Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid Review

The Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid is a Windows 11 laptop with a detachable display that turns into a standalone Android tablet. Is this Frankenstein’s monster of functionality just crazy ..

. or is it crazy like a fox? Does this make any sense at all? At a high level, yes, it feels like a good idea: The Windows 11 laptop and the Android tablet each have their own processor, graphics, RAM, storage, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, speakers, and battery, but each device also integrates with the other in interesting ways. For example, the front-facing webcam built into the Android tablet/display is compatible with Windows Hello in Windows 11.



And while you can toggle between Windows and Android on the fly while the PC is configured like a laptop, you can also run Android inside a window in Windows like it was an app, and copy files between the two environments. Sign up for our new free newsletter to get three time-saving tips each Friday — get free copies of Paul Thurrott's Windows 11 and Windows 10 Field Guides (normally $9.99) as a special welcome gift! This design brings some complexities, for sure.

But the bigger issue is the price: You could buy a Windows 11 laptop and Android tablet with similar specifications–or, better still, an iPad–for a lot less. So the question is, are the cross-platform integration features useful enough to matter? Let’s find out. While it’s not immediately obvious to any observer that the ThinkBook Plus has unique, hybrid capabilities with a lift-off display that transforms into an Android tablet, it is undeniably unique, with an industrial aluminum look and sharp, metallic edges.

It’s thick for a laptop, top and bottom, and it’s heavy and dense in a way that speaks to its quality. And also to the fact that it’s really two computers in one, each with its own battery. There are a few visual clues that something is amiss.

Aside from its curious thickness, the display lid has a large, smartphone-like dual-camera module that feels out of place on a PC, four sets of speaker grill holes on the left and right sides. And the hinge isn’t in the usual place, it’s about half an inch forward of the rear of the device. So when the lid is closed, you can see that it’s smaller than the laptop base.

In keeping with its mostly metal design–only the keyboard keys, bezel surround, and a few smaller parts aren’t made of aluminum–there’s a lot of gray here. Lenovo calls the color scheme Luna Grey, and the contrasts, when present, are subtle. The sides of the base and lid are a bright brushed aluminum, the keyboard keys are a slightly darker gray than the body, and, like other ThinkBooks, the outer display lid of the Plus use a familiar two-tone gray look with shiny ThinkBook and Lenovo logos.

God help me, I like it. There are unique little touches everywhere. There are two very large heat exhaust vents, one on either side of the keyboard base.

The Wi-Fi antennas, one on each side of the base, towards, the front, are visible and resemble similar cutouts on modern smartphones. On the display lid, you’ll find two metallic hardware volume buttons and a hardware switch for the front-facing webcam on the top, and those speaker grill holes on the sides. Finally, the power button is on the right side of the base.

It has an integrated fingerprint reader, which isn’t obvious, but it’s colored and styled like the Wi-Fi antenna cut-outs. Overall, I like the look quite a bit. It may be a bit too masculine or metallic for some, and it sure is heavy.

But it’s a handsome PC and it what I’d call an opinionated, purposeful design aesthetic. It looks like it’s ready to get real work done. The ThinkBook Plus features a 14-inch 2.

8K (2880 x 1800) OLED multitouch display with a 16:10 aspect ratio and Dolby Vision HDR capabilities. This is a brilliant display panel with 100 percent DCI-P3 color space coverage and TÜV Eyesafe low blue light certifications. The panel supports adaptive color, but I eventually disabled it because the color looked so off in certain lighting conditions, an issue I have on just about every PC that supports this feature.

It offers a pedestrian 60 Hz refresh rate and emits just 400 nits of brightness, so you’ll need to stay indoors. I don’t have an issue with either, but I know many expect more from a display these days. Overall, this is a great display for productivity work.

It’s not particularly reflective, thankfully, and the bezels are notably small on the left and right sides, giving it a modern look. It can’t lay flat, but it leans back quite far, and is always rock-steady. Plus, the display is detachable as well.

I discuss that functionality later in the review, but this neatly answers the cramped airplane seat issue, assuming you can do what you need to do in Android. More on that in a bit. The PC lurking inside the ThinkBook Plus keyboard base is quite capable, and Lenovo makes your buying decision easy.

