Lenovo isn’t afraid to push the envelope. This is the same company that brought us convertible laptops, integrated E-ink displays into traditional clamshell laptops, and was one of the first to bring us foldable laptops. This time around, Lenovo is experimenting with modularity with the Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4 and the Magic Bay Light.

Originally making their debut in 2023, Lenovo's Magic Bay peripherals are finally becoming more widely available, starting with the Magic Bay Light. The ThinkBook 13x G4 is more than its attachments though. It’s a super light laptop with an Intel Core Ultra processor designed to handle more than its fair share of the work. The 13-inch notebook also comes with a gorgeous display, powerful audio, and serious endurance lasting nearly 15 hours on a charge.

It’s a lightweight workhorse that’s ideal for students or mobile professionals.

Pricing and availability

Lenovo sent over the base model of the ThinkBook 13x G4. It costs $1,580 and has a 1.2-GHz Intel Core Ultra 5 125H processor with 16GB of soldered LPDDR5X-8400MHz RAM, a 512GB M.2 2242 PCIe Gen4 TLC SSD, integrated Intel Arc Graphics, and a 13.5-inch, 2880 x 1920, IPS touch display.

There’s also a more powerful variant of the laptop that has an Intel Core Ultra 9 185H CPU with double the RAM and storage. This iteration costs $2,220.

Design and ports

You won't have to worry about back pain toting the ThinkBook 13x G4 around. At only 2.7 pounds, the 11.5 x 8.1 x 0.51-inch laptop fits in just about any backpack or large purse without adding too much weight. It’s a tad more than the 2.6-pound, Dell XPS 13 9345 (11.6 x 7.8 x 0.6 inches). However, the Lenovo is lighter than both the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (2024) (2.8 pounds, 12.3 x 8.7 x 0.59 inches) and Acer Swift 14 Go (2.91 pounds,12.3 x 8.6 x 0.59 inches).

The ThinkBook 13x G4 serves two-toned realness, and I’m here for it. The Luna Gray CNC aluminum lid is a standout in a sea of monotone chassis with just a slight color deviation. Like most of its laptops, the ThinkBook sports a small silver metal Lenovo tag on the side of the lid. But where the brand logo tends to be a little understated, the ThinkBook emblem features prominently along the lid’s right side, catching every beam of light.

The camera module metal housing sits at the top of the lid, protruding slightly, making it easy to open the laptop. But unlike the module on other Lenovo laptops, this one has a set of Pogo pins. And if you look closely, you’ll see the words “Lenovo Magic Bay.” This is where you’ll be sticking one of the modular accessories Lenovo created to give the laptop more functionality and versatility. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Magic Bay products. They started showing up back in 2023. But Lenovo made a stronger case for the nascent peripherals in 2024, showing off a variety of accessories including lights, cameras, fans, and even an aromatherapy diffuser.

Personally, I wanted Lenovo to send either the 4K camera or the diffuser. But they only sent me the light which, with its 150 nits of brightness, definitely helps to make you look your best in even the darkest environments. C’est la vie.

Back to the rest of the laptop. Upon opening the laptop, you’ll see a glossy display ensconced in relatively slim bezels. Directly below is the keyboard deck with the aforementioned input device sitting in a slight rectangular recess. Wrapped in a thin strip of shiny silver chrome is the touchpad, and another metal Lenovo tag on the right side of the deck.

The notebook’s undercarriage has six screws to secure the panel in place. Towards the front of the laptop sits a speaker grille on either side. Finally, there are three raised light gray rubber feet, two short feet in the front and a long one in the back.

The ThinkBook 13x G4 doesn’t have many ports. In total, the notebook has three Thunderbolt 4 ports and a headset jack. There’s also a power button doubling as a fingerprint reader and an e-shutter switch.

Display, webcam, and audio

It’s not OLED, but I don’t imagine most people will mind as the ThinkBook’s 13.5-inch, 2.8K display is that bright and vivid. The display’s 3:2 aspect ratio gives viewers more real estate than a typical 16:9 offering. The 120Hz refresh rate makes for smoother scrolling or light gaming, if that’s your thing.

When I measured with my colorimeter, I found the panel fell a little short on the sRGB gamut, reaching only 98%. It was worse on the other gamut tests with the ThinkBook only reproducing 75% on Adobe sRGB and DCI-P3 and 70% on NTSC. As far as brightness, the display doesn’t meet Lenovo’s 500-nit estimate at 436 nits. But that’s still pretty bright.

However, I can’t say my eyes weren’t drawn to the intense neon hues of actor Gabz’s competition outfit. Meanwhile, fellow actor Jessica Córes’ skin shone like burnished bronze. The details are so crisp I saw the fine plaits in her hair that began her glorious Bantu knots.

I really wish Lenovo included a pen for the touchscreen, as it’s a shame to smudge the shiny panel. But, you’ll be glad to know that the display is agile and very responsive. Just make sure you have a microfiber cloth cleaner handy when you’re done.

The 1080p webcam gave a stellar performance. It did a great job of capturing my exact skin tone, and while I really didn’t appreciate seeing that I’m overdue for a touch up on my dye job, I can’t deny the camera’s accuracy. My only complaint is that the detail is a bit muddy, as noticed on my couch and the fur on my plushies.

The camera is Windows Hello compliant, so you can log in via facial recognition. And when you’re done using it, you can disable the webcam via the e-shutter button located on the laptop’s right side.

