LG gram Style 2023 (designer review)

Review unit on loan from LG Singapore

LG has refreshed the LG gram series of laptops in 2023 with new models and the Intel 13th gen Raptor Lake processor. In addition to the usual LG gram laptops, there's now the 15.6-inch LG gram Superslim (or Ultraslim) that weighs 998g and the LG gram Style 16 and 14 that feature a glass top design with pearlescent looks.

The model that I've received from LG Singapore is the LG gram Style 16 with 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD storage, Intel Iris Xe and the 13th Intel Core i7-1360P (4P 8E) that draws 28W power.

My review is from the perspective of a visual content creator, someone who does graphic design, digital art, edits photos and videos.

Listed below are the LG gram models available for sale in Singapore:

• LG gram Style 16, 16Z90RS-i7, 512GB, 3200 x 2000 OLED - SGD 3099
• LG gram Style 16, 16Z90RS-i5, 512GB, 3200 x 2000 OLED - SGD 2899
• LG gram Style 14, 14Z90RS-i7, 512GB, 2880 x 1800 OLED - SGD 2799, USD 1499
• LG gram Style 14, 14Z90RS-i5, 512GB, 2880 x 1800 OLED - SGD 2599
• LG gram 17 17Z90R-i7, 1TB, 2560 x 1600 IPS LCD display - SGD 2999, USD 1799
• LG gram 17 17Z90R-i7, 512GB, 2560 x 1600 - SGD 2799
• LG gram 17 17Z90R-i5, 512GB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2599, USD 1499
• LG gram 16 16Z90R-i7, 1TB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2799, USD 1699
• LG gram 16 16Z90R-i7, 512GB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2649, USD 1449
• LG gram 16 16Z90R-i7 with external GPU, 512GB storage, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 3199
• LG gram 16 16Z90R-i5, 1TB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2599
• LG gram 16 16Z90R-i5, 512GB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2499, USD 1399
• LG gram 15 Superslim 15Z90RT-i7, 512GB, 1080P OLED - SGD 2499, USD 1699
• LG gram 15 Superslim 15Z90RT-i5, 512GB, 1080P OLED - SGD 2299
• LG gram 14 14Z90R-i7, 512GB, 1920 x 1200 LCD - SGD 2299
• LG gram 14 14Z90R-i5, 512GB, 1920 x 1200 LCD SGD 1999
• LG gram 16 2-in-1 16T90R-i7, 512GB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2899, USD 1599
• LG gram 14 2-in-1 14T90R-i7, 1TB, 2560 x 1600 LCD - SGD 2799
• LG gram 14 2-in-1 14T90R-i7, 512GB, 1920 x 1200 LCD - SGD 2699
• LG gram 14 2-in-1 14T90R-i5, 512GB,1920 x 1200 LCD - SGD 2499, USD 1299

Full specifications for these laptops can be found on this LG webpage.

All the models come with 16GB RAM and 2 years warranty in Singapore.

The models with integrated graphics card are not sold in Singapore. For the 15.6 inch models, only the Superslim models are sold and those have 1080 resolution (16:9 aspect ratio).

Bottom line

The LG gram Style is beautiful, lightweight and extremely portable. There is no dedicated graphics card so don't expect good gaming performance. Overall performance is smooth and lag-free unless you run processor intensive tasks, e.g. exporting lots of photos in the background.

The OLED display has vibrant colours, excellent contrast and sharp visuals.

The compromise of such a lightweight design is there is some flex with the build quality. Sound quality is affected by the downward facing speakers. Battery life is just 7 hours vs the 10 hours you can get with the normal LG Gram (non-Style).

The laptop is good for office workers, students and those want a laptop that's really portable.

Design

The new LG gram Style has several new features over the normal LG gram models.

First, glass is used for the display lid, palm rest and haptic touch pad with a pearlescent look that will change its colour depending on the angle and light. This certainly looks stylish compared to the usual gray, black or white matte textured LG gram models.

Second, the LG gram Style uses OLED displays with anti-glare reflective coating. The resolution and refresh rate for the 14 and 16-inch models are 2880 x 1800 @ 90Hz and 3200 x 2000 @120Hz.

Dolby Atmos has been added to the speaker system.

Unfortunately, the HDMI and one USB-A port are removed, leaving behind two Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports, one USB-A 3.0 and a microSD card slot.

LG gram Style 16 with Intel i7 is SGD 450 more LG gram 16. LG gram Style 16 with Intel i5 is SGD 400 more LG gram 16.

LG gram Style 14 with Intel i7 is SGD 500 more LG gram 14. LG gram Style 14 with Intel i5 is SGD 600 more LG gram 14.

The LG gram Style with OLED displays are more expensive compared to the normal LG gram models with LCD displays.

I probably prefer the normal LG gram models for the extra savings since I don't mind LCD displays as those from the LG gram are pretty good (89% AdobeRGB and 100% DCI P3 measured from 2022 models). But if you want something more stylish, you have that option this year with the LG gram Style.

The 14 and 16-inch models weigh 999g and 1.23kg respectively. That's really lightweight compared to other laptops. The Apple Macbook Air 13 and 15 are 1.24kg and 1.51kg. The Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 13.5 and 15 are 1.27kg and 1.56kg.

