Lenovo leans on luxurious leather with flagship Yoga 9 series refresh

Laptop makers are gearing up for the holiday season, and Lenovo is among the first to reveal what it has up its sleeve. That includes the new Yoga 9 series, made up of the Yoga 9i and Yoga Slim 9i, both of which offer some rather luxurious finishes. And though you might have to wait to get your hands on them, these new Yogas could make some of the best Ultrabooks of the year.

Lenovo Yoga 9i 14-inch and 15-inch

The standard Yoga 9i comes in both 14-inch and 15-inch versions and packs all of the latest hardware you’d expect. Lenovo promises up to Intel’s next-gen CPUs, which are presumably the 11th Gen Core series expected to debut this week. That also includes the Xe graphics architecture that Intel has been working on for some time.

Both of those additions should bring some quality upgrades in performance over Intel’s 10th Gen ice Lake chips.

The real stars of the show here, however, are the design upgrades Lenovo has thrown in. While you’ll be able to snag the Lenovo Yoga 9i with the standard all-metal exterior, Lenovo also has an option for a “Shadow Black Leather” covering on the lid. We’ve seen PC makers toy with new materials on their laptops for a couple of years now, and Lenovo’s implementation looks quite attractive.

For the leather, Lenovo says that it designed a 20-step bonding process to ensure the covering is integrated securely with the laptop while still retaining the ripples and natural texture you expect from leather. Lenovo claims it should stand up to some abuse as well, thanks to UV and tension testing.

The leather models also get the added benefit of a haptic, all-glass trackpad. Haptics are something we’ve seen Apple incorporate in its MacBook line for a few years now, eliminating the moving “click” mechanism for a simulated click. This helps to slim things down while still providing the feeling of clicking when you press.

Where the Yoga 9i packs all of its features into your standard laptop chassis, the Yoga Slim 9i shrinks things down to be as portable as possible. Built with a 14-inch screen, Lenovo still managed to squeeze a lot of power in here. You get a lot of the same features as the standard 9i models, but slimmed down into a tighter package.

The same leather cover is available here, as is the all-glass haptic trackpad. Lenovo also offers an optional 3D contour glass display that wraps around the edges for a “streamlined design.” Intel’s latest 11th Gen CPUs and Xe graphics architecture are on offer here as well.

All of this is in a design that’s only a little over half-an-inch thick and weighs 2.64 pounds. That’s combined with an estimated up to 20 hours of battery life, along with fast charging through three Thunderbolt 4.0 ports.