Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review – Gaming Laptop with RTX

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Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review

Credit: Reviewed

Verdict

The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro is without a doubt one of the best gaming laptops we’ve ever tested, demonstrating that the Legion series can stand up to its more well-known competitors. At a low price, the Lenovo Legion 5 Pro offers robust build quality and a simplistic design. It can play any game with an AMD Ryzen 7 5800H CPU and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 GPU.

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Pros

  • Outstanding gaming performance
  • Superb QHD display
  • Outstanding hardware controllers
  • Excellent value for money
  • A lot of power
  • The design is understated
  • Large 16-inch display with a refresh rate of 165Hz
  • High-quality build

Cons

  • Bulky, having a massive 300W charger
  • The keyboard is mushy
  • Ineffective speakers
  • It gets noticeably heated

Gaming laptops are numerous these days, but the product category has advanced significantly in the previous five years. The Legion 5 Pro is one of the most powerful gaming laptops Lenovo presently makes, thanks to considerable advancements in CPU and GPU technology.

You may choose from two AMD Ryzen CPUs, as well as many Nvidia GeForce RTX GPU tiers. You get a solid-yet-bulky chassis, a 16-inch QHD IPS LCD with a 165Hz refresh rate, and an almost-professional appearance regardless of whatever variation you choose. With its visual choices, the laptop as a whole does not scream “gamer.”

In this Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review, we will tell you that why this gaming laptop deserves to be in contention for one of the best gaming laptops out there. Also, you can see the best laptops for work and gaming

Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review

  1. Price and Availability of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro
  2. Specifications of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro
  3. Design
  4. Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Laptop Display
  5. Performance
  6. Software and Features
  7. Battery life of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro
  8. Microphone and Webcam


Price and Availability of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro

Price and Availability of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro

Credit: SeekDevice

The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro model we reviewed is the only configuration available at this time and is now on sale in the US for $1,599 and in UK £1,135 / AU$2,075, with the UK and Australia availability coming soon.

Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review

Credit: Lenovo


This is $200 less than the Asus Zephyrus G15 configuration we reviewed. While the Legion 5 Pro’s Ryzen 7 5800U is a step below the Ryzen 9 5900HS found in the Zephyrus G15, the specs are essentially the same otherwise. 

As we’ll get into in our performance section, the Legion 5 Pro is better valued against the Zephyrus G15, as configured in our review, so the Legion 5 Pro’s price tag is a major point in its favor. Its limited availability at the moment isn’t specific to this laptop though, since every laptop with RTX 30-series hardware is generally tough to come.

Specifications of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro


Screen Size16 Inches
Dimensions14.02 x 10.41 x 1.07 inches
Resolution2560×1600 pixels
Operating SystemWindows 10 Home
Human Interface InputMicrophone, Keyboard
CPU ManufacturerAMD
ColorBlack
CPU Speed4.40 GHz
RAM TypeDDR4 SDRAM
Hard Disk Size1 TB
Processor Count8
Chipset BrandNVIDIA

Design


Design of Lenovo Logion 5 Pro

Credit: NotebookCheck

The Legion 5 Pro reminds me of older gaming laptops, with its bulky design and hinge placement. At more than an inch thick, this is no svelte gaming machine. It’s also quite heavy at nearly 5.5 pounds. 

The Legion 5 Pro is stacked to the gills with ports, most of which are on the back. There, you’ll find an Ethernet jack, three USB-A ports, a USB-C power delivery port, and an HDMI port, plus Lenovo’s standard rectangular power input. The laptop’s left side the laptop houses another USB-C port and the headphone jack, while the right side is home to a fourth USB-A port and a camera kill switch toggle.

Design of Lenovo Logion 5 Pro-1

Credit: Lenovo

Vents take up a fair bit of the laptop’s body, with one on the bottom, one on either side and one on the back. Considering the hardware inside this thing, that’s no surprise. Even so, as with basically every gaming laptop, I recommend a cooling pad so that the fans don’t drown out your gameplay

For audio, the bottom-firing speakers are fine. To get the most out of your games, I recommend getting one of the best gaming headsets. The speakers themselves have weak treble and muddy bass, although they can get quite loud. But the Legion 5 Pro’s speakers are ultimately underwhelming, especially on a laptop that can easily exceed $2,000.


