The LG gram 17 (2021) is a 17-inch ultraportable Windows laptop. It's available with Intel 11th Gen. CPUs, ranging from a Core i3-1115G4 to a Core i7-1195G7, and up to 16GB of memory and 2TB of storage. It has a QHD 16:10 IPS display, a full-size keyboard with a Numpad, a 720P webcam, and an 80Wh battery. Its port selection includes two USB-As, two USB-C/Thunderbolt 4s, an HDMI 1.4, an SD card reader, and a 3.5mm headphone jack. A fingerprint sensor is built into the power button for quick logins.
See our unit's specifications and the available configuration options in the Differences Between Variants section.
The LG gram 17 is great for school use. It's a well-built laptop with a sturdy chassis, and despite its large size, it's still portable, thanks to its lightweight design. Its compact charger fits easily into most bags, but you likely don't need it as the battery lasts 13 hours of light productivity. The display provides enough space for multitasking, the keyboard feels comfortable to type on for extended periods, and the touchpad is large and responsive. Its Intel 11th Gen CPU and integrated graphics can handle most light workloads like web browsing and text formatting but aren't ideal for demanding tasks like graphic design or 3D animation. The screen gets bright enough for use in most indoor settings; however, visibility is an issue in well-lit or sunny environments as it doesn't handle reflections well.
The LG gram is sub-par for gaming. Its Intel 11th Gen CPU and integrated GPU aren't powerful enough to handle graphically demanding AAA games. You can play some lighter, well-optimized titles with the Core i5s and i7s' Iris Xe Graphics, but you'll have to play at the lowest settings or at 720p to get smooth gameplay. Also, it has a 60Hz display with a slow response time and no VRR support, and its CPU and GPU throttle under load.
The LG gram is decent for media consumption. Although it's a fairly large device with a 17-inch screen, it's still very portable as it's incredibly light. The battery lasts over nine hours of video playback, enough time to get you through multiple full-length movies and TV show episodes. The screen is sharp and colorful; however, it doesn't handle bright reflections well, and its low contrast makes blacks look gray in dim settings. Likewise, its speakers sound well-balanced but don't get very loud. Sadly, the display doesn't support touch input, and it has poor color accuracy out of the box.
The LG gram 17 is okay as a workstation. Its Intel 11th Gen CPU and integrated GPU aren't powerful enough to handle demanding tasks like video editing or 3D rendering. Also, while the fans are quiet under load, the CPU and GPU get very hot and throttle, causing a noticeable performance drop in heavy, sustained workloads. You can do some color-correction work, though, as the display has full DCI P3 coverage. Unfortunately, you can only configure the laptop with a maximum of 16GB of memory, and the RAM modules aren't user-replaceable. On the upside, it has a fast storage drive for quick file transfers and a wide port selection that includes two USB-Cs with Thunderbolt 4 support.
The LG gram 17 is great for business use. It feels well-built, and while its large size requires a fairly big bag, it's still a very portable device thanks to its thin and light design. Battery life is outstanding as it lasts 13 hours of light productivity, meaning you can leave the charger at home. The display is large enough for split-screen multitasking, the touchpad is large and responsive, and the keyboard feels comfortable to type on for extended periods. If you need to connect to an external display for presentations, it has a wide port selection, including an HDMI port and two USB-Cs with Thunderbolt 4 support. Unfortunately, it isn't very serviceable as it's hard to access the internals, and you can only replace the storage drive and battery.
We tested the LG gram 17 (model 17Z95P-K.AR55A8) with an Intel Core i5-1155G7 CPU, integrated Intel Iris Xe Graphics, 8GB of memory, and 512GB of storage. The CPU, memory, and storage are configurable; you can see the available options in the table below. Our review applies only to variants with a model number starting with '17Z90P' and '17Z95P'.
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See our unit's label here.
The LG gram 17 is among the best 17-inch ultraportables on the market. It's one of the lightest laptops you can find, and it provides a great user experience with a sharp display, comfortable keyboard, and large touchpad.
