LG G Flex – 4G

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Main features

1. World's first 6 inch CURVED screen
2. Self healing coating
3. 32GB onboard memory
4. 13 megapixel fully featured camera
5. Dolby Mobile sound enhancement

Read our full review here >>>

by Mike Leader

The LG G Flex is the world's first curved, and flexible mobile phone thanks to LG's expertise in OLED technology. The Korean giants haven't been hanging around either, following on swiftly from the introduction of the world's first curved television set.

The more clued-up amongst you might point to the fact that the Samsung Nexus S had a curved screen but it was only a very slight curve. But the G Flex is CURVED!

Flexible plastic

The flexible plastic screen isn't the only thing that's going be flexed. You're going to have to "flex your plastic" too if you want one. It will come as no great surprise to you that this is one of the most expensive smartphones you can buy.

If you want innovation then, you're going to have to pay for it. But then that didn't stop millions of you buying the iPhone!

Curvy screen

That curved screen is of course the major talking point, and LG claim that it makes watching videos and movies and playing games all much more exciting. The problem is, er, no it doesn't.

They say that because the phone follows the curve of your face, it improves the call quality because it is in a more natural position in relation to you mouth. Er, no it doesn't. Not that we could tell anyway.

Flat yet curved screen

The most remarkable thing is that you can actually flatten the screen, but it takes quite a bit of pressure to do so and you can't keep it flat, as soon as you let go it just pops back into it's "natural" curved shape again.

It's a huge device, the screen size being 6 inches, which makes it difficult to hold and unfortunately the curve shape doesn't help here. It also means you can't use it flat on a table.

Self repairing casing

What we do like is the self-healing coating on the back panel which as the name suggests heals itself if you happen to scratch it, though we would not expect it to cope with a major scar. Small blemishes do indeed disappear though.

It's clever stuff, and something we hope will become a more popular feature on many more phones in the future.

Self healing

LG have also placed the volume buttons on the rear panel, in the centre below the camera, as first seen on the LG G2. Once you get used to the idea it really does feel more natural than having the buttons on the side. The sad thing is that's just about the end of the good stuff.

This giant smartphone will set you back the best part of £650 on Pay As You Go and quite frankly the screen is rather disappointing overall.

There seems to be a blurring of some pictures and text particularly when using it online, and while this seems to vary depending on what you are viewing it again points to a substandard screen, particularly at this price.

Poor resolution

It runs an outgoing version of Android, 4.2.2 and while we would hope it will be upgradeable to version 4.4.2, known as 'KitKat' there is no official word from LG that it will be at the time of typing this review.

The P-OLED 6 inch screen - the P stands for plastic, the thing that helps make it curved - you only get a 1280 x 720 resolution screen offering 245 pixels per inch and that's pretty poor for a supposedly top end smartphone.

Those curves mean you can't have a memory card slot either, though you do get 32GB on board memory.

13 megapixel camera

Camera features are pretty comprehensive. A 13 megapixel camera offers HDR, geotagging, panoramic mode, face detection and simultaneous video and image recording. Video is also recorded at 1080p at an impressive 60 frames per second with stereo sound and image stabilisation.

Its just a shame that you will need another device to watch it on in full HD. There is also a front facing 2.1 megapixel video camera which works well for clear videos of your mugshot when used with Skype for example.

Powerful connectivity suite

It's snappy enough, running on a quad core 2.26 GHz Qualcomm processor and the rest of it's credentials will not leave you wanting
for anything. Dual band Wi-Fi is here, as is Wi-Fi hotspot, DLNA, NFC, stereo Bluetooth and Dolby Mobile sound enhancement technology.

You also get a stereo FM radio with RDS and satellite navigation in the form of assisted GPS with access to Russia's GLONASS system.

Our summary

It's a feat of technology, of that there is no doubt. But the very high price tag for what is of little practical use over that of a standard non-bendy smartphone, coupled with the fact that it houses a less than impressive screen, probably not helped by the very fact that it flexes.

I have always considered the iPhone to be overpriced, more so in recent times with so many top quality Android smartphones on the market, but frankly the LG G Flex even makes the iPhone 5s sound like good value.

It's a shame because LG make some cracking stuff, not least the Nexus 5 and the LG G2, but the G Flex just isn't everything it's cracked up to be.

There may be a future for these flexible devices and it's not a bad effort, but unfortunately it's a little to expensive for our liking at the moment.