For quite some time, LG has been struggling to rejoin the big names in the industry, but 2013 was a great year for the company. What happened was that LG released the G2 high-end smartphone in the second half of the year, overshadowing most of its rivals in terms of specs. However, there was more to the G2 than an imposing specs sheet, as the G2 also proved to be quite innovative in the design department. With a remarkable screen-to-size ratio and an off-beat key positioning on the back, the G2 delivered a breath of fresh air to the market. Needless to say, the handset was well-received, and it paved the way for something even bigger that was to happen this year.
Enter the G3 – LG's all-out attack on the Android universe that will employ all the available resources and technology in order to make a dent in the industry. That's not to say that it's going to have an easy time doing it. Phones like the Galaxy S5, One (M8), and Xperia Z2 certainly are a truly fearsome bunch, but it seems like the LG G3 has all the needed guns in order to deal with the threat. Quad HD screen? Check. Enormous screen without an enormous body size? Check. No-compromise specs sheet? Check. Elegant design? Check. Is this the phone to rule them all in 2014? Let's find out!
Note that for this review, we're using the Korean version of the LG G3, which may exhibit some subtle differences in comparison with the international model.
UPDATE (Jun 25, 2014): This review was originally based on our experience with the Korean version of the LG G3. After testing the International (European) version of the phone, we've found differences in a few areas, including display quality and brightness, indoor camera quality, and call quality. The battery section has also been edited, due to a technical mistake in the original result. We've updated the text of the review accordingly.
Design
Rear keys meet elegance – it's a good-looking, but very big phone
The G3 borrows a lot of the aesthetic principles characteristic of its predecessor. Its form and overall appearance follow in the footsteps of the G2, but it's safe to say that the G3 builds on the heritage of its predecessor in every way. So, the exterior of the G3 is nicely curved on the back, making it sit nicely in the hand. The phone is rather big with its 5.76 x 2.94 x 0.35 inches (146.3 x 74.6 x 8.9 mm). Since it's equipped with a significantly bigger screen, one would expect that the G3 will be larger than its competitors, and it indeed is. For example, the Galaxy S5 (5.59 x 2.85 x 0.32 inches (142 x 72.5 x 8.1 mm)) is both shorter and narrower, while the One (M8) is about as tall (5.76 inches), but significantly narrower (2.78 inches) than the G3. The G3 is also significantly bigger than the G2, which had a 5.2” display. However, the thing is that thanks to the extremely thin bezels around the display, the G3 doesn't feel that much bigger than its opponents. What's more, the G3 has managed to retain a decent weight of 5.26 oz (149 g), so it's not really that overwhelming.
The front has that signature short top bezel, like in the G2, while the bottom one is slightly higher, but now features a splash of color that corresponds to the coloring of the rest of the phone. Frankly, it makes the whole shebang look classier and more elegant – a significant upgrade from the styling of its predecessor.
The smooth polycarbonate used for the exterior of the G3 may not be decidedly premium, but it's still a notch above your typical plastic finish. Yes, the G3 is predominantly made of plastic, but LG does note that there's a matte anti-fingerprint finish on top, as well as an extremely thin film of metal in the back cover, so it's supposed to be a bit more than 'just plastic'. As a whole, it does well in replicating the look of the brushed metal finish of the HTC One, while delivering the warmth and relative non-slipperiness of plastic. Its matte coating also does very well in avoiding those nasty smudges that are so typical with glossy plastic. It's really like you're getting the best from both worlds.
LG's signature rear keys are here, of course, positioned neatly on the back of the handset. Sure, this positioning takes some getting used to, since it's so different from what's widely accepted in the industry, but all in all, the rear keys don't come off as especially hard to use, especially after you've used them for a while. In terms of feel, they are by no means excellent. The power key is fine, with a decent amount of clickiness, but the volume rocker buttons are a bit too shallow.
The speaker of the LG G3 is placed on the back side, similarly to the Galaxy S5. It doesn't get muffled if you put the phone on a smooth and hard surface, but otherwise, it does. Right next to the signature rear keys is where the 13 MP camera resides, accompanied by a dual LED flash and a laser beam that's designed to aid it in its auto-focusing efforts. But more on that later.