For more options, check out our recommendations for the best laptops, the best business laptops, and the best laptops for college.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the ASUS VivoBook 15 OLED K513 (2021) are both ultraportable laptops with Intel 11th Gen processors. The LG is better for productivity because it has a larger screen for multitasking, a more comfortable keyboard, a more responsive touchpad, and a better webcam for video calls. For media consumption, the ASUS comes out ahead because it has an OLED panel that displays much deeper blacks, and it's more color-accurate out of the box. In terms of battery life, the LG lasts much longer, nearly twice as long for light productivity and video playback. The LG isn't as portable due to its larger size, but it's lighter than the ASUS.
The LG gram Pro 16 (2024) is slightly better than the LG gram 17 (2021) for most uses. The gram Pro 16 is available with much faster Intel Meteor Lake CPUs, and there’s also an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Laptop discrete GPU option to tackle more demanding tasks like video editing and 3D graphics. The gram Pro 16 is also smaller and lighter, making it easier to carry around. You can get the gram Pro 16 with a 144Hz QHD+ IPS or a 120Hz 2.8k OLED panel, whereas the gram 17 is only available with a 60Hz QHD+ IPS screen.
The Dell XPS 13 (2021) and the LG gram 17 (2021) are ultraportable Windows laptops with Intel 11th Gen processors. The LG's larger display gives you more screen real estate for multitasking; however, the Dell has sharper 3.5k OLED and 4k IPS panel options. Both laptops have a great keyboard that provides a comfortable typing experience and a large, responsive touchpad. The LG has a better webcam for video calls, and its wider port selection includes two USB-A and an HDMI port, which the XPS 13 lacks. The LG also has longer battery life, lasting nearly 3 hours longer in light productivity workloads and almost twice as long for video playback.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Lenovo Yoga 7i 14 (2021) are both ultraportable Windows laptops with Intel 11th Gen processors. The LG is a traditional clamshell laptop with no touch input support, while the Lenovo is a 2-in-1 convertible with a 360-degree hinge. The LG provides a better user experience overall as it has a larger and brighter display, a bigger touchpad, and a wider port selection. The LG is more cumbersome in size, but it's incredibly light and weighs the same as the Lenovo, which is remarkable for a 17 inch laptop. The Lenovo has a smaller battery but still lasts longer than the LG for light productivity workloads and video playback.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the HP ENVY x360 13 (2020) are both thin and light Windows laptops. Both are configurable with Intel 11th Gen CPUs, though the HP has additional AMD Ryzen 5000-series options. The HP has a smaller screen, but unlike the LG, it supports touch input, and its 360-degree hinge lets you use the laptop as a tablet. The HP also has multiple display options like an IPS panel with 1000 cd/m² brightness and an OLED that produces inky blacks. On the other hand, the LG has a larger touchpad with better tracking, better-sounding speakers, and a much better webcam for video calls. The LG also has a wider port selection as it gives you an HDMI and a second USB-C port, and its battery life lasts nearly 3 hours longer for light productivity workloads.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 15 (2019) are ultraportable Windows laptops providing a premium user experience. The LG has a larger display, giving you more screen real estate for multitasking, but it also makes it a bit more cumbersome to carry around as it might not fit in some bags. It's still very portable, as it's even lighter than the Microsoft laptop. The LG has a better port selection as its USB-C supports Thunderbolt 4, while the Microsoft has a basic USB-C port with USB 3.2 Gen 2 transfer speed. The LG's battery lasts much longer, and its Intel 11th Gen CPUs perform significantly better than the Microsoft laptop's AMD Ryzen 3000-series processors.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Framework Laptop 13 (2021) are thin, light Windows laptops with very different features. The LG focuses on portability by being as light as possible while still providing a premium user experience. On the other hand, the Framework focuses on repairability and upgradeability. It also has a modular port system that lets you swap out the ports on the fly. The LG has a larger display for multitasking, a bigger and more responsive touchpad, and its battery lasts much longer. The LG's fans don't get as loud under load, but its CPU and GPU throttle, whereas the Framework can maintain full performance at all times.