Each and every year, Lenovo is one of the top PC manufacturers in the world, not just by sales, but also in cool factor. It’s mostly because the company is willing to take certain risks and make crazy devices that no one else would really consider making (probably because they’re not that financially viable). The ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid is the latest of these crazy concepts to become a real product, and it’s arguably my favorite one yet. It’s a great Windows laptop, except the screen is actually an Android tablet, and you can switch between Windows and Android on the fly, or detach the two halves and use them independently.
Regardless of the quality of the product, I hope Lenovo makes more laptops like this. The sheer excitement of having something so off-beat compared to the rest of the laptop market is worth celebrating and carrying on. It helps that the Lenovo TinkBook Plus Gen 5 is a legitimately great device in almost every way. The build quality is fantastic, performance is as great as you could want, and the display looks great. But it’s the fact that these are actually two entirely separate devices that make this one of the coolest laptops I’ve ever used.
About this review: Lenovo sent us the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid for the purposes of this review. The company had no input in its content.
Crazy 2-in-1
Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid
A Windows laptop and Android tablet in one
$2040 $3518 Save $1478
The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid combines an Android tablet and a Windows laptop in a from factor that works surprisingly well, allowing you to use these devices in tandem or separately. The concept is very well executed, with great build quality, a beautiful screen, and high-end performance. It’s not for everyone, though.
- Two high-end devices in one
- The integration between Windows and Android is surprisingly seamless
- Excellent build quality
- Very expensive for a laptop
- A 14-inch tablet can be unwieldy
- It’s a a bit heavy overall
Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid: Pricing and availability
The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid was announced at CES 2024, and it’s currently available directly from Lenovo. Due to its high price and unusual concept, it’s possible you won’t find it at a lot of other retailers.
Lenovo’s website puts the total price of the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid at $3,518, but thje company is almost always running some kind of promotion. Currently, the device is going for $2,040, which is a very good price for what’s on offer here.
Design
An extremely premium laptop
Being two devices in one laptop form factor has a lot of implications, but one you might overlook is the design. A normal laptop has the bulk of its thickness on the bottom half, and the lid is usually where the structural rigidity is a bit overlooked because you want the laptop to be as thin as possible. But now that Lenovo had to make sure this device can be used as a laptop and a tablet, the top portion needs to be that much more premium, and it is.
This is probably the most rigid laptop I’ve ever used
Both halves of this laptop feel incredibly well-built with their all-aluminum chassis, and they’re designed so that the laptop looks totally seamless when it’s closed, but both parts still feel really solid when separated. Put simply, this is probably the most rigid laptop I’ve ever used, and that can only be a good thing. It feels great.
It does come with a downside though, which is the weight. Since both halves of this computer are a full device on their own, with premium build quality to boot, that adds up in terms of weight. The Hybrid Station alone weighs around 2.14 pounds, and the Hybrid tab weighs 1.73 pounds, so we’re looking at a 14-inch laptop that weighs almost four pounds. That’s not light at all.
Detaching the Hybrid Tab from the Hybrid Station is both harder and easier than I would expect. It’s easier because, unlike Microsoft’s Surface Book concept, there’s nothing you need to do before removing the tablet. You can just pull the screen away form the base whenever you want. However, this requires a bit more force than I would expect, to the point where I though I was doing something wrong at first and I was worried about breaking it.
Limited ports, and a smart connection
Because the mere concept at play here requires the device to be fairly large and evenly designed, Lenovo also had top hold back a bit in terms of ports. On the Hybrid Station, all you get in terms of regular ports is two Thunderbolt 4 ports and a headphone jack. Meanwhile, the Hybrid tab has a single USB-C port, which isn’t accessible when the tablet and base are joined together.
Connecting the two halves is a Smart connector, is drives the display and cameras for the Windows PC in the base, as well as the keyboard, touchpad, and power delivery for the tablet. Indeed, the base will charge the tablet through the smart connector, so you can still charge this like a regular laptop.
One thing that’s worth noting is that the USB ports on the base can not be used by the tablet, so if you switch to Android mode, these ports are useless. You’re limited to the keyboard and touchpad in the Hybrid Station itself.
Keyboard and touchpad
Lenovo rarely misses
If you’ve used a Lenovo laptop before, you already know that the company makes some of the best laptop keyboards in the business, and it’s no different here. As per usual, the keyboard on the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid is very comfortable to type on, with everything spaced out just right and in the right positions (unlike some ThinkPad models)
The keyboard on the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid is very comfortable to type on
Of course, you can use it on Windows and in Android, and importantly, since you can use the Hybrid Station as a standalone desktop computer, it works great there, too. It’s not as comfortable as a full desktop keyboard, maybe, but I still enjoyed it using in this context.
