The ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 (starts at $1,638.45; $1,885.95 as tested) represents a slight change in tactics for Lenovo. Formerly known as the ThinkPad X1 Yoga, the X1 2-in-1 laptop has a larger stylus that attaches magnetically instead of docking inside its chassis, and the fingerprint reader has moved from the power button to the keyboard. However, these differences don’t radically alter the X1 2-in-1’s position against its competition. It’s still a 14-inch, Intel-powered hybrid laptop that prioritizes practical features over attractive design, which, coupled with middling performance for nearly two grand, keeps it from a higher score. Instead, we point to the Lenovo ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 Gen 4 as a more fulfilling 2-in-1 laptop for work (and an Editors’ Choice award winner) or, if those hybrid features aren’t precious to you, the HP Dragonfly G4.The entry-level ThinkPad X1 sold directly by Lenovo starts at $1,638.45. That buys an Intel Core Ultra 5 125U processor, 16GB of memory, and a 512GB solid-state drive. Lenovo sent us a midrange variant of this 2-in-1 laptop with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155U CPU, Intel Arc integrated graphics, 16GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD for $1,885.95.
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(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Lenovo’s processor options top out at the Intel Core Ultra 7 165U, RAM runs up to 32GB, and storage gets as capacious as 2TB. All versions ship with integrated Intel Arc graphics. Most configurations have a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel, anti-glare touch screen, but a 2,880-by-1,800 OLED touch screen is available. 5G cellular connectivity comes as an optional upgrade.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
These prices are steep for the hardware included, but ThinkPads, like Dell Latitude and HP EliteBook devices, are meant for enterprise customers and include features not commonly on consumer devices. Not to mention: They’re often sold in bulk orders negotiated through exclusive commercial channels. The ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 ships with Windows 11 Pro and a three-year warranty. Some also support Intel’s vPro, a technology platform intended to make a device easier for an organization’s IT department to manage, but not this model.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Design: Function Over FormMost shoppers will have trouble distinguishing between the ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 and its predecessor, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 8. The most obvious change is the new model’s silver colorway, which is lighter and brighter than the previous gunmetal look. Size and weight have barely budged here: The X1 2-in-1 is identical in thickness and weighs just a couple ounces less. The X1 2-in-1 also retains its predecessor’s camera hump, which contains the webcam, IR camera, and microphone array.A couple of differences will stand out on close inspection. The new design has a better screen-to-body ratio, which has improved from 86% to nearly 88%. That translates to a slightly smaller chassis, as the new X1 2-in-1 is a couple of tenths of an inch smaller in width and depth.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The X1 2-in-1 is thin and light but doesn’t set records. It measures 0.61 inch in profile and weighs a hair less than three pounds. It’s lighter than the Dell Latitude 9450, which weighs 3.5 pounds, but also much heavier than the 2.22-pound HP Dragonfly G4. The Lenovo’s weight is easy to ignore when stowed in a bag, but it still feels unwieldy when using the 2-in-1 as a tablet.The camera hump makes room for a feature-packed webcam. It records in 1080p resolution and at up to 30 frames per second. It also supports both Windows Hello facial recognition (through an included IR camera) and Human Presence Detection, a feature that automatically dims the display or locks the laptop when you leave it unattended. The webcam’s image quality is adequate but doesn’t stand out from the crowd.Compared with its alternatives, the X1 2-in-1’s design is plain. The Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1’s seamless touchpad strikes a more modern look, while HP’s Dragonfly G4 stands out with its uncommon 3:2 display aspect ratio. The X1 2-in-1 isn’t as luxurious as these alternatives.Using the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9: Expect Trade-OffsThe ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9’s keyboard is its most alluring feature, with a spacious layout that feels immediately comfortable and keys that activate with respectable travel and a pleasant, tactile snap. Shoppers skeptical of Microsoft’s Copilot AI will be pleased to hear the X1 2-in-1 lacks a Copilot key, instead leaving that space to the keyboard’s fingerprint reader.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
While the keyboard is sublime, Lenovo’s touchpad is polarizing. The X1 2-in-1, like other ThinkPads, has a TrackPoint in the middle of the keyboard. It’s an alternative to the touchpad that allows mouse control without moving your hands from a typing position. The TrackPoint is supported by three physical, clicky mouse buttons occupying the touchpad’s top end. They take space away from the touchpad, which measures 4.5 inches wide and a measly two inches deep—the smallest touchpad in its class.Every X1 2-in-1 ships with a touch screen. It works well and has a matte finish, which is uncommon: Most touchscreens have a glossy finish. But, as mentioned earlier, the X1 2-in-1 is too heavy to hold and use as a tablet for more than a few minutes.Lenovo’s Slim Pen is a $60 upgrade and is included in some configurations. It’s slimmer and shorter than most, contains an integrated battery that charges via USB-C, and attaches magnetically to the side of the 2-in-1. It differs from the X1 Yoga Gen 8, which had an even smaller pen that tucked inside the 2-in-1’s chassis. The increase in size is appreciated, but it’s still much smaller than a Microsoft Surface Pen or Apple Pencil, and I don’t find it as comfortable to use as those.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Connectivity is a strength for this laptop. The X1 2-in-1 has two Thunderbolt 4 ports that support DisplayPort Alternate Mode (for connecting external displays) and Power Delivery (for charging). Lenovo also serves up a pair of USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports, HDMI 2.1, and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. For comparison, Dell’s Latitude 9450 2-in-1 relies entirely on USB-C ports, and HP’s Dragonfly G4 has just one USB-A. Wireless connectivity is decent on this laptop, too, with Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 joined by optional 5G mobile data (though our test laptop did not have that feature).