There’s only a single configuration with a first-generation Intel Core Ultra 7 155H “Meteor Lake” processor and integrated Intel Arc graphics, 32 GB of 7467 MHz LPDDRX5 dual-channel RAM, and 1 TB of M.2-based PCIe Gen 4 SSD storage. It was notably more reliable than , which is interesting.

And the performance in day-to-day productivity work–Microsoft Edge, Microsoft Word, Typora, Notion, Affinity Photo, and so on–was spot-on. Given that success, I also used the ThinkBook to complete some more demanding tasks. This included updating my .

NETpad app for the shipping version of .NET 9 in Visual Studio, creating and editing a book project in Affinity Publisher, and even some light gaming. For the most part, this was all quite successful, and I think the PC’s additional RAM and fast storage factor into that.

(And some Meteor Lake microcode updates; I had no reliability issues to speak of.) I know, no one’s going to confuse the ThinkBook Plus for a gaming PC. On that note, I didn’t bother installing the latest title, assuming it would be a bad experience.

I did, however, play a bit of , and that ran and looked just fine, though achieving a steady 60 FPS required a low 1366 x 768 resolution and medium graphics quality all around. I have no issues with that. What I do have issues with is the unsettling heat and fan noise.

I can’t recall the last time a laptop got this warm. In normal usage–and with Windows set to its default Balanced power mode–the keyboard and wrist rest area routinely heat up noticeably, and more than I like. To be clear, this is when running apps, not games.

I often point out that laptops work best when used on a hard surface, as beds and other softer surfaces can block air intake and cause heat problems and fan noise. But with the ThinkBook, it doesn’t really matter: Even on a solid surface, it always gets warm in regular use. Not hot, and not uncomfortable per se.

But unusually warm compared to all the other laptops I’ve reviewed. And that means that the fans are running pretty much full-time as well. Fortunately, they’re pretty quiet, and there’s one on each side of the device, with an accompanying large air vent that helps them do their thing, as noted.

Those fans and vents are clearly necessary. Still, it’s weird using a laptop that warms up your hands as you type. Connectivity is as modern as the processor these components are tied to you: You get previous-generation Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.

3, which is perfectly fine, and I never had any connectivity issue. There’s no cellular data option, of course. The ThinkBook Plus expansion story is a bit mixed.

There are only two ports, but both are Thunderbolt 4/USB4 Type-C ports with the full 40 Gbps of data transfer, and there’s one on each side of the PC. Aside from that, there’s a headphone/microphone combo port, which is nicely located towards the front of the left side. And that’s it.

The laptop base of the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid provides two upward-firing 2-watt speakers under the keyboard. They’re tuned by Harman Kardon and sport Dolby Atmos immersive audio capabilities. But that’s not the full story here.

There are also four 1-watt speakers built into the left and right sides of display/tablet, and they’re accessible when the system is used as a PC. So when you play music or videos, you receive a more immersive experience. The sound quality is terrific–all the usual caveats about placing the device on a hard surface applies here, of course–and it gets plenty loud with no distortion at 100 percent volume.

I left Dolby Atmos configured to “Dynamic,” so it could auto-adapt to the content, and as with other Lenovo PCs, that control is in the standalone Dolby Access app and in Lenovo Vantage, for some reason. Modern movies, like and , that offer both HDR and Dolby Atmos/spatial audio, give the best AV experience, assuming you can look past the quality of the stories. I discuss the Android experience a bit later, but you lose the use of the laptop base speakers in this environment, even when you use the Lenovo ThinkBook like an Android tablet.

It works fine for what it is, and the sound stage is still nicely wide and immersive regardless. From a hybrid work perspective, the ThinkBook Plus provides a Full HD (1080p) front-facing webcam–it even supports Windows Hello facial recognition Windows Studio Effects in Windows–and what I assume is a fairly standard dual-array microphone setup, though the documentation there is on the light side. I can see the two pinholes on the front edge of the laptop base and on the top of the display/tablet that are clearly those microphones.

And when I covered the holes on the display/tablet during my audio quality test recordings, there’s no quality difference, so I can only assume that the PC side of this thing uses only the mics in the base. Unfortunately, the quality isn’t great, with a remote and robotic sound. Lenovo provides a few basic microphone noise-canceling controls in its Vantage app, as usual, but I wasn’t able to improve the sound quality.

