Lenovo Legion Pro 7 Gaming Laptop Review: Performance Trumps All

Lenovo’s Legion line of gaming laptops have historically been a solid option for mobile gamers, and this year’s latest iteration continues that tradition. The Lenovo Legion Pro 7 16IRX9H we'll be showing you here has everything discerning gamers crave, including screaming fast hardware in a sleek package with configuration RGB options. However, there’s a lot to like even if you’re not a gamer, because this powerful machine can also be a stealthy workhorse.

The Lenovo Legion Pro 7 16IRX9H made quick work of just about every benchmark we ran, in both gaming and productivity scenarios, but we're getting a little ahead of ourselves. Let’s take a closer look at the specificaitons and hardware Lenovo has managed to pack into this bad boy, and then we'll get to some numbers...

Lenovo Legion Pro 7 16IRX9H Specifications & Features

The Lenovo Legion Pro 7 we received came configured with a Core i9-14900HX, which is currently the top-of-the-line mobile CPU Intel offers with a 55W TDP. This CPU has 24 cores and supports 32 threads. The cores are comprised of 8 P-cores and 16 E-cores. The P-cores can hit a max frequency of 5.8GHz, while the E-cores can reach 4.1 GHz, and they're backed by a healthy 36MB of L3 cache.

Gaming and graphics are handled by an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 on our unit, however, anyone looking for a maxed-out system can opt for a model that has an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 infeatures 12GB of GDDR6 memory, can reach boost clocks up to 2,280MHz, and has a TGP of up to 175W.

Lenovo Legion Pro 7 16IRX9H: Features and Build Quality

The Lenovo Legion Pro 7 has an all anodized black colorway that permeates throughout the design, with only a small, silver tag on the left side of the lid displaying the Lenovo logo. There’s also a Legion logo on the right side of the lid that uses a reflective black to stand out from the matte finish.

In our opinion, the Lenovo Legion Pro 7 looks great, but it's also a very sturdy maching. Lenovo uses aluminum throughout the device and it just feels incredibly premium while carrying or using it. The downside to using aluminum with a dark color is that fingerprints will be readily visible anywhere you touch the system. If you’re the type of person who is bothered by this then be ready to carry a microfiber cloth with you.


Another side effect to using lots of aluminum is the weight. While this system is relatively slim considering the powerful hardware it houses, it’s also incredibly dense and weighs in at 5.78 lbs, which is not insignificant. While sub-6lbs is relatively svelt in light of previous-gen, high-end gaming laptops, If you need to carry this system around for extended periods of time you will most certainly start to feel it. However, we still think it's a great option if you seek a powerful mobile system, that's easy to transport from place to place.

The power brick also adds a bit of heft. It’s a substantial piece of gear, and it needs to be to deliver the 330W of power that the Core i9 and RTX 4080 require to run at full tilt.

Of cource, one of the upsides of using a rigid material throughout the machine's construction, is that it makes for a wonderful typing experience. There’s simply no flex on the keyboard deck while using it, and I tend to be a heavier typer. You really get to feel the generous key travel Lenovo offers with this design, making it a joy to type on. Even after long sessions (this entire review was produced on the machine), we found the keyboard experience to be top notch.


Gamers who want plenty of RGB action will also like the per-key RGB lighting Lenovo incorporated into this keyboard. It’s evenly lit and adds a nice pop of color to the monolithic black aesthetic. Of course, you’ll be able to control how bright the RGB gets, the type of RGB effects it can display, or turn it off if you’re taking care of some business. There’s also a nice light bar on the bottom edge of the computer that adds an attractive under glow.

The trackpad also works very well, though one point of contention for some might be its size, which is a bit small for a computer with this large of a form factor. The reason it isn’t as expansive as some others in this class is because the arrow keys are full sized, and just out a bit from the bottom of the keyboard area. That arrow keys limit both the size and placement of the trackpad. This feels like a move designed to make the notebook more attractive to productivity minded users, because gamers will use WASD for movement.

The display in the Lenogo Legion Pro 7 is particuarly nice. It’s a WXGA (2560x1600) IPS panel sporting a 240Hz refresh rate. It didn’t matter if we were running a game or consuming content, everything looked great overall. This display is bright and vibrant under a wide variety of conditions. While IPS panels can't match the contrast and punch of an OLED display, this high-refresh IPS panel didn't dissappoint. It also sports a 16:10 aspect ratio, which makes it a  bit more versatile and more suitable for productivity related tasks.


Ther are also a plethora of ports and IO options on the Lenovo Legion Pro 7. On the left-hand side is one USB 3.2 Gen 1 USB-A port, alongside a Thunderbolt 4 USB-C port. The back of the computer has two more USB 3.2 Gen 1 USB-A ports, an ethernet port, an HDMI 2.1 port, a USB-C port with 140W power deliver (PD) and DisplayPort 1.4, and the power connector. The right-hand side has one more USB-A port alongside a headphone and microphone combo 3.5mm jack. Basically, you can plug in just about anything into the Legion Pro 7, except and SD Card, though there are plenty of ports to plug in an external reader.

Lenovo Legion Pro 7 16IRX9H: The Software Experience

Lenovo includes software specific to this line of notebooks, designed to give users the ability to keep tabs on the system or make it easier to manage game libraries that may be scattered across various game launchers.


The first is Lenovo Vantage, which displays information regarding all of the hardware in the machine and its current status. This is a good tool for users because it makes it quick and easy to check system vitals and tweak the performance profile if necessary.


The other piece of software included is Legion Arena.This app is able to detect installed games and have them all accessible in one location, regardless of what store they were purchased in. Users can also launch their games from within Legion Arena. Whether or not a user finds this handy will come down to user preference, but for less computer savvy gamers, we could see Legion Arena removing some friction and making it easy to launch their favorite games.