The Lenovo Legion Slim 5 is a 16-inch gaming laptop powered by an AMD Ryzen 7 processor (7435HS or 7735HS) and NVIDIA RTX 4060 or RTX 4070 GPU — the exact configuration specification depends on the retailer and country (this model specifically is known as the 16ARP9 or 83EX). I bought this laptop on Amazon mostly for use as a gaming system connected to an external monitor, and I’ve been pretty pleased with the performance so far.

Note: The RTX 4070 Laptop is discontinued at this point. I recommend buying a laptop with an RTX 5070 Laptop GPU now. I have a list of the current best deals on RTX 5070 laptops here.

Lenovo Legion Slim 5 (16ARP9) specifications

• Processor: AMD Ryzen 7 7435HS or 7735HS (8 cores, 16 threads / 4MB L2, 16MB L3 cache / 3.1-3.2GHz base clock, 4.5-4.75GHz boost clock)
• GPU (video card): NVIDIA RTX 4060 (125W) or NVIDIA RTX 4070 (140W) mobile / 8GB vRAM
• Display: 16-inch WQXGA (2560×1400) 165Hz IPS, 350 nits / G-SYNC compatible, FreeSync Premium / matte anti-glare / Dolby Vision HDR / non-touchscreen
• RAM (memory): 16GB DDR5 4800Mhz (single channel, upgradeable to dual-channel, max 64GB) — retailers can configure up to 64GB
• SSD (storage): 512GB or 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD (second empty M.2 slot included) — retailers can configure up to 8TB
• Battery: 80wH lithium
• Connectivity (ports): 2x USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 10Gbps (only one rated 140W USB-PD + DisplayPort 1.4), 2x USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 10Gbps, HDMI 2.1, 1x Gigabit Ethernet, 1x SD card reader, 1x 3.5mm audio, 1x power connector
• Wireless: Wi-Fi 6E (2×2), Bluetooth 5.3
• Power supply: 230W external brick, proprietary connector
• Webcam: FHD (1080p)
• Weight: 5.07lbs (2.3kg)
• Dimensions: 14.16″ x 10.26″ x 0.86″ (359.7 x 260.5 x 21.9mm)
• Price: Retail around $1500 (this model is no longer on sale, but I recommend the newer Legion 5i; it’s similarly priced and specced better)

Lenovo Legion Slim 5 pros

• Value… when on discount: In particular, the RTX 4070 version of this laptop presents a strong value when it’s on sale. I wouldn’t pay list price (~$1500) for the Lenovo 16ARP9, but it’s frequently on sale for less if you can find one.
• Excellent performance: The AMD Ryzen 7 mobile platform paired with an RTX 4070, especially, delivers desktop-class performance in a relatively slim (for a gaming laptop!) form factor. I play Baldur’s Gate 3 fully maxed out on this system no problem, and most modern games can be played with relatively high settings. The GPU performs well within its designed thermal envelope.
• Good connectivity: The port selection on this laptop isn’t quite workstation-class, but it’s very much good enough, with two USB-C and two USB-A ports all rated at 10Gbps, with one USB-C port with 140W Power Delivery and DisplayPort 1.4 support. You also get a gigabit Ethernet port, Wi-Fi 6E, HDMI 2.1, SD card slot, and a headphone jack.
• Low bloatware: At least my German version of this laptop only shipped with one notable piece of crapware (McAfee)… not counting Windows 11 itself… which was easily removed. Lenovo’s add-on software for Legion stuff is unobtrusive and doesn’t even run at startup by default. Windows itself is the biggest piece of bloat you’ll deal with!
• Modern high-end GPU features: All the latest NVIDIA DLSS 4 and upscaling tech is supported on the 4070-series GPU (including frame generation), plus you get ray tracing, G-SYNC, and can drive up to a 240Hz 4K external display.

Lenovo Legion Slim 5 cons

• Loud: There’s no getting around stuffing a powerful processor and graphics card in a laptop — these things generate a lot of heat when they’re being fully utilized. The 16ARP9’s fans are noisy. No more so than most other gaming laptops, but you’ll want some good over-ear headphones while gaming.
• Poor battery life: It’s a gaming laptop, battery life on the 7435HS model in particular is going to be terrible. I wouldn’t count on more than 3 hours, maybe you could eke out 4-5 hours on the 7735HS version with its integrated graphics for basic web browsing. You could bring along a laptop power bank to juice it up on the USB-PD port for an extra hour of playtime, I guess.
• Mediocre display: It has a respectably high refresh rate, but this is a pretty uninspiring IPS panel. I have noticeable backlight bleed, colors are relatively drab, and the idea you’d actually get something out of enabling “HDR” on 350 nit maximum luminance is laughable. But I use this laptop with an external monitor.
• Offset trackpad: The trackpad is offset to the left. This drives me absolutely bonkers, but I use an external mouse and keyboard with this laptop 99% of the time, so I rarely have to touch it anyway.
• Windows 11: It’s still amazing (read: horrifying) to me how much Microsoft is trying to do with Windows 11. This is an operating system that, at best, you just find yourself trying to avoid using whenever humanly possible. At worst, it’s a festering pile of Bing, Copilot, and other “recommended content” trash that has to be actively disabled (when it’s even possible). Going back to my MacBook Air 15 to write this review, for example, is a night and day improvement in UX and UI.

