LG Gram Max Touchscreen Laptop Model 17Z90UB-H.AU99U3 (2026 Release) Review

LG Gram Max Touchscreen Laptop Model 17Z90UB-H.AU99U3 (2026 Release) Review

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Takeaway: Powerful, lightweight, and durable laptop, perfect for back to school, work, and play.

Thank you to Best Buy for sending me this product for free to try. You’ll receive a pocket-size 65 Watt USB-C power adapter, 6-ft USB-C to USB-C cable, and instruction manuals. The laptop measures 15” wide, 10.5” long, and just 0.5” thick with a slight taper towards the front. On the right-hand side are two USB-A 3.2 ports and headphone/mic combo port and on the other side you’ll find an HDMI 2.1 port and two USB-C 4 Thunderbolt ports that both support DisplayPort out and double as power input. There are no ports or vents along the back side.

On the bottom there is a full-length vent towards the back and 5 rubber feet with two additional lift points for added support. The downward-facing speakers towards the front support Dolby Atmos 3D Surround Sound for virtualized 360° audio. There are no visible screws anywhere on the unit, as the ones holding on the bottom panel are hidden beneath the rubber feet. That being said, it is possible to open up the laptop if you want to upgrade the included 1TB SSD or add additional storage since there is a second, unoccupied M.2 slot inside. The RAM, however, is soldered to the motherboard and not upgradable.

The chassis of the laptop is made from an aluminum metal alloy, dubbed ""Aerominum"" by LG, that is durable and has a high-end look with its matte bronze finish and chrome embossed brand on the cover. The laptop is incredibly light, weighing less than 3.5 lbs, but still manages to be mil-spec 810H rated for resilience under extreme conditions. The small 65W wall charger can be plugged into either USB-C port for charging the laptop, though I think it would have made more sense to put them on opposite sides rather than adjacent to one another.

The screen opens to a maximum angle of around 135° and at the top in the middle is an integrated 2.1 MP webcam and dual-array microphone. The full-sized keyboard has ultra low-profile keys, a numpad on the right hand side, and half-size arrow keys below the right-hand shift. There’s also a dedicated Co-pilot key in place of a right-side control. The mouse trackpad is very large with a 6 x 4 inch area and it is responsive to multi-finger clicks and gestures like pinch-to-zoom and 3-finger swiping.
I felt the keys had too mushy of a feel when pressed despite a higher-than-expected actuation force. This combination made typing somewhat more tedious for me resulting in reduced speed and accuracy. I do like though that you can toggle on backlighting for the keys with two brightness levels making them easier to see in the dark. Just remember that they dim after 30 seconds of inactivity.

This particular build is the 17Z90UB-H.AU99U3and has an Intel Core Ultra X9 388H CPU, 1 TB of SSD storage, 32 GB RAM, integrated Intel Arc B390 graphics, an IPS touch display, and the battery is rated to upwards of 26 hours of run time. The laptop runs on a 77 Wh battery that uses AI-driven power management, and I found between 8-9 hours was a more realistic expectation for my usage habits that include video content creation, watching videos, and casual gaming.

The power button is located at the top right hand corner of the keyboard and has a status LED next to it. The first time you power it on you will need to complete Windows setup. As there is not Ethernet port for wired connections, you’ll need to connect to a WiFi network for internet access, and the device supports up to the latest WiFi 7 standard for fast, reliable, and stable network connections. During setup, I chose to enable face sign-in via Windows Hello which uses the webcam to detect your face so you don’ t need to enter your PIN or password to log in, although these are always available as backup methods of entry.

The screen has a max resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels with a fixed 60 Hz refresh rate, and 8-bit color that covers 99% of the DCI-P3 color gamut. This makes the panel suitable for creators in art, photography, and video content creation, and I found the colors on the screen to be accurate and vibrant with good contrast. I especially appreciate how dark the blacks appear despite the screen not being OLED. The display is glossy, however, so reflections and fingerprints may be visible on it. It has a max brightness of 350 nits which is still decently bright when set at 80% to prolong battery life.

After setup, approximately 731 GB of the 1 TB SSD storage space was free. The processor has a 2.1 GHz base clock with max boost speed of 5.1 GHz over 16 intelligent cores delivering power and performance while keeping power consumption low. It handled exporting 4K video from Adobe Premiere just fine with speed and efficiency, and multi-tasking with various applications running simultaneously didn’t bog down the system. The Bluetooth 6.0 adapter has lower latency than previous standards for less audio lag, better stability and syncing, and channel sounding for near pinpoint accuracy of device location tracking, all while consuming less energy to extend battery life.

The integrated graphics has impressive performance similar to a lower-tier dedicated GPU. Although, the refresh rate of the panel is fixed at 60 Hz, I was still able to play games like Halo Infinite and CS2 at full-resolution and get 60-75 fps with medium to high graphics settings and AI frame interpolation. I didn’t experience any performance issues like stuttering, lag, or dropped frames, even while on battery power.

When set to Max performance in LG’s “My gram,” the fans ran continuously while under load to keep the unit cool and did make a decent amount of noise. Most of the heat generated is concentrated above the keyboard deck, so the actual keys remain cool to the touch. In the My gram application, you can change settings like the cooling mode, enable features like Away From Keyboard screen locking, and even USB-C Offline charging which lets you charge devices even when the laptop is turned off. There’s optional AI features that can enhance mic and speaker sound quality via noise cancelling, smart EQ and voice tracking.

The speaker sound is just okay, and while you do get a sense of stereo separation and a little depth, the sound stage is fairly small and boxed in. They are loud enough to drown out much of the fan noise though which will typically be running at full speed while gaming. Music can still sound a bit thin in the upper ranges without much bass support. I felt the volume levels were also somewhat low even at the highest setting which also produced noticeable distortion. You’ll have a much richer and fuller listening experience using headphones.

I tested out LG’s on-device gram chat AI which is supposed to be able to help with device specific tasks like offline file searching, adjusting system settings, translating and summarizing documents, and browsing computer usage history. A handful of sample prompts are provided. And when I asked the AI how many megapixels the webcam had, but when I tried to ask questions about the system like how many megapixels the webcam had, it produced an answer that wasn’t accurate. It seems gram chat’s ability to recognize simple prompts unreliable if not within a narrow instruction set, making its usability and convenience fairly limited.

Overall, the LG gram Max is an excellent large format laptop, delivering plenty of power in a lightweight but durable machine that looks as good as it functions. I love it for daily and on-the-go use as I can seamlessly transition from work to casual use or gaming with long-lasting battery performance that lasts all day.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. #CommissionsEarned
Buy it at Amazon: LG Gram Max Touchscreen Laptop Model 17Z90UB-H.AU99U3 (2026 Release) [Affiliate Link]