Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition

By Bettina V. Roc, Associate Editor

THE Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition is part of the brand’s lineup of artificial intelligence (AI) PCs. It is primarily marketed as a commercial Copilot+ PC and is powered by Intel Core Ultra 7 processors.

Lenovo Philippines lent BusinessWorld a unit of the notebook for this review.

The review unit came with a 2.2 GHz Intel Core Ultra 7 256V processor on the Intel Evo Edition platform with integrated Intel Arc graphics, 16GB in installed RAM in a dual channel configuration (soldered), and a 1TB SSD. These are all upgradeable when purchasing, depending on your needs, but maxing out configurations can get expensive.

It features a 14-inch 2.8K OLED anti-glare, anti-reflection, and anti-smudge touch display with a 120Hz refresh rate, a ThinkPad TrackPoint backlit keyboard and a three-button TrackPad. It has a clamshell design with a 180-degree hinge, and the box also included a GaN 65-watt USB-C charger for the laptop’s 57Whr CRU battery.

The first thing I noticed about the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 was how light it was, even inside the sealed box. When the review unit was delivered, I had to do a double take and check if it was really sealed to make sure there was a laptop inside. The brand said this is the thinnest and lightest ThinkPad X1 Carbon ever, weighing just 980 grams for the TrackPad version with dimensions of 312.8 x 214.75 x 8.08-14.37 mm.

According to Lenovo, the laptop is made up of various sustainable materials, including recycled carbon fiber contained in its plastic frame and recycled magnesium and post-consumer recycled content plastic for other parts of the chassis and even its AC adaptor. But even with the plastic frame and lightweight body, build quality feels very premium and sturdy, although with its Eclipse Black color and soft-touch finish, it easily collects smudges and also attracts dust. It’s easy to lift the display even with just one hand because of the notch part that also houses its camera, and it has enough grip and heft so its bottom half does not leave the desk.

Also, even with its thin form factor, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 comes with a wide array of ports. For this particular unit, there are two Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports and one USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 (5Gbps) port on the left edge, while the right side has another USB-A port, an HDMI port, and an audio jack, along with a lock slot and the power button. Part of me wishes one of the two USB-C ports was also placed on the right side so users have the option to charge that way as well. Another small design issue is that having the small power button placed at the side could sometimes lead to accidental presses when lifting or even just adjusting the notebook’s placement (happened to me a few times).

The keyboard’s layout and the slightly curved keycaps allow for a smooth typing experience, and the TrackPoint is always useful if you’re familiar with how it works. The review unit also had a dedicated Copilot key beside the fingerprint sensor and came with the standard three-button TrackPad that is very responsive and is big enough to use comfortably (there’s also an option for a glass haptic TouchPad).

The 14-inch display’s color reproduction is great, and it has good contrast, brightness, and fairly crisp visuals. I can imagine that the touchscreen, combined with the 180-degree hinge, would be a great tool to have for small office meetings or presentations and collaborative work. The sound output when playing high-quality audio files was also decent for a notebook.

As for the performance, while I couldn’t really replicate my real-world work use case with the review unit for security reasons, I tried to test it with the usual heavy tasks I subject my office PC to, which are firing up browsers with a ton of open tabs for research, word processing, online and offline spreadsheet work, and moderate graphic design work (layout for newspaper publishing and batch photo editing). Because this is marketed as an AI PC, I also ran some AI tasks via Copilot+.

The notebook was able to handle most of these with no problem, even simultaneously, but there were times when you could hear the fan working overtime and you could feel some heat from behind the keyboard. Battery life is enough for normal office use at about 11 hours on a single 100% charge (which takes about two hours to get), depending on your workload.

Because this is an Aura Edition PC, it comes with several preloaded productivity, security, and utility features from Lenovo and Intel, which add to the user experience.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 is a premium business PC that can handle most day-to-day office tasks for moderate users, and the best part is it’s as portable as portable notebooks get at below a kilogram and its thin form factor, making it perfect for those who work on the go, and even personal users looking for a productivity laptop in a very compact package.

However, it also comes at a premium price (starts at about P130,000 locally), and while it can hold its own in terms of performance, those that have more demanding workloads, especially those who need more GPU power, may need to consider other options.