Review: Lenovo LOQ 15

I'm always on the hunt for cheap gaming laptops that don’t suck, but let’s be real—many of them do. The Nvidia RTX 5060 graphics card at least guarantees you’ll get decent performance at 1080p resolution, as long as the system receives the full 115 watts of power, and that's exactly what Lenovo's LOQ 15 laptop delivers.

It’s not the prettiest laptop in the world, nor is it the most powerful. But for a gaming laptop under $1,000, it doesn’t get better than this.

It’s Not Flashy

Photograph: Luke Larsen

The Lenovo LOQ 15 looks generic, but I appreciate that it’s fairly mellow. Nothing overly striking or ambitious, without a hint of flashing RGB lighting. That gives a modern, if plain, aesthetic. Naturally, it’s awfully thick and heavy at 0.96 inches at its thickest point and weighing just over 5 pounds. You’ll pay an extra $1,000 for a thin and light gaming laptop with similar components, such as the Razer Blade 14. Like many laptops of this size, though, it feels well-built and sturdy.

Touch pads and keyboards are often compromised on cheaper machines, but not here. The 1.5-mm keyboard switches feel like they have a low actuation point, which is combined with rigid keycaps, giving it a very precise feel. It might take some getting used to, but I prefer this over the mushy keys found in lots of cheap gaming laptops. The layout is spacious, offering a 10-key number pad, media control, and full-size arrow keys. The only thing it's missing is a fingerprint reader or an IR camera. The LOQ 15 doesn't support Windows Hello, so you'll have to rely on a password. It has a surprisingly responsive, large touch pad, the surface of which feels nice and smooth to drag your finger across. The click is too loud, though.

The LOQ 15 has several ports, none of which are on the left side. On the right, you get a USB-A port (5 Gbps), a headphone jack, a USB-C port (10 Gbps), and a webcam shutter switch. Most of the ports are on the back, in between the large vents. That’s where you get the power jack, which looks similar to a USB-A, an Ethernet port, HDMI 2.1, and a USB-A (5 Gbps). These are convenient locations for these ports, especially if you don’t plan on moving your laptop around too much.

Photograph: Luke Larsen

The LOQ 15’s display is its most important and distinctive feature. Unlike so many gaming laptops under $1,000, Lenovo didn't cut corners. You're getting a quality IPS display with a 144-Hz refresh rate, a max of brightness of 347 nits, and the kicker: really solid color performance. It's every bit as good as the non-gaming laptops at this price, covering 100 percent of the sRGB color space and 78 percent of AdobeRGB. That translates to colors that look natural and accurate. Other competitors I've tested, like the Acer Nitro V 16 and MSI Cyborg A15, suffer in this regard.

My only complaint with the screen is that it's a 16:9 aspect ratio, 15.6-inch panel instead of a 16:10 16-inch size. That means it has an abnormally large bottom bezel and less screen real estate in the same size footprint on the table.

Unsurprisingly, the 5-megapixel webcam and speakers are both pretty basic. I recommend using an external camera and computer speakers.

Where It Counts

Photograph: Luke Larsen

The LOQ 15 has a few different configurations in the wild, including an Intel or AMD option for CPU, as well as RTX 5050 or 5060 for graphics. My unit came with the AMD Ryzen 7 250, RTX 5060, 16 GB of RAM, and 512 GB of storage. The memory is single-channel, meaning there's an open slot available to add more RAM. There's also a secondary storage slot to add an extra SSD, either in the standard 2280 or shorter 2230 size. Having all of this upgradable gives you lots of options in the future.

Surprisingly, the LOQ 15 with the RTX 5060 outperformed the Razer Blade 14 with the RTX 5070 in my tests. If performance is what you care about, save your money and buy the LOQ 15. These games were tested without Nvidia's DLSS or ray tracing on, showing the raw performance of the system. While I wished it could get over 60 frames per second in games like Marvel Rivals and Monster Hunter Wilds at Ultra settings, I walked away impressed by the performance. It can handle more or less any game at decent frame rates and image quality, as long as you're willing to tweak the settings a bit.

Because it's in the same price range, it's worth mentioning that this is a big step up from the RTX 5050 laptops out there. For example, this Lenovo LOQ 15 performs 40 percent better in the 3DMark Steel Nomad benchmark than the MSI Cyborg A15 with the RTX 5050 I tested it against. The LOQ 15 is also really good at managing heat, keeping the palm rests cool even during long gaming sessions.

Photograph: Luke Larsen

Battery life is decent. It only comes with a 60-watt-hour battery, unfortunately, but it lasted for a little under nine hours in my local video playback test. That's in line with other gaming laptops, but toward the back of the pack. That battery length is cut in half when using the laptop for heavier applications or multitasking, but you'll be able to spend a few hours away from the wall when needed.

I always say that you should lower your expectations when shopping for a gaming laptop under $1,000, but the Lenovo LOQ 15 surprised me. The quality of the display, combined with the solid performance, makes it the best gaming laptop you can buy under $1,000, and the option many people should consider first before spending more.