Review LG Gram 16: The champion of the ultralight laptops division

Ultrabooks have been around for a while, and many people love them because they’re lightweight and easy to carry. However, ultraportables usually have an important disadvantage: they’re small. Most ultrabooks come with 13 or 14-inch screens, and for some people, that’s not enough screen estate for productive use. And then comes the LG Gram 16 ultra-light laptop that offers a generous 16-inch screen while also being a champion of the lightweight division. With powerful hardware and engineered under the Intel Evo platform, it promises to offer everything you might want: ultra-portability, top-notch performance, a large screen, and beautiful design. To learn more, read this review:

LG Gram 16: Who is it good for?

The LG Gram 16 laptop is an excellent choice for:

• People who want an ultra-lightweight laptop that’s easy to carry
• Those who want an ultrabook with a large screen
• Anyone who appreciates minimalism and longs for a beautiful notebook
• Users looking for a portable laptop designed mainly for productivity on the go

Pros and cons

There are many good things to say about the LG Gram 16:

• It comes with a powerful processor, plenty of RAM, and a fast solid-state drive
• Its display is high-quality and offers excellent color reproduction
• The keyboard is comfortable to type on, with backlit keys, and the trackpad is large
• The body is made from magnesium alloys, light and durable
• Its minimalist design is simply beautiful
• The selection of ports is more generous than you’d expect from an ultrabook
• The battery life is stellar

As for the downsides of the LG Gram 16:

• It’s quite expensive
• Some models don't have a touchscreen (depending on their price)
• There’s some bloatware preinstalled on it

Verdict

The LG Gram 16 is one of the nicest ultrabooks we’ve ever tested. We loved it from our first encounter, and we’re pretty sure you will too. It’s a beautiful device with a minimalistic and well-thought design. If you’re a person who needs to work on the go and wants a genuinely portable notebook, the LG Gram 16 might be exactly what you should buy. It offers more than enough performance for any kind of productivity task, and its huge battery life can easily get you through a whole day of work without having to plug its charger into a power socket. If you have the money for it and you don’t necessarily want a touchscreen on your laptop, you should strongly consider the LG Gram 16.

Unboxing the LG Gram 16Z90P

The LG Gram 16Z90P notebook comes in an average-sized box made of premium dark-gray cardboard. As you can see in the picture below, it’s a minimalist package: the only thing printed on the box is gram. The box of the LG Gram 16 Opening the box reveals the contents: the beautiful LG Gram laptop, its power adapter, and cable, and some installation guide documents. Unboxing the LG Gram 16 Unboxing the LG Gram 16Z90P laptop is fast. We can only describe both the box and its contents as minimalistic. But, the laptop looks pretty cool at first sight. 🙂

The LG Gram is built on the Intel Evo platform

LG Gram 16 is built on the Intel Evo Platform. It’s important to know what that means, so you can better understand its design and hardware choices. Intel Evo laptops are premium, thin and light devices, co-engineered by Intel with its partners, characterized by some key technologies and design choices. They offer the following:

• A high degree of performance, as they need to have 11th Gen Intel Core processors and Intel Iris Xe graphics
• Huge battery life that surpasses 9 hours of work on Full HD screens
• Fast wireless networking, with built-in Intel Wi-Fi 6 network adapters
• Fast boot times
• Thunderbolt 4 ports

Intel Evo platform According to Intel, the Intel Evo Platform offers 25% faster CPU performance, 1.84 times faster graphic performance, 33% faster DDR4 (4266MHz), and support for NVMe storage. The CPU and Graphics performance numbers are based on Intel’s testing from August 2020.

