Huawei P10 and P10 Plus focus on fancy colours, dual camera advancements

With many phones looking much the same these days, Huawei is going for a colourful unique selling point for this year’s P-series flagships, the P10 and larger-scale P10 Plus. Yep, it’s all about colour.

The P10 and P10 Plus will arrive in one of eight colours: greenery, dazzling blue, dazzling gold, graphite black, rose gold, white ceramic (not actual ceramic, it’s polished metal), mystic silver and prestige gold make up the other colours. These will be region-specific, so don’t expect all to arrive where you live.

The two handsets – the P10 a 5.1-inch Full HD device, the P10 Plus a larger 5.5-inch WQHD device – pack in the latest Kirin 960 octa-core processor, with bags of graphical power in a palm-sized device.

• Huawei P10 vs Huawei P10 Plus: What’s the difference?

Breaking away from Huawei tradition of a fingerprint sensor being found on the rear, the new P10 models position it to the front, much like a Home key. It’s not flush with the front, however, revealed instead as a recessed dip beneath the glass. By default this is the main control for the phone, with the traditional Android softkeys hidden away in the software.

Speaking of which, Huawei’s EMUI arrives in version 5.1, adding in some performance improvements, plus Highlights feature reel which can auto-tag your photos (a bit like Apple’s Photos).

Dual cameras make an expected return, too, in Leica Dual Camera 2.0 form. The P10 dons two 28mm equivalent lenses with f/2.2 aperture, while the P10 Plus goes one better with improved optics and f/1.8 aperture.

No word on price or release date just yet, but we’ll bring the official info from the Huawei press conference at this year’s Mobile World Congress as and when we have it.

Huawei Watch 2 official: Classic and Sport add Android Wear 2, GPS and fitness focus

The original Huawei Watch looked like the real deal, but to wear we found it big, clunky and – despite its glitzy image – it just didn’t feel right.

Enter the Huawei Watch 2 – in Classic and Sport forms – and the approach is a little different. There’s a greater focus on fitness, with GPS tracking built-in for activities, Android Wear 2.0 taking pride of place, plus NFC so Android Pay payments will be possible from the off.

Both Watch 2 products come with built-in fitness tracking features which, paired with the built-in heart-rate sensor, offer ‘Fat-burn’ and ‘Cardio run’ sessions.

The key difference between the two options is their target audience (despite both being IP68 weather-sealed): the Sport comes in orange with a sporty strap to resist sweat and hardship, while the Classic goes for that more sophisticated look, complete with leather strap (black and grey options are available).

Both watches have a 1.2-inch display in perfectly round form – no black bar to be seen along the base, as per the Motorola 360 series. And all the better for it; this was one of the original Watch’s bigger selling points.

The Sport will be available in a 4G connectivity version, while the Classic will not offer mobile connectivity. Both Watch 2 options have 2GB internal storage, however, so you can listen to your tunes when on the go without the need for a phone.

No final word on price, availability, strap options or whether a smaller version will be available. We’ll bring official info from the Huawei launch event at Mobile World Congress 2017 as and when we have it.

Huawei P10 preview: The lean, green photo machine

It’s not often a phone is revealed in a green colour finish. Or “greenery” to give it full credit. Which, as it so happens, is Pantone’s colour of the year 2017. Huawei is oh so on trend.

Not that offering a green finish is the Huawei P10’s biggest sell (other colours are available too). This 5.1-inch iPhone-a-like has all of the company’s latest smarts on board, including dual camera technology, updated EMUI 5.1 software, the top-spec Kirin 960 processor and a newly front-positioned fingerprint scanner.

Does all that add up to make the Huawei P10 the handset people are going to want to buy in 2017?

Huawei P10 review: Design

• Hyper diamond cut finish
• 8 colour options (not all regions)

Throughout its various iterations the Huawei P-series has slowly refined itself into a shapely, good-looking phone. The P10’s 5.1-inch screen size puts it into the smaller scale bracket of phones these days (it’s marginally smaller than the earlier P9 on that count), especially with so many equal-or-greater-than 5.5-inch handsets arriving to market.