With the LG gram, you can have a huge display with the weight of a smaller laptop.

The laptop is quite thin, compact and portable.

The laptop with made with magnesium alloy and glass and there is flex with the display and keyboard deck. And where's flex, there's some creaking sound too. The build quality is not as solid compared to heavier metal construction but that's the compromise to achieve the lower weight. By the way, build quality is not solid does not mean durability is compromised. The laptops are rated with MIL-810H Military Standard.

Here are the weights of the various LG gram models:

• LG gram Style 16 - 1.23kg
• LG gram Style 14 - 999g
• LG gram 17 - 1.35kg
• LG gram 16 - 1.19kg
• LG gram 14 - 999kg
• LG gram 16 2-in-1 - 1.48kg
• LG gram 14 2-in-1 - 1.25kg

The LG gram 14 is for those who want extreme portability. LG gram 16 and 17 are for those who want huge displays with portability.

The LG gram 17 is massive you'll need a bag that's big enough to hold it. LG gram 16 should fit easily into most backpacks.

The 16-inch OLED display has 3200 x 2000 resolution and 120Hz refresh rate. The 16:10 aspect ratio is better for productivity compared to a 16:9 display.

It's satisfying to use such a big display on a laptop that's just 1.23kg (or 1.19kg for the normal LG gram). The 17-inch display is even more massive, and immensely satisfying, but that's around 150g heavier.

Unfortunately my colour calibrator does not work with OLED displays so I can't measure the actual colour support. According to LG, colour support is for 100% DCI-P3 and there's VESA DisplayHDR 500 True Black, 1 million:1 contrast ratio. This is an OLED display so the colour accuracy is gonna be fantastic so I don't doubt the marketed specs. This display does look terrific out of the box. The colours are vibrant, contrast is excellent.

The colour accuracy is definitely good enough for graphic design and photography.

The OLED display on the LG gram style comes with anti-glare reflective coating which does a pretty good job at minimising reflections. I've my phone by the side in the photo above to show you the actual reflection. Most OLED displays are glossy and reflective so having the anti-glare coating is really nice even though there's still some diffused reflections that can be seem. Having said that, this is a good compromise for the better colour accuracy and contrast vs LCDs with (what I feel) nicer matte displays.

Brightness of the OLED display is up to 400 nits and this display does look bright enough for use in bright room environments. The 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio is high enough that you can get true HDR effect even with 400 nits brightness.

More on the colour support

This OLED display has 10-bit colour depth but you have to enable it from Intel Graphics Command Center app.

You may also want to turn off the colour temperature control from the LG Smart Assistant if you use colour calibration.

LG gram also has the annoying power-saving auto-brightness dimming feature from the Intel Graphics Command Center app/driver. Basically when the display will dim when showing darker content and become brighter when showing lighter content.

To turn off auto-brightness, from Windows Start menu, open Intel Graphics Command Center, go to System-Power-Display Power Savings and turn off Enhanced Power Savings. This is not the usual auto-brightness settings under Windows display settings.

Another setting that affects auto-brightness is called "Content adaptive brightness control" found in Settings -> System -> Display -> Brightness. You may also want to turn that off.

The LG gram has 2 NVMe slots so you can add another NVMe SSD in the future for more storage. The 16GB RAM is not user upgradable.

Even though the two 3W speakers are downward facing, the Dolby Atmos does make the audio sound more stereo and provide good surround. There's good clarity and volume is loud enough. But the speakers are still downward facing and won't sound as good compared to forward facing ones where the audio has more presence and feels in front of you.

Hinge

The display can be angled quite low. It's low enough for you to work on when you're sitting on the floor with the laptop on your lap.

The downside is the hinge isn't as tight as I like. At certain angles, the display may move down when lifting the laptop. I'm not sure if this is an issue that's specific to this model because I don't remember having this issue with the 2022 model. Anyway, it's a minor issue.

The display also wobbles quite a bit when you first place the laptop down. Many reviewers mention the wobble but it's not a problem because it doesn't wobble forever.

Keyboard and touchpad

The keyboard is standard size except for the numpad which is narrow and uses a 3-column design.

There are function shortcuts and function lock. There is no fingerprint sensor built into the power button. Biometric unlock is handled by Windows Hello and it works quite effectively and fast.

The keys are backlit. Typing experience is good. The keys have good travel and feedback. The keyboard deck still has some flex if you press on it but doesn't flex when typing.

The 3-column numpad has rearranged keys compared to the standard 4-column design and this may take a long time to get used to. The 17-inch model uses the standard numpad layout.

The LG gram Style uses a haptic touchpad with glass top. This is an upgrade over the physical touchpad on the normal LG gram which doesn't feel as solid. This glass touchpad has haptic motors to simulate clicks and it feels quite natural compared normal touchpad clicks. There are two vertical light stripes which will light up whenever the touchpad is in use and unfortunately there's no way to turn on the lights. The touchpad is big, tracks accurately and supports Windows touch gesture shortcuts. This touchpad works well.