The webcam is better: The video is crisp and clear, and a bundled Lenovo Smart Meeting app provides enhancements like tracking mode, video enhancer, soften skin, “face” (with numerous settings), enhanced clarity, and background switcher. Nothing special, really, but if you spent a lot of time in front of the camera and are obsessed with your appearance, its worth a peek. Smart Meeting works with the rear-facing cameras on the ThinkBook Plus display/tablet as well, though I’ve never understood the need or why tablets even come with cameras.

But they do, and Lenovo gives customers two lenses there, a 13 MP lens with autofocus and a 5 MP wide lens with a flash. These lenses get the same Smart Meeting capabilities as the front-facing camera, but you can also use two camera views (one front, one back) at the same time and then choose from a set of layouts (side-by-side, PIP, and so on). Again, not sure what the point is.

Aside from the weird warmth that transmits up through the laptop base, the full-sized, backlit keyboard Lenovo provides is terrific, with an ideal 1 mm of key travel and a familiar island-style design, scalloped keys, and a handful of PC-specific special keys. The critical keys (like Fn and Ctrl) are all in the right places, the arrow key-based Fn alternatives (Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn) all work properly, and because the power button is on the side of the PC, there’s room for a few special features in the function row. Key among them is the Smart key (Insert) found between F12 and Print Screen.

This key toggles between Windows and Android in about two seconds, letting you use the PC as a laptop in either environment. You can also press and hold the Smart key to access a superfluous Smart key panel with Lenovo Vantage and Lenovo Smart Meeting links and a button for customizing how it works. I mostly left that one alone, but I used Smart key to switch between Windows and Android quite a bit, and that works fine.

Beyond that, there’s a function key that launches the Lenovo support website for some reason, plus just as odd keys for Windows Settings, locking the PC, and the Calculator app. And that pointless Copilot key, of course: I used PowerToys Keyboard Manager to disable that. The touchpad is mechanical and medium-sized, and it’s wonderfully reliable and accurate: I never needed to disable three- and four-finger gestures, always a good sign.

Lenovo also ships a Tab Pen Plus with the ThinkBook Plus that has flat sides so it doesn’t roll off the table, magnets for lightly clinging to the PC, and a single barrel button for turning it on and pairing it. Apparently I didn’t bring it to Mexico, however. Sorry: This PC ships with some additional hardware that would be tedious to travel with, and I don’t use smartpens normally anyway.

Lenovo gives ThinkBook Plus users the full suite of security capabilities, with Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-In Security that supports both facial and fingerprint recognition, and presence sensing capabilities that complete the picture. Facial recognition was particularly accurate and, with presence sensing, more convenient, though the fingerprint sensor on the side-mounted power button was a little more awkward to use because of its placement and skinny shape. There’s a physical webcam shutter near the front-facing camera, but it’s on the top edge of the display/tablet and is an easily found physical switch that I like quite a bit.

There’s also the usual microphone toggle key in the function key row. One weirdism: Modern Windows laptops display a white light next to the webcam when it’s in use, and this light was on for much of the entire time I used the ThinkBook Plus. I can’t explain this, and I tried to troubleshoot it by checking in privacy settings (Settings > Privacy & security > Camera > Recent activity), but it always listed whatever app I’d used last or, more commonly, “Windows Hello.

” Perhaps this is related to the weird extra cameras built into the PC, I’m not sure. But I found myself doing something I’d never done before and just switching off the camera manually. (In publishing this review, I re-enabled the webcam and the light didn’t come on.

I don’t know.) Like its other big PC maker brethren, Lenovo is doing a great job with sustainability, and the ThinkBook Plus benefits from that. It’s made with 100 percent recycled hydro-aluminum used in the top cover, 90 percent post-consumer content (PCC) recycled plastic in the power adapter, 45 percent bio-based content in the rubber feet, and 90 percent recycled content and rapid-renewable bamboo and sugarcane content in the plastic-free packaging.

While the display/tablet is in no way user-serviceable as expected, the laptop base can be opened with 8 exposed Torx screws and a pry tool, providing you with access to its battery, SSD, and wireless module. Weighing in at nearly 3.9 pounds–2.

14 pounds in the laptop base and 1.73 pounds in the display/tablet–the ThinkBook Plus is quite heavy for a 14-inch laptop, in fact, it’s almost 25 percent heavier than the average. It’s also a lot thicker than most, at 0.

