Pros and cons of living with the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Rollable OLED screen

We recently finished reviewing the 14-inch Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen6 with a rollable 16.7-inch OLED screen. While it's far from being Lenovo's first unconventional laptop, it's arguably one of the company's most useful and practical concepts thus far. Some of the major pros and cons of the screen are as follows after spending several weeks with the device ourselves.

Pro: Literally a 16.7-inch OLED screen in a 14-inch laptop form factor

The ThinkBook Plus Gen6 is the only laptop out there with a screen size that's larger than the diagonal of the chassis due to the rollable display. Your 14-inch screen turns into a 16.7-inch screen with just a single push of a button.

Con: A little on the heavy side

The 14-inch chassis facilitates a large 16.7-inch screen in addition to motors which add weight to the overall system. Traditional clamshells like the MacBook Pro 14 can be a few hundred grams lighter in comparison for easier traveling.

Pro: It's perfect for tight spaces or flights

Because the screen extends upwards, a spacious desk isn't required to use the large screen unlike on the ThinkPad X1 Fold or Zenbook Duo. The tall 16.7-inch screen can be used almost anywhere you would a regular 14-inch laptop.

Con: Expect some attention in public

Passersby or seat neighbors will be eying your tall and expensive screen whether you like it or not. Hopefully you won't be working on sensitive materials too often in public as the wide OLED viewing angles may do you more harm than good.

Pro: Battery life is still pretty long

While runtimes are shorter than a traditional 14-inch clamshell, the very efficient Lunar Lake CPU makes up for some of that loss for a real-world WLAN runtime of over 10 hours in our tests.

Con: The screen is for Portrait mode only

If you like to watch a lot of movies or have two windows side by side, then you'll be disappointed to know that the 16.7-inch screen was not designed to be rotated. In fact, attempting to rotate the screen via Windows will result in an error.

Pro: There is no learning curve

Unlike the ThinkPad X1 Fold and its reliance on accessories or the awkward viewing angles and keyboard of the Zenbook Pro 14 Duo, the ThinkBook rollable is much easier to use from an ergonomic perspective.

Con: Hinge angle is limited

The lid can only be opened up to ~120 degrees whereas most clamshell designs can open 150 degrees or even the full 180 degrees. This can make the ThinkBook Plus Gen6 difficult to use on the lap, couch, or bed where you might not have access to a flat desk.

Pro: You get full DCI-P3 colors and a fast 120 Hz refresh rate

Because the screen is OLED, all the benefits of OLED are automatically available including wide P3 colors, perfect black levels, and no ghosting to be fit for amateur and some professional-level editing.

Con: It's not bright enough for comfortable viewing outdoors

At around 400 nits maximum, screen brightness is about average for the 14-inch category. The MacBook Pro 14 is more than 50 percent brighter for better glare control.

Con: You'll miss the 16.7-inch screen if you ever go back to regular 14-inch laptops

The tall 16.7-inch screen enhances the user experience in almost all scenarios. Once you get used to browsing, emailing, or opening spreadsheets on the tall screen, a regular 14-inch laptop can start feeling cramped.

There are, of course, more pros and cons to the model once you dive deeper into the system. See our full review of the ThinkBook Plus Gen6 rollable to learn more about Lenovo's skunkworks laptop.