/s. And it hit and even exceeded those rated metrics in ATTO. In our benchmark run, sequential reads peaked at 2,200MB/s, just as advertised, while sequential writes climbed to 1,330MB/s, which is higher than advertised. Good stuff.
Looking at the measured IOPS, reads peaked at 91.79K IOPS, while writes hit 85.29K IOPS. Neither is quite as advertised, but decent overall. The bottom line is, for the vast majority of workloads, the storage in this the Yoga 7i is not going to drag down performance.
Speedometer Web Application Benchmark
Browser Performance
We recently moved on to BrowserBench.org'sSpeedometer test, which takes a holistic look at web application performance. This test automatically loads and runs several sample webapps from ToDoMVC.com using the most popular web development frameworks around, including React, Angular, Ember.js, and even vanilla JavaScript. This test is a better example of how systems cope with real web applications, as opposed to a pure JavaScript compute test like JetStream. All tests were performed using the latest version of Chrome.
Our early experiences with Tiger Lake have shown it performing very well in this benchmark, and the Yoga 7i with its Core i5-1135G7 continues the trend, taking a No. 4 position behind three other benchmark runs with the faster Core i7-1165G7. This is what we alluded to earlier—there will inevitably be a performance hit when comparing the Core i5-1135G7 to faster Tiger Lake SKUs, but it is not a giant one. And compared to every non-Tiger Lake part, the Yoga 7i stands strong.
Cinebench R20
3D Rendering Performance
The current version of Maxon's rendering benchmark, Cinebench R20 us a sustained multi-threaded workload, which makes it a good indicator of how well the cooling system performs. This version is a pure CPU benchmark, and we tested both single-threaded and multi-threaded performance here.
Here we see another strong showing from the Yoga 7i and the Core i5-1135G7. If sorting by multi-core performance, as we have done in our graph above, it performs nearly on par with Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 with a faster Tiger Lake chip inside. There is some spunk to this 4-core/8-thread chip.
Sorting by single-core performance would not change the Yoga 7i's position—it would still reside in fifth place among the laptops compared here, with a score of 520. Interestingly enough, all five scores breaching the 500 mark belong to Tiger Lake, including the lower end Core i5-1135G7.
Geekbench 5
Single and Multi-Core Performance
Geekbench is a cross-platform benchmark that simulates real world processing workloads in image processing and particle physics scenarios. We tested the notebooks featured here in Geekbench's single and multi-core workloads.
In our comparison of Geekbench 5 scores, the Yoga 7i falls several pegs. However, the multi-core scores of the entire middle of the pack are all very close to one another. And if we shift our focus to the single-threaded performance, the Yoga 7i's score of 1,410 catapults it towards the top of the pack into the No. 5 spot, which further underscores the performance capabilities of Intel's Tiger Lake architecture, even in a mid-range part.
PCMark 10
Productivity and System-level Benchmarking
PCMark 10 uses a mix of real-world applications and simulated workloads to establish how well a given system performs productivity tasks, including image and video editing, web browsing, and OpenOffice document editing. While these scores appear to be all over the place, the systems are sorted by their overall PCMark score, which is the third (gray) bar in each cluster.
This particular benchmark gives us perhaps the best snapshot of the Yoga 7i's intended performance, as the focus is squarely on productivity. Sorting by the overall score, the 14-inch laptop slots into the No. 6 spot, coming in just behind Lenovo's ThinkPad X13 Gen 1 with a Ryzen 5 4650U CPU inside. All of the individual scores here are fairly strong, too, not just the overall one. This is where we want to see a laptop like this flex.
3DMark Benchmarks
3D Performance
3DMark has several different graphics tests which focus on different types of systems. UL seems to have discontinued support for Cloud Gate, but fortunately there are a couple of tests remaining that run well on integrated graphics. First up is Sky Diver, which uses the DirectX 11 graphics API.