The P10 isn’t a wild reimagining of the series; more a nip and tuck revision of the P9. There’s more fluidity to the back camera plate which stretches across the width of the device, while interference from intersecting antenna lines isn’t as prominent as it once was.

The “dazzling” finish options – which takes eight and a half minutes to diamond cut per device, Huawei says – gives a glossy finish without being a fingerprint nightmare, while presenting various colour options (although only blue, green and gold are available in this exact format – graphite black, rose gold, white ceramic (not actual ceramic, it’s polished metal), mystic silver and prestige gold make up the other colours). Shame the blue and green colour choices we saw look dull rather than dazzling, then.

Huawei P10 review: Fingerprint scanner

• Front-positioned fingerprint scanner

Perhaps most notable of all is the Huawei hallmark rear-positioned fingerprint sensor is no more. Instead it’s found around the front, positioned where the would-be home key would otherwise be positioned. Only this not a button at all; it’s a haptic feedback-based sensor that will gently vibrate to communicate – much like the iPhone 7’s Home key or even the OnePlus 3T’s layout.

It’s a bold move shifting where that fingerprint scanner sits, especially given how used we are to finding it on the back of Huawei devices – a location, we’ve felt, where it’s always sat naturally. Placing the scanner on the front means swipe gestures are now a thing of the past, too, which is a shame.

Huawei describes the fingerprint sensor as being the first time a manufacturer has placed it under glass in a “seamless” fashion. Thing is, it’s not really seamless: it’s recessed into the body, just not as deeply as the once rear-positioned sensors are.

It makes using the P10 feel different, almost more futuristic, as you’ll not be poking for soft keys on the screen by default. You can, however, switch on the usual home/back/apps trio from within the software settings – we did so at our device pre-brief just to be sure.

Oh, there’s also predictive fingerprint tracking, so the phone will be able to sense where on the scanner you’re about to press, based on initial movements, for an ultra accurate response. Huawei calls it, yup, Ultra Response.

Huawei P10 review: Screen

• 5.1-inch 1920 x 1080 resolution IPS LCD display
• P10 Plus model is 5.5-inch 2560 × 1440 resolution

While many top-tier Android devices are pushing higher resolutions, Huawei is sticking with a Full HD (1080p) panel in the P10. It’s an IPS LCD which means viewing angles are good, while auto brightness and colour temperature seemed pretty good from our brief glimpse. If you want to tweak things then EMUI 5.1 will offer manual colour balance and low-light comfort reading options too.

The twist actually comes from the P10’s bigger brother, the P10 Plus. We know, we know, we’ve taken until now to mention the elephant in the room: the 5.5-inch larger, more powerful model comes with heaps more pixels on its panel. But we’ve not handled this device yet, so can’t comment on exactly what it looks like. It sounds like the preferable device, though; like the Mate 9 Pro in a different guise – which is perhaps our vision of the perfect Huawei phone.

Huawei P10 review: Power

• Kirin 960 chipset, octa-core (4x 2.4GHz, 4×1.8GHz)
• Mali G71 MP8 GPU, Vulkan API
• 4GB RAM, 64GB on-board storage (plus microSD)
• P10 Plus: 6GB RAM, 128GB storage

Under the hood of the slender P10 body is the company’s current top-spec config: the very same as you’ll find in the Huawei Mate 9. That means Kirin 960 octa-core, 4GB RAM and 64GB on-board storage. That all ought to add up to a very fluid experience – we’ve been using the Mate 9 for some three months now and it rarely falters.

The P10 Plus adds extra RAM (6GB) and extra storage (128GB), in-fitting with its name. That’s the same spec as you’ll find in the China-only Mate 9 Pro, so it’s fitting to see that here.

There’s a microSD card slot in the dual SIM tray too (well, so long as you’re not using two SIM cards, otherwise there’ll be no space for one).