63 inches. As noted, the display/tablet is a bit smaller (0.26 x 12.

3 x 8.8 inches) than the base (0.37 x 12.

3 x 9.2 inches). But you can’t get its hybrid functionality for free, so this seems acceptable.

Efficiency was excellent–the ThinkBook Plus lost just 1-2 percent battery life overnight–but instant-on performance was acceptable, and not up to the standard set by PCs build on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X processors. Sometimes it would come right on when I opened the display lid, sometimes not, and I suspect it was that deeper sleep that enabled the better-than-expected lack of overnight battery drain. Battery life was less acceptable.

I averaged just 4.5 hours on a charge using the device normally as a Windows 11 laptop. It’s too bad you can’t use the display/tablet’s battery in Windows mode too, as was the case with Microsoft’s old Surface Book products (which had a battery in the base and behind the display well).

But the Android tablet could still help with battery life, assuming you can continue working in Android to some degree or are willing to take a break and do a bit of reading, video watching, game playing, or whatever else on that side. I would find that difficult, but I do appreciate the option. The ThinkBook Plus ships with a beefy 100-watt USB-C power adapter that’s notably heavy as well, but not as big as the power adapters I’m familiar with from 16-inch laptops.

It charged the laptop base’s 75 watt-hour battery to almost full capacity in about an hour. (The 38.7 watt-hour battery in the display/tablet can be charged to 80 percent in about an hour, and that works with a 65-watt or larger adapter.

) I didn’t really measure the battery life of the Android tablet in standalone mode. As noted below, I ended up having little use for it, as the 16:10 aspect ratio and size of the display made it awkward to use as a tablet. Speaking of which.

The big innovation here is that the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 is a hybrid computer, really three computers in one. You can use it like a traditional Windows laptop, as I did most of the time. You can use it like a big Android tablet, which I tried but found awkward for all the expected reasons.

Or, you can use it like an Android laptop, which is ...

interesting. In this mode, the ThinkBook is a bit like a Chromebook, but with more of an emphasis on Android apps. The display/tablet is a freestanding Android device with its own battery and other internal components, and despite the interesting cross-platform integrations noted below, some of these components are usable by both OSes–Windows in the laptop base and Android in the display/tablet–and some are not.

Aside from the inability to use the display/tablet’s battery in Windows laptop mode, all this mostly works as expected. Switching between modes is straightforward. There’s a Smart key in the function row for toggling between Windows and Android laptop modes.

And to use it as a tablet, you orient the display so that it’s straight up and down on the base at a 90-degree angle, and then you just pull it up off the base. This works fine, and I quickly learned to get over my fears and appreciate that there’s no electromechanical release that can easily fail, as was the case with Surface Book: This is just mechanical. The Android half of this hybrid equation is a lot like the Windows half, pretty powerful but not quite the very latest technologies.

It’s powered by a 2022-era Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor with Qualcomm Adreno graphics, 12 GB of LPDDR5X RAM, and 256 GB of UFX 3.1 solid-state storage. There’s a single USB-C port with Power Delivery 3.

0 capabilities for those untethered tablet moments, and you can rapid charge the 38.7 watt-hour battery to 80 percent capacity in one hour. Connectivity is identical to that of the Windows side, with Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.

3, and, as noted, there are four 1-watt speakers, two cameras (with two lenses on the rear). Lenovo uses a so-called Smart connector to provide a physical pass-through of hardware capabilities between the base and the display/tablet, and there are two tabs to help guide you when it’s time to reconnect them. This process is slightly less seamless than removing it, but it does work fine, and it’s obvious when you’ve connected them correctly.

The display/tablet locks when it is at anything other than 90 degrees (plus or minus 5 degrees, Lenovo says, but it’s pretty much just 90 degrees), but it’s rock steady regardless of the angle. When it’s disconnected, the Android tablet has a single “high speed” (read: 5 Mbps) USB-C port that supports Power Delivery, meaning you can charge it using the bundled power adapter or any 50-watt or better adapter. It charges automatically when connected to the base, too, of course.

I didn’t bring this with me to Mexico City, but Lenovo also ships a heavy, triangular, and metal easel with the ThinkBook Plus that feels a bit unnecessary but speaks to the versatility of this unique form factor. You can detach the display/tablet from the laptop base and use them together regardless, with the easel acting as a prop for the display part. Of course, separating the two halves of the PC puts the display/tablet into Android mode, but I was surprised that there was no way to switch back to Windows like this.

