LG has revealed its latest flagship smartphone handset at the 2016 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
The G5 is being noted for its modular build, something the company hopes will make it stand out against key rivals such as the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the new iPhone, which is set to be revealed this September.
Full details of the phone are out and the first hands-on impressions are in. So what's LG's latest phone like?
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Design
The G5 moves on from the LG handsets of old by introducing a metal unibody design over the plastic chassis' used in previous generations.
The overall shape has morphed, too, losing much of the sculpting seen on previous handsets. With bevelled glass on the front, a reworked back and a curve at the top of the display, as well as the movement of some key buttons, it's eye-catching, sleek, and "an impressive piece of design", says Wired.
Grabbing most headlines is the modular nature of the phone, though. Pressing a small button releases the bottom section connected to the battery and from this, different peripherals, which LG is calling "Friends" accessories, can be connected to the phone.
Display
A 5.3ins QHD display - slightly smaller than the outgoing G4's screen, which measured 5.5ins – offers a pixel density of 544ppi and a resolution of 2560x1440.
Much like the Samsung Galaxy S7, the G5 has an "always on" feature for quick access to key information such as the date, time, and notifications – a feature the company claims will actually save battery power. Toggling the feature will only burn through 0.8 per cent of the energy supply per hour while the phone is left alone.
Camera
Know Your Mobile says LG has introduced a serious bunch of upgrades for the G5's camera. There are two sensors on the back – One has 75° field of view (FoV) and 16 megapixel sensor; the other a much wider, 135° FoV and eight megapixel sensor. The captured images can be merged or toggled to be used separately and a wide angle option should be ideally suited for those times when a bigger, wider picture is needed. LG has also brought in new software for real-time photo and video-editing.
Hardware
The G5 uses the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 octo-core chipset mated to 4GB of RAM and boasts 32GB of storage alongside a micro SD card slot for expansion, which is more or less run of the mill for phones in this range.
The battery capacity is 2800mAh , but users can swap them out and use the modular system to mate "Friends" accessories to the phone, offering some flexibility.
A fingerprint scanner sits on the back of the handset and there's a USB Type-C port and quick-charge 3.0 capabilities, although there's no wireless charging.
Software
As the G5 ships with its own, doctored version of Android Marshmallow 6.0, there are small changes to the user interface and navigation, such as the app drawer being replaced with an iPhone-like set of icons – although users can still make folders if they wish.
There has also been some tinkering to optimise support for the range of G5 accessories that will be offered, with a "Manager" app to take care of external devices and dockables.
Price date and release
Neither price nor release date has been announced yet, but Alphr says if LG gets it right, the new smartphone "could be a contender" this year.
The company themselves hinted the phone would be launched in key markets such as the US, Europe and Korea come early April.
As for the price, Recombu has scouted around and found that retailer mobilefun.co.uk has already listed the G5 on their website, with a tag of £499.99.
https://recombu.com/mobile/article/lg-g5-price-release-date-uk-networks
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