Huawei P10 review: Software

• EMUI 5.1 (built over Android 7.1)
• New Highlights photo tagging and video-generating mode
• UX design follows phone’s exterior colour by default
• Enhanced machine learning for optimum long-term experience

There’s always a lot of chit chat about Huawei’s software. Built on the latest Android operating system, the company’s EMUI re-working adds some interesting features. Our favourite is App Twin, which allows two Facebook/WhatsApp/WeChat/QQ apps to run in the one OS (one per SIM). There are also knuckle-based commands (for when fingertips just aren’t enough!), and machine learning for an optimum long-term user experience. We’ve written about EMUI 5.0 extensively, take a look below.

• EMUI 5.0 tips and tricks: Take charge of your Mate 9, P9, Honor 8

In the P10, Huawei is introducing the latest iteration of its software: EMUI 5.1. This modifies the machine learning based on user behaviour, introduces some compression for lesser used apps, and heightens responsiveness. Other quirks include the UX matching your device’s colour choice straight out of the box (blue meets blue, green meets green, etc – which can be updated within Themes as you please) and, via a left swipe from the home screen, adds HiBoard – the “all about me” pages to keep your experience personal and quickly accessible.

The software also ventures into the camera department, which brings us neatly to that vitally important area of the P10…

Huawei P10 review: Dual cameras

• ‘Leica Dual Camera 2.0’: 20MP B&W sensor; 16MP colour sensor
• 28mm equivalent lenses, f/2.2 aperture (f/1.8 on P10 Plus)
• Front camera is Leica optic/sensor for first time
• Introduces portrait mode, with facial tracking
• Highlights feature for auto-tagging and video editing

Huawei’s most advanced camera setup comes from the – drum roll please – P10 Plus. Why? Because that larger device plumps for Leica Summilux optics at f/1.8. That’s ought to mean brighter, sharper results from the bigger phone.

The standard P10 is similar, mimicking the Honor 8’s 20-megapixel black & white and 16MP colour sensors, coupled with ‘Leica Dual Camera 2.0’ software and lenses for a supposedly more premium experience.

The biggest push in the P10 comes from the software though: EMUI 5.1 means a now Portrait mode is now available, as is Highlights to auto-tag images and arrange everything by categories, dates, events and, well, just about everything Apple does so well with Photos on iPhone.

The Huawei Portrait mode doesn’t depend on a longer focal length lens like the iPhone 7 Plus, however, it’s more about what the software is doing: with the ability to track 190 points of a face, it will ensure exposure is best for the subject, then pseudo-bokeh the background for a more pro-like effect.

This bokeh effect being, of course, a new Huawei staple. Its dual camera technology can depth map a scene and use the Leica software to produce a would-be f/0.95 image with a melty backdrop. It’s imperfect, to say the least, but all these modes are – as we’ve said of Apple, HTC, et al.

The Highlights reel adds another interesting feature, co-developed with GoPro, the action cam makers. Similar to that company’s Quick app, the P10 can utilise your picture highlights to produce a video showreel, cut it to music of your choice, and allow for you to make adjustments too. This, we suspect, is a glimpse of the third-party association that Huawei is looking to employ to drive the brand forward in the west. Nice idea too.

First Impressions

The Huawei P10’s biggest success might be the one thing we’ve barely discussed: its size. At 5.1-inches, it’s nearer to palm-size than many of the current giant phones on the market and that, irrelevant of greenery/dazzling blue colours, we suspect will be the feature to lure punters in.

If the price is right – an area in which Huawei is typically competitive – then the P10 packs in all the power and usability that you’re likely to ever need form a phone. The improvements in power, reliability and software over the years have placed the company in a strong position – and the P10 epitomises that.

Huawei unveils its Leica-branded P10 and P10 Plus flagships

Huawei made a valiant effort with the P9, even if its Leica hype didn’t quite deliver. At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the company has unveiled its successor, the P10, with another dual-camera system endorsed by the ‘red dot’ company. It’s a real looker, with a thin profile and some funky colors to choose from. The big question, however, is the software. Huawei has proven that it can deliver top-tier performance, but EMUI, the company’s custom Android skin, often leaves us feeling frustrated. If Huawei can tone down its software teaks, this could be a real contender.