Instead, you can attach the laptop base to an external display and then use the Android tablet completely separately. (Lenovo recommends using it for note-taking with the pen or web browsing.) Ah well.

All this hybrid configuration wizardry is fun, but the ThinkBook Plus is going to sink or swim on the software. And that’s pretty impressive. You get Windows 11 Pro in the laptop base and Android 13 with Lenovo ZUI 15.

1 in the display/tablet, though it seems mostly stock to me. Both OSes are technically running all the time, and when the system is in a standard laptop configuration, you can switch instantly between the two environments by tapping that Smart key (Insert, if it weren’t for the function toggle) on the top right of the keyboard. Well, instant if it weren’t for the two-second pause and the need to occasionally authenticate yourself in either direction.

Whatever, that works well. When you detach the display/tablet, it’s running Android and there’s no other option. But the laptop base isn’t useless, assuming you have an external display: Just attach it via USB-C and you’re off to the races, with two separate but full-features computers.

You can also use Windows and Android simultaneously, assuming you don’t mind using the latter in a window. Using the bundled Hybrid Stream app, you can use the underlying Android system as if it were an app, and this works fine, too. There are navigation buttons in the window frame, but touch works fine, and you get a sort of best of both worlds situation.

That said, an even more elegant solution in which you could launch Android apps in their own windows inside of Windows would be even more useful. Maybe for v2. Lenovo also provides a handy file sync capability between the two environments.

Once you’ve paired the two devices–sometimes, it’s difficult to remember they are separate–a Hybrid Folder (A:) drive appears in File Explorer in Windows and in Files in Android. And anything you put in the folder is available in both environments. You can also browse the entire Android file system from File Explorer (though not do the reverse from Android).

And there are little niceties all over the place. For example, when you tap the Windows key on the keyboard while in Android, the app shelf expands so you can select an app or search. The Print Screen button works in both environments.

So does copy and paste. In the end, I used Windows and Android mostly separately, and usually in laptop mode, preferring to toggle between the two environments with the Smart key. But the versatility here is fun and useful, and I suspect others might settle into different configuration favorites.

The Android software load-out is mostly stock, with Lenovo adding its Freestyle and Vantage apps, a standalone Hybrid Folder “app” (that just launches Files), and a note-taking app called Neebo that supports the pen. But the Windows side is pretty clean, too, once you get by McAfee LiveSafe: Lenovo bundles seven in-house apps, an Intel graphics utility, and Dolby Access. As noted, there is only a single ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 configuration that provides an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor, 32 GB of RAM, and 1 TB of SSD storage on the PC side, plus a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor, 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB of UFX 3.

1 solid-state storage on the Android side. It costs about $3500, which is quite expensive. But Lenovo PCs are often on sale, and if you could get it closer to $2000, it might be interesting: A decent premium laptop is typically $1200 to $1500, while a 14-inch Samsung Tab S10 Ultra starts at about $1000.

Aside from the price, there’s a lot to like here. The Meteor Lake-based laptop side of the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 was a lot more reliable than expected, and the performance was good, and the cross-platform integration capabilities with the Android side are compelling. A 14-inch standalone Android tablet with a 16:10 is a bit heavy and awkward, but using Android in laptop mode was interesting, and you can always access that environment in window under Windows when needed.

There are a lot of moving pieces here, but I was surprised it wasn’t more complicated to use. If you can get it on sale and really would use its hybrid features, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 is highly recommended. It’s a unique take on the 2-in-1/convertible PC, and a step forward in hybrid PCs.

Paul Thurrott is an award-winning technology journalist and blogger with 30 years of industry experience and the author of 30 books. He is the owner of and the host of three tech podcasts: with Leo Laporte and Richard Campbell, , and with Brad Sams. He was formerly the senior technology analyst at Windows IT Pro and the creator of the SuperSite for Windows from 1999 to 2014 and the Major Domo of Thurrott.

com while at BWW Media Group from 2015 to 2023. You can reach Paul via , or . Join the crowd where the love of tech is real - become a Thurrott Premium Member today! Sign up for our new free newsletter to get three time-saving tips each Friday.