I ordered the 13″ Lenovo LaVie Z for my wife back in 2015, the intended primary use being internet and media – this was not a gaming machine, at least not for any games that demanded high graphic specs. My Mrs’ primary requirement was that it had to be as lightweight as possible. Writing this post around 8 years later, the Lenovo LaVie Z still remains as one of the lightest full power laptops ever released, weighing in at just 1.87lbs. The low weight was a result of the chassis being constructed with a magnesium / lithium alloy which is much lighter than the aluminum that makes up most premium laptop chassis.

The Lenovo LaVie Z did not have a low-power Intel Atom or Core M CPU, or even a standard low-voltage Core i5 like most notebooks; it was a full power laptop with an Intel Core i7-5500U CPU with integrated Intel HD 5500 graphics, 8GB of DDR3 ram @ 1600MHz, and a 256GB SSD as default.

The screen was a very nice 13.3″ WQHD (2,560×1440) LED matte ‘anti-glare’ screen, which provided clear distinct colors from edge to edge. Above the screen was a 720p HD cam, which served its purpose adequately. The battery life was also pretty good, able to run about 8 hours of casual use, but ymmv depending what you were doing.

As far as ports go, the Lenovo LaVie Z was pretty well represented considering the size and extremely low weight; on the right hand side was a combo headphone/mic jack, SD card reader, 2 x USB 3.0 ports, and an HDMI port. On the left was a Kensington lock, a proprietary power jack, and the power button.

The LaVie Z did not have an RJ45 ethernet port (it was too thin for one), but only used 802.11ac wireless for connection, and also had Bluetooth 4.0. A few of the keys on the keyboard were a little small (particularly the shift and up/down keys), but that was just a matter of getting used to.

My Mrs happily used this laptop pretty much daily for over 6 years until I ordered her a Samsung Galaxy book Pro in early 2022. The Lenovo LaVie Z was still going strong at that time, although a couple of the keys were a bit sketchy. Windows 10 will reach the end of support in October 2025, so the Lenovo’s days were numbered anyway as the machine was not capable of running Windows 11. The laptop was discarded soon after it was replaced.

Overall it was a great little laptop, with an almost unbelievable low weight – anyone who held it couldn’t believe how light it was – it almost felt like a plastic mock up of a laptop because it was really that light. Here’s a few pictures of the Lenovo LaVie Z sourced from Google Images.