First, the basics. The P10 is equipped with a 5.1-inch, 1080p display, while its larger sibling rocks a 5.5-inch, WQHD panel. Both are coated in Gorilla Glass 5 and have an octa-core, Kirin 960 processor humming away underneath. The pair will come with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage as standard; Huawei will, however, sell a version of the P10 Plus with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of memory too. A 3200mAh battery sits inside the P10, while a 3750mAh cell powers its large P10 Plus brother. Like previous models, both will support ‘SuperCharge’ for quick top ups.

The P10 is sporting what Huawei calls a “Leica Dual-Camera 2.0 Pro Edition” setup. It consists of a F1.9 SUMMILUX-H lens and two sensors — a 12-megapixel one for regular shots and a 20-megapixel sensor dedicated to monochrome imaging. Both are supported by optical image stabilisation (OIS) and a four-in-one hybrid autofocus system. Together, Huawei says this camera setup will deliver best-in-class landscape, portrait and macro shots. We’ll reserve judgment until we’ve played with it ourselves.

In another step to boost its street-cred, Huawei has teamed up with Pantone for some exclusive color options: “Dazzling Blue” and “Greenery.” The name alone could sway some creative types, but they’re also interesting shades in their own right. If you’re after something a little more subtle, however, both phones will be sold in ceramic white, dazzling gold, graphite black, mystic silver an rose gold too. (So. Many. Colors.)

Developing. More to follow…

Click here to catch up on the latest news from MWC 2017.

Huawei reveals the Watch 2 at MWC 2017

It was almost two years ago to date that Huawei unveiled the “Watch,” the company’s first Android Wear device. Today, at MWC in Barcelona, Huawei has just announced its successor, the imaginatively-titled Watch 2. Perhaps the first notable difference (beyond the design tweaks), in the inclusion of 4G connectivity (on select models, via SIM or eSIM), meaning you won’t need a phone for all the smart features to work. According to Huawei, the Watch 2 will debut in Spain, France, Portugal, Germany, Italy and, of course China this month. It’ll come to the US and UK in April. There are a few different strap and color combinations, but prices start at 320 Eur (around $350).

The Watch 2 has a — now typical — 1.3-inch, 390 x 390 display, 4GB of storage (not all of that is available to users), and a 420 mAh batter, which Huawei claims is good for two days general use, or 10 hours in “training” mode.

As you might expect, the Watch 2 comes with Android Wear 2, and there’s an Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 2100 processor calling the shots. There also appears to be a focus on the sports crowd, with many of the different color combinations touting a masculine, rugged-looking design and the inclusion of built-in GPS (and, of course, the now-standard heart rate monitor).

For those of you with finer tastes, Huawei’s Watch 2 also comes in a special Porsche Design edition. The two companies already collaborated on a special edition P9 handset, and the Watch 2 edition will be the perfect complement to that handset, unsurprisingly, although there are no specific details on price or release for that.

Click here to catch up on the latest news from MWC 2017.

HP’s Pro x2 hybrid comes with a Wacom pen, military specs

Microsoft’s Surface Pro was arguably the first tablet that could do serious work rather than just web-browsing, so HP ran with that idea for its original Pro x2 612 laptop back in 2014. With its latest model, the Pro x2 612 G2 (yes, that’s a terrible name) it has cranked up the power and toughness. It not only has better specs and less weight, it now features MIL-STD 810G specs for business types in the field.

During a presentation for Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, HP said it wanted a hybrid laptop (with an emphasis on “laptop”) that was portable, stable, pen- and keyboard-equipped, lightweight, connected and with a long battery life. It hit most of those goals with the Windows 10-equipped Pro x2 612 G2, which weighs just 2.65 pounds with a travel keyboard, lasts up to 11 hours and can be charged to 50 percent within a half hour.