Ports

Ports on the left are one 3.5mm audio jack and two Thunderbolt 4 that supports charging and video. The normal LG gram has a HDMI port but the LG gram Style does not.

On the right there is a microSD card slot and one USB-A 3.2 port with an inconvenient cover that has to be pushed down before anything can be inserted. For one hand insertion of the USB-A port, you have to tilt the laptop up on the right side.

Performance

The LG grams come with either the 13th gen Raptor Lake P-series Intel Core i7-1360P (4P 8E) or the Intel Core i5-1340P (4P 8E) processors.

These Rapter Lake P-series processors draw 28W power and aren't as powerful compared to the 45W H-series processors which are significantly more powerful.

I was only able to get 7 hours battery life at maximum brightness with the 80Wh battery capacity. When I drop the brightness down to 70%, I could get around 7-8 hours. Perhaps it's the OLED display, 120Hz, higher resolution that's using more power. With the normal LG gram with LCD display from 2022, I could get around 10 hours battery life which for a Windows laptop is considered really good.

You may get more battery life if you drop the refresh rate down to 60Hz from 120Hz, but it doesn't make sense to buy a 120Hz display only to reduce the refresh rate.

This is not gaming laptop and should not be treated as such. Even when playing non-taxing games, I have to drop the resolution to 720P. There are LG gram models that come with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 4GB Laptop GPU but those are not sold in Singapore. And since I don't have those models to test, I can't say much about gaming experience.

The LG gram is good for office type work and school. It can handle graphic design and some photo editing. The laptop is still responsive enough when exporting photos in the background with Adobe Lightroom, but Adobe Lightroom itself will lag. There may also be some lag if there's another app that's pushing the processor, e.g. Adobe Cloud updating, Windows updating. Anyway, photos export fast so the laptop will be back quickly to being responsive.

Graphic design apps, such as those from Adobe and Serif, all run smoothly without issues.

The laptop is still good enough for 1080P video editing but not suitable for 4K workflows. Anywyay, this is not a laptop for editing videos.

The fans will come on when exporting photos or when the battery is charging. During the first week, the fans are always always on due to Adobe Creative Cloud and Windows constant updates.

You can use Low mode with the LG Smart Assistant for quieter fans but that may affect performance so there may be the occasional sluggishness with animation (60 & 120Hz), eg maximising and minimising windows, scrolling.

Software features

LG has included some useful software features with the laptop.

There's the LG Glance feature which can detect your presence and react accordingly, e.g. turn off the display when you are not around, blur the screen when there's another person around. This can help turn off your screen faster to conserve battery life.

When an external display is detected, a pop-up will appear asking you to assign the side where the external display is.

LG Smart Assistant to control laptop settings can let you limited battery charging to 80%, has Fn key lock, instant boot and more.

Instant boot is a feature that lets your laptop boot up from sleep instantly just like how you wake a tablet from sleep. More Windows laptop nowadays are adding this feature.

Conclusion

The key selling point for LG gram is portability. If you don't mind using a small displays, there are laptops from other companies are are quite lightweight too but of course the LG gram 14 is still gonna be lighter at 999g. Where the LG gram becomes a compelling options is if you need larger 16 or 17-inch displays but still want the portability.

Even though I have reviewed LG gram laptops since 2021, it still feels unreal to hold a 16-inch laptop that's just 1.19 to 1.23kg.

In terms of performance, the laptop is good for graphic design and photography for the high colour accuracy provided by the OLED display. This is not a gaming laptop or a video editing laptop although editing 1080P videos is alright. This is not a laptop I would recommend for video editing though.

This laptop is suitable for office workers, students, graphic designers and even photographers. The pricing is on the higher side compared to other laptops so it's for you to decide whether the extreme portability is worth your money.

Pros and cons at a glance
+ Beautiful and compact design
+ Much lighter compared to other laptops with similar display size
+ Smooth overall performance for light to average workload with multi-tasking
+ Large, sharp, vibrant OLED display with excellent contrast
+ 120Hz refresh rate makes animation and user experience look and feel smooth
+ Good typing experience
+ Keyboard is backlit
+ Many useful software features included by LG
+ Haptic touchpad works well and feels more solid compared to moving touchpad
+ Space NVMe slot included
+ Battery charging speed is fast enough
+ 2 years warranty included
- Battery life drop from 10 hours (normal LG gram) to 7 hours (LG gram Style)
- No HDMI port
- Downward facing speakers affect audio quality
- Build quality has flex and creaking sound
- 3 column numpad design
- Pricier compared to other laptops of similar specs, except for weight
- LG gram Style is pricier compared to normal LG gram model

Availability

You can find LG gram Style 2023 on Shopee SG, Lazada SG and KrisShop, and authorised retailers – Best Denki, Challenger, Courts, Gain City and Harvey Norman.

If you have intention to buy the LG gram Style 2023 on Amazon, consider using the affiliate links I have for you below. I earn some money for sales through the links but at no extra cost to you.

Make sure the laptops come with the 13th gen Intel processors: i7-1360P or i5-1340P.

Here are the Amazon links:
Amazon.com | Amazon.ca | Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.de | Amazon.fr | Amazon.it | Amazon.es | Amazon.co.jp