We challenge all test systems’ graphics with a quintet of animations or gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark test suite. The first two, Wild Life (1440p) and Wild Life Extreme (4K), use the Vulkan graphics API to measure GPU speeds. The second pair, Steel Nomad’s regular and Light subtests, focus on APIs more commonly used for game development, like Metal and DirectX 12, to assess gaming geometry and particle effects. Last, we turn to 3DMark Solar Bay to measure ray tracing performance in a synthetic environment. This benchmark works with native APIs, subjecting 3D scenes to increasingly intense ray-traced workloads at 1440p.
Our real-world gaming testing is based on the in-game benchmarks of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Cyberpunk 2077, and F1 2024. These three games—all benchmarked at the system’s full HD (1080p or 1200p native) resolution—represent competitive shooters, open-world games, and simulation games, respectively. If the screen is capable of a higher resolution, we rerun the tests at the QHD equivalent of 1440p or 1600p. Each game runs at two sets of graphics settings per resolution, for a total of up to four runs on each game.
We run the Call of Duty benchmark at the Minimum graphics preset—aimed at maximizing frame rates to test display refresh rates—and again at the Extreme preset. Our Cyberpunk 2077 test settings aim to push PCs to the max, so we run it on the Ultra graphics preset and again at the all-out Ray Tracing Overdrive preset without DLSS or FSR. Finally, F1 2024 represents our test of DLSS effectiveness (or FSR on AMD systems), demonstrating a GPU’s capacity for frame-boosting upscaling technologies. The capacity of these frame-rate boosts changes with the version of frame generation tech available, with DLSS 2 and 3 stitching in one AI-generated frame for every originally rendered frame, and the latest DLSS 4 inserting up to three additional frames. (FSR can generate up to four new frames per original, while XeSS can only stitch in one new frame per original frame.)
The Legion Pro 5’s RTX 5060 displayed potent midrange performance, but don’t expect to take full advantage of that 165Hz refresh rate in AAA games at the very highest settings. That said, you’ll be able to play most modern AAA games and even future ones, especially thanks to DLSS 4’s frame generation technology in games that support it.
Up against a range of RTX 5050, RTX 5060, and RTX 5070 competitors, the Legion Pro 5 won some and lost some. That’s no bad thing, especially since it surpassed or kept pace with an RTX 5070 on occasion, albeit a rather restrained one inside the smaller Razer Blade 14.
I dislike playing games at a lower resolution when I have a high-resolution screen, so if you’re like me and want your gaming laptop to truly shine, I recommend adjusting the frame generation and/or lowering the overall graphics settings to achieve the best experience at 1600p.
