LG’s latest flagship phone is finally here. LG calls it the LG G7 ThinQ. It’s a bit odd as to why LG added “ThinQ” to the name as many will still know it as the G7. Does it stand out? Not really. But it packs some impressive specifications the latest most powerful phones carry. Of course it’s LG. Any one can expect a powerful device to stand in the lead with offerings from top manufacturers like Samsung, Apple, Huawei and more. One feature that was unexpected at the very first was the display notch which eventually made it in many leaks. Such was first seen in the Essential Phone but later trended more with the iPhone X, we saw it in Huawei’s P20 phones and LG’s notch undoubtedly takes a leaf from Apple’s iPhone X notch as well.
The LG G7 takes the resembleness of the resent LG V30, with glass back and aluminum on the rails. It has a total of four buttons around it, the power button on the right while held facing the display, and three buttons on the right. Volume rockers are close to each other while the button below them is a new one in LG phones. It’s the Google Assistant button used to launch Google’s Voice Assistant right from sleep or on any screen.
We’ve seen similar in new Samsung phones that come with the Bixby button and of course in the Google Pixel phones that come the same exact button. This button on the LG G7 is currently not remapable so you can’t assign any other action to it.
On the back of the G7 we see two camera modules placed in vertical form. Both are 16 megapixel cameras with f/1.6 aperture and the bottom one a wide angle lens common within LG phones that come with two modules. Other manufacturers have gone with a secondary telephoto lens but LG sticks with wide angle in it’s second lens, perhaps something LG users still prefer.
The fingerprint sensor is located right beneath the camera modules.
On the front is a large 6.1 inch 3120 by 1440 IPS display with a notch. It is capable of going so bright outdoors something expected of good IPS LCD displays.
On the inside, the G7 ThinQ is powered by the latest most powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor with 4GB RAM and juiced by a 3000mAh battery. The software is LG’s own skin on top of Android 8.0 Oreo. Any LG phone user will feel right at home with the software. It’s also not that different from Samsung’s Touchwiz software. The software packs a lot of features, some handy and others gimmicky.
LG also offers an option within software to hide the notch in case the user doesn’t want to have it visible on the top. The notch can also be decorated with different accent colors.
Artificial Intelligence is one other thing that many manufacturers today are highlighting and so does LG with it’s new G7. There is definitely and element of AI especially within the camera app that adjusts color variations in the photo being taken when it detects the object that is being taken. This was very common in Huawei’s recently released devices. It’s unclear though if people are really ready for this or will actually like their photos adjusted instead of taking the photo of the object raw as it may look.
The phone is also IP68 certified water resistant and comes with a headphone jack many manufacturers today are getting rid of. Definitely a huge welcome to many users that appreciate good audio output. It also comes with a memory card expansion slot for storage expansion.
Conclusion:
The LG G7 is definitely a powerful device but in all that it packs, nothing really makes it stand out from the pack especially when many manufacturers like Huawei that use Android have already done what LG is presenting like the display notch and AI implementation when taking photos.