Spec-wise, the top-end model comes with an Intel Core i7 (7Y75) CPU with Intel Graphics 615, a 1,920 x 1,280 screen, 8GB RAM, up to a 512GB (removable) M.2 SSD and LTE connectivity. That’s not going to let you play Crysis easily, but it should do the job for business and graphics pro.

For sketching and taking notes, it has an active Wacom stylus and 165-degree kickstand that transforms it into an easel or presentation tool. At the same time, you can get it with a rugged case for field work and a number of accessories like a charging dock, travel hub with enhanced connectivity and scanning or mobile retail accessories. Workers in the field needn’t worry (much) about breaking it, as it packs Gorilla Glass and a MIL-STD 810G rating for drops, dust, humidity, temperature changes and functional shock.

HP also considered the repairability of the device. It has a removable back cover for “in-field serviceability,” a fanless design and, most interestingly, a removable M.2 SSD. The idea is that if it needs to go in for repairs, you can pop out the SSD and send it off without worrying about your data. However, the battery can’t be removed and must be repaired or replaced under warranty.

The HP Pro x2 612 G2 is now available starting a $979, though HP hasn’t yet said how much a higher-end Core i7 or i5 will cost (probably a lot more). The Rugged Case runs $49 and is also available now, while the Elite USB-C Dock is coming in March starting at $149. Considering its intended business market, those prices are surprisingly reasonable.

Click here to catch up on the latest news from MWC 2017.

Awesome tech you can’t buy yet: Jellyfish tanks, wearable luggage, and more

At any given moment, there are approximately a zillion crowdfunding campaigns on the web. Take a stroll through Kickstarter or Indiegogo and you’ll find no shortage of weird, useless, and downright stupid projects out there — alongside some real gems. In this column, we cut through all the worthless wearables and Oculus Rift ripoffs to round up the week’s most unusual, ambitious, and exciting projects. But don’t grab your wallet just yet. Keep in mind that any crowdfunded project can fail — even the most well-intentioned. Do your homework before cutting a check for the gadget of your dreams.

JellyTank — jellyfish-friendly aquarium

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Jellyfish are amazing creatures. These gelatinous, free-swimming non-vertebrates are among the oldest groups of animals on earth. They’ve been around for over 500 million years, and can be found in every ocean in the world, from the surface to the deep sea. Masters of survival, they have endured every major extinction event since the Cambrian period. But the thing is, while they’re really good at surviving in the open ocean, they’re not so great at living in tanks. They’re just not built for it, so without the right kind of aquarium, they typically don’t survive for very long.

That’s where the JellyTank comes in. This sucker was built from the ground up to be an ideal habitat for your captive jellies. It features a proprietary shape and a custom-designed pump that work together to provide a gentle flow similar to what jellyfish would experience in their natural environment. On top of that, there’s also an integrated filtration system that constantly keeps tabs on the water quality, and a set of color-variable LEDs you can use for lighting.

Read more here

Awesome tech you can’t buy yet: Jellyfish tanks, wearable luggage, and more

At any given moment, there are approximately a zillion crowdfunding campaigns on the web. Take a stroll through Kickstarter or Indiegogo and you’ll find no shortage of weird, useless, and downright stupid projects out there — alongside some real gems. In this column, we cut through all the worthless wearables and Oculus Rift ripoffs to round up the week’s most unusual, ambitious, and exciting projects. But don’t grab your wallet just yet. Keep in mind that any crowdfunded project can fail — even the most well-intentioned. Do your homework before cutting a check for the gadget of your dreams.

JellyTank — jellyfish-friendly aquarium

Please enable Javascript to watch this video

Jellyfish are amazing creatures. These gelatinous, free-swimming non-vertebrates are among the oldest groups of animals on earth. They’ve been around for over 500 million years, and can be found in every ocean in the world, from the surface to the deep sea. Masters of survival, they have endured every major extinction event since the Cambrian period. But the thing is, while they’re really good at surviving in the open ocean, they’re not so great at living in tanks. They’re just not built for it, so without the right kind of aquarium, they typically don’t survive for very long.

