Living With an LG G7 ThinQ

Over the past couple of months, I've been using an LG G7 ThinQ as my chief phone. It'due south LG's current flagship, and the company wants it to stand out from other Android phones for its "AI features" – which include a quick manner to pull upwardly the Google Banana and several interesting features in the camera app. But in general, I've been impressed by the G7 ThinQ, for a variety of its camera and brandish features.

The G7 ThinQ is likely to well-nigh often be compared with Samsung's Galaxy S9+, which besides runs the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor and a current version of Android 8.0 Oreo. The AI features – which LG terms "ThinQ" – are meant to distinguish information technology, but the differences are subtle.

When the company introduced the phone in May, William Cho, president of LG Electronics USA, said AI was ushering in the "third age of smartphones." I'm non certain it'due south anything nearly that dramatic, only it is a very squeamish phone.

In the introduction, LG talked upwards "meaningful AI," which really emerges in the G7's "AI cam" feature that enables the camera to choose the best settings for a photograph. LG says this uses 1,000 different prototype identifiers to choose from nineteen shooting modes and four different color options.

The photographic camera setup is a chip unusual but in keeping with LG'south previous pattern. Information technology has two 16-megapixel rear-facing cameras – a standard camera with optical paradigm stabilization and f/1.6 aperture, and a broad-bending f/1.ix camera (yous can switch between the cameras easily with the bear upon of a button). With previous LG cameras such equally the G6, I've liked the way LG fabricated it easy to accept broad-angle photos, which I find are better for landscapes and for including lots of people in a shot. I continue to appreciate this on the G7.

For the most part, I establish the shots I took with the G7 to be more vibrant and have ameliorate colour balance than those I took with the S9+. In recent testing, both phones produced amend results than the iPhone 10 on my test subjects. I preferred the portrait style on the S9+, which had a better bokeh effect, to the ane on the LG G7, but generally, my results with the iPhone have been better in this surface area. The G7 also has an 8-megapixel, f/1.9 front-facing camera.

LG says it uses "pixel binning" to plough four pixels into one, which results in pictures that are 4 times brighter, and the company says the camera will automatically conform to low light. I did find that low-low-cal photography has improved compared with last year's model, but all smartphone cameras withal have a long mode to go before they can match larger cameras and sensors.

When you first open up the photographic camera app, you tin but have a picture with the default mode (which is what I did virtually of the time), or choose from three additional options—AI Cam, Portrait Manner, or Google Lens.

AI cam is designed to pick out the all-time photographic camera way for a photograph. It's an interesting idea, and i I sometimes found useful. Usually, the choices were helpful, only information technology did occasionally pick the wrong option. For things like fireworks, it did a great job, and I found the pictures to be notably better than those taken with the default options on other phones.

Google Lens analyzes things in your photos and identifies them. This characteristic, which was first introduced on the Google Pixel phones, is a great idea. It typically works to identify logos and major landmarks merely is yet a work in progress. Ideally, yous point at all sorts of specific products or buildings and meet more information on the spider web. When it works, it's bully. On the other manus, it identified the Waldorf-Astoria as Rockefeller Centre—not quite right—and when it saw a keyboard, it said it "looks like…function supplies."

For video, a comparison could be made with LG'due south V30, aimed at videographers. The G7 actually has most of the same filters and controls every bit the V30, but the specific commands are buried, then they come when the AI calls for them or if you sift through the menus. I'm not a large video creator, but the videos I took with the G7 looked good.

Google Assistant

A dedicated key on the left side of the device pulls up the Google Banana, and so you don't need to say "Ok, Google." I constitute this much more user-friendly than using the Assistant on the Samsung Galaxy S9+, designed for Samsung's ain Bixby assistant, which isn't as comprehensive. Google Assistant remains arguably the best voice assistant on the market place today, and I keep to be impressed past how easily it understands and accurately answers virtually questions.

LG has added a variety of custom device tasks, which make use of the Google Assistant to launch applications or change settings on the telephone. It's nice, only I didn't find myself using it that much.

One affair that improves the performance of the Google Assistant are updated far-field microphones, which LG claims work from 17 feet instead of only half-dozen feet away.

The Nuts

The basic design is pretty much what I'd expect from only nigh whatever telephone these days. It features a large display with a small bezel, and similar most LG phones, the fingerprint reader is conveniently located on the back of the telephone (where information technology remains easier to press than on the current Samsung phones). The G7 measures half dozen.0 by two.8 past 0.3 inches (HWD) and weighs 5.7 ounces. With a 6.one-inch, 2,880-by-1,440-pixel resolution, information technology is slightly smaller than the Galaxy S9+ (which has a 6.two-inch display). But it's bigger than the Galaxy S9, which has a 5.8-inch display. It's a bit lighter than either, but however feels quite solid. The G7 offers a diverseness of colour options, with both matte and glossy finishes; I tested a sleek blueish model.

The phone I tested included 4GB of RAM and 64GB of flash storage, with the pick to add more memory via an SD bill of fare. It felt as fast as any phone I've used, and while the battery life may not be quite as adept as the larger Galaxy S9+, I was able to get through a total day of relatively heavy apply without a trouble. Similar most flagship phones, it supports fast charging and wireless charging.

One unusual option is to select for the display to bear witness the notch on the top of the phone (as on the iPhone X), where the front-facing cameras are located; alternatively, 1 tin opt for a flat look that crops the display below the notch. I'd rather have as much screen real estate as possible, so I've been using the notched version, but that's a personal preference, and it certainly doesn't hurt to accept choices.

The display is an IPS LCD display, which LG terms "Super Bright." LG adds a white pixel to the traditional RGB combination, and the company says the phone shines up to thousand nits, making it brighter than competing designs. Even in vivid sunlight, information technology seemed to match the best OLED displays for readability.

The display has a nineteen.5:9 attribute ratio, which I found worked well for vertical viewing, as y'all tin can easily encounter 2 applications running side past side. The brandish besides works well for viewing videos in a horizontal format, though every bit with all of today'south displays, you volition see black bars on the sides of many videos.

For sound, the G7 features DTS-10 and a 32-bit High-Fi QUAD DAC, and LG says it offers a 39 percent louder speaker than previous models, with powerful bass. I've been impressed by the improvements in speakers on all of the new phones lately (given their small sizes), but the G7 did seem louder. On the other hand, I mostly listen to music on my telephone via earbuds, and the G7 includes a standard 3.5mm audio jack.

LG has promised "continuous upgrades," which are designed to bring new capabilities to the phone. 1 that has already been added is support for Google Lens. It's an interesting idea, though time will tell. Equally part of the long-term vision, LG volition extend the telephone'due south warranty to two years upon registration.

Overall, the G7 ThinQ has slap-up hardware – a fast processor, attractive brandish, and a camera that can stand upward against whatsoever phone in the market. But it'due south how like shooting fish in a barrel it is to use many of the phone's novel features – Google Assistant, and the AI features on the camera – that make this model stand out from the other flagship Android phones.