- Conclusion Get the lowdown
- Features How they compare
- Performance Real world benchmarks
- Differences Technical showdown
- Reviews Word on the street
- Competition Others to consider
- Discussion Answers and opinions
Compare with...
- Apple MacBook Pro with Retina Display
- Apple MacBook Pro 8th Gen
- Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon
- Apple MacBook Air 4th Gen
- ASUS Zenbook UX31E
- 13.3"
- Core i7 1.7 GHz Dual core
- 8 GB DDR3-1333
- 128 GB SSD
Announced January, 2012
Rated 80% by by TrustedReviews (Mar, 2013)Compared to the £850 Toshiba Satellite U920t, our Yoga offers a higher-resolution, better quality display, a far nicer keyboard and a lot more processing power, though it loses out when it comes to battery life and portability.
Rated 100% by by C.-Goldblatt (Feb, 2013)The sound is adequate, graphics are suitable for light gaming, SSD is quiet and quick, display is bright but not bright enough to overuse the battery and the battery is adequate (although if they were able to add in a bigger battery without changing the weight I probably would be a little happier).
Conclusion Which is better for you?
Features Key features of the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga compared to the Apple MacBook Air 5th Gen
GHz1.7
Intel Core i7 3517U
Rated 82% by by c|net (Nov, 2012)For any 13-inch laptop, battery life is key, and even more so for an ultrabook, which is specifically designed for use on the go.
1.8 GHz
Rated 100% by by Selden-Deemer (Aug, 2012)Screen resolution, contrast, and viewing angles are excellent, and photos seem especially vivid.
screen size
13.3"
13.3"
IdeaPad Yoga by The Verge (Nov, 2012)But still, It's neither the best nor the worst display I've seen on a device in this class, this size, or this price.
MacBook Air 5th Gen by Roger-A.-Adams (Apr, 2013)This is the best laptop I have ever owned, the small size of the laptop was a concern at first but after several months of use I have come to love the small 11.6 inch screen.
cpu speed
| 0 GHz | 1.8 GHz | 2 GHz |
IdeaPad Yoga by LaptopMag (Nov, 2012)Our $1,099 review unit of the IdeaPad Yoga features a 1.7-GHz Intel Core i5-3317U CPU, 8GB of RAM, a 128GB SSD and an Intel HD Graphics 4000 GPU.
MacBook Air 5th Gen by Farb-DannonOf course the Air (which I got factory upgraded to the 2.0 GHz i7 processor and 8GB of RAM) is lighter, slimmer, and sleeker than the Pro, and yes, it does have a much higher resolution display, but I was surprised just how much faster the MacBook Air is compared to the Pro is despite the Air's slower CPU clock speed.
processor
IdeaPad Yoga by TrustedReviews (Mar, 2013)The specific processor in question is the dual core Intel Core i7-3517U, which hums along at 1.9GHz by default but can turbo clock up to 3GHz.
MacBook Air 5th Gen by Abraham-BurnettKeep in mind that you're only getting dual-core processors in either MacBook Air... which can prove frustrating if you're really crunching some data through Excel or Access.
memory
| 0 GB | 8 GB | 8 GB |
IdeaPad Yoga by TrustedReviews (Mar, 2013)Oddly for a machine sporting such a nice chip by default, 4GB is the maximum amount of RAM on retail models - the Lenovo Yoga 13 doesn’t seem to be available from the company’s UK site right now, where specs tend to be configurable and the Yoga should take up to 8GB.
MacBook Air 5th Gen by Roger-A.-Adams (Apr, 2013)There is very little difference in the performance of the macbook air to the macbook pro, and if you install the extra 4gb of ram like I did this small laptop preforms almost every macbook pro.
Performance Real world tests of Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga vs Apple MacBook Air 5th Gen
battery life
8 hour
5 hour
IdeaPad Yoga by TrustedReviews (Mar, 2013)Under the hood, this Yoga can offer up to a Core i7 CPU, up to 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD, putting it at the top of the convertible game in terms of power – yet Lenovo still claims battery life of up to eight hours.
MacBook Air 5th Gen by Tanara (Jul, 2012)It is also lightweighted, but it lacks a core feature I was expecting from such an expensive piece of hardware - a good battery life.
Differences What are the advantages of each
Advantages compared to the Apple MacBook Air 5th Gen
| Has an accelerometer | Yes | vs | No |
|---|---|---|---|
| Somewhat common; Detects movement for interactive apps | |||
| Much faster internal storage | 0.1 ms (SSD) | vs | 10 ms (HDD) |
| 100x faster random access time; faster boot times and shorter application load times | |||
| Much more RAM | 8 GB | vs | 4 GB |
| Twice as much RAM; run more applications and have more browser tabs open without slowing down the system | |||
| Significantly longer battery life | 8 hour | vs | 5 hour |
| 60% longer battery life; surf the web longer without having to plug in | |||
Advantages compared to the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga
| Has a microphone jack | Yes | vs | No |
|---|---|---|---|
| Somewhat common; Can use an external microphone for superior audio quality | |||
Reviews Word on the street
Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga | Apple MacBook Air 5th Gen |
Competition What else you should consider
| | 2 | Apple MacBook Pro 8th Gen Quite good CPU benchmark score |
| | 8 | ASUS ZENBOOK UX31A 4-way tie: Is full HD |





