Review: Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x Copilot+ PC

Like HP before it, Lenovo targets the corner office—or at least the cubicle—with its interpretation of Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC concept. These computers are powered by Qualcomm chipsets based on ARM architecture, a breakaway from the traditional Intel-based laptops of old. They've been promising big battery gains, performance enhancements, and artificial intelligence tricks.

The Yoga Slim 7x hardware is as tame as they come, a no-nonsense aluminum shell decked out in ThinkPad so-blue-it’s-black paint and largely devoid of frills. A small tab above the screen serves as a place for the webcam to live and provides a way to more easily open the clamshell, and a speaker flanks the height of the keyboard on each side.

Photograph: Christopher Null

I mention these things because if I didn’t, I don’t know what else I’d say about the design of the laptop—14.5-inch screen, 2.8 pounds, 18 mm thick—which is otherwise about as Lenovo as a Lenovo can be. One point worth noting: The paint job tends to attract oily fingerprints with surprising ease, and I found myself constantly wiping down the chassis to clean it.

Under the hood, the Yoga Slim 7x offers entry-level specs, with a Snapdragon X Elite X1E78100 CPU backed up by 16 GB of RAM and a 512-GB solid-state drive. The touchscreen is the real standout here, providing a resolution of 2,944 x 1,840 pixels and pouring on the brightness. Short of the Microsoft Surface Pro, it’s the brightest Copilot+ PC I’ve tested to date and one of the brightest laptops I’ve seen overall.

Port selection is curious but probably good enough for most users: three USB-C ports, all supporting USB 4.0. You’ll need one for charging. On the right side of the laptop, you’ll also find a privacy shutter for the webcam. This is perhaps the least intuitive place for such a switch, but I suppose it’s better to have it here than not at all.

Photograph: Christopher Null

Performance is strictly middle-of-the-road, and the Yoga Slim 7x turned in average scores among the five Copilot+ PCs I’ve tested to date, on both general CPU-intensive applications and graphics-heavy tests, though I did achieve an oddly outlying high score on the Cinebench 2024 image-rendering benchmark I couldn’t readily explain. A curious result, but I won’t shrug at unexpectedly great performance, however fleeting it is.

At the risk of repeating myself yet again, remember that Snapdragon-based computers still have compatibility issues and won’t run every app; if you need the basics—web browser, Microsoft Office, Minesweeper—this won’t be a big deal, but power users are already running into roadblocks with some of their most essential pieces of software.

The laptop’s battery life, in keeping with other Copilot+ PC units, is exemplary. Its score of 15 hours and 36 minutes on a full-screen YouTube test was second only to the Surface Pro’s 17 hours and 20 minutes, and just ahead of the 15 hours I achieved on the HP EliteBook Ultra G1q. Audio quality is fine but short of stellar; in a larger room, it won’t be sufficient for movie night.

The hands-on experience with the laptop is solid. The 14.5-inch screen is an oddball size, but it gives the laptop a bit more roominess without feeling overly large. The keyboard has that classic Lenovo snap, with well-spaced keys and a light powder coating on the keycaps that gives them a pleasant feel on the fingertips. The touchpad is spacious without being garishly large, and I rarely hit it with a palm while typing.

Photograph: Christopher Null

There is one downside to the Slim 7x, and it’s kind of a big one: The fan runs even under moderate loads, and it’s loud—by far the loudest Copilot+ PC I’ve tested to date. The new Snapdragon chipset is supposed to veritably sip power, which is why it enables such impressive battery life, so a bruisingly loud fan is a surprise here. It’s an unfortunate eyesore (earsore?) in what is otherwise an impressive package.

Making up for that and any other defects is the price. At $1,200, the Yoga Slim 7x is the cheapest of the Copilot+ PCs I’ve tested to date, and dollar for dollar it’s got the best price-to-performance ratio of any of the lot, regardless of what metric you’re looking at (raw performance or battery life). If you’re seeking a flashy, head-turning experience, best-in-class power, or room-filling multimedia system, this probably isn't your best choice. But if you want an all-around solid utility player at a reasonable price (and you’re sold on Snapdragon), you can’t go wrong.