Design and hardware specifications

The LG Gram 16Z90P model that we received in testing looks great. It features a beautiful black minimalist design, while the build quality is top-notch. The entire case of this ultrabook is made of magnesium alloy that feels great to the touch and provides good grip, resistance to scratches, durability, and, most of all, an extremely light bodyweight. We’re talking about premium craftsmanship here! A view of the LG Gram 16 The whole LG Gram ultrabook comes with a large 16” screen, but somehow manages to weigh just 2.6 pounds (1.2 kg), while its charger only adds another 0.6 pounds (0.3 kg). Although fairly large for a regular ultrabook, measuring 14.01 inches (356 mm) in width and 9.58 inches in depth (243 mm), it’s incredibly slim, having a thickness of just 0.66 inches (16.8 mm). All in all, the LG Gram is what you’d call a truly ultraportable and ultrathin device, one which you can easily carry in one hand. Furthermore, its weight is practically negligible if you carry it in a backpack or even a purse. The LG Gram 16 with its lid closed On the back of the screen, LG engraved the gram name, but other than that, there are no other patterns or visual elements, no LED lights, or any other distracting elements. The laptop’s screen hinges are barely visible but feel quite robust. When opened, the screen stays firmly in the position you set it. However, speaking of the screen’s robustness, probably because it’s so thin, we noticed that it bends quite easily, so a bit of care on this side won’t hurt. The hinges of the LG Gram 16 On the LG Gram, you won’t find large air vents like on regular laptops. There’s just one large cooling grid made of countless tiny holes on its bottom. Air vents are found on the bottom of the LG Gram 16 Let’s get a glimpse of what’s under the hood. The LG Gram family of ultrabooks is huge and comes in many shapes and sizes, and the LG Gram 16 model that we tested is one of the most powerful. The “brain” of the Gram 16 is an Intel Tiger Lake Core i7-1165G7, with four cores and eight threads. The CPU runs at a base frequency of 2.8 GHz and a maximum Turbo Boost clock of 4.7 GHz. The CPU also offers 12 MB of Level 3 cache memory and has a default TDP of just 28 Watts. LG Gram 16: Processor details In terms of memory, the laptop we tested had 16GB of DDR4 RAM running at a frequency of 4266 MHz. There are no available SO-DIMM slots available, as we’re talking about an ultrabook. Except for the SSD, which can be upgraded, all the other components, including the RAM, are soldered to the mainboard. LG Gram 16: RAM specs Regarding graphics, the LG Gram 16 laptop doesn’t come with a dedicated video card, instead relying on the GPU chip included in its processor: Intel Iris Xe Graphics. LG Gram 16: Graphics specifications The display uses an IPS 16” QHD (2560 x 1600 pixels) panel with a refresh rate of 60 Hz and 99% coverage of the DCI-P3 color space. It’s a beautiful screen, surrounded by small bezels, with excellent color reproduction and viewing angles. The only thing that’s a bit underwhelming is the fact that it’s glossy, so it doesn’t do that well outdoors, in bright sunlight. The LG Gram 16 with its lid opened to the max As for storage, the LG Gram 16Z90P comes equipped with a fast 1 TB NVMe PCIe 3.0 solid-state drive made by Hynix. LG Gram 16: SSD details The LG Gram 16Z90P does great in terms of wireless networking: you get Wi-Fi 6 (Intel AX201) with 2×2 MU-MIMO and Bluetooth 5.1. As for wired networking, LG didn’t include any Ethernet card, probably because the laptop is so thin by design. Regarding audio, the LG Gram 16Z90P delivers it via a set of built-in stereo speakers found on its bottom. Both speakers are rated at 2.0 Watts each, and LG says that the speakers combined can deliver a maximum of 5 Watts using Smart Amp tech. The LG Gram 16 is more generous than you’d expect from an ultrabook in terms of input/output ports. All of them are positioned on the left and right sides of the laptop - no port is found on the back or on the front edges. On the left, there is a full-sized HDMI 2.0 port, two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, and a 3.5mm combo audio jack, while on the right edge of the LG Gram 16, you get two USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports and a microSD card reader. The ports found on the right of the LG Gram 16 Finally, one of the strong points of the LG Gram 16 is its impressive battery. As thin as it is, this ultrabook bundles a battery with a capacity of 80 WHrs. To charge it, you get a 65W charger that you plug into one of the USB-C ports found on the left side of the laptop. Ports found on the left of the LG Gram 16 LG sends the Gram 16 laptop with Windows 10 preinstalled (our model had Windows 10 Home) and promises that you can upgrade to Windows 11. We can attest to that, as the first thing we did when we got it was install Windows 11 before running any benchmarks. 🙂 For more details about this laptop’s features and technical specs, and alternative configurations for it, visit the LG Gram 16 web page. The LG Gram 16 is one of the most powerful and well-designed ultrabooks we’ve ever tested. Its hardware should be more than capable of handling any kind of productivity task. On the next page of this review, we share details about the user experience, the software, and apps bundled with the LG Gram 16Z90P laptop, as well as its benchmark results.

Using the LG Gram 16

On top of having a really beautiful design, the main strong point of the LG Gram 16 is that it’s extremely lightweight. As we mentioned earlier, it’s so light that you won’t even know you have it in your bag. It’s as light as any 13” ultrabook, but this one is a 16” device! And not just that, but it’s also quite a powerful notebook. It’s destined for productivity, and it really shines in this area. Although we’re all gamers here at Digital Citizen, what we do most on our laptops, in reality, is research and writing. That’s exactly what I used the LG Gram 16 for: web browsing, writing some tutorials, running virtual machines, and making this review. It was great for all of that. Working with Office apps such as Microsoft Word or Excel, as well as navigating the web in tens of browser tabs, can’t slow down the LG Gram 16. The capable processor, paired with the generous amount of RAM and the fast solid-state drive, handles everything with speed. And the keyboard, which is essential when writing a lot, like we do, is top-notch. Its size is adequate, definitely larger than what you’d get on an ultraportable 13” notebook, it doesn’t bend at all, and it’s quite comfortable to type on. The keys feature large characters that look elegant, and I also appreciated the fact that they are backlit. Furthermore, I like that LG chose white for the LEDs. Some prefer red, some prefer green, some want RGB, but I always have and always will like white best. It’s the only color that feels natural to me on a keyboard. The keyboard of the LG Gram 16 The touchpad on the LG Gram 16 is large and responsive, as you’d expect from a premium device. The buttons are under the touchpad surface, their travel distance is short, and they’re also relatively silent, which is pretty nice. The touchpad found on the LG Gram 16 The audio quality is decent for a device that’s as slim as the LG Gram 16. The speakers are pointing downwards, making them sound OK when you use the laptop on a flat surface. However, if you keep it on your lap, the audio quality suffers a bit. Before closing this section, a word about gaming. The LG Gram 16 is not a device for gamers, as it has no dedicated video card. It simply lacks the graphics power for playing demanding games. However, it can run less-demanding games. The only game I actually tried playing on this ultrabook was League of Legends, and, to my surprise, it handled it quite well. In 1080p resolution and using the highest video quality, it managed to render above 80 frames per second without lagging or stuttering! Using the LG Gram 16 was a delight for us. It’s fast and powerful, handling everything with ease (except for games, but that’s not what it was made for), typing on it is very comfortable, and it’s so light that you don’t even know you have it in your backpack!