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Apple MacBook Pro 16 (2019) are very different. The LG is an ultraportable Windows laptop designed for light workloads like text formatting, spreadsheets, and video playback, while the Apple is a macOS mobile workstation with a dedicated GPU designed for demanding tasks like video editing. The Apple laptop's display is smaller, but it's sharper, brighter, and more color-accurate out of the box. The Apple also has a larger haptic touchpad that's easier to use because you can click anywhere, and its speakers sound better and louder. However, the LG has a more comfortable keyboard, and its wider port selection includes two USB-As and an HDMI port, whereas the Apple only has USB-C ports. The LG has much longer battery life, and it doesn't get as hot or loud under load.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Apple MacBook Air 13 (M1, 2020) are both ultraportable laptops designed for light productivity workloads like text formatting, spreadsheets, and web browsing. They both have sharp and bright screens, but if you plan on working with a single display, the LG will give you more space for multitasking, though it isn't as color-accurate as the Apple's. The LG laptop's keyboard feels more comfortable to type on, and it includes a Numpad, which might be helpful for those working with a lot of numbers. It also has a much better port selection with USB-As, USB-Cs, and a full-size HDMI port, whereas the Apple laptop only has two USB-Cs. However, the Apple has a larger haptic touchpad that's more responsive and easier to use because you can click anywhere on the touchpad. The Apple laptop's speakers sound louder and fuller, and its webcam captures a more detailed image for video calls. The LG doesn't get very loud under load, but the Apple is even quieter because it's fanless.
The Apple MacBook Pro 16 (2021) is much better than the LG gram 17 (2021) for most uses. The Apple provides a better user experience overall, as it has a sharper, brighter, and more color-accurate display with Mini LED backlighting to provide local dimming, a more comfortable keyboard, and a larger touchpad with better tracking, as well as better-sounding speakers. It also has longer battery life, and its M1 SoC can handle much heavier workloads than the LG laptop's Intel 11th Gen processors. On the other hand, the LG is more portable, and it has USB-A ports, which the Apple laptop lacks.
The LG gram 17 (2021) and the Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 (2022) are very similar ultraportables, but there are some differences. The gram 17 has a much better port selection and significantly longer battery life. Its larger display gives you more room for multitasking; however, its increased size makes it less portable than the Surface Laptop. On the other hand, the Surface Laptop has a more responsive touchpad and a better webcam. The Surface Laptop's display is more accurate out of the box and supports touch input.
The LG gram 14 (2023) and the LG gram 17 (2021) are similar overall. The gram 17 has a larger and sharper 17-inch screen, making it a better option for multitasking, although its larger size also means it isn't as portable. On the other hand, the gram 14 is available with much faster Intel 13th Gen. CPUs, and its HDMI port supports HDMI 2.0 standard, whereas the gram 17 is limited to HDMI 1.4. The gram 14 is lighter since it's a smaller device, but the gram 17 is still very portable, as it weighs only 3.1 lbs.
The LG gram 17 has a simple and sleek design that fits well in a professional work environment. It has a magnesium alloy chassis that feels premium, and its display's bezels are thin on all sides. You can find the speakers on the bottom near the front and the exhaust vents near the back. It's available in three color schemes: White, Silver, and Black.
The build quality is excellent. The magnesium alloy chassis feels sturdy, exhibiting only some flex in the display and almost none in the keyboard deck. The rubber feet are thick and stick firmly to the bottom. The Black model picks up fingerprints fairly easily, but it's likely less of an issue on the White and Silver models.
The serviceability is disappointing. It's hard to access the internals as you need to remove lots of plastic caps and rubber feet before you get to the nine Philips screws holding the back panel. The plastic caps are hard to remove and break easily, making them unusable afterward, and the rubber feet require additional adhesive to put back on. After removing the screws, it's fairly easy to undo the clips holding the back panel with a pick or prying tool, but you have to be careful as some of the clips towards the back of the laptop might break.