Slightly dim and oversaturated – the screen of the G3 makes up with area and resolution
LG G3's 538 ppi compared to OPPO Find 7a's 5.5'' 403 ppi display
The screen is a pretty major asset for the LG G3. First of all, it's really enormous for a smartphone – with a 5.5” diagonal, it's decidedly bigger than the rest of the 2014 competition. The Xperia Z2's 5.2” panel comes closest to it, but those 0.3” do make a difference. With a screen that big, we're especially thankful to LG for minimizing the thickness of the bezels, as otherwise the G3 would have ended up a gargantuan affair. Now, with its efficient design, it's just a very, very big affair.
The second key aspect of this IPS LCD screen is the resolution. This is the first globally-available phone to make use of the enormous 1440 x 2560-pixel resolution, or in other words – QHD. A resolution this high enables a staggering pixel density of 538 ppi, meaning that whatever comes up on screen is supposed to look extremely sharp, without a hint of pixelization. Yeah, we said the same thing when 1080 x 1920 screens arrived, but this statement is getting more and more accurate now that QHD is here. Now, we obviously have to answer the question of just how much of a benefit there is in having QHD resolution instead of 1080p in cell phone screens of such size. Well, let's just say that some difference in clarity might be there, but it is extremely hard to notice. Yes, things do look super-fine, but we can't honestly say that it looks cleaner than 1080p in some way. At the same time, the higher resolution means a bigger load on the processor and the battery, so we aren't really sure if this jump in resolution is justified.
The maximum brightness that we could achieve with the LG G3 is about 450 nits. That's a pretty decent result, on par with what most other Android flagships offer. This kind of visibility usually translates to a display that's hard to view under direct sunlight, but in most other cases, you won't have an issue reading it. In comparison with the rest of the landscape, the Galaxy S5 appears to be just a bit easier to view outdoors, while the HTC One (M8) seems to exhibit a pretty much identical outdoor viewing experience, compared to the G3. Meanwhile, minimum brightness is about 9 nits, which is a bit high – it won't be unbearable for your eyes too look at in the dark, but it won't be the most comfortable experience either.
The LG G3 is yet another phone to arrive with pumped-up saturation of its screen, or at least that's what we can make of the display measurements we've done with it. Primary colors (red, green, and blue) tend to have that slightly oversaturated look, though, thankfully, they aren't too punchy. Overall color balance is pretty decent, with the screen being a bit colder than it needs to, with color temperature standing at 7100 K. Average gamma is about 2.26, which is very close to the reference value of 2.2. It definitely would have been much appreciated if there was a “natural” screen mode in the G3's setting, but oh well ...
The numbers below represent the amount of deviation in the respective property,observed when a display is viewed from a 45-degree angle as opposed to direct viewing.
The CIE 1931 xy color gamut chart represents the set(area)of colors that a display can reproduce,with the sRGB colorspace(the highlighted triangle)serving as reference.The chart also provides a visual representation of a display's color accuracy. The small squares across the boundaries of the triangle are the reference points for the various colors, while the small dots are the actual measurements. Ideally, each dot should be positioned on top of its respective square. The 'x:CIE31' and 'y:CIE31' values in the table below the chart indicate the position of each measurement on the chart. 'Y' shows the luminance (in nits) of each measured color, while 'Target Y' is the desired luminance level for that color. Finally, 'ΔE 2000' is the Delta E value of the measured color. Delta E values of below 2 are ideal.
The Color accuracy chart gives an idea of how close a display's measured colors are to their referential values. The first line holds the measured (actual) colors, while the second line holds the reference (target) colors. The closer the actual colors are to the target ones, the better.
The Grayscale accuracy chart shows whether a display has a correct white balance(balance between red,green and blue)across different levels of grey(from dark to bright).The closer the Actual colors are to the Target ones,the better.