We have seen that the Yoga 7i can handle itself well in productivity chores, but what about gaming and graphics? Intel is mighty high on its Xe architecture, and in 3DMark's Sky Diver test, it came out ahead of laptops with various other GPU solutions, like the GeForce MX150, Radeon Vega 8, and previous gen UHD 620 solutions. So far, so good, but will it hold up?
Here is a look at 3DMark's Night Raid test...
We have seen Intel's Iris Xe graphics perform rather well in this benchmark, and certainly the Core i5-1135G7 lifted the Yoga 7i above some previous generation laptops, but there is a sizable gap between it and the Core i7-1165G7. Why is this?
Well, it partially comes down to the number of execution units. Both the Core i7-1165G7 and Core i5-1135G7 are running Iris Xe graphics, but whereas the Core i7 part has the benefit of 96 EUs, the Core i5 SKU is working with 80 EUs. The max graphics clock is the same (1.3GHz), but with fewer EUs, the Core i5-1135G7 is just not going to put up the same level of graphics performance as the Core i7-1165G7.
However, that alone does not explain why the performance dips below last generation's Iris Plus graphics. We suspect the comparatively low memory speed is also to blame. This laptop is using DDR4-2666 memory, whereas the Dell XPS 13 with a higher end Tiger Lake CPU is using DDR4-4267 memory. Some Tiger Lake laptops go all the way up to DDR4-4733, and as we are seeing some graphics tests, memory speed matters here.
Next up is 3DMark's Fire Strike Extreme test...
We see this play out more prominently in the more demanding Fire Strike Extreme test. At its best, the Core i7-1165G7 scored north of 2,000 in this benchmark, while the Core i5-1135G7 is not able to propel the Yoga 7i to quadruple digits, settling in at 930.
It is a lower end graphics solution, plain and simple. However, it is still faster than Intel's UHD graphics, with a core that is nearly double that of Lenovo's ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 5.
GRID Autosport
Gaming Performance
GRID Autosport is a cross-platform racing simulation developed by Codemasters. The developer wanted to make up for GRID 2, which released to mediocre reviews from critics and gamerse alike. Codemasters set out to improve GRID Autosport's handling and environment rendering to make it a true racing simulator. The third GRID game is built on Codemasters' EGO engine that boasts more realistic physics and damage systems to add a bit of danger and some extra realism to the racing. Codemasters also tuned its graphics engine to perform well over a wide variety of mainstream systems, which makes it a great test for systems with integrated graphics. Codemasters also promotes that GRID Autosport is "optimized for integrated Intel HD Graphics", which is certainly something. We tested at 1080p with the High image quality preset.
The Yoga 7i is not built for gaming, though even with a lower tier Tiger Lake chip on board, it is enough to obtain playable framerates in Grid Autosport at 1080p, with the high image quality preset, no less. You will not muster 60 frames per second, but 47 fps is not too shabby for a system like this.
That said, there are stronger integrated solutions for gaming, as we see with the Dell's XPS 13 coming out ahead, and the ASUS Zenbook Flip S coming way out ahead.
Gears Tactics
UE4 Gaming Performance
Gears Tactics is a much more recent title that runs on the Unreal 4 Engine. It's a pretty fun tactical real-time strategy game, and has a wide array of graphics options that can look pretty great if the system is up to the challenge. We turned off all the automatic frame rate adjustments, turned the resolution up to 1080p, and then tested at Low, Medium and High details settings.
At a glance, it looks like the Yoga 7i fell off a cliff in this benchmark, and to an extent it did—Gears Tactics is only barely playable at 1080p at low settings, and not really playable at medium or high. That is in stark contrast to the systems with faster Tiger Lake chips, which show that a beefier implementation of Xe can top 60 fps in this game.
The flip side is that nearly all of the included comparison laptops are running faster Tiger Lake solutions, as we only recently started including this benchmark in our gamut of tests. Intel's previous generation UHD graphics would undoubtedly be even worse here. Still, the point remains that in games like this, the Yoga 7i is going to struggle.
Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-In-1: Acoustics, Battery Life And Our Verdict
The Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 is not an especially noisy laptop. There are vents on the back and bottom to exhaust hot air, which gets actively pushed out with a decently sized single 50mm fan. In our usage, it took quite a bit to get this machine's fans to ramp up.
Even after a few minutes of running Prime95 and Furmark simultaneously to fully stress the CPU and GPU, the laptop did not get loud by any stretch. You can definitely hear the fan spinning and working to remove hot air, but it is more of a polite whir. At full blast, we recorded around 46-48 decibels with our noise meter. We'll take it.
HotHardware Custom Video Loop
Battery Life Performance
We run a custom 1080p HD video loop test developed in-house, to prove out battery life with our test group of machines. In all tests, Windows 10 Quiet Hours has been enabled and the displays are calibrated with lux meters on pure white screens to as close to 115 lux as possible. For the average laptop this is somewhere between a 40-60 percent brightness setting. In the case of the Yoga 7i, this required lowering the brightness to 78 percent on the slider in the Windows 10 sidebar.
While gaming may not be a strong suit of the Yoga 7i, battery life is, as it is supposed to be for an Evo certified laptop. This machine ran for 7 hours and 39 minutes in our home-brewed battery life test, which is 12 minutes longer than Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1. That is solid uptime, and it means that you could conceivably get a full work day of use out of the Yoga 7i before needing to charge it up again. Though of course that will depend on how you are using it. Note, this test keeps the display lit 100% of the time and there is minimal idle time, so typical everyday computing could actually result in more or less uptime, depending on workload.
Lenovo Yoga 7i Review Wrap-Up
The 14-inch form factor is an opportunity to prove that big things can come in small sizes, and Lenovo achieves that in some areas with the Yoga 7i 2-in-1. Not all of it qualifies as new, of course. We are familiar with the flexibility afforded by Lenovo's Yoga lineup (like the Yoga C940), and if you are a fan of its flexible design, the Yoga 7i carries on the tradition, in a premium package that looks and feels like it cost more than what you paid for it.
The setup we tested is on sale right now for $749.99 at Best Buy, an attractive price for sure, especially considering it is running a Tiger Lake processor (and we've seen it on sale for as low as $649.99, an absolute steal). More often than not, laptops in this general price range feel cheaper or make too many compromises. The Yoga 7i, however, does not feel like an inexpensive machine, nor does it look like one. This system would fit right in with a professional setting, be it a board room (back before the pandemic, when we actually went somewhere for work) or anywhere else.
And let's talk Tiger Lake. The Core i5-1135G7 brings Intel's latest mobile architecture and Xe graphics to the fold, for a fair price. As we saw in benchmarks like PCMark 10 and throughout our hands-on use, it is a solid CPU capable of delivering respectable performance and a productive experience. The Yoga 7i never feels slow when using it to get work done, or just knocking around the web and Windows 10. So, even though it is clocked slower than the other Tiger Lake CPUs we have tested to date, this laptop is still a workhorse.
Graphics performance is a bit of a different story. The Core i5-1135G7 has a scaled-down version of Intel's Xe graphics, with 80 execution instead of 96 EUs as found in the Core i7-1165G7. This was the difference between playable and non-playable framerates in some instances, like Gears Tactics. Then again, the Yoga 7i is not really targeted at gamers.
Perhaps a bigger deciding point for the intended audience will boil down to the port selection. Lenovo is pushing USB-C / Thunderbolt 4 with this laptop, and it serves up two of those ports on the right side. But if you are mainly using USB-A peripherals, you will have to make do with a single USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port on the left side, and that's it. There's no microSD card slot here either. These limitations may matter to some, and not to others.
Overall, though, we feel the Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 is an excellent value for the money. From its premium build quality and multi-purpose design in a 2-in-1 form factor, to the strength of Tiger Lake and thoughtful touches like a privacy shutter, this laptop delivers more than what you might expect for the money. The Lenovo Yoga 7i is not perfect, but it's a great value and worth considering if you are looking to spend less than a grand on a new laptop powered by Intel's latest Tiger Lake and Evo platform technologies.
