Hands on: Lenovo LOQ 15 review

Lenovo has always had a foot in the gaming laptop game, with machines that run the gamut from portability to power, the latter being represented by the Lenovo Legion Pro 7i and the former by the new Lenovo Legion Slim 7 coming soon. However, it seems that the PC manufacturer wants to now dip its toes into a brand new market – the budget gaming laptop market to be precise.

With the new Lenovo LOQ 15 line, it is gunning for both performance and affordability. From what I’ve seen so far, it features a solid suite of specs that’s sure to support high settings for any of the best PC games, while offering a budget price for gamers who are looking for something of great value. 

With these offerings, Lenovo is hoping to change some minds and target gamers who want the next-gen premium experience without the next-gen premium pricing.

There are two versions of this model, the Lenovo LOQ 15 and the Lenovo LOQ 15i, with the only difference between the two being which CPU they’ve been outfitted with, either AMD or Intel.

Lenovo LOQ 15: Price & availability

So far, no official pricing has been revealed for the LOQ 15 and 15i models, though we have been told that pricing will start at around $900, which would make these incredible deals for the specs they feature. Considering that AMD tends to be priced less than Intel, it wouldn’t be surprising if the LOQ 15 was cheaper than the 15i, as the former uses an AMD CPU.

And though availability has also not been revealed as of yet, Lenovo has a solid track record of making its products not only available in the US, UK, and Australia but in other regions as well. Once we find out the official price, release date, and availability, TechRadar will be sure to report on that. So stay tuned to our ongoing coverage, as well as any other Lenovo news or product reveals.

Lenovo LOQ 15: Design

Image 1 of 3

Both the Lenovo LOQ 15 and 15i only come in Storm Grey, which is a bit disappointing since it’s such a boring color to look at. It's also a shame because the chassis itself is not only of good build quality, but has a unique design element that gives it this great metal finish and a sort of cool, futuristic look.

The port selection is pretty good, though it lacks certain ports that the Legion Slim 7 and 7i have. It’s outfitted with one USB Type-C port, three USB Type-A ports, an audio jack, and an HDMI 2.1 port. I wish it had an ethernet port as well as an SD card reader, and replacing one of the Type-A (the 2.0 one in particular) with another Type-C would have been great.

The keyboard is solid with RGB lighting, has anti-ghosting, and even has a numlock pad, but it doesn't have the same tactile quality as the keyboards on the Slim 7 and 7i. The touchpad is big enough, and it feels smooth and easy to control. Sound quality should be solid for a laptop, as it’s outfitted with two 2W Harman speakers with Nahimic audio. And the webcam is 1080p and comes with a switch on the side that lets you adjust its shutter.

It’s a pretty heavy gaming laptop, weighing in at 5.73.lbs (about 2.6kg) but compared to some of the absolute behemoths that have been launching so far this year, it’s almost positively svelte. There’s also a Lenovo LOQ 16 version of the series, which boasts a slightly larger display and weighs a bit more, but I wasn’t able to personally test them out. Other than that, the specs are the same.

Lenovo LOQ 15: Performance

For a budget gaming machine, the specs are quite solid. It comes with up to Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060, up to 16GB dual-channel 5600Mhz DDR5 RAM, and up to 512GB or 1TB PCIe SSD NVMe TLC/QLC M.2 2242 (Gen4) storage. The LOQ 15i features a 13th Gen Intel Core i7-13700H CPU while the LOQ 15 has an AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS. 

Both CPUs are slightly weaker than the ones in the Slim 7/7i laptops but all still current-gen components that can handle productivity work like a champ. The same goes for the GPU, which can’t reach the ultra-premium RTX 4070s but is still an excellent card with great gaming performance.

Though I wasn’t able to try out any games or perform benchmark tests in my limited time with the machines, these specs alone promise some serious gaming, especially since the 4000 series-powered gaming laptops we’ve tested out so far have proven to be extremely powerful. I also noticed the excellent ventilation, which is absolutely necessary to run those behemoth graphic cards without having serious overheating issues.

The top display specs are an impressive 15-inch WQHD (2560 x 1440) IPS with a 165Hz refresh rate, 350 nit brightness, 3ms response time, and 100% sRGB. Both versions also support either Nvidia G-SYNC Support or AMD FreeSync. This laptop is perfect for creative work, giving it even more value for its reported lower price point.

Lenovo LOQ 15: Early verdict

The Lenovo LOQ 15, as I’ve seen so far, could be a contender for one of the best cheap gaming laptops for gamers. It features some great specs, both in hardware and display, while choosing options that keep its price point down. If its configurations can deliver on the $900 and up MSRP, then we’ll have our clear winners for this generation.

That's not to mention how much lighter this machine is than some of the offerings we’ve seen this generation yet. 

If the price is truly right — and it should be with the option to customize and lower pricing even more, as well as the choice between AMD and Intel CPUs — then we could be looking at the kind of mix between value and performance that’s long overdue in the gaming market.