If you prioritize a premium build and longer battery life for general use, the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) with its higher-resolution, brighter Mini LED display could be your choice, especially if you work with creative applications that require accurate color representation. However, it comes at a premium price and has a heavier build. For more portability and better value, the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" is lighter and often less expensive, featuring more storage, a higher refresh rate screen for smoother visuals, and dedicated graphics suitable for gaming and intense engineering work, although its screen isn't as bright and it has a lower color accuracy than the MacBook Pro. Give Feedback
this description is based on the product variant with some specs and product variant with some specs. At the time of writing, the variant with some specs cost some dollars and the variant with some specs cost some dollars.
Advantages of the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023)
Excellent overall display quality
Best in class overall build quality
Best in class battery life
Best in class speakers
Best in class keyboard
Advantages of the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16"
Very good for gaming and AI
Key differences
General Use
8.8/10
8.2/10
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
2560 x 1600
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
IPS
487.0 nits
DISPLAY BRIGHTNESS
502.0 nits
17.5 Hours
BATTERY LIFE
7.0 Hours
9.5/10
KEYBOARD QUALITY SCORE
8.5/10
7.6/10
PORTABILITY SCORE
7.5/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" are both very good for general use, though the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is somewhat better.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) stands out with a longer battery life and a high-quality Mini LED screen, making it excellent for tasks like photo/video editing and general use. However, the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" offers a more powerful graphics card suitable for gaming and graphics-intensive tasks, but this comes at the expense of shorter battery life.
Gaming and AI
7.5/10
8.2/10
6.2/10
OVERALL GPU SCORE
8.3/10
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
2560 x 1600
120Hz
REFRESH RATE
240Hz
No
SUPPORTS DLSS
Yes
No
MUX SWITCH / ADVANCED OPTIMUS
Yes
8.7/10
FAN NOISE SCORE
7.5/10
The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" is very good for gaming and AI, while the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is good.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 with its Apple M3 Pro GPU can handle 3D tasks well, but its lower screen refresh rate of 120 Hz is less optimal for fast-paced gaming compared to the Lenovo Legion Slim 7, which boasts a superior Nvidia RTX 4060 GPU and a higher 240 Hz refresh rate, offering very good gaming and 3D performance. Additionally, the Legion Slim 7 runs Windows, which supports many popular games that are not available on the Mac's operating system.
Content Creation
8.9/10
8.3/10
9.1/10
OVERALL CPU SCORE
9.1/10
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
2560 x 1600
18.0 GB
RAM
16.0 GB
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
IPS
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" are both very good for content creation, though the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is somewhat better.
PerfectRec’s Content Creation Score takes into account the many different features of the laptop that make it more or less suitable for photo editing, video editing and other content creation tasks.
Software Development
8.9/10
8.0/10
9.1/10
OVERALL CPU SCORE
9.1/10
18.0 GB
RAM
16.0 GB
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
2560 x 1600
9.5/10
KEYBOARD QUALITY SCORE
8.5/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" are both very good for software development, though the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) is somewhat better.
PerfectRec’s Software Development Score takes into account the many different features of the laptop that make it more or less suitable for software developers.
Screen Quality
9.3/10
8.7/10
16.2in
SIZE
16.0in
3456 x 2234
RESOLUTION
2560 x 1600
Mini LED
DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY
IPS
120Hz
REFRESH RATE
240Hz
487.0 nits
BRIGHTNESS
502.0 nits
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 has a better screen than the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 for general use, engineering and design, software development, and content creation, while the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 has a better screen for gaming and AI.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16's screen stands out for general use and engineering due to its high-resolution display, exceptional brightness, and support for wide color gamuts, ensuring sharp, vibrant visuals suited for detailed design work. Despite its screen quality, it is less ideal for 3D applications as it has a standard refresh rate, not the high refresh rate preferred for smooth rendering of 3D graphics and fast-paced content. Conversely, the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" offers a very good display for general use and engineering, but its lower-than-ideal refresh rate for gaming makes it less optimal for 3D gaming where fast refresh rates are necessary for fluid gameplay.
Battery
17.5 Hours
7.0 Hours
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 has 17.5 hours of battery life. The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 has 7 hours of battery life.
Battery life estimate is based on a mix of common use patterns. More portable and higher performing laptops tend to have less battery life.
Build Quality
10.0/10
7.6/10
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) has best in class build quality, while the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" has good build quality.
PerfectRec’s Build Quality Score incorporates case materials, display and keyboard flex, hinge quality, and overall reliability.
Cost
$2,499
$1,680
$500
$1,000
$1,500
$2,000
$2,500
$3,000
$3,500
$4,000
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) has a price of $2,499 and the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" costs $1,680.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" are both very good for engineering and design.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 is well-suited for engineering and design tasks due to its powerful Apple M3 Pro chip with a 12-core CPU and an 18-core GPU, combined with a high-quality Mini LED screen, making it ideal for color-sensitive work, though it puts a premium on portability.
Portability
Good
Good
16.2in
SIZE
16.0in
4.7 lbs
WEIGHT
4.4 lbs
0.6in
THICKNESS
0.6in
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" both have good portability.
The most portable laptops are small, thin, and light.
Give feedback
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How the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) and the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16" compare to other laptops
"The Apple MacBook Pro 16 2023: M2 Max challenges GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. The new MacBook Pro 16 2023 with the M2 Max SoC is the most powerful laptop Apple has on sale right now. While we do not get the expected performance and efficiency improvements from completely new 3 nm chips, which we expected ahead of the launch, the 2023 model is still a solid update. The CPU of the M2 Max can be up to 20 % faster than the old model and we also see an advantage of 25-30 % for the GPU with 38 cores. However, both components also consume more power, so the efficiency did not change that much under maximum load."
"The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 is a slim Legion notebook that is just as excellent with Nvidia & Intel. However, the Legion Slim 7i slightly sullied by lacklustre battery life. You get a slim aluminium chassis, great input devices, decent port selection, fast high-quality WQXGA display and great performance. Supporting Thunderbolt 4 is one advantage of the Intel/Nvidia model tested in this review. Moreover, this variant has slightly higher CPU performance as well as better GPU performance in certain applications (e.g. CUDA-based apps). The Lenovo Legion S7i is thin, premium and performant – but less efficient than its AMD counterpart."
Get a great deal on the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (Late 2023) or the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 16"
About Apple
Apple, an American technology company, is one of the world’s largest company in terms of market capitalization. Their MacBook laptops feature a slim, minimalistic design, class-leading battery life, and premium display and speaker quality. In 2020 Apple switched from using Intel processors to their own silicon chips which have excellent performance and efficiency. The macOS operating system is the second most widely used OS, after Windows.
About Lenovo
Lenovo is a Chinese technology company, and one of the largest personal computer vendor. They are well known for a variety of technology products, including laptops. Their consumer series include their entry level IdeaPad and LOQ series and mid-to-high-end Yoga and Legion series. On the business-oriented side, their series include their entry-level ThinkBook series and mid-to-high-end ThinkPad series. Lenovo laptops offer strong performance for reasonable prices, and are often on sale.
This information was produced and vetted by the PerfectRec laptops team. We are a product research and recommendation organization that meticulously reviews and evaluates the latest laptop information and makes it digestible for you.
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