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Testing the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9: Mid-Pack PerformerThe Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 specifications are typical for a midrange 2-in-1. The Intel Core Ultra 7 155U, a 12-core processor with two performance cores, eight efficient cores, and two low-power efficient cores, is commonly found in many consumer and business laptops. The X1 2-in-1’s memory and storage options also match the competition.
We benchmarked the X1 2-in-1 against a variety of comparable laptops. These include the more mainstream Lenovo ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 and Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 (7445), the latter of which is a consumer 2-in-1 with similar specifications that we have tested but not yet published our review for at press time. Meanwhile, the Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1 and HP Dragonfly G4 are business-class 2-in-1 and clamshell laptops, respectively.Productivity and Content Creation TestsWe run the same general productivity benchmarks across both mobile and desktop systems. Our first test is UL’s PCMark 10, which simulates a variety of real-world productivity and office workflows to measure overall system performance and also includes a storage subtest for the primary drive.Our other three benchmarks focus on the CPU, using all available cores and threads, to rate a PC’s suitability for processor-intensive workloads. Maxon’s Cinebench R23 uses that company’s Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene, while Geekbench 5.4 Pro from Primate Labs simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning. Finally, we use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to convert a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p resolution (lower times are better).At last, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Systems, which uses the Creative Cloud version 22 of Adobe’s famous image editor to rate a PC’s performance for content creation and multimedia applications. It’s an automated extension that executes a variety of general and GPU-accelerated Photoshop tasks ranging from opening, rotating, resizing, and saving an image to applying masks, gradient fills, and filters.
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 was mediocre in our productivity and content creation benchmarks. It traded blows with competitive laptops but frequently fell to the middle or latter half of the pack.The AMD-powered Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 stood out from the comparison list. Powered by an AMD Ryzen 7 8840HS processor, it beat the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 in five out of six productivity tests. The Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1 also scored several wins against the Lenovo. Though similarly priced, the Latitude 9450 2-in-1 we reviewed had a more powerful Intel Core Ultra 7 165U processor. However, these numbers suggest a competent system for general office work.Graphics TestsWe test the graphics inside all laptops and desktops with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark, Night Raid (more modest, suitable for laptops with integrated graphics) and Time Spy (more demanding, suitable for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs).To further measure GPUs, we also run two tests from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses both low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like image rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Car Chase tests, rendered offscreen to accommodate different display resolutions, exercise graphics and compute shaders using the OpenGL programming interface and hardware tessellation respectively. The more frames per second (fps), the better.
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 again kept pace with the competition but reached mid-pack results in 3DMark Time Spy and Night Raid. The X1 2-in-1 was edged out by the Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1. Meanwhile, the Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 with AMD Radeon integrated graphics beat the X1 2-in-1 by large margins in all graphics tests. This laptop will get you by in displaying the necessary visuals for regular office work, like displaying 1080p video and handling basic image touch-ups, but much beyond that and it might start to buckle.Battery and Display TestsWe test each laptop and tablet’s battery life by playing a locally stored 720p video file (the open-source Blender movie Tears of Steel) with display brightness at 50% and audio volume at 100%. We make sure the battery is fully charged before the test, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.To gauge display performance, we also use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Windows software to measure a laptop screen’s color saturation—what percentage of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 color gamuts or palettes the display can show—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per square meter).
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 ships with a modest 57Wh battery. That’s the second-smallest of the laptops we compared it with, and the disadvantage was apparent in battery life tests. The X1 2-in-1 achieved just 11 hours and 59 minutes of endurance, the least in the competitive field.Lenovo’s ThinkPad display quality was mediocre, too. The X1 2-in-1 had a wider color gamut than the Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 and HP Dragonfly G4 but fell behind the ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 and Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1. The X1 2-in-1’s display wasn’t bright, either: While 340 nits are acceptable, it was defeated by the HP Dragonfly G4 and Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1, which achieved 428 and 547 nits, respectively.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
Verdict: A 2-in-1 Laptop for ThinkPad Fans OnlyThe Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 delivers the features ThinkPad fans expect. It has a first-class keyboard, prioritizes the TrackPoint over the touchpad, and serves up a variety of USB-C and USB-A connectivity.However, compared with the Dell Latitude 9450 or HP Dragonfly G4, the X1 2-in-1 looks plain. And while the X1 2-in-1 managed to defeat the HP, which had a 13th Gen Intel Core processor, in processor benchmarks, the Lenovo was otherwise mid-pack in our processor, graphics, and battery tests. It also fell behind in battery life, and the fact that it didn’t outstrip the ThinkBook’s weaker CPU in some tests is concerning, considering this ThinkPad’s higher-end position.The X1 2-in-1 will appeal most to ThinkPad fans with unwavering opinions on keyboard quality and those who prefer the TrackPoint over a touchpad. Meanwhile, shoppers more focused on performance-per-dollar will lean towards the Dell Latitude 9450 2-in-1, which presents a more luxurious design and better overall performance.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9
Cons
Mediocre performance overall
Display fails to stand out
Disappointing battery life
Dull, basic design
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The Bottom Line
Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 Gen 9 has excellent keys with the classic Trackpoint for purists, but its performance falls behind competitors, and its function-over-form design doesn’t live up to its price.
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About Matthew Smith
I’ve dedicated the past 17 years to reporting on the latest advancements in consumer technology. My work spans thousands of reviews on PC laptops, desktops, monitors, and other PC hardware. I’ve contributed to top publications including PCMag, IEEE Spectrum, The Verge, Ars Technica, Wired, Business Insider, PC World, and IGN. As an editor at Digital Trends, I led a team to test and review over 1,000 products annually.
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