LG released two new smartphones this year, and both of them are gorgeous, trendy flagships. The LG G6 was announced back in March, while the V30 became available in U.S. markets only a month ago.
T-Mobile was kind enough to send me a new V30 unit to test with their 600 Mhz LTE band. Since I’m a picky critic, it’s important to document my initial reactions and experiences before conducting a more in-depth review. After all, they say first impressions are everything.
LG packaged this smartphone beautifully, as one should expect every flagship to be these days. Inside the box is a basic array of accessories, including a fast-charging USB-C brick, SIM ejection tool, and instruction manual. Immediately, I became disappointed to see no headphones are included, stirring a similar emotion with last year’s OG Google Pixel. For a phone that retails at $850, that’s disappointing. But let’s move on.
The device itself is pretty attractive, yet there are a few minor drawbacks. Gorilla glass covers the front and back, and helps to make fingerprint smudges stick out like… a sore thumb? A thin band of metal keeps everything secure, sitting flush against the glass. The headphone jack rests at the top, which I personally consider inconvenient, but I guess other folks are into that sort of thing. The camera bump is barely noticeable, and I’m thankful the fingerprint sensor/power button is ergonomically positioned. Well done, LG.
In terms of features, this phone has it all. Like, really. Not messing around, the V30 debuts an IP68 water-resistance and still boasts a headphone jack (ahem, Silicon Valley). It also features a MIL-STD 810 G military durability rating, in case you need that on your daily driver. LG squeezed in wireless charging, fast charging, and a fairly hefty 3300 mAh battery. Oh, and it also has expandable storage.
I don’t find the screen to be obnoxious, whatsoever. Maybe I’m blind, but I think it is a pleasant experience. Setting the display resolution to 2K makes text and images even more palatable. I guess I’m also fortunate enough to not get burn-in, and an OTA update causes the always-on display clock to continually change positions. Overall, except for a lot of blue tint, the screen looks quite decent.
The boot-up time is nothing special, and the speed of the processor seems to be a bit lackluster. I think this is the slowest phone to boast a Snapdragon 835 quad-core CPU, and that’s after I turned Developer Option scales to 0.5x. Opening, switching, and multitasking apps is a chore. You know what else was surprisingly painstakingly slow? The camera.
I’m astonished to find this camera to be the worst I’ve experienced on a flagship in years. Most reviews praised these dual-sensor rear snappers. Some said it performs the best in low-light, others said video modes are comparable to cinematic movies. I’ll be honest: if T-Mo hadn’t sent this device to me, I would have regretted spending more than $400 for a flagship with a camera as bad as the V30. Images I took were blurry, dark, over-exposed, distorted, and underwhelming. And I used a tripod. I simply stopped taking pictures of my 10-week old and had my wife hurry to catch any memorable moments on her Pixel 2. Let’s agree to simply not talk about the front-facing selfie cam.
LG didn’t make the visual software interface too horrible, but bloatware is rampant. Many apps cannot be disabled, but at least I can hide them with the LG launcher. And fortunately, there are several different launcher skins available, because the one out of the box is blow-your-mind ugly. A 6” 18:9 display, and it only supports four apps wide!
Battery life is good, possibly great. I’m a power user, so even a car battery won’t get me through the day. But as far as smartphones are concerned, even at maxed resolution, I can go about five or so non-stop hours before flatlining.
In conclusion, I haven’t used the device for many months or years, so things could definitely get worse (or better, with updates). So here is a summary of my overall first impressions of the LG V30: The phone has all the necessary features to compel a specs enthusiast to fork over the big bucks, but the real world performance is just meh. The durability and battery make for a positive experience. But the cons include sluggish multitasking, dismal photography, and a host of annoying apps. And those are problems my Google Pixel 2 has never known.
Photos: The Verge