This laptop comes equipped with a backlit full keyboard and a number pad. Unfortunately, this makes it extremely uncomfortable to type on, since the main keyboard is off-center and the number pad is only marginally useful. Beyond the layout, the keyboard isn’t all that great. The key travel is fairly short, which is common on a lot of laptops, but the keys themselves also feel mushy. The Legion 5 Pro did not facilitate a pleasant typing experience.

The Legion 5 Pro’s touchpad is merely serviceable. Lenovo probably figured you’d hook up a mouse. The touchpad is on the small side. My fingers didn’t slide over it very well, either, and it’s a far cry from something like the touchpads on a MacBook Pro. I don’t think this one is too bad, but it’s not great, either.

Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Laptop Display


Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Laptop Display

Credit: Lenovo

The Legion 5 Pro, according to Lenovo, is the first gaming laptop with a 16-inch QHD 16:10 display. With narrow bezels surrounding it, it’s pretty attractive. The 16:9 aspect ratio is seen on most gaming laptops. The 16:10 display of the Legion 5 Pro is perfect for gaming while also providing a little additional vertical room for online surfing or document work. Because I believe that 16:9 is inherently restricting on laptops, I was pleased to see this machine’s aspect ratio.

In addition to the 2560 x 1600 resolution, the Legion 5 Pro’s display supports G-Sync and has a refresh rate of up to 165Hz. With a frame rate of up to 165 frames per second and minimum screen tearing, you’ll have a seamless gaming experience. Overall, playing games like Destiny 2 at high framerates was a fantastic experience.

I compared the display benchmark results of the Legion 5 Pro against those of the Razer Blade 15 Advanced and the Alienware m15 R4. With 472 nits of brightness, the Legion is the brightest of the three devices. That’s rather bright, yet in direct sunshine, it’s still restricted.

With a score of 0.3, the Delta-E color accuracy was likewise pretty good. The Legion 5 Pro offers a balanced color profile, covering 116 percent of the sRGB color gamut. This transfers nicely to games, which have a vivid appearance. If you edit your images and movies on this laptop, you’ll get more color-accurate results.

Aside from its strong hardware, the Legion 5 Pro’s main strength is its display. I liked how clear the visuals were, and each game I tried looked great. 

Performance


Performance Lenovo Logion 5 Pro

Credit: GizNext

The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro is about as good as an RTX 3070 gaming laptop can get when it comes to gaming performance. The Legion 5 Pro exceeds the Asus Zephyrus in terms of pure gaming performance, both in graphics benchmarks and actual gaming experience, even without any hardware performance enhancement courtesy of Lenovo Vantage.

The Legion 5 Pro routinely outperformed the Asus Zephyrus G15 in our 3DMark testing. The Legion 5 Pro won Night Raid with 44,061 points to the Zephyrus G15’s 43,645; Fire Strike with 22,031 points to 21,211; Time Spy with 9,583 points to 9,333; and Port Royal with 5,936 points to the Zephyrus G15’s 5,723.

The Asus Zephyrus G15 isn’t destroyed here, but in our Total War: Three Kingdoms and Metro: Exodus benchmarks, the Legion 5 Pro routinely scores five to ten more frames per second than the Zephyrus G15, regardless of graphical settings.

The CPU performance of the Legion 5 Pro falls short of that of the Zephyrus G15 we evaluated. That’s hardly surprising, given that the Zephyrus G15 has an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HS processor and the Legion 5 Pro has an AMD Ryzen 7 5800U. Even though the Legion 5 Pro falls short in these tests, it isn’t far behind the Zephyrus G15.