Get the owner's manual here.
The LG gram 17 has a large and sharp display that provides plenty of room for split-screen multitasking. Its 16:10 aspect ratio gives you slightly more vertical space than a standard 16:9 display so that you don't have to scroll as much when reading a document or website, but it also means that you'll almost always have black bars at the top and bottom when viewing videos.
The display gets bright enough for use in most indoor settings but not in well-lit environments or outdoors in broad daylight, mainly due to the display's mediocre reflection handling. If you like viewing content in the dark, it gets dim enough to help reduce eye strain.
The LG gram 17's display has mediocre reflection handling. Its glossy finish struggles with bright lights shining directly at the screen, as it doesn't reduce the reflection's intensity or diffuse it in any way. The reflections make dark content near impossible to see, and they're visible in bright content even with the screen at maximum brightness.
The display has a good horizontal viewing angle. The image remains accurate until you reach a moderately steep angle from the side; then, the image starts to dim and wash out. This means you can share color-critical work with someone else as long as the other person isn't too far off to the side.
The display's vertical viewing angle is okay. The image quality doesn't degrade much if you view the screen from slightly above or below, which can be handy in tight spaces that force you to view the screen at an angle, like on a bus or airplane. However, it's best to look at the screen directly if you need perfect image accuracy.
The LG gram's out-of-the-box display accuracy is poor. Many colors are inaccurate because it targets a wider color space to produce more saturated colors. The white balance is noticeably off, and the whole image has a slightly bluish tint due to its cool color temperature. The gamma doesn't follow the sRGB curve, making most scenes appear brighter than they should while over-darkening dark scenes. If you want a similar laptop with better display accuracy out of the box, check out the Microsoft Surface Laptop 5 (2022).
The display's color gamut is outstanding. It has full sRGB and DCI-P3 coverage, making it suitable for viewing and producing SDR and HDR content. Its Adobe RGB coverage is excellent but not enough for professional print photography as it can't produce the saturated greens that define Adobe RGB.
The LG gram has a great keyboard. It feels spacious, and the layout is easy to get used to. The keys are stable and have a lot of travel, and while they require a fair amount of force to actuate, they don't cause fatigue over an extended period. They don't feel outright mushy, but they aren't the most tactile, either. You can adjust between two backlight brightness levels or turn it off completely.
The touchpad is excellent. It's large and smooth and has a premium feel to it. It tracks all movements and gestures well, and there aren't any issues with palm rejection or actions like dragging and dropping. The positioning isn't as far to the left as other laptops with a Numpad, but it isn't in the way when typing.
The LG gram laptop has decent speakers. They sound relatively well-balanced. However, they can't produce deep, thumping bass, and vocals lack clarity. They don't get very loud, but on the upside, the sound quality doesn't degrade at max volume.
The webcam's video quality is great. The image is a bit soft and noisy; however, it's still very good, considering its resolution. The microphone sounds clear but loud, so you may have to turn down the mic gain slightly.
The port selection is outstanding. The two USB-A ports support USB 3.2 Gen 2 data transfer speed (up to 10Gbps). The two USB-C ports support Thunderbolt 4 (up to 40Gbps data transfer speed and video output to 4k displays at 60Hz), USB4 Gen 3, and Power Delivery. Power Delivery allows for fast charging of the laptop and other PD-supported devices connected to the port.
The wireless adapter is an Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201.
The LG gram is available with the following CPUs:
All five are power-efficient processors designed to handle light to moderately heavy workloads, like text formatting, web browsing, video playback, and spreadsheets. The Core i3 is powerful enough if you mainly work in a web browser or don't have too many things running simultaneously. However, if you're a heavy multitasker or need to run more demanding multi-threaded applications, it's best to go with an i5 or i7, as they have double the number of cores and threads to provide a smoother experience. There isn't much performance difference between the two Core i5s and the two Core i7s, as the i5-1155G7 and the i7-1195G7 are essentially better-quality parts that can run at slightly higher clock speeds than the i5-1135G7 and i7-1165G7. The i7s are faster than the i5s, but only in short bursts as they likely throttle more in heavy, sustained workloads.