Performance in benchmarks

To get an objective view about the performance offered by the LG Gram 16, let’s also see how well it does in benchmarks: First of all, we ran all the tests on Windows 11, which is now available for any and all compatible computers and devices. We started by using BootRacer to measure how much time the ultrabook needed to start. As you can see in the following screenshot, the LG Gram 16 requires about 31 seconds to boot, which is a good result. LG Gram 16: Boot time Next, we tested the 1 TB NVMe Hynix SSD found inside the laptop, using CrystalDiskMark. Both the reading and writing speeds are excellent, confirming that this PCIe 3.0 solid-state drive is fast and can deliver a great deal of performance. LG Gram 16: SSD benchmark As the LG Gram 16 is an ultrabook destined for productivity tasks, this is the next thing we checked. To test it in everyday productivity tasks such as working with Office apps, videoconferencing, browsing the internet, and creating digital content, we used PCMark 10. As expected, considering the excellent processor, RAM, and storage, the laptop managed to obtain a high score: 4841 points. LG Gram 16: Benchmark result in PCMark 10 Although the LG Gram 16 is not a gaming device (it has no dedicated GPU), we still had to run a gaming benchmark, namely 3DMark’s Time Spy, just to get an idea. 🙂 Obviously, the score it got was not impressive: only 1122 points. Even so, the graphics chip can handle some casual games that don’t demand a lot of resources. At least League of Legends runs well on it. LG Gram 16: Benchmark result in 3DMark Time Spy To see how the laptop’s cooling system manages heat, we ran Prime95 to stress the processor to the max. As you can see in the following screenshot, the CPU did reach a slightly worrying 91 degrees Celsius for a second or two, but it instantly throttled to lower its temperature. Still, keeping in mind that this ultrabook will probably be bought and used by people mostly concerned with productivity tasks or maybe multimedia, its processor will probably very seldomly get as hot as in this extremely demanding test. LG Gram 16: CPU temperature recordings In the end, we ran PCMark 10 again to measure the laptop's autonomy on battery. While running common tasks such as writing, web browsing, and video conferencing, the LG Gram 16 managed to stay on for a very impressive 9 hours and 12 minutes! LG Gram 16: Battery life The results we got in benchmarks prove that the LG Gram 16 is quite a performer when it comes to productivity tasks and can even run some casual games.

Apps bundled with the LG Gram 16

The LG Gram 16 ultrabook comes with quite a few bundled apps:

• LG Control Center lets you adjust a series of system settings, power management options, color temperature, the laptop’s cooling mode, and allows you to quickly enable or disable the Windows Firewall and UAC settings.
• LG Easy Guide provides you with a range of tutorials and how-tos for your LG laptop.
• LG Power Manager allows you to change a few settings related to the battery management and hibernate mode, as well as show you the battery use per app.
• LG Troubleshooting gives you tutorials and FAQs on how to troubleshoot your LG laptop.
• LG Update Center, which you can use to automatically download and install system updates for your laptop.
• CyberLink Director Suite includes several apps: PowerDirector, PhotoDirector, ColorDirector, AudioDirector, PowerMediaPlayer. You can use the first four to edit and work on video, photo, and audio files, while the last one we mentioned is a media player app.
• McAfee Live Safe is a 30-day trial version of a security suite that, in the past, disappointed us. You might want to uninstall it and either buy a better antimalware solution or keep using Windows’ built-in Microsoft Defender Antivirus.
• Virtoo by LG helps you sync your smartphone (Android or iPhone) to your laptop and receive notifications, make calls, send texts, mirror the screen, and transfer files.

LG Control Center The only thing that’s slightly underwhelming about the LG Gram 16 is that it bundles some apps that we’d call bloatware. We don’t think that the CyberLink apps are needed for professionals who intend to buy this ultrabook. Also, most of the LG apps preinstalled could have been combined to become one single app that offered different sections for everything from updates to troubleshooting and help.

What do you think about the LG Gram 16?

Now you know what we like and do not like about the LG Gram 16. Before you close this review, let us know in the comments section your opinion about this ultraportable laptop and whether you would buy it.