A neat, flat, simple, and feature-rich user experience – a notable newcomer in the Android world
Naturally, the LG G3, being the super-phone that it is, cannot afford to run on anything less than Android 4.4.2 KitKat. What's more interesting here, though, is LG's new user interface, which has been reworked in accordance with the modern software design trends that promote lightness and simplicity. While LG's strengths have never been in the field of software design, we have to say that the company has done a surprisingly good job with its new UI. LG has shied away from using a lot of primary colors, and instead, it has opted for more secondaries, such as some lighter shades of orange, yellow, magenta and cyan. This has lead to a more of a mature look for the interface, despite the utmost simplicity and cleanness. It's also a good thing that LG has preserved the remarkable amounts of functionality that typically come with its software, but has designed the UI so that nothing really stands in the way of normal, comfortable usage.
In terms of structure and organization, LG's new UI stays true to the Android way – there is a lockscreen, homescreen, app launcher... everything that you'd expect, just made more advanced and customizable. The lockscreen, for example, presents you with customizable app shortcuts, as well as widgets, if you'd like. The useful KnockOn functionality is here, allowing you to wake the phone up by just doing a double-tap on the screen. And, if you'd like to make use of the same type of gesture to unlock your phone, but with a higher degree of security, you can take advantage of LG's Knock Code. The subject of many recent marketing efforts by LG, Knock Code lets you create a knock pattern, or sequence, with which to unlock the device. The benefit of this is that it allows you to bypass the lockscreen completely, but the disadvantage is that it's not super-secure.
As we said, LG's interface is extremely customizable. For example, the G3 makes use of on-screen navigation buttons, but you can actually add a fourth button there, which lets execute one of the following features: notification bar, QMemo+, QSlide, or Dual window, with most of these being self-explanatory enough.
A notable feature here is Dual window, which allows you to run two apps in splitscreen mode. The way it works is this: you activate Dual window, choose two apps that you want to run simultaneously, and after a few moments, they pop up on screen. It's not really casual, and has a mostly niche appeal, but it's good to have either way.
There are also some new additions to LG's software. Smart Notice is one of them – it's a Google Now kind of feature that attempts to act like it's your personal assistant of sorts. For example, it will remind you about various things, like birthdays of your contacts, or that you've recently rejected a call and might want to get in touch with that person, in case you're not that busy now. Other simple examples may include reminders to take an umbrella, when the weather forecast is looking wet and gloomy. Actually, Smart Notice is also voice-recognition enabled, so you can execute various tasks using voice commands.
Some other not-that-groundbreaking new features have also been baked right into the UI of the LG G3. Such are Content Lock and Kill Switch. The former lets you secure certain directories on the phone, so that they can't be accessed by other users, while the latter enables you to remotely lock and wipe your device, in the unfortunate event of your phone being stolen. As you can see, the G3 is a truly feature-packed phone, but that doesn't mean there isn't anything missing. For instance, there isn't a one-handed mode for easier operation, as on some competing devices, like the GS5.
Phonebook
The phonebook of the LG G3 is rather extensive. It does utilize the new, lighter and flatter UI design, but that doesn't mean that's not pretty heavy on features. You get a total of five tabs, dedicated for the dialer, call log, contacts list, favorites, and groups. Some manufacturers tend to combine some of these under a single tab, and this often means that compromises have to be made. LG has obviously gone for the opposite solution – to put everything in its own separate tab. That makes for an organized interface, but of course, it also means that there's going to be a lot of tab switching. One thing that we enjoy in the contacts list is that all contacts have small 'dial' and 'message' keys next to their names, allowing you to quickly dial or message them, right from the list.
Messaging
The LG G3's messaging app is as customizable as ever. You can even change the background and bubble colors in your threads, in order to make the suit your liking. Other than that, it's just a messaging app – nothing too fancy about it, besides the abundant customization capabilities.
One thing of note here is the new Smart Keyboard. LG has designed its QWERTY keyboard so that it adapts to your writing style, trying to make it easier for you along the way. It'll try to figure out what words you're more likely to type when trying to predict your input, and such kind of stuff. It's also very cusomizable – you can actually adjust the keyboard's height to your liking. We actually enjoy the keyboard's layout, as it maintains a good balance simplicity and versatality. Thankfully, there's also built-in Swype-like functionality, for those of us who are too lazy to actually press those buttons.
