LG G8 ThinQ Review: The Quiet Competitor

So after the different variants of the S10, we’re shifting gears to cover the latest from LG: the G8 ThinQ. LG can make great phones but never really been enough to truly compete. They always seemed a step or 2 behind in select areas. Spoiler alert: they’ve gotten better but not a true competitor but more so a quiet one. This year, we got new gestures, an OLED display, faster internals, more storage, more camera features, and more. So we’re gonna let you know its strengths, weaknesses, and where they can improve. Proceed to our LG G8 ThinQ review.

So Are The New Gestures Worth Using?

What’s new is their new gestures utilizing the new Z camera w/ ToF (Time of Flight) technology. LG takes the concept of what Apple started w/ Face ID and expands on it. Air Motion uses your hands to switch between apps as well as turn up the volume. All w/o having to touch your phone. This requires a super-precise sweet spot to use it. I thought it didn’t work but again you have get the hang of it in order to use it properly. Hand ID is tracking the veins in your hand for a more secure & unique form of security. But you have to find the sweet spot for it to work accurately as well as make sure it’s not using your face to unlock.. Face Unlock is pretty fast as its using infrared instead of just a standard camera. However, it can still be fooled by a photo of you though. You can put this in the gimmick category after using it for a while but will be useful for the times you need it.

Is The Audio Still Good? Yes and No.

Now that other companies are seeking to beef up their audio features, LG added a few more to keep them at bay. The headphone jack + built-in Hi-Fi Quad DAC is still here along w/ Boombox speaker. Instead of an actual earpiece for phone calls, you got something they call Crystal Sound OLED that acts as a bone conductor of sorts when using it. For the 1st time, they’ve partnered up w/ British company Meridian Sound to do a bit more. The overall sound quality via speaker is still good but not as good as last year’s LG devices. Anything sound from the headphone jack is still superior though.

The body of the G8 is a metal & glass slab like many high-end flagships w/ subtle design choices. Like you have the rear cameras under reinforced glass for protection as well as symmetry for a flat back. They also applied a 4-side bending method to curve the glass into metal for a seamless overall feel to it. All while retaining the IP68 dust/water-resistant body, headphone jack, and dedicated Google Assistant button.

Instead of an LCD panel, LG swapped out for a lovely 6.1inch POLED FullVision display. Not that the LCD panel on the G7 is bad but the upgrade to OLED is amazing. Darker blacks, brighter & vivid colors while keeping a great level of brightness w/ Always-On Display. Great for viewing as well as navigating the G8 in Dark Mode – when or if it comes to this device.

6.1inch QHD+ OLED display w/ 3120 x 1440 resolution
Snapdragon 855 CPU
6GB of RAM + 128GB of storage expandable up to 2TB via microSD
Rear-facing f/1.5 12MP standard lens + OIS and an f/1.9 16MP wide-angle lens
Front-facing f/1.7 8MP lens + Z Camera
3500 mAh battery w/ wireless charging
Boombox speaker
Hi-Fi quad-DAC
DTS:X 3D Surround Sound
IP68 dust/water-resistant body
Android 9.0 Pie

Overall performance hasn’t been an issue for LG devices for quite some time now. Like the V40, we got 6GB of RAM w/ the newer Snapdragon 855 CPU on board. Still speedy and lag-free from everything from multitasking, image processing, and more. You got lots of storage on board w/ 128GB expandable up to 2TB via microSD card.

Keeping your phone going is a 3500 mAh battery inside all of this metal & glass body. And like most smartphones w/ this battery size, this will last you all day. My day consists of streaming music + YouTube videos, emailing, web browsing, and social media. I would get home from a 10-12 hour work day and still have a little over 20% of juice left.

LG wanted to try to beef up their shooters for the most part. You got an overall lower aperture all around. You got a f/1.5 12MP standard w/ OIS and a f/1.9 16MP wide-angle lens as well as single LED flash that sits flush when you sit it down. For the most part is an improvement but only subtlety. The front-facing selfie camera is more or less what you can expect from LG unfortunately. The f/1.7 8MP shooter is decent but can still be noisy so definitely not an improvement – at least on my end anyways.

Many improvements w/ the shooters but manual camera & video still reigns supreme.

Click Photo To See Full Resolution

So the rear cameras offer slightly better imagery than last year’s LG flagship smartphones. This is thanks to better image processing + lower aperture lenses. This will grant you a little bit sharper images and video for better results. The Auto mode gives you a slightly blue hue while the new-and-improved AI Cam gets a lot better and adds punch of color to it all. Night Mode is present and it works pretty good but not a game-changer.

They added Apple’s Portrait mode – for those of you who care to use it. However the good thing that came from it is portrait video. This gives you a bokeh effect when close enough to your video. You’re gonna need to be close to your subject and not move a lot or it will get a weird focusing effect or seeking a subject and bokeh. It fine just don’t expect to replace your mirrorless camera w/ it so keep that in mind.

Unfortunately, the software is more or less the same. As it’s their LG UX on top of Android 9.0 Pie so it grants you most things form the latest version of Android. LG keeps their Smart Bulletin page when you swipe to the right and system-wide search from the homescreen. I just wish LG took a serious approach to software like they do w/ their hardware. Samsung just did it and its now my favorite software so maybe next year we can get some new flavor. I doubt it but fingers crossed anyways.

On the surface, the G8 looks like a mild update but there is more to it than meets the eye. The question is: is it enough for you?

Don’t let the lack of marketing or press of this device fool you. Now there isn’t a lot wrong w/ the G8, it just doesn’t stand out from the crowd as much as other devices this year thus far. The display is sublime and can compete against Samsung, slight better camera, great performance, good battery life, and the same old software (which is probably the only downside). It is a great phone that I would recommend but if you have a G7 or a V40, I would say to hold off. This would be an ideal upgrade for those w/ a G6 or older LG device.