That’s where the JellyTank comes in. This sucker was built from the ground up to be an ideal habitat for your captive jellies. It features a proprietary shape and a custom-designed pump that work together to provide a gentle flow similar to what jellyfish would experience in their natural environment. On top of that, there’s also an integrated filtration system that constantly keeps tabs on the water quality, and a set of color-variable LEDs you can use for lighting.

Read more here

Awesome tech you can’t buy yet: Jellyfish tanks, wearable luggage, and more

At any given moment, there are approximately a zillion crowdfunding campaigns on the web. Take a stroll through Kickstarter or Indiegogo and you’ll find no shortage of weird, useless, and downright stupid projects out there — alongside some real gems. In this column, we cut through all the worthless wearables and Oculus Rift ripoffs to round up the week’s most unusual, ambitious, and exciting projects. But don’t grab your wallet just yet. Keep in mind that any crowdfunded project can fail — even the most well-intentioned. Do your homework before cutting a check for the gadget of your dreams.

JellyTank — jellyfish-friendly aquarium

Please enable Javascript to watch this video

Jellyfish are amazing creatures. These gelatinous, free-swimming non-vertebrates are among the oldest groups of animals on earth. They’ve been around for over 500 million years, and can be found in every ocean in the world, from the surface to the deep sea. Masters of survival, they have endured every major extinction event since the Cambrian period. But the thing is, while they’re really good at surviving in the open ocean, they’re not so great at living in tanks. They’re just not built for it, so without the right kind of aquarium, they typically don’t survive for very long.

That’s where the JellyTank comes in. This sucker was built from the ground up to be an ideal habitat for your captive jellies. It features a proprietary shape and a custom-designed pump that work together to provide a gentle flow similar to what jellyfish would experience in their natural environment. On top of that, there’s also an integrated filtration system that constantly keeps tabs on the water quality, and a set of color-variable LEDs you can use for lighting.

Read more here

LG G6: Our First Take

LG is back in 2017 with a brand-new flagship phone: the LG G6. It’s not a modular phone like the G5 or a quirky device with customization options like the G4. The G6 is a classy, sexy glass and metal phone with high-end specs and the kind of cameras that are meant to make you drool.

We got a behind-the-scenes look at the G6 and all the work that went into it directly from LG. Here are our first impressions.

Be sure to also check out our full LG G6 teardown and battery test.

A gorgeous, sophisticated design

Gone are the days of removable batteries and plastic backs. LG is joining the design craze for shiny, polished glass and strong metal with the G6. Two pieces of Gorilla Glass are sandwiched inside an attractive metal band, which adds strength to the device and limits damage from corner drops.

More: LG G6: News and rumors

It looks like the Galaxy S7 from the back, but it still has a distinctly LG look and feel. The G6 is chunkier and the metal frame is thicker, making the phone feel more solid than Samsung’s 2016 flagship. It’s not as unique looking as the leather-backed G4 or the banana-shaped G Flex, but the G6 has a glamorous look that’s right in line with all the latest trends. Whether that’s a good thing to you or not depends on your perspective. LG’s quirky design cues are missing, but the G6 is gorgeous. It’s shiny, sleek, and all grown up.

The design is simple and sophisticated. You’ll see slim bezels around a device that’s almost all screen, a metal frame with power buttons and a volume rocker, a glass back with a subtle G6 logo, and a single speaker along the bottom edge.

Malarie Gokey/Digital Trends

Malarie Gokey/Digital Trends

The silver color option is the most attractive and hides fingerprints better than the black and white models. We’re not fans of glass-backed phones because of all the oily smears they collect as you hold them, and the fragility of glass is also a concern. LG said the thicker metal frame helps protect the glass more and the Gorilla Glass 5 back is as shatter resistant as it gets in the industry. The company didn’t offer an estimate on the cost of replacing the glass on the G6 if it breaks, but we’ll update you when we get a quote. We still wish it weren’t so fragile and recommend you use a case to avoid breakage and fingerprints.

