LG G7 ThinQ – Review & Impressions!

LG’s line-up of smartphones is often left behind because people do not realize the potential of their devices as a whole. In an example, last year the LG V30 did not manage to sell as expected and it is because people did not understand how good it was, which makes them go to the other top-selling phones – it’s all publicity at the end of the day.

However, the new LG G7 ThinQ has a lot of similarities like the V30, in my opinion, and I think that it should get some more recognition. Not only is LG making perfectly good devices, but they are trying things that are somehow different from the plans of other companies, which is something I really admire and think that it should be appreciated by a bigger audience.

The LG G7 is expected to be released at the second quarter of 2018 (~850 Euro), meaning that it should be really soon, so I think that it is my job to offer you a more in-depth review, meaning you should know whether it will be the most suitable device for you, or it is contrary to what you want. Tons of YouTubers have already released videos that shed light on the device looks, performance, specs, and overall opinion on it.

Marques Brownlee released a nice video a few days ago, in which he perfectly described all the important points of the new smartphone, so I think that it is a must-see video, if you are into consideration of getting the G7 ThinQ. Of course, getting a new smartphone is a big step, because some people do it once in 3-4 years, so read & inspect things carefully, before making a choice that you will later regret!

Design

When it comes to design, I think that it is one of the best models out there currently! The LG G7 ThinQ is only 7.9mm thick, and weights 162grams as a whole, which is really close to the V30 from last year, which had 7.3mm thickness & a weight of 158grams. Both phones look aesthetically perfect, and it is clear that they’ve been made to be of top-end quality, which LG perfectly managed to do!

On the front, you can see the beautiful 6.1″ IPS LCD display, with the incredibly thin bezel on the side, making it look even bigger than 6 inches. Right above it is the notch, that is something quite often seen in smartphones nowadays and I actually have some mixed feelings about it. Of course, there are options about the notch, that I will get more detailed about in just a few lines.

Tell me, don’t you think that it has a lot of similarities with the Samsung S8/S9 on the front and sides? The main difference between both is in the notch and edge display, but it could be just me who thinks so, I don’t know… However, moving on to the back is where the uniquity of LG is being shown the most! Once again, I will say that it is like a twin to the V30 from last year.

No, really – they are more than identical, and I think that they’re following some steps from Samsung for sure. On the V30 the dual-camera was positioned sideways and on the G7 it was moved vertically. The fingerprint is on the same spot, just below the camera, and the model logo is below the fingerprint, with the LG logo at the bottom-center of the back panel.

Why am I saying that they’re following the steps of Samsung? Because we all know what they did as a difference between the S8 and S9 model – they kept the design somehow the same, with some slight difference. The biggest one was that they moved the fingerprint below the camera instead of keeping it on the side of the lens, and LG did the same thing but with the camera – they changed it by putting the camera from horizontal, to vertical positioning.

Moving to the sides is where something interesting happens. It has been fully made out of aluminum, which contrasts perfectly with the glass front/back and we can again see some similarities with the Samsung S-series. But that’s not the “something interesting” part that I’ve wanted to point out, but we can see that there is some major change in the alignment of the buttons.

In this LG G7 ThinQ model, the company decided to put not only the volume-control buttons (left side) but this time they’ve decided to put an actual power-button, which is the only button that you can see on the right side of the device. The interesting thing happens below the volume-control buttons, and it is visible that they’ve added another button, that is a specially added button for the Google Assistant feature.

I haven’t seen it in another device and I think that it is way better than Bixby, so if I had the chance to use the G7, I would definitely make an awesome use out of that dedicated Google Assistant button! The bad thing about it is that LG decided to make it fully dedicated to the assistant, and as the Samsung, they’ve disabled the idea to make it mappable for other apps…

Camera & the Notch

The Notch is what makes the LG G7 stand out but I don’t know how to feel about it. Not only isn’t it fully supported by all apps, but it is somehow strange to me. Why doing such a thing just to save up some millimeters of bezel? It looks both cool and weird, but I don’t think that I’ll ever go with it. If you think like me, you can disable the notch from the settings menu, by filling up space on the left/right side of it with black, making it look like an actual normal bezel. If you like the Notch and want to get fancy, you can also change the colors on the side and make it like a gradient effect or something similar.

The camera went under some changes, but the major change is on the way it has been positioned. The V30 had a main camera of 16MP, with the ability to record video at 2160p., and the same thing happens with the G7. The lens and aperture are a bit different – the G7 has f/1.6, OIS, laser & PDAF technology. You can find the main difference in the camera between the G7 & V30 in the front selfie camera. They upgraded it from 13MP to 16MP and kept the aperture the same – f/1.9.

Performance & Hardware

When it comes to hardware and the overall performance of the device, it is the aspect that actually rocks the most out of the whole smartphone, which is really important when getting a new phone. None of us would like to have a perfectly looking device, which on the inside has been built like a microwave and is slower than a 2004 Nokia.

In order to make things run smoothly, LG upgraded the processor by adding Snapdragon 845 and kept the internal storage capacity of 128GB (6GB RAM) and the other version of 64GB (4GB RAM). I think that both versions have more than enough storage capacity, but if you think that you need more, then you can upgrade it with a microSD card up to 400GB (one card in microSD slot and one memory card on the place of the SIM2 slot) and make it like a portable hard-drive smartphone.

Combining the storage capacity, camera specs & options, and the pure display, it will be one of the best devices that you can get when going on an adventure that you’d like to capture! Not only can you capture it with photos, but you can record hours long videos – the capacity will be enough, but make sure that you carry a portable battery pack with you!

The display is, as I’ve already said, 6.1-inch big IPS LCD with a resolution of 1440 x 3120 pixels (averagely 560 ppi). It has been covered with Gorilla Glass 5 technology, meaning that it should manage to survive a fall from an average height, but most importantly – it won’t easily scratch and it has an IP68 certificate. The IP68 means that it could stay in water (non-salt) for 30 minutes at depth of up to 1.5meters.

LG did everything perfectly, but I think that they could’ve done better with the battery. It is a 3000mAh battery that should manage to withstand a whole day of average use, but I am sure that they could have done better when it comes to this…

Special thanks to:

Marques Brownlee YouTube channel – video for LG G7 ThinQ Impressions!