Similarly, the touchpad is also quite good and it feels premium. It’s very smooth to the touch and responsive. Just like the keyboard, it works in both Android and Windows, and in Android, it has the benefit of properly replacing some touch actions. I can scroll up with two fingers and it will open my app drawer, or scroll down to view my notifications. The big problem with using the touchpad on Android is that palm rejection doesn’t exist, so whenever you’re typing, you will move the mouse or click somewhere you don’t want to and mess up what you’re writing. I initially wanted to use Android for a full workday to measure battery life, but I had to give up on that idea as a result.
Display
It’s OLED, and that’s about it
The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid comes with a 14-inch display on the Hybrid Tab portion of the device. This is an OLED panel with a very sharp resolution of 2880×1800 in a 16:10 aspect ratio, and it looks fantastic for both Windows and Android. Whether you’re using Windows for work or watching your favorite show on Android, it’s a fantastic screen.
Aside from being an OLED panel, it’s not overly impressive. The refresh rate is 60Hz, so it’s not going above and beyond to do anything too crazy, but just being an OLED panel already has huge benefits, like vivid colors and true blacks. Lenovo claims the display covers 100% of DCI-P3, and based on my testing, that’s accurate. My measurements show 100% coverage of sRGB and DCI-P3, 96% of Adobe RGB, and 92% of NTSC.
Meanwhile, brightness for a lot of OLED panels in laptops maxes out at around 400 nits in SDR mode, and that’s also the case here.
Image credit: XDA
All in all, it’s a great display. I’m not too bothered by the 60Hz refresh rate, but it would have been nice to see at least 90Hz.
It has six speakers in total
Between the Hybrid Station and the Hybrid Tab, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid has a total of six speakers. The base portion has two 2W speakers, while the tablet has four 1W speakers, all supporting Dolby Atmos surround sound.
When using the laptop in Windows mode, all six speakers are used by Windows, but in tablet mode, only the four speakers on the Hybrid Tab are used by Android. The two speakers on the Hybrid Station remain allocated to Windows, so you can have some audio playing in the background while you use Android, if you want, though this doesn’t work in reverse. I kind of wish it did, because it makes more sense for me to have YouTbe playing in the background on Android, where it likely uses less power. But I understand this would probably be hard to implement. When Windows goes to sleep, Android also takes over the Hybrid Tab’s speakers, so you can get notifications coming in.
As for the quality of the speakers themselves, it’s pretty good. With all six speakers combined, you have a very powerful sound system in laptop mode, and even the four speakers on the tablet are very good for media consumption. You’ll have a great time watching movies or listening to music on it. The two speakers on the base alone won’t blow you away, but they’re good enough.
Performance
Intel Meteor Lake is what you’d expect
The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hyubrid Station comes packing Intel’s Core Ultra 7 155H processor, which has 16 cores and 22 threads. At this point, this processor is a fairly known quantity, and performance is everything you’d expect it to be. Everything runs smoothly enough on this PC. With 32GB of RAM, multitasking is also not a problem, since there’s plenty of breathing room for running multiple apps and browser tabs at once. And, since the Hybrid Tab has its own RAM and CPU, these two devices don’t interfere with each other.
Here are some benchmarks I ran:
|
ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid (Core Ultra 7 155H) |
Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (Core Ultra 7 155H) |
Asus Vivobook S 15 (Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100) |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
Geekbench 6 (single/multi) |
2,367 / 12,430 |
2,355 / 12,202 |
2,430 / 14,447 |
|
Cinebench 2024 (single/multi) |
101 / 645 |
101 / 547 |
108 / 961 |
|
PCMark 10 (AC/Battery) |
6,573 / 5,452 |
6,555 / 5,750 |
— |
|
3DMark Steel Nomad (Light/Normal) |
3,029 / 727 |
— |
2,019 / 498 |
|
3DMark Wild Life (Normal/Extreme) |
21,590 / 6,362 |
21,855 / 6,306 |
16,772 / 6,417 |
As you can see, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid is about on par with other laptops with the same chip. To be fair, the Zenbook 14 OLED isn’t the fastest Meteor Lake laptop around, but it’s still a solid machine, and by extension, so is the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid. Of course, this chip still pales in comparison to the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite and intel’s Lunar Lake chips, but those came well after Lenovo announced that laptop, so there’s only so much complaining I can do.
The big problem with these Intel processors is battery life, though. I tested this out over a few days, and the best result I got was 6 hours and 12 minutes, while the worst was surprisingly close, at 5 hours and 58 minutes. Surprisingly, using Windows alone or using a mix of Android and Windows didn’t do much to change the battery life, maybe because I never left the Windows portion idle long enough for it to actually go to sleep.