Organizer
LG G3 is equipped with a host of versatile organzer tools, like a calendar, notes, and health apps, as well as some additional features designed to enhance multitasking and productivity. One of those features is Dual window, which lets you run two apps at a time. That's cool, but another feature, called QSlide, tends to be a bit more gimmicky for us, as it also attempts to let you have a number of apps running at the same time, but displaying them one over another, appliying different levels of transparancy to them. Obviously, it isn't anything that's managed to creep its way to mainstream thus far.
Processor and Memory
The QHD resolution slows things down a bit, but the G3 still packs quite a punch
Snapdragon 801 is the name of the game for all globally-available high-end smartphones in the first half of 2014, and the LG G3 is not an exception. Similarly to the Galaxy S5, the G3 is equipped with the slightly more powerful 801 variation – 8974-AC. This chip makes use of a super-fast 2.5 GHz quad-core Krait 400 CPU. Of course, this is complemented by the tried and true Adreno 330 GPU, as well as the plentiful 2 or 3 gigs of RAM (depending on whether you got the 16 or 32 GB vartiant, respectively). As you can see, that's one mighty configuration that should be able to force its way through anything you throw at it. To an extent, it does, but unfortunately, there's a substantial amount of lag and choppiness as you browse through the interface. This can be attributed to two main possible causes: it's either because of the high QHD resolution, or bad software optimization. There are just slight hints of slow-down every now and then, while executing simple tasts, such as browsing through the menus, opening and closing apps, etc. If the screen was 1080 x 1920, performance would have probably been considerably better. Anyway, to be honest, the LG G3 doesn't seem to lag more than the Galaxy S5, for example, so its not really that bad.
The synthetic benchmark tests we did proved that the QHD screen does present the chipset with a rather heavy load, as the results achieved by the G3 are comparable to those of the G2 or the Xperia Z1 – phones that are one generation older. Not that it's slow – quite the contrary – the G3 is still a speed demon, but that's mostly because mobile software can't quite catch up with mobile hardware yet. So, at the end of the day, performance of the G3 is still very good, although the extraordinary number of pixels stuffed in its screen mean that its performance is limited to sub-S5/M8/Z2 levels.
No compromises have been made when it comes to storage space. Internal space comes in 16 GB and 32 GB varieties, and if this doesn't seem to be particuarly spacious for you, you still have the option to insert a microSD card of up to 128 GB. This way, you'll be able to keep anything you want right on your phone.
As you can imagine, the larger-than-life 5.5-inch display is simply perfect for internet browsing. With the G3, LG is supplying its own browser, but we'd rather stick with Android's stock browser, Chrome. After all, Chrome has reached a very mature level, plus it's getting tons of support from Google, so it's really hard to come up with an overall better browsing solution on Android.
Needless to say, we had zero issues while surfing the web on the G3. Everything loads as quickly as possible, while navigation actions such as scrolling and zooming are performed in a snappy and fluid fashion.
The Snapdragon 801 chipset inside the LG G3 comes with support for all kinds of GSM and 3G bands, allowing it to be usable almost everywhere around the world. Naturally, there's also LTE support for areas where such is present. It wouldn't be a true LG smartphone, though, if it doesn't pack almost all the connectivity features known to mankind. Those include Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi 802.11 a, b, g, n, ac, NFC, DLNA, and SlimPort. The latter is TV-out technology typically used by Nexus smartphones, while its more popular alternative, MHL, is usually found in devices by Samsung, Sony, HTC, and other companies. If you prefer to wirelessly stream your content to a big-screen TV, though, you can always resort to DLNA, or for wireless mirroring purposes – Miracast.
Camera
A no-nonsense 13 MP shooter – jack of all trades, master of none
LG hasn't gone crazy with the number of megapixels in the G3, keeping it at 13, which, as we know, is more than enough to produce super-detailed and great-looking photographs. But is that the case with the G3?
