Laptops are complicated devices, and there are a lot of factors that contribute to whether one is great or not. It's not often you find a laptop that truly deserves a perfect review score, and for me that list is only one long: the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x (Gen 9), my favorite laptop that I'll happily recommend to anyone who's listening. For a limited time, it's also been cut down to its lowest price ever, and is just $999.99 at Best Buy. I might buy two just for the fun of it.
✅Perfect for: Those who need an amazing, all-around Windows laptop that can handle general productivity, media consumption, and creative work without breaking a sweat or dying before the day is over.
❌Avoid if: You're a heavy gamer or have specific legacy apps that don't work well yet with Windows on ARM devices.
💰Price check: $1,199.99 at Lenovo
👀Alternative deal: Dell XPS 13 (Snapdragon X Elite) for $1,299.99 $1,099.99 at Dell
🔍My review: Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x (Gen 9) review — Lenovo has made one of the best laptops I've ever used, thanks to Qualcomm | Windows Central
❓Why Best Buy? Best Buy is one of the most trusted retailers for electronic products, with excellent customer support, a standard 15-day return window, and a price match guarantee. My Best Buy members (with a free tier available) get added perks including free 2-day shipping, extended 60-day return windows, exclusive discounts and promotions, superior customer support and discounted repairs, and more.
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Out of over a dozen laptops, this one is my favorite
• Display: 14.5-inch OLED, 16:10 aspect ratio, 3K (2,944 x 1,840) resolution, 90Hz refresh rate, 1,000 nits peak brightness, 100% DCI-P3 color gamut, Dolby Vision HDR support, touch support
• CPU: Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite (XIE-78-100, 12 cores, up to 3.4GHz)
• GPU: Qualcomm Adreno
• NPU: Qualcomm Hexagon (45 TOPS)
• RAM: 16GB LPDDR5X @ 8,448MHz
• Storage: 512GB NVMe M.2 2242 PCIe Gen 4.0 SSD
• Battery: 70Whr, 65W Rapid Charge Express
• Dimensions: 325 x 225.15 x ~12.9mm (12.79 x 8.86 x ~0.51in)
• Weight: 2.82lbs (1.28kg)
I've used a lot of laptops. I've reviewed many of them for Windows Central. I have over a dozen laptops in my office right now. Out of all of them, the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x is my favorite, and it's the one I'm choosing to bring with me on a business-related trip to Los Angeles in the near future. There are a lot of great reasons for that, too, many of which I go over in my in-depth Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x (Gen 9) review. Don't worry, though, I'll give you the summary.
The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x is part of the latest generation of Windows on ARM laptops, meaning it's powered not by Intel or AMD but rather the powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon X series of chips. This means the Yoga Slim 7x gives up some legacy compatibility in exchange for unparalleled efficiency, delivering true all-day battery life without sacrificing a thin-and-light design.
The result? Lenovo designed a 14.5-inch laptop that's less than 13mm thick, weighs less than three pounds, and still boasts over 12 hours of actual usage on a single charge. It does everything that 99% of people use their laptops for without hesitation, and what it can't do natively it can often run through the new and improved Microsoft Prism emulation layer without losing much performance. Of course, there are some legacy programs and applications that still don't play nice with these WoA laptops, but those that need those apps know who they are.
When you're using one of the best Windows on ARM apps, this laptop is among the smoothest I've ever used. It's so effortless, and its hardware supports that experience to an extreme degree. The 14.5-inch display is OLED, with a 90Hz refresh rate, nearly 500nits of max brightness, and Dolby Vison HDR support. The keyboard is the same excellent quality we expect from Lenovo, and the touchpad is great, too (even if it's sadly not a haptic touchpad). Even wireless connectivity is top-notch, with Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 on board for future proofing.
Genuinely, the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x is the only laptop that has earned a perfect review score from me so far, although that of course doesn't mean the laptop is actually perfect. Despite supporting Dolby Atmos, the speakers are only okay, for example. The design is spectacularly beautiful, but it absolutely attracts a lot of fingerprints. This may be one of the best Copilot+ PCs, but Copilot+ PCs in general can't do a lot with their Neural Processing Units (NPUs) yet to make the "AI PC" tag exciting.
None of that is enough to stop this laptop from being one of my absolute favorites. It looks great, it runs awesome, it's thinner and lighter than you'd ever expect, it lasts forever, and the best Windows on ARM laptops (including this one) have come so far in such a short time that I honestly can't really recommend current Intel or AMD laptops to most people if a WoA device would be better for them. The Yoga Slim 7x is so good, that I really, really hope Lenovo drops a Yoga Slim 9x in the future with a haptic touchpad, more premium design and build quality, and cellular connectivity.
That laptop would undoubtedly be more expensive, though. At full price the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x is one hell of a deal, and when it's $200 off (its lowest price ever, by the way), it's unbeatable. For just $999.99 at Best Buy, you're getting an incredible laptop that I have no doubt would last you many years. I've already recommended this laptop to multiple people in my life, and they couldn't be happier with it.
Why should I buy from Best Buy?
Best Buy is one of our favorite retailers to recommend for any product because of the company's iron-clad reputation for trustworthy pricing, reliable customer support, and valuable perks for customers like standard 15-day return windows. Our in-depth My Best Buy membership FAQ also goes into why it's worth joining Best Buy's customer program, with tiers starting for free at Best Buy.
What is a Copilot+ PC?
A Copilot+ PC is supposed to be the next generation of Windows laptops powered by Microsoft's capable Copilot AI. That means access to exclusive AI features that older laptops simply aren't capable of, like Windows Studio Effects to improve your video calls, Live Captions for translations and accessibility, improved search features, AI image generation, and even future features like Windows Recall. These features are possible because of powerful NPUs dedicated to AI tasks, and means Copilot+ PCs are currently exclusively powered by Qualcomm chips. Intel and AMD will join the fun later.
Will a Windows on ARM laptop work for me?
The answer is probably yes. These new Windows on ARM laptops are highly capable, and the number of native ARM apps that work perfectly on these devices has massively grown over the years and continues to increase every day. Most of the apps and programs that these laptops can't run natively, they can emulate without losing much performance. However, there are absolutely still some things these laptops can't run yet, like specific VPNs, games, and legacy apps. It's worth doing some research on the specific apps you need before pulling the trigger.