Lenovo gives you the option to change how battery usage is managed between the Hybrid Tab and Hybrid Station, but it seems to me like the Hybrid Station will never drain the tablet portion completely. In my experience, the Android tablet will often have about 50% battery by the time the laptop dies, assuming both start at 100%.
The Hybrid Tab also performs well
Meanwhile, the Hybrid Tab comes with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, which is a high-end chip for Android devices, though it is two years old. This may seem like a big corner being cut, but I’d argue the performance improvements in these chips each year have lessened significantly in terms of real-life impact, and Android runs extremely smooth on this hardware. Having 12GB of RAM is also very good for an Android tablet, so I never had any performance issues here. If you’re interested in benchmarks, I did run a couple of tests, but I didn’t go very deep into it on the Android side:
|
Geekbench 6 (single/multi) |
1,856 / 4,720 |
|---|---|
|
3DMark Wild Life Extreme |
2,809 |
|
3DMark Steel Nomad Light |
867 |
Battery life is also great on this hardware. With such a large battery and power-efficient chip, the tablet has basically never died on me, but to be fair, I also don’t inensively use the tablet by itself. The laptop will take some power from the tablet portion during normal use, but it’s not enough to drain it completely during a work day.
Using Windows and Android
Lenovo put a lot of work into this
I’ve already talked about the duality of Windows and Android throughout the review, but there’s a bit more that’s worth diving into to fully understand this device. As I’ve already mentioned, the Hybrid Station (the base of the laptop) is a PC running Windows, and the screen is an Android tablet. At any point, you can press the smart button on the keyboard to switch between operating systems, and you never lose anything in this process, because they’re separate devices. You can keep all your apps running and everything just the way it is, and simply jump back and forth as you see fit. Both operating systems run natively at any given time. I ended up using the device in a way that separated work and play, so I would work on Windows, but have some online forums and chatting apps on Android, and I’d switch between the two as it made sense.
At any point, you can press the smart button on the keyboard to switch between operating systems
Lenovo even implemented a feature that lets you see your Android screen inside Windows by basically using a Remote Desktop-like connection (as you see in the image at the top of this review). You’re still using your physical Android device here, and at full performance, too. The only lag you’ll see is from the remote connection, but everything runs smoothly and natively.
Because these are separate devices, another problem to consider is storage and how sharing files work, because both the Hybrid Station and Hybrid Tab have their own storage. For that, Lenovo implemented a solution called Hybrid Folder. This solution sections out a chunk of storage from both devices, and it essentially creates a copy of the same folder in each section. When you move files into the Hybrid folder on Android or on Windows, they will automatically sync when the two devices are joined together. When you’re using them separated, the folder won’t immediately sync, but Lenovo has implemented solutions so that sync conflicts can be resolved manually if there are any changes made when the devices aren’t together.
On Android, Hybrid Folder is a simple folder within the Files app (or whatever file manager you use), while on Windows, this folder actually appears as an entirely separate disk (not a partition), and interestingly enough, it uses drive letter A, which you never see anymore.
Of course, when you separate both devices, you can continue using them separately, too. Hook up the Hybrid Station to a Thunderbolt dock, and it can power your desktop setup, without even needing an external mouse or keyboard. Meanwhile, the Hybrid Tab even comes with a stand you can use to prop it up by itself. There’s also an app that allows you to use the Hybrid Tab as a second screen for your Windows PC by connecting wirelessly. I couldn’t get this to work properly, however, but maybe it has to do with my specific setup.
Should you buy the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid?
For most people, the answer to that question may be no. If all you want is a laptop, you can find better for less money. But if you want a laptop and a tablet that’s actually good, then this is the perfect device for you. You get a premium Windows laptop and a great Android tablet for a price that’s actually very reasonable if you take advantage of Lenovo’s frequent sales.
Lenovo really made this device as good as it could be considering the sort of insane concept we have to work with here, and I love it. It’s not the best laptop for work or travelling, but it’s such a versatile machine that I can’t help but love it.
You should buy the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid if:
- You want a single device for all your needs
- You need some Android apps and some Windows apps to run at full performance
- You love crazy laptop concepts only Lenovo is brave enough to do
You shouldn’t buy the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 if:
- You don’t need or want an Android tablet
- You want something light and easy to carry
- You’re looking for a value option
Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid
$2040 $3518 Save $1478
The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid delivers on its promise as well as it could have. It’s a Windows laptop and Android tablet all in one device, and it has a lot of work done to make the two operating systems work well together. It’s not for everyone, but it achieves its goal exceptionally well.