This laptop is only available with integrated graphics. The Core i3-1115G4 has Intel UHD Graphics for 11th Gen processors with 48 execution units, the Core i5s have Intel Iris Xe Graphics with 80 execution units, and the Core i7s have Intel Iris Xe Graphics with 96 execution units. These GPUs can only handle general productivity tasks, not demanding workloads like video editing or AAA gaming. You can run some lighter or older games on the Core i5s and i7s' Iris Xe Graphics, but you'll almost always have to play with low settings to get playable frame rates. If you need a laptop with a more powerful GPU for video editing or gaming, check out the ASUS ProArt Studiobook Pro 16 OLED (2021).
You can configure this laptop with 8GB or 16GB of memory. The memory isn't user-replaceable.
You can configure the LG gram laptop with 512GB, 1TB, or 2TB of storage space. The storage is user-replaceable. there are two storage slots; both support M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 4 SSDs.
The LG gram's overall score in Geekbench 5 is great. The Core i5's performance is great for an Intel 11th Gen processor and good enough for general productivity tasks. That said, there are significantly faster CPUs on the market, like Intel's own Meteor Lake CPUs, AMD's Ryzen 7040U CPUs, and Apple's M2 SoC. The Core i3 will perform worse, especially in multi-threaded workloads, as it has fewer cores and threads. The Core i7s will only perform slightly better, not enough to make much difference in general productivity tasks.
As for the GPU compute score, Intel's Iris Xe performs poorly and isn't suitable for demanding workloads.
The LG gram's Intel Core i5 performs well for a low-power CPU from its generation, but it's rather slow compared to more recent CPUs on the market. This level of performance is only suitable for light productivity workloads. If you're a heavy multitasker or need to run heavily multi-threaded applications, it's best to get a laptop with an H-series CPU, like the Dell XPS 15 (2023), or a MacBook Pro with Apple silicon, like the Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M3, 2023).
The LG gram performs poorly in Blender. If you need to render 3D images in Blender, you're better off getting a laptop with a discrete GPU, as even an entry-level graphics processor, like an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650, can render images much faster.
The LG gram 17 performs poorly in the Basemark GPU benchmark. None of the integrated GPUs are ideal for graphically demanding games. The Core i5s and i7s' Intel Iris Xe Graphics can handle some lighter or older titles, but you'll have to play at the lowest settings to get smooth gameplay.
Borderlands 3 isn't playable on the LG gram. It's extremely choppy, even at the lowest graphical settings, and it freezes at times. Also, the game keeps crashing in DirectX 12, so you can only run it in DirectX 11. None of the configurations can run this game smoothly.
Civilization VI runs poorly on the LG gram. It's playable if you turn down some graphics settings, but even then, the turn time is very long. The Core i7s will only get a few more frames per second and slightly shorter turn times, not enough to make much difference. The Core i3 will perform significantly worse or not run the game at all.
The performance in CS:GO is passable. The average frame rate at high settings is good, but frequent stutters happen due to frame drops. It's smoother at low settings; however, you'll still experience some choppiness here and there, which isn't ideal for an FPS game. The Core i7s will only perform slightly better, while the Core i3 will perform significantly worse, with the average frame rate reaching 60 fps only at the lowest graphical settings.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider isn't playable. The game is extremely choppy, even at the lowest graphical settings. None of the configurations can run this game smoothly.
The LG gram laptop's thermal and noise handling is okay. The keyboard deck is cool when idle, and the fans are completely silent. The keyboard gets very hot under load, but the hottest spot is towards the top, away from where most people rest their hands. While the fans are noticeable under load, they aren't annoying as it's mostly the sound of heavy airflow rather than a high-pitch whine.
The LG gram has many pre-installed software applications, including:
The LG gram laptop has a fingerprint sensor built into the power button. You can use it to log into Windows quickly, authorize purchases on the Windows Store, or auto-fill passwords on supported websites.