Lenovo Legion Pro 5i review: 1440p display, 240Hz refresh rate make this a gaming beast

The device has stunning 2K display with 240Hz refresh rate. (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

Display: Best in the business

I liked the display on the Legion Pro 5i for multiple reasons. For one, it’s a 2K (2560x1600p) panel, and it also has a whopping 240Hz refresh rate with Dolby Vision playback support. The 16-inch screen offers plenty of real estate for gaming and binge-watching content. To top it all off, the screen is colour-accurate with 100% sRGB coverage and is also DisplayHDR 400 certified.

Despite being an IPS panel, the screen has a good dynamic range, and I also liked the narrow bezels, which make this laptop look like a 15-inch machine despite packing a large 16-inch display. Even when it comes to gaming, the laptop can easily handle modern AAA titles at 1440p and deliver over 60fps at high graphics settings without any issues. Lastly, it also has low blue light technology to reduce eye strain.

The device includes an upgraded 1080p web camera. (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

Keyboard, trackpad, and webcam

The keyboard on the Legion Pro 5i is phenomenal, and it gets RGB treatment, and the same can also be said about the trackpad. The 1080p webcam is definitely class-leading, and I really liked the fact that it comes with a switch that physically disables the webcam for added security. Overall, this machine delivers on the core aspects of a laptop.

The device features a RTX 4070 laptop GPU. (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

Performance: Best-in-class gaming

This machine comes with the Intel Core i9-13900H CPU with the RTX 4070 laptop GPU with 8GB of video memory. The laptop also offers 1TB of storage and 32GB of DDR5 RAM. Overall, this combination of hardware makes the Legion Pro 5i one of the best gaming laptops under Rs 2,00,000.

The Intel Core i9-13900HX is one of the first laptop CPUs with 24 cores (8 P-cores + 16 E-cores) and a maximum clock speed of 5.6GHz. This ensures that the CPU delivers excellent single-thread and multi-thread performance, making it a great chip for both gaming and content creation. Here are some benchmarks numbers from the Legion Pro 5i.

Legion Pro 5i CPU benchmark numbers (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

I played Far Cry 6, where the laptop achieved over 90fps at 1440p resolution and high graphics settings. Similarly, in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, it delivered an average fps of 95 (with DLSS upscaling), and this machine can easily offer over 100 fps even on a demanding AAA title without any issues. The CPU benchmarks also prove that the laptop can handle professional workloads like video editing without any hassle.

Legion Pro 5i gaming performance. (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

I also liked the fact that the laptop operates quietly in non-gaming scenarios. However, while gaming, the fans do kick in to sustain peak performance. I liked that the keyboard area does not get heated up even with continuous gaming.

An excellent gaming laptop (Image credit: Vivek Umashankar/Indian Express)

Verdict: A well-designed gaming laptop

The Lenovo Legion Pro 5i is one of the best gaming laptops that I have tested this year. Despite having almost cutting-edge hardware, it doesn’t cost as much as some other machines with similar hardware. Overall, Lenovo has once again made a stellar game laptop without compromising on any of the basic parameters.