If our source is accurate, which I’m 99.99% positive it is, Lenovo will soon release an 8GB/128GB variant of the popular Chromebook Flex 5. Personally, this is the Chromebook that I feel Lenovo should have led with when the Flex 5 was debuted at the beginning of the year. However, that’s not the only pony Lenovo is going to have in the premium Chromebook race. In case you forgot, Lenovo recently announced what will be one of the first Chromebooks on the market powered by AMD’s Ryzen C-series processor that was designed specifically for Chrome OS.
There isn’t an “official” release date from Lenovo for this exciting new Enterprise-focused device but the Chrome OS community is anxious to see the Chromebook in the flesh. The 13.3″ 2-in-1 could potentially shake up the premium Chromebook market thanks to AMD’s Ryzen 3700C that is putting up early benchmarks comparable to Intel’s 10th Gen Comet Lake Core i5-10210U found in devices like the Acer Chromebook Spin 713. The Lenovo ThinkPad C13 will offer up an optional 4K display and a segment-first optional garaged USI stylus. Additional features include a deck-mounted fingerprint sensor, Bluetooth 5, Wi-Fi 6, a full-sized HDMI port, and a privacy shade for the webcam. Oh yeah, the C13 also touts that iconic Lenovo “nub” pointing stick in the center of the keyboard.
ICYMI: Chrome Unboxed Gear of the Year
Lenovo stated that the starting price of the new Chromebook would be $579 but that is likely for a lesser Ryzen or even an Athlon chip and it will be missing some of those “optional” features I mentioned above. That said, I loosely predicted that the big-boy, Ryzen 3700C model with 16GB of RAM would likely come in over $1,000 and it looks like my prognostication may have been pretty spot on. We received word from one of our readers that the Lenovo ThinkPad C13 Yoga Chromebook had just surfaced on a number of commercial websites that are generally known for listing devices a little bit early.
All three listings show a Ryzen 3700C Chromebook with 16GB of RAM and 256GB of NVMe storage which should be the top-tier model of the C13 but it isn’t clear if this model has the optional 4K upgrade. The listings range in price from $958 to $974 which leads me to believe that this is probably the FullHD model but honestly, 4K is beautiful overkill on a 13.3″ Chromebook. Just saying. There are no other details on the device and all three listings show as unavailable or temporarily out of stock but that usually just means that the laptop will be physically in inventory in the coming weeks. I was hoping to see this Chromebook before the end of the year and this is a good indicator that the possibility is real that we may get our hands on this exciting new device sooner than later.
Fingers crossed that this Chromebook will hit retail channels so that consumers can get their hands on it without paying for the Chrome Enterprise Upgrade. At $950, I don’t think this listing includes the upgrade and honestly, it’s a competitive price for a Chromebook that could plausibly go toe-to-toe with some of the most powerful Chrome OS devices on the market. Stay tuned. We will update you as soon as we know more about the specific configurations, pricing, and availability of the Lenovo ThinkPad C13 Yoga Chromebook.
Special thanks to Sam K. for spotting this.
