IFA 2024 | Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5x gets Snapdragon X Plus SoC and OLED display upgrade with €200 price hike over x86 counterparts

At IFA 2024, Lenovo is updating a number of its IdeaPad and Yoga laptops and convertibles with the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus 8-core SoCs, bringing the new ARM CPUs into both the mainstream and premium segments. One of the slightly more affordable options is the €899 Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5x. 

The new IdeaPad Slim 5x is about what you'd expect from a thin-and-light Lenovo laptop, featuring a fairly lightweight 1.48 kg, 16.9 mm thick all-metal chassis and a 14-inch, 16:10 form factor. The 1920×1200p OLED display is likely to give the IdeaPad Slim 5x a premium feel without having too much of an impact on battery life, thanks to the moderate resolution and reasonable 400-nit brightness. 

Lenovo claims that the OLED display covers 100% of the DCI-P3 colour space, which could make it a rather attractive prospect for creators and photo editors on-the-go, depending on how accurate the display turns out to be. Adding to its productivity potential is up to 32 GB of LPDDR5X memory and up to a 1 TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD. 

The aforementioned efficiency and battery life seem to be front-and-centre with these latest devices from Lenovo. Although the IdeaPad Slim 5x only has a moderate 57 Wh battery, it features one of the lowest-power Snapdragon SoCs, LPDDR5X RAM, and that OLED display tops out at 60 Hz. The IdeaPad Slim 5x seems to be playing a game of compromises in the name of battery life, so it will be interesting to see how that pans out in reviews. 

Meanwhile, unlike the similar IdeaPad 5x 2-in-1, the IdeaPad Slim 5x sacrifices a little more when it comes to its ports, with a single USB Type-C port for data and charging alongside an HDMI 2.1 port, a 3.5 mm audio jack, and two USB Type-A ports — likely of the USB 3.2 10 Gbps variety, although Lenovo has not specified. There's also a microSD card slot, which may be a bit disappointing to photo editors looking to take advantage of the display's wide colour gamut, since a full-size SD card slot is far more useful for professional work. 

The Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5x will go on sale in September with a starting price of €899, which makes it a whole €200 more than the Ryzen 7000-powered IdeaPad Slim 5 that also received a refresh at IFA 2024.