The LG G6: Built like a tank!

LG has built some amazing smartphones in the past, starting from the NEXUS 5 and the beautiful G series that is still awesome till date. The 2017 flagship by LG is the best smartphone ever made by the company and is pretty durable as per the videos posted by many tech youtubers. The G6 looks classy and with minimum bezzels and a huge screen in a small body. LG has even included dual rear cameras as the V10 and the V20. 

 The LG G4 was all plastic. The LG G5 was all metal but oddly felt like plastic. Unlike its predecessor the G6 is carved out of corning gorilla glass 5 and metal and is pretty solid at the rear. The screen is covered by a corning gorilla glass 3 though. While Gorilla Glass 5 has been designed to survive extreme drop stress, Gorilla Glass 3 focuses largely on scratch-resistance. 

 The G6 is built to last long with bending resistant materials and shock-dispersing design, according to LG. It has passed Military-grade MIL-STD 810G tests which include 26 different angle drop tests from chest height, it claims. It's quite reassuring, the G6. While its closest rival, the Samsung Galaxy S8 takes great pride in its gorgeous curves, the G6 takes a flat minimalist approach. LG's phone is as flat as they come, and also it has sharp corners that are a little raised out so the phone could bear accidental drops and come out unscathed. Samsung's Galaxy S8 doesn't look like it could take a beating. LG's phone is a lot more practical in comparison. Button placement on-board the G6 is trademark LG. The power button is on the back. It's also a fingerprint reader. It's mostly fast and mostly accurate but there's room for improvement.

 The LG G6 is powered by a 2.35GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor clubbed with 4GB RAM and 64GB internal memory which is further expandable by up to 256GB via a hybrid micro-SD card slot. While not exactly next-gen, the Snapdragon 821 inside the G6 when combined with LG's Android 7.0 Nougat-based UX 6.0, doesn't leave a lot to be desired unless of course you're someone who's hard pressed about paper specs and say, "a Snapdragon 835 would have been nicer." You're better off buying the Samsung Galaxy S8 in that case. The LG G6 isn't the one for you.

 LG's UX software may not be the best looking in the business -- in fact it's ugly and cluttered -- but at least it's well optimised with the available hardware. It's smooth sailing 9 out of 10 times, but, if Samsung could design a whole new level of user experience for the Galaxy S8, I don't see why LG can't. It's high time that it should. And maybe get rid of some bloat or unwanted apps along the way as well.

 The 3,300mAh battery inside the G6 is a significant improvement over the outgoing G5. Battery life is better, nay much better in comparison. It lasts longer than the Samsung Galaxy S8 which frankly speaking has pretty disappointing battery life. Most users with a more generalised usage should get at least one full day of usage on single charge. The G6, needless to say, also supports fast charging. The India model, doesn't support wireless charging though.

 The LG G6 comes with a dual camera system on the rear, consisting of two 13-megapixel sensors -- offering a 125-degree wide angle -- with one working 'specifically' to offer the wider field of view. The rear camera system is further assisted with f/1.8 aperture, 3-axis Optical Image Stabilisation, phase detection auto-focus and dual-LED flash. On the front, the G6 sports a 5-megapixel camera with f/2.2 aperture.

In the LG G6, while one of the rear cameras has what you can call a regular lens, the other one has a wider lens. A wider lens means the phone's rear snapper can cover a larger area with a distinct fish-eye effect on the edges. It kind of gives you a 3D-like panorama sweep of what you're clicking without having you to move your phone in a certain manner. It shouldn't be confused with an actual panorama shot though.

Switching between the two lenses happens seamlessly with just a tap on a toggle that rests comfortably on the screen all the while that you have the camera app up and running. It's actually quite fast to switch and is as fast to focus and shoot. In fact you never lose a breath while switching between the two lenses which makes the G6 all the more fun to play around with. Every time I took a regular picture, I made sure to click the same shot again with the wider lens just to see how things looked from a wider perspective.

As for image quality, it's fantastic especially in good light. Both the rear cameras boast of excellent dynamic range. Images clicked with them have no visible metering issues so that level of detail stays put on almost all occasions. The image quality of the wider lens toting camera is more or less in the same league as the regular, but it more than compensates for its hit-or-miss performance courtesy its wider scope.

The USP of the G6 is apparently its 'big screen that fits.' The phone comes with ridiculously slim bezels allowing the display to take up over 80 per cent of its front side: a concept also seen in Samsung's Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+. The Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+ are however a lot more curvier in comparison, and also they offer more screen-to-body ratio -- an 83 per cent -- than LG's phone.

The 5.7-inch QHD+ 18:9 Full Vision display of the G6 boasts of a 2,880x1,400 pixel resolution. Although there's lots of screen it's no match for the Galaxy S8's super-punchy Super AMOLED display panel. Colours on-board the G6 appear muted in comparison. But, viewing angels are quite good, so is peak brightness.

The G6, however, has one ace up its sleeve in the display department. It is the world's first smartphone to support Dolby Vision (and HDR 10) for enhanced videos, a feature which was until now limited to high-end TVs.

Should you buy it?

The G6 is LG's best phone ever. In fact, it's safe to say, that it's among the best flagship Android phones in the market right now. It may not look as good as Samsung's Galaxy S8, but, that's not really what LG's phone is going after.