But, in the end, this is a gaming laptop, and the Legion 5 Pro is a better gaming machine on those grounds, even if the difference isn’t one you’ll notice unless you compare the two side by side. Furthermore, the Legion 5 Pro is less expensive than the Zephyrus, making it a better deal if you’re only interested in gaming performance.

Software and Features


Software and Features Lenovo Logion 5 Pro

Credit: Gadget Pilipinas

We’re delighted to report that there isn’t a lot of bloat on the Lenovo Legion 5 Pro, so there won’t be much to uninstall.

The Lenovo Vantage software is the one item you should not uninstall. Typically, these control centers are only minimally helpful, serving only as a means of controlling the laptop’s RGB lighting. The hardware controllers on the Legion 5 Pro, on the other hand, may make a significant impact on gaming performance.

In all of our laptop reviews, we keep these variables set to “balanced,” and the ratings above reflect these settings for consistency between systems. Turning these settings to “performance” in Lenovo Vantage, on the other hand, quickly adds thousands of points to the 3DMark Night Raid result, with similar gains across the board.


This also provides you a healthy fps increase while gaming, and when we say healthy, we mean highly apparent. Other “performance” settings on other systems just don’t attain the same level of smoothness. 

This comes at the cost of battery life, heat management, and noise level – full performance mode makes the Legion 5 Pro sound like a small, handheld vacuum – but if you’re playing at a desk, table, or another non-lap surface while plugged into a wall outlet, using anything else is almost criminal.

Battery life of Lenovo Legion 5 Pro

The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro falls short in this aspect when compared to the Asus Zephyrus G15. The Legion 5 Pro’s 80WHr battery performs admirably, but the Zephyrus G15’s 90WHr battery just cannot be beaten.

In our PCMark 10 battery life test, the Legion 5 Pro only lasts six hours and 29 minutes, compared to eight hours and 56 minutes for the Zephyrus G15. The Legion 5 Pro lasted six hours and 31 minutes in our HD movie test, whereas the Zephyrus G15 only lasted eight hours and 22 minutes.

However, the Legion 5 Pro is still a gaming laptop with high-performance technology, so claiming that it “only” lasted six and a half hours in our tests is a little misleading. While we can’t claim that the Legion 5 Pro has the best battery life, it’s still quite good.

Microphone and Webcam

The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro’s webcam is a rather basic 720p, although, unlike the Asus Zephyrus G15, it does include one. It also includes an electronic shutter operated by a physical switch on the side, which is superior to many other laptops. 

This is one area where Lenovo excels, and at this point, it would only be noteworthy if Lenovo’s cameras didn’t have a privacy shutter. There’s also a dual array microphone for audio, so you’ll sound amazing whether you’re on a video chat or broadcasting on Twitch, at least as well as you can expect without utilizing a professional mic setup.


Competitive Laptops

HP Victus 16.1 Gaming Laptop

HP Victus 16.1

Amazon.com

$979.99


Alienware m17 R4

Dell Alienware m17 R4

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$2,199.00


HP Pavilion 15 Laptop

HP Pavilion 15

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$699.00


Alienware Area 51M Gaming Laptop

Dell Alienware Area -51M

Amazon.com

$2,479.99


HP Omen 15 Gaming Laptop

HP Omen 15

Amazon.com

$1,199.99


ASUS ROG Zephyrus G15

Asus ROG Zephyrus G15

Amazon.com

$2,569.00


Acer Nitro 5 Gaming Laptop

Acer Nitro 5

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$773.00


Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review
  • Lenovo Legion 5 Pro Review
4.1

Summary

Anyone looking for a contemporary gaming laptop should still consider the Legion 5 Pro. The 16-inch QHD+ display with a 16:10 aspect ratio has a 165Hz refresh rate, NVIDIA G-Sync, 500+ nits brightness, Dolby Vision, and HDR, among other features. There are lots of ports, and the E-shutter on the camera provides a layer of secrecy. When it comes to battery life and DC performance, this isn’t the best Legion laptop Lenovo has ever launched, but it is one of the best Legion laptops Lenovo has ever issued. I’m looking forward to comparing the Intel and AMD versions.

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