But before we leave the camera portion of the review, let’s talk about the detachable Lenovo Magic Bay Light. Bundled with the ThinkBook, the peripheral is designed to light up its subject so they look their best whether taking a still or jumping on a video conference. I took it downstairs and used my blackout curtains to shut out as much light as possible.

Without a background light source, I look like a horror movie villain emerging from the shadows. And what’s usually a nice smile looks pretty creepy. Darkness or no, you can still see the slight striations on my dress. When I attached the light to the laptop, I’m totally illuminated, but I’m definitely blown out. The best results came when I used the light in natural lighting, with the light bringing out my reddish undertones. Once the peripheral is attached, you can control the light’s brightness with the Lenovo Smart Meetings app. It’s here that you can also change the background, apply beauty filters, and adjust tracking.

It seems my war against bottom-mounted speakers continues. If left unimpeded, the ThinkBook 13x G4's quad of Harman Kardon speakers produce loud, relatively clean audio at max volume. I learned this first hand while listening to “Beautiful Love (feat. BJ the Chicago Kid)” by Jill Scott. The otherworldly synthesized keyboard filled my medium-sized living room with enough room in the soundstage to let the tinkling keys of the piano shine through. The bass was more diffused than I like, but the two vocalists’ voices were an aural feast, especially with the Dolby Access software enabled.

This was when the notebook sat directly on my lap. But if I shifted my legs even slightly so that the ThinkBook slid between my thighs, the chonk took over and muffled the speaker grilles. It’s a shame, as the ThinkBook 13x G4 really sounds great under the right circumstances.

Keyboard and touchpad

The ThinkBook 13x G4’s keyboard is a step below the awesomeness that typically comes with ThinkPad laptops, but not by much. I did detect some mushiness in the keyboard, but my fingers never bottomed out. The large keycaps are a nice bonus, as is the generous spacing between the keys and the adjustable backlighting. And for those looking to have an AI chat, the Microsoft Copilot is right between the Alt and left arrow key.

I took the MonkeyType test and typed at 75 words per minute with 98% accuracy, which is higher than my usual 70 wpm on my home keyboard.

The touchpad is very reactive and has good palm rejection. Performing multitouch gestures such as pinch-zoom, two-finger scroll, and three-finger flick were effortless endeavors.

Performance

The Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4 has a 1.2-GHz Intel Core Ultra 5 125H processor CPU. It’s a middle child of a processor, which means that it’s not as powerful as its Core Ultra 7 or Ultra 9 counterparts. That’s not to say it can’t take care of business, you just have to temper your workload. So, instead of my 70-80 Google Chrome tabs, I cut it down to 58 with a mix of G-Suite apps, social media, videos and news sites. I also did some batch image resizing in Adobe Photoshop without an issue, and slapped together a three-minute video in Premiere Pro.

Against its competitors with more powerful chips, the ThinkBook 13x G4 tends to miss the mark, but it’s never too far behind. Honestly, I’d love to see how the Ultra Core 9 version of the ThinkBook 13x G4 would fare. But for now, let’s work with what we’ve got. Starting with PCMark 10, the ThinkBook 13x G4 managed to overtake the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (Intel Core Ultra 7 155H CPU) 6,565 to 6,555. However, the Acer Swift 14 Go (Intel Core Ultra 7 155H CPU) blew both systems out of the water.

Although the ThinkBook 13x G4 made a little ingress on PCMark, the same couldn’t be said for either the single or the multi-thread test during Geekbench 6. It was the same story on the Cinebench 2024 benchmarks (single and multi-thread). However, the ThinkBook squeaked past the Dell XPS 13 (9430) during the Crossmark test.

The integrated Intel Arc Graphics aren’t designed to run AAA games, but you can definitely play older or less-taxing titles. I was astonished that the ThinkBook ran the Black Myth: Wukong benchmark and got 31 frames per second. Granted, the settings were on low, but the fact that it played at all was impressive. The laptop also easily ran Hades II.

Running the 3DMark Time Spy and Time Spy Extreme benchmarks, the ThinkBook defeated the XPS 13, but couldn’t surpass the Zenbook 14.

But where the ThinkBook 13x G4 really shines is the battery life. The notebook’s 74Whr battery lasted 14 hours and 51 minutes on the PCMark 10 Modern Office battery life test with the display brightness turned down to 200 nits.

Should you buy the Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4?

You should buy the Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4 if:

• You want an ultralight, elegantly designed laptop
• You want a laptop with a bright, vibrant display
• You want a laptop with excellent battery life
• You want a laptop with a useful peripheral

You shouldn’t buy the Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4 if:

• You want a laptop with stronger performance
• You want a touchscreen laptop that comes with a pen

The Lenovo ThinkBook 13x G4 is innovative without being too gimmicky. Bundling Magic Bay peripherals like the light adds a level of functionality to the notebook that many can’t match. However, if you take away the peripherals, you still have an ultraportable that can handle most productivity tasks with nearly 15 hours of battery life. The speakers produce audio that’s loud and clear and the keyboard, while not ThinkPad-level, is still great. Plus, the touchscreen is a joy to look at.

With its Intel Core Ultra 5 processor, the ThinkBook 13x G4 isn’t the most powerful ultraportable on the block though. For that, you’ll want either the Asus Zenbook 14 (OLED) or the Dell XPS 13 (9430) or upgrade the ThinkBook to the Ultra 9 CPU model. Otherwise, the ThinkBook 13x G4 is a great choice for mobile professionals or students who want an ultraportable with extreme endurance.