Lenovo 100e 11.6" 83G80002US 2024, Intel N100, 4GB, 32GB eMMC, Graphite Gray

The Lenovo 100e Gen 4 is a rugged, lightweight Chromebook built for classrooms. It's compact and affordable, but the 4GB RAM, 32GB storage, and terrible TN display hold it back hard. Buy it only if you need a cheap, tough machine for basic schoolwork, and don't pay more than the low end of the price range.

The Intel N100 is a plucky little chip for what it is. Four cores at 0.8GHz base clock means it wakes up fast and handles Chrome tabs, Google Classroom, and video calls without much drama. But 4GB of LPDDR5 RAM is the bottleneck. Open more than a handful of tabs and you'll feel it. The 32GB eMMC storage is also rough, it's slow and fills up fast. ChromeOS leans on cloud storage, which helps, but offline work gets cramped quickly. The integrated Intel UHD Graphics are fine for streaming video and basic web games, but this thing scored 1.5 out of 100 for gaming. It's not a gaming machine and it doesn't pretend to be.

Stacked against the competition, the 100e Gen 4 is a specialist. The Apple MacBook Pro M1 Pro and ASUS Zenbook UX3405CA are in a completely different universe, they cost way more and deliver way more. The HP OmniBook X Flip and Samsung Galaxy Book4 Edge are also premium machines with OLED screens and real performance. The Dell Plus 14 is closer in spirit but still offers more storage and a better display. The 100e wins on compactness and affordability, it's in the 99th percentile for compact and 88th for affordability. But it loses on everything else. If you need a cheap, tough Chromebook for a kid, this is your pick. If you need a laptop for actual work, any of those competitors will serve you better.

Pricing is all over the place. In the US you'll find it between USD 302 and USD 438, and that USD 136 spread means you should shop around. The best US deal we're seeing is at the lower end of that range. In Europe it's even messier, EUR 520 to EUR 799 depending on the country and vendor. At the low end, this is a reasonable buy for a basic school machine. At the high end, you're paying way too much for what you get. For USD 438 or EUR 799, you can find Chromebooks with better screens, more RAM, and actual SSDs. Don't overpay for this one.

The Lenovo 100e Gen 4 is a Chromebook built for one thing: surviving a classroom. It's light at 1.23kg, has a rugged graphite gray shell, and runs ChromeOS on an Intel N100. That's a low-power quad-core chip that sips battery and handles basic web work without breaking a sweat. But the specs tell a very specific story. 4GB of RAM and 32GB of eMMC storage put this firmly in budget territory. The 11.6 inch TN display is the weakest link here, ranking dead last in our screen comparisons. If you're buying this for a student who lives in Google Docs and YouTube, it'll do the job. If you expect anything more, keep scrolling.

Skip this if you need more than a basic web machine. The 4GB RAM will frustrate anyone who multitasks, and the 32GB storage is a joke for offline files. If you want to watch movies or edit photos, the TN display will make you sad. And if you're shopping in Europe, the EUR 799 price tag is borderline offensive for these specs. Look for a Chromebook with at least 8GB RAM, 64GB storage, and an IPS display instead.

This is a classroom Chromebook, full stop. Buy it for a student who needs something light, tough, and cheap to replace when it inevitably gets dropped. The N100 handles schoolwork fine, and ChromeOS keeps things simple for IT admins and parents alike. But the 4GB RAM and 32GB storage mean it's not a machine you'll grow into. It's a machine you'll grow out of. For the right buyer at the right price, it's a solid deal. For everyone else, it's a compromise too far.