The 13 MP camera doesn't differ much from that of the G2 when it comes to specs. The sensor size is still the standard phone affair – 1/3.06", which is the same as on the iPhone 5s and the One (M8). Meanwhile, some other flagships, like the Xperia Z2, have bigger sensors (1/2.3"), allowing them to achieve higher resolutions, while still preserving a decent pixel size. Additionally, aperture of the G3's camera is F2.4, so, as you can see, these are the kind of specs that don't sound great on paper, but we all know that it has never been only about the specs. Plus, the G3 has some tricks of its own, like its optical image stabilization (OIS+), so great results should definitely be expected from it.
The LG G3 has another ace up its sleeve – laser-assisted autofocus. By shooting a laser beam, the G3 can quickly determine the distance towards the subject in the frame, allowing it to lock the correct focus in an extremely quick manner. Since we got to play around with the G3's camera for a while, we can admit that it's really super-fast in locking a focus, however, we can't really say that feels faster than, say, the Galaxy S5 and its phase-detection autofocus. The HTC One (M8) is also perfectly competitive in terms of camera speed, so all we can say is that the G3 has a very fast camera, but not necessarily faster than those of its rivals.
The camera app of the LG G3 is surprisingly similar to that of the Samsung Galaxy S5, at least in terms of graphical user interface. It's not the most straightforward layout possible, with numerous settings scattered across a number of different menus. It's nothing that you can't get used to, though.
The good news, however, is that the LG G3 allows you to take great photographs without having to tweak any of the settings. You can just take the handset out, fire the camera up, and take the shot. In most cases, you'll end up having a rather good-looking image. Overall quality of the G3's camera is up there with the best propositions at the moment, but that isn't to say that it's not without any issues whatsoever.
When it comes to colors, we have to point out that the G3 often goes for an image that's good-looking, but also a bit too warm. As a matter of fact, the G3 camera handles colors in a very similar manner to the iPhone 5s, which also tends to overwarm things, making them appear slightly yellowish/reddish. In that field, the GS5 is the phone that manages to deliver a more realistic, well-balanced image quality. The G3 also likes to pump things up, making colors look a bit too vibrant and cheerful. The phone also has a useful HDR mode, which works as intended for the most part, but doesn't always manage to balance out the dark and bright areas as much as we'd want.
Detail level in the images of the LG G3 is very good, but it's ever so slightly worse than that of the Galaxy S5, which manages to capture a bit more with its 16 MP camera. Still, if you don't look too closely, you'll find that details and sharpness with the G3 are more than sufficient.
Indoors, the camera leaves something to be desired. It often opts for slower shutter speeds, instead of using the LED flash, causing images to come off a bit blurry at times. Be sure to keep your hands extra steady! Should you manage that, it'll present you with above average pictures, although it appears to get somewhat confused by our controlled studio lighting, delivering unnaturally warm results. Thankfully, it tends to exhibit natural color reproduction in other indoor scenarios. Meanwhile, the front camera of 2.1 megapixels doesn't insprire us that much, a pictures taken with it lack fidelity and resolution.
1080p video recorded with the LG G3 is mostly fine, but suffers from the same drawbacks as the images. Namely, it's a tad too saturated and contrasty. Switching to 4K video recording, image quality gets noticeably better and more detailed, but the warmer-than-normal color balance remains. Video footage moves at a smooth pace, while the sound captured with the handset's microphone is mostly loud and clear, though it can get a bit too harsh at times.
Multimedia
Nonsurprisingly, the 5.5" display is perfect for multimedia and games
Do we even need to say that the quality 5.5" screen is just spectacular for... pretty much anything you're going to enjoy on your phone, including video, images, and games. The massive diagonal will let you play even some more intricate games in a convenient manner, though we have to admit that the presence of on-screen navigation buttons is quite annoying. Thankfully, those aren't visible when watching video or viewing images, so you can enjoy the massive, high-resolution display to your heart's content.
The music player of the LG G3 is visually-impressive, as it displays music art throughout its different screens and filtering options. Of course, it's all combined with the new simplistic UI style, making for a truly modern and well-organized music experience.
