Lenovo Idea Tab Plus Review: Great Deal or Big Mistake?

In our review of the Lenovo Idea Tab Plus, we found one huge weakness — but also a major highlight. That’s why for some, this could be the perfect tablet. For others, a big disappointment. Stick around until the end, because we’ll tell you whether you should go for the Idea Tab Plus or its biggest rival, the Xiaomi Redmi Pad 2 Pro.

Hardware and Performance

The Lenovo Idea Tab Plus packs a Mediatek Dimensity 6400 processor, which is paired with 8GB or 12 GB of RAM and 128GB or 256GB of UFS 2.2 storage. If you want, you can also expand it by up to 2 TB using a microSD card. 

In our benchmarks, we quickly see that the Dimensity 6400 isn’t that great performance-wise. The results in the Geekbench 6 test are virtually identical to those of the Dimensity 6300 in the regular Lenovo Idea Tab, which is a lot cheaper. And the Redmi Pad 2 Pro is more than twice as fast in pretty much all benchmarks.

In normal, everyday use, it’s responsive enough, and if you’re just browsing, watching YouTube and Netflix, you won’t notice the poor performance.

But unfortunately, our gaming tests reflect the benchmarks. Fortnite isn’t much fun on the Lenovo. At the lowest settings, you can only select 30 FPS, but those are rarely achieved in reality. We mostly got around 15 to 20 FPS. That’s not really playable. On the other hand, on the Redmi Pad 2 Pro, Fortnite runs at up to 120FPS at low settings, so it’s a significantly better gaming tablet.

Of course, Fortnite is a very demanding game, but you can always play lighter games, of course. That even includes Call of Duty: Mobile, which doesn’t look perfect but runs surprisingly well and is fun to play on the Idea Tab Plus.

Display and Speakers

While gaming is a major weakness for the Idea Tab Plus, the screen is a big highlight. We get a 12.1-inch IPS display with a resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels. It supports 90 Hz and achieves a typical brightness of 600 nits, and up to 800 nits for HDR content.

In practice, that means the Lenovo’s display is very bright, and when viewing from the side, it shows significantly better viewing angle stability than the Redmi Pad 2 Pro. It also remains easy to read in direct sunlight.

The Lenovo’s display even looks a bit brighter even when viewed from an angle.

In our comparison with the Redmi Pad 2 Pro, the Lenovo’s display is a bit brighter when viewed at an angle. In fact, in HDR videos, the Lenovo’s colors are far richer with much greater brightness. For example a bright red cherry on the Redmi appears brown.

As another comparison, it fares really well against the Honor Pad 10. Sadly the Honor isn’t available in the US but it’s great alternative if you live in the UK, Europe or Asia.

If you want a really good display for under $250, the Idea Tab Plus is a fantastic choice. Especially if you want to read magazines and comics.

The display is also great for Netflix and YouTube, of course. But we wish it had better speakers. The sound quality is fine, but Xiaomi and Honor offer better speakers in the same price range.

Design and Build Quality

In terms of design and build quality, at just 1.16 pounds (530g) and with a thickness of 6.29mm (about a quarter of an inch), the Idea Tab Plus feels pleasantly light and slim. The build quality is excellent and clearly stands out from virtually all competitors in this price range. The body feels sturdy and is more reminiscent of a premium tablet.

Lenovo gives the device an IP52 certification, which at least offers protection against dust and dripping water. It’s not a tablet for the beach or heavy rain, but it’s prepared for everyday life.

In terms of connectivity, it’s simple: there’s a USB-C 2.0 port and a microSD card slot. Unfortunately, the USB port doesn’t support video output, so external monitors can’t be connected. A fingerprint reader is also missing.

On the front, we get an 8-megapixel webcam, and on the back, a 13-megapixel main camera, and the quality of both is solid for this price range.

Software

The Lenovo Idea Tab Plus ships with Android 15—so not the very latest version, but still okay. We love that Lenovo pre-installs almost no bloatware. The operating system is lean and looks clean.

Lenovo promises two major Android updates up to Android 17 as well as four years of security updates. That’s okay for this price range, but not perfect at all.

Stylus and Keyboard

We think it’s great that the stylus is included, so you don’t have to buy it separately. But if you’re looking for a drawing or notetaking tablet, we can’t recommend the Idea Tab Plus. The stylus is good for occasional doodling or for children’s drawings. However, it isn’t precise enough for serious use.

If you want the cheapest possible tablet with a good stylus, we recommend the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Lite. The stylus is rarely ever good with cheaper devices, unfortunately.

Lenovo also offers a keyboard, which we’ve already taken a closer look at at IFA a couple of months ago. It appears to be solidly built and allows for fluid typing, but it strongly resembles the keyboards from the Honor Pad 10 and Redmi Pad 2 Pro. Just like those, it lacks a touchpad and can only be set up at one angle.

So, the keyboard is alright, and, as we said, the competitors’ ones are virtually identical.

Battery Life

Inside sits a 10.200 mAh battery. In our standardized battery test, in which we run an HD YouTube video on a loop at maximum brightness, it achieves a runtime of 6.85 hours.

That’s not the best score ever, but it’s certainly acceptable, especially considering the high display brightness. The battery still lasts longer than the iPad 11, even though its display is dimmer.

Lenovo Idea Tab Plus Review: Final Verdict

The Lenovo Idea Tab Plus leaves us with a mixed score. The build quality is great, the display is bright and has high contrast and the software is nice and bloat-free. 

The major weakness, however, remains performance. Anyone who enjoys playing demanding games or is looking for a particularly powerful tablet will be disappointed here. The significantly faster Redmi Pad 2 Pro shows what’s possible in this price range.

We’d love to see a mix of the outstanding display of the Idea Tab Plus and the excellent performance of the Redmi Pad 2 Pro. But as it stands, you’ve got to decide what’s more important to you: gaming performance or the display.

For us, the Idea Tab Plus is best if you’re looking for a tablet for reading, comics and magazines, and surfing the web.

And as of writing this, it’s not clear if the Xiaomi competitor will be released in the US. And the price of the Idea Tab has dropped from $300 to $220 already, which makes it quite a nice deal.

If you want a tablet that’s a bit better in pretty much everything, make sure to check out our review of the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Lite. It has a better performance, better pen, better keyboard option, and much much longer updates.