Lenovo ThinkPad T14
Hacker ApprovedRanked 11 of 63 laptops by recommenders
Owners praise its repairability, cheap used prices, battery life, and support for Linux and FreeBSD. Critics mention soldered RAM in early generations and hardware failures in some units.
Owners praise its repairability, cheap used prices, battery life, and support for Linux and FreeBSD. Critics mention soldered RAM in early generations and hardware failures in some units.
55 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 39
- criticize it
- 16
- approval share
- 71%
Recommended in 10 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 1 year
Median of the 3 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it carries the badge
- 39 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 2.4 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 10 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Repairable, upgradeable parts
“it's great to know that USB-C ports can just be replaced that easilly without soldering”
Comment from 4 Mar 2026 in “Lenovo's New ThinkPads Score 10/10 for Repairability” “Thinkpad T14 gen 5/6/current should have AMD APU, has a 4k OLED, and 2 sodimm slots.”
Comment from 22 Sep 2026 in “Used ThinkPad Buyer's Guide (2019)” “The current t14 with the 16:10 screen and improvements to repairability look good.”
Comment from 22 Sep 2026 in “Used ThinkPad Buyer's Guide (2019)” - Comment from 18 May 2026 in “ThinkPad: From IBM's Bento Box to Lenovo's AI Workstations”
- Comment from 18 Aug 2026 in “Fixing a Bricked Framework Laptop”
- Comment from 21 Apr 2026 in “Framework Laptop 13 Pro”
- Comment from 18 Aug 2026 in “Fixing a Bricked Framework Laptop”
- Comment from 26 Dec 2025 in “I'm a laptop weirdo and that's why I like my new Framework 13”
Cheap used prices
“My buddy just bought a used ThinkPad T14 with 32GB of RAM and 1TB of storage for about $500”
Comment from 1 Apr 2026 in “DRAM pricing is killing the hobbyist SBC market” “I'm typing this on a T14 Gen 2 Ryzen 7 Pro 32GB/512GB I picked up last year for $220.”
Comment from 18 May 2026 in “ThinkPad: From IBM's Bento Box to Lenovo's AI Workstations” “You'll get a much better laptop by buying a used laptop versus buying that brand new Acer.”
Comment from 24 Apr 2026 in “MacBook Neo and How the iPad Should Be” - Comment from 18 May 2026 in “ThinkPad: From IBM's Bento Box to Lenovo's AI Workstations”
- Comment from 27 Mar 2026 in “Hold on to Your Hardware”
- Comment from 24 Mar 2026 in “Microsoft's "Fix" for Windows 11: Flowers After the Beating”
Good battery life and sleep
“My Thinkpad T14 G2 has S3 and it draws 0.3% per hour, pretty much in line with what Macbooks draw when sleeping.”
Comment from 6 May 2026 in “StarFighter 16-Inch” “the T14 is lighter, has much better battery life, generates less heat”
Comment from 18 May 2026 in “ThinkPad: From IBM's Bento Box to Lenovo's AI Workstations” “I have had excellent sleep duration with a T14 Gen4 AMD under Fedora”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “Lenovo's New ThinkPads Score 10/10 for Repairability” Works with Linux and FreeBSD
“I have had excellent sleep duration with a T14 Gen4 AMD under Fedora”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “Lenovo's New ThinkPads Score 10/10 for Repairability” “I own these and they also work great with FreeBSD”
Comment from 9 Apr 2026 in “FreeBSD Laptop Compatibility: Top Laptops to Use with FreeBSD” “Back to Debian stable on the T14 gen 3 it is...”
Comment from 18 Jan 2026 in “Spirit of ThinkPad”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Hardware failures and replacements
“enough hardware defects that they eventually sent me a new Intel model because I had RMA'd it so many times for failures”
Comment from 19 Nov 2025 in “AMD continues to chip away at Intel's x86 market share” “mainboard replaced during first 6 months (cursor moving alone, with jitter, random crashes)”
Comment from 2 Dec 2025 in “Ask HN: Quality of recent gens of Dell/Lenovo laptops worse than 10 years ago?” Soldered RAM in early generations
“T14 gen 5 is unsoldered, but gens 1 through 3 had soldered RAM, IIRC.”
Comment from 27 Nov 2025 in “Unpopular Opinion: I hate ThinkPads and there are better laptops for me” “the T14 had half or fully soldered RAM for the first several gens”
Comment from 4 Mar 2026 in “Lenovo's New ThinkPads Score 10/10 for Repairability” Weak Wi-Fi performance
“I have a T14 that has a slower WiFi chipset than my T440p. Almost none of the benefits of PC but all of the downsides.”
Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Apple Announces New Mac Sales Record Following MacBook Neo Launch” “you may be surprised by how poorly the Wi‑Fi works”
Comment from 6 May 2026 in “StarFighter 16-Inch” Slower than MacBook Air
“while the sound is clear it's shameful how much better my wife's Macbook Air is”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “OLED Not for Me” “the 32gb T14 I had ad work was frankly worse performant than the little air”
Comment from 30 Jun 2026 in “Free the Icons”
Other laptops people recommend
The four most recommended other laptops, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple MacBook Pro | 928 | 688 | 57% | 13 | 5 yrs248 owners | — |
| Apple MacBook Neo | 707 | 355 | 66% | 9 | 1 mo8 owners | — |
| MacBook Air | 633 | 209 | 75% | 12 | 5 yrs130 owners | Approved |
| Apple MacBook | 499 | 348 | 59% | 12 | 9 yrs77 owners | — |
| Lenovo ThinkPad T14This page | 39 | 16 | 71% | 10 | 1 yr3 owners | Approved |
What people said
40 of the 74 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“The current t14 with the 16:10 screen and improvements to repairability look good.”
“Thinkpad T14 gen 5/6/current should have AMD APU, has a 4k OLED, and 2 sodimm slots.”
“My thinkpad t14g1 with 16gb ram somehow still relevant today.”
“did get a 10/10 from ifixit repairability score”
“the only reason the T14G7 is as repairable as it is”
“the 32gb T14 I had ad work was frankly worse performant than the little air”
“For my work bag I just bought a T14 Gen 3 i5-1250P 32GB/512GB WWAN for $370 that looks new.”
“I'm typing this on a T14 Gen 2 Ryzen 7 Pro 32GB/512GB I picked up last year for $220.”
“I bought to meet the criteria of having AV1 hwdec and upgradeable RAM”
“Super happy with the upgrade, for less than $300 mind you”
“the T14 is lighter, has much better battery life, generates less heat”
“I ended up with a T14 Gen 4 and I'm super happy with it.”
“you may be surprised by how poorly the Wi‑Fi works”
“My Thinkpad T14 G2 has S3 and it draws 0.3% per hour, pretty much in line with what Macbooks draw when sleeping.”
“I will keep my Intel Thinkpad T14 G2, The Last of the Mohicans that can.”
“You'll get a much better laptop by buying a used laptop versus buying that brand new Acer.”
“ThinkPad T14 series has the perfect keyboard that I genuinely miss”
“thinkpads are almost as upgradeable as frameworks”
“I own these and they also work great with FreeBSD”
“My buddy just bought a used ThinkPad T14 with 32GB of RAM and 1TB of storage for about $500”
“for the same price as 16G/512G would have cost at Lenovo”
“bought a $275 thinkpad T14 on ebay to use instead”
“I have a T14 that has a slower WiFi chipset than my T440p. Almost none of the benefits of PC but all of the downsides.”
“windows downloads all the needed drivers and even bios updates”
“the T14 has eaten the same ground loop and even a 48V passive PoE in an accident and dealt with it by rebooting”
“AMD, Intel and Lenovo fail to ship a fanless X13 and T14.”
“I have had excellent sleep duration with a T14 Gen4 AMD under Fedora”
“the T14 had half or fully soldered RAM for the first several gens”
“it's great to know that USB-C ports can just be replaced that easilly without soldering”
“Still getting driver and firmware updates through regular windows updates, which is neat.”
“Was a nice upgrade. The GPU sucks, which I don't need or care about, but the rest is fine.”
“Back to Debian stable on the T14 gen 3 it is...”
“while the sound is clear it's shameful how much better my wife's Macbook Air is”
“The T14 Gen 5 [0] gets a 9/10 score on ifixit.”
“it does touch the screen on regular basis when closed”
“I think T14 gen 2 has the best price/usability ratio at the moment.”
“mainboard replaced during first 6 months (cursor moving alone, with jitter, random crashes)”
“Thinkpad is faster, has more RAM (easy to get 64GB now), better keyboard.”
“T14 gen 5 is unsoldered, but gens 1 through 3 had soldered RAM, IIRC.”
“enough hardware defects that they eventually sent me a new Intel model because I had RMA'd it so many times for failures”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.