The loudspeaker of the phone is quite powerful – it may not be the cleanest one yet, but it sure packs quite a punch, which is very important. The G3 arrives with the familiar Quad Beat 2 earphones, which deliver a clean and well-balanced sound, though the highs are slightly more present than needed, while the bass frequencies could be a bit more pronounced.
Armed with a punchy earpiece, the LG G3 is a fine handset to make calls with. Loudness is pretty decent on the incoming side, while voices tend to sound clear and easy-to-comprehend. On the other end of the line, things sound in a similar manner – your callers will mostly enjoy the conversation due to your voice sounding relatively clear and natural.
Battery
Whether because of the large panel with high resolution, or something else, the LG G3's 3000 mAh juice pack delivers a sub-par performance in the battery department. It lasted for only 6h 14 min in our custom battery life test, which puts it behind handsets like the Galaxy S5, Xperia Z2, and One (M8) – pretty much every 2014 flagship thus far. Overall, it's not really such a bad result – the G3 will last you through a day of moderate usage, but don't expect wonders from it.
Of course, we should keep in mind that there are quite a lot of factors in play when it comes to battery life, so it'll be normal for the handset to last slightly longer for some users, and slightly less for others. Meanwhile, the statistics provided by LG itself paint a mostly positive picture, with 3G talk-time listed at 21 hours, and 3G stand-by time at 23 days. A nice touch by LG here is that the G3 has built-in wireless charging, but in order to take advantage of this, you'll have to purchase a wireless charging dock separately.
We measure battery life by running a custom web-script,designed to replicate the power consumption of typical real-life usage.All devices that go through the test have their displays set at 200-nit brightness.
The LG G3 is a remarkable Android smartphone, there's no doubt about that. It's probably the most technologically-advanced smartphone at this point, which alone is a great achievement. The question is, does it come off as an offering that's well-rounded enough in order to become a best-seller in this highly-competitive market?
By the looks of it, LG has most of the boxes checked. In the design department, the G3 doesn't only prove to be extremely efficient in terms of screen-to-body ratio, but it also throws a hint of elegance and style – something that you don't quite get with its biggest rival, the Samsung Galaxy S5 (although its perforated back might appeal to some). True, it's mostly a plastic phone, but it looks and feels good to the touch, so we guess it's function over form for LG and the G3.
The display is one of the features that make us see the G3 as more technologically-advanced than most of its rivals. The massive, 5.5" size, along with the staggering QHD resolution is an imposing configuration. Although, we're still unsure about the benefits of QHD, especially when sticking with 1080p could have improved performance a bit. There's also some room for improvement in terms of color reproduction, but if you can live with some oversaturation, it's not really that bad.
Considering the other aspects of the device, we're pleased with the overall user experience, and the software design. It does pack a bit too many bells and whistles for our taste, but thankfully, it's just well-organized and doesn't leave us with the feeling that we're working with a cluttered device.
The 13 MP camera? Well, it's very, very good. The shooter isn't industry-leading, but it can definitely go head-to-head with most other phone cameras and put up a fight. Yeah, it does have the tendency to slightly overwarm things, but hey, that isn't anything new! If you can look past that, you'll be delighted by the immersive photographs that the G3 creates.
At the end of the day, we're quite happy with the LG G3. It's a rather big phone. Probably too big and wide, even with its extremely efficient bezels. However, we also enjoy the benefits of the larger-than-life screen, so we definitely see it as a tradeoff that many would be willing to do. This is not the best phone of 2014, as some would rush to say. But it's definitely one of the best Android handsets thus far. A bit too geeky, and a bit too pumped up, but still great across the board. Those who buy it would definitely have a wonderful time with it.
Rad Slavov is the Editor-in-Chief at PhoneArena. He joined the media in 2008, right on the cusp of the modern smartphone revolution. Through time and perseverance, he amassed a great deal of knowledge and industry know-how, allowing him to guide and organize the company's growing line-up of talented content creators and ever-expanding content portfolio.
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