Lenovo Legion Slim 5 (16ARP9) gaming performance and benchmark scores

Gaming performance on the Legion Slim 5 is pretty good!

• I can easily play Baldur’s Gate 3 on maxed settings and maintain 50-60FPS almost all the time without DLSS or other upscaling enabled on my Legion Slim 5.
• Red Dead Redemption 2 on very high settings with DLSS runs around 60FPS.
• Cyberpunk 2077 gave me the most trouble — performance with any kind of ray tracing enabled was terrible (30-40FPS). With all RT effects disabled and using DLSS (and all other settings maxed), 60-70 FPS was easy to get, though.

I also ran Geekbench 6 on the Lenovo Legion Slim 5. Performance was mostly on par for what you’d expect based on the CPU (Ryzen 7 7435HS) and GPU (NVIDIA RTX 4070 Laptop) combination in my machine.

Geekbench 6 CPU testing was a mixed bag (single-core: 1913, multi-core: 7959). The multi-core score is a bit lower than I’d expect. Most likely, Lenovo has configured this system conservatively, as my multicore score in Geekbench was over 10% lower than the largely-identical Ryzen 7735HS chip. Single-core scores were within low single-digit percentages of the 7735HS, so no issues there. Single-thread performance comparables for this chip include the Intel i7-11850H in the mobile space. On multithread performance, nothing Intel offers for laptops comes close unless you’re looking at workstations; this aging AMD chip still compares well to mid-range Intel desktop parts from 2-3 years ago.

Geekbench 6 GPU OpenCL testing (score: 112883) indicated the RTX 4070 Laptop (2023) has performance besting the RTX 2080 desktop GPU (2018), an RTX 3060 Ti desktop GPU (2020), or a previous-generation RTX 3070 Ti laptop GPU (2021). My scores were extremely close to the reference score for this model of laptop GPU, which is encouraging.

More than anything, I think what you see here is that NVIDIA’s laptop GPU offerings only get big step-ups in performance very two product cycles — so, every 4 years! The new RTX 5070 Ti Laptop GPU (2025) is over 50% more performant in Geekbench 6 than the RTX 4070 Laptop, which is a big step up — but good luck finding one right now. You’ll pay nearly double the price ($2000-2500, or more) for a relatively “cheap” machine if you do.

Lenovo Legion Slim 5 CPU and GPU model differences

The following key components vary between models of the Lenovo Slim 5 (16ARP9). Here’s how to choose between your options.

Processor: AMD Ryzen 7 7435HS vs 7735HS

The processor options (AMD 7435HS and 7735HS) differ in one key respect: Integrated video. The AMD 7735HS includes Radeon 680M integrated graphics, which theoretically means the laptop will have significantly better battery life during day-to-day (i.e., non-gaming) operation. The AMD 7435HS has no integrated graphics — and thus the system is always using the NVIDIA GPU for video acceleration.

The only other material difference between these AMD parts is the maximum clock speed. The 7735HS tops out at 4.75Hz in boost clock mode, while the 7435HS can hit 4.5GHz. In practice, these chips are nearly identical; it’s extremely unlikely you’d notice any material difference in gaming or processing workloads between the two. They have the same number of cores and threads, the same amount of cache, and the same max TDP (54W).

Takeaway: If you plan to use the 16ARP9 as an actual laptop for non-gaming activities like work or web browsing, the 7735HS is a significantly better processor because of its effect on battery life. If you plan to use the 16ARP9 almost exclusively for gaming (or will always leave it plugged in), there is no significant reason to prefer the 7735HS over the 7435HS. Additionally, many global regions don’t even offer the 7735HS processor option, so it’s frequently not a consideration.

GPU: NVIDIA RTX 4060 vs RTX 4070

The GPU options (RTX 4060 and RTX 4070) are quite similar on paper, though benchmark comparisons do reveal some performance delta between these two mobile NVIDIA video cards in practice. While both the 4060 and 4070 have 8GB of video RAM, the 4070 has around 50% more CUDA cores (4,608 in the RTX 4070 vs 3,072 in the RTX 4060), giving it a significant advantage in overall performance. Lenovo claims that it’s using a 140W configuration of the 4070, but the testing I’ve seen indicates that the card isn’t meaningfully capable of exceeding 125W of total draw, and that its typical power consumption is very similar to the RTX 4060.

Takeaway: If you can find or afford the RTX 4070 version of this laptop, I’d go for that option. You’re getting a substantially more capable graphics card, and the GPU in this laptop is not upgradeable down the line. You should always, therefore, purchase the most capable GPU in a laptop your budget allows, and the RTX 4070 is a significant enough upgrade over the RTX 4060 that paying a premium is worth it.