Lenovo Legion Go 2 review: The most rugged handheld yet

Lenovo seems to have a clear mission in the gaming PC stakes – it aims to be the biggest third-party brand on the market, and it knows it has to beat the likes of Asus to take that crown. When Asus goes out of its way to work with Xbox directly, that makes life difficult, of course.

Still, it’s clear that Lenovo’s approach is soft enough to keep it running, with last year’s Legion Go S (SteamOS) standing as my favorite PC I’ve ever tested. Its latest arm, Legion Go 2, is growing in strength and size. The brand will make a version of SteamOS later this year, but, for now, the only option is a Windows animal that is simple in terms of portability, but it passes where power is concerned.

I used it for two weeks to see how Legion Go 2 stacks up against the competition, and my time with it was a perfect test bed for holding a mobile game of this genre.

Price and availability

There are two different tiers of Legion Go 2 – and they have huge price differences. Whichever you choose, though, the bottom line here is £899 or $899 for the standard version with an AMD Ryzen Z2 processor. Directly from Lenovo, that version now costs £1049 at the time of writing, so prices haven’t changed a bit.

If you want the more powerful Ryzen Z2 Extreme chipset for a power boost, that version will set you back £1,300 or $1349, for a more expensive proposition.

All this comes after while you can easily order the handheld in the UK, at the time of writing things are tight in the US, where the Legion Go 2 is listed as “Available Immediately” when you buy directly with Lenovo.

Design and features

The first-generation Lenovo Legion Go has already stood out as the biggest PC gaming handheld you can pick up. It was a beast, there’s no two ways around it, and Lenovo still hasn’t unveiled its Legion Go 2.

Once again, the entire device is built around an 8.8-inch screen, and again, it’s just a beast in the hand. Compared to the Nintendo Switch 2, in particular, it feels gargantuan, a few centimeters thicker and weighs a lot more (at 930g). This has one major effect: the console may not be the best for those with small hands, and it means that its portability is a work in the eye of the beholder.

That said, one key feature is the sturdy kickstand that makes it easy to prop the Legion Go 2 up, with removable controls that ensure you can use it just like you could on the Switch 2. The latches that release those controls aren’t that slippery, though, and take some getting used to.

The console is also packed with more buttons compared to many of its competitors. Alongside the face buttons, joystick, pad and shoulder buttons, you also find two additional buttons on the back of each side of the handset, and two on the sides, on the edges.

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This means you can customize your controls in games to have more options than others, and it helps to make one controller work in its preferred mouse mode. This sees it mounted on a small stand and acts as a vertical mouse, and it’s an acquired taste – I found it awkward and uncomfortable. Also, Nintendo’s balanced mode on the Switch 2 seems to be ergonomically superior as a solution.

That said, since Legion Go 2 is, at the moment, only a Windows 11 machine, it’s great to have a full mouse when you need it (which is changed by changing the bottom of this controller on the right). You can also use a small touchpad on the same controller if you like, similar to the one on the Steam Deck.

This is the smoothest version of Windows I’ve come across on one of these handhelds, which is impressive, but not the best experience with a touchscreen alone.

That brings us to the show, which is really the star of the show. It’s an 8.8-inch 144Hz 1920 x 1200 OLED panel, and it’s frankly beautiful. It’s the best panel I’ve ever used on a laptop, as I’ll get to later, and it goes a long way to justifying the great size of the handheld. For some this will be where Nintendo’s Switch 2 missed a trick.

Under the not-so-small hood, Legion Go 2 is the most powerful version of the handheld that came before it. It comes with AMD Ryzen Z2 or Z2 Extreme, depending on the money you spend, but 32GB of RAM or whatever.

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The cheapest version comes with a 512GB SSD, but can go up to 1TB, and the Z2 Extreme version can be purchased with 1TB or 2TB of storage. That’s the only difference, though – all versions have the same screen, 74Wh battery and software on offer.

On paper this makes it the most powerful gaming handheld out there (beating the ROG Xbox Ally X from Asus by a hair), but there’s no getting around it. The design is deliberately chunky, but I can’t pretend I like it too much – it’s thick and not nearly as ergonomic as smaller models like the Legion Go S.

Likewise, the money you could shell out depending on availability is huge – north of the price of a PS5 Pro with at least one Switch 2 console thrown in for good measure. The target market may not be the same, but it’s still worth making these comparisons to draw stories.

Performance and display

So, if you’re going to charge Lenovo-sized money for something like the Legion Go 2, and hope that people can get past the complexity of its design, you’d better back things up with negligible performance.

Thankfully, that’s exactly what you get in the Legion Go 2. The version I tested packed the Z2 Extreme chipset, so it’s an expensive configuration, but its gaming power was really something special.

While it’s probably a fair assumption that most gamers considering this type of purchase already know very well how to do it in the settings menu, it’s always interesting to see how this type of mobile fares without detailed customization.

I was playing the lead Bad Need for Residents when I reviewed Legion Go 2, and loaded its Steam version I was very impressed with the results. To let the game automatically detect my hardware and choose its graphics settings, I got to play at 1080p at very low settings and a stable frame rate, and it looked absolutely stunning on the 8.8-inch display.

I was duly impressed The Requiem on Switch 2, but the performance boost in Legion Go 2 was huge, making for a sharper experience with brighter colors and better detail. If you buy a regular Steam Deck right now you can’t expect to play the latest games easily, but Legion Go 2 just let me play the big AAA releases without any problems – that’s great.

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That show can’t be talked about enough, either. It is very sharp and very bright, and having 144Hz as its ceiling means that if you play games with low power requirements, you can get the best performance out of it in a way that makes the game easier.

Another improvement from the Legion Go to the next one was in the battery department, and you get big benefits from it there. Where before Legion Go couldn’t make it past a few hours of playtesting, now you can expect to see more like three or four under the right conditions.

Of course, that may sound anemic, but there are some facts at play that mean battery life can’t be crazy yet – and having a portable power bank is probably something that portable gamers rely on regardless.

There are dozens of modes and settings that you can adjust and choose from in Lenovo Legion Space, the integrated management software that Lenovo stores its settings. This is a very slick and easy-to-launch app that lets you browse to your heart’s content, and some settings have a real impact on your battery life or performance, which is great.

Lenovo Legion Go 2 review: Verdict

Legion Go 2 is in many ways what it says on the tin. Lenovo took the formula that worked the first time around, added AMD’s next-generation silicon to the mix, and improved battery life and RAM to round out the offering.

That leaves Legion Go 2 as an absolute beast of a mobile game, and keeps it as the biggest option out there. I still have reservations about the size, which makes it a bit awkward to move around, but it will be down to personal preference.

I also can’t ignore the chunky price tag attached. For all we know, continued inflation is possible given a volatile market, too. Which might be a reason to double back and jump right in if you’re serious about buying a great handheld game right now.

However, those doubts are easy to dispel when you open up Legion Go 2, load up the flagship game title and get to play it on the best handheld display on the market, with unbelievable frame rates. If you have a big budget, why not go ahead with your mobile game?

Think again

I’m looking at Legion Go 2 and I see two other big options for many buyers. One to find another premium Windows gaming handheld out there: the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X. It also has the Z2 generation of chips at its heart, and has a very different design and other Xbox integrations, but it’s a little less powerful.

Another option is to cut your costs even further and get the Lenovo Legion Go S (SteamOS) – my favorite PC gaming handheld to this day. It’s smaller and more convenient, much cheaper, and skips some optional extras that aren’t really needed. That said, it’s also very underpowered, so it can’t do much.