Lenovo's New Laptop Concept Can Swivel the Screen From Landscape to Portrait

"Lenovo isn't shy about trying new things. Last year, the PC maker teased a concept laptop with a transparent screen. Earlier this year, the ThinkBook Flip concept employed a flexible OLED display that folded over the top of the laptop lid, ready to flip up whenever you needed the extra screen space. At CES 2025, we saw a ThinkBook with a rollable OLED screen that expanded upward automatically at the touch of a button-this one is a real product you can actually buy."

"The back panel the screen is mounted on has a felt backing to keep everything smooth and scratch-free, and you can even prop a phone up here in this orientation. There's a mechanism inside that manages the motion and keeps it operating smoothly. Despite this, the PC is still fairly slim at 17.9 mm, and it weighs roughly 3 pounds. (The 14-inch MacBook Pro is around 15 mm thick and weighs 3.4 pounds.)"

"I use a dual-screen setup with one vertical monitor next to my main ultrawide monitor at home. Having a vertical screen is a game-changer, as it's perfect for applications that utilize more vertical space. Email is a great example, so are apps like Slack, anything to do with PDFs, and even most word processing software. But I've yet to change my screen orientation in the middle of a workflow."

Lenovo introduced the ThinkBook VertiFlex, a 14-inch laptop whose display manually swivels from a standard horizontal orientation into a vertical portrait mode. The display consists of a second layer that juts out and rotates when the user pushes the corner. The rear panel features felt backing to prevent scratches and to support a prop for a phone. An internal mechanism guides the motion for smooth operation. The chassis measures about 17.9 mm thick and weighs roughly 3 pounds. The design targets workflows that benefit from extra vertical space such as email, Slack, PDFs, and word processing.

Read at WIRED