In other ways, the phone is more durable. The G6 is sealed up tight and as waterproof as the last Galaxy, and the iPhone, with an IP68 rating. You can dunk it in 1.5 meters of fresh or saltwater for up to 30 minutes without fear of destroying your shiny new phone. LG’s keeping tight-lipped about how it protects the G6 from salt water, but its engineers assured us it is indeed saltwater safe.

No bezels about it! The G6 is mostly screen

The hallmark of the G6’s design is the stunning 5.7-inch Quad HD screen with its unique 18:9 aspect ratio. To get the phone to an 80 percent screen-to-body ratio, LG cut back on the bezels all around the device. The top and bottom bezels are super small, but they are still there, unlike on the Xiaomi Mi Mix, which has no bezel at all around three sides of the phone. Even though the G6 does keep slender bezels, the device is still mostly screen, and it’s beautiful to behold.

Related: LG V20 review

Although it’s a 5.7-inch screen, the phone’s body feels like it’s only a 5-inch phone. It’s an astonishing feat of technology. You get all the screen without any of that big-phone, phablet feel. I could actually wrap my fingers around it and my thumb and ring finger would touch. Trying that on the iPhone 7 Plus always leaves a 1-inch gap between my fingers. The G6 is usable in one hand. I could text one-handed on the screen without any problems — that’s a big deal. The G6 is extremely comfortable to hold.

Of course, the elongated 18:9 screen aspect ratio means some content may look different on the non-standard screen. LG told us most of the content will auto-adjust, but you may see some black bars now and then. However, LG is probably right in predicting that screens will move to 18:9 to keep screens big and phone sizes down.

A solid spec sheet

When it comes to specs, LG is done with the spec war. It’s sticking with tried and true components to make the G6 reliable and appealing to everyone. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor and 4GB RAM power the G6, making it a zippy phone that’s on par with the Google Pixel in processing power. It doesn’t have the Snapdragon 835, which is slated to hit phones later in the year, so spec fiends may howl that it’s not good enough, but the 821 is more than capable.

Inside, is 32GB of storage, which is expandable via a MicroSD card. It’s not as much storage as you might expect from a flagship phone, but it’s passable. The additional storage in the MicroSD card should make up for it and help you keep your G6 storage open. We recommend using Google Photos to keep your photo storage down, because you’ll want to take lots of pictures with the cameras.

There’s also wireless charging on U.S. model, but international folks won’t get this feature.

There’s a sharp 5-megapixel selfie camera with a 100-degree field of view for wide angle shots on the front of the phone that can do normal or wide-angle views, depending on your needs. The G6 sports two 13-megapixel cameras on the back, and one is a wide-angle lens with 125-degree field of view. The cameras were impressive and fun to use during our hands-on time, but we need to perform more testing.

A 3,000mAh battery is inside the G6, and it juices up quickly with Quick Charge 3.0. You should only need 10 minutes to get a 15 percent charge. There’s also wireless charging on U.S. model, but international folks won’t get this feature. To compensate, some Asia countries will get a Hi-Fi DAC (high-resolution audio) on the G6. Europe is the odd man out with neither wireless charging nor the Hi-Fi DAC.

Slick software

The G6 runs the newest version of Android, called ‘Nougat,’ with Google Assistant, and it currently has Google’s February security patch, which is a good sign for security. It’s unclear how quickly updates and patches will come through, but LG typically does a decent job of being on time. Nougat is covered with the light veneer of LG’s interface, which is attractive and simple. It doesn’t hide Nougat’s beauty, so Android purists will be happy. It also adds a few flourishes to make the design more uniform and suited to the G6’s unique 18:9 aspect ratio.

Malarie Gokey/Digital Trends

Since 18:9 translates to 2:1, GUI (the name of LG’s interface) is built upon the idea of the screen as two perfect squares. Many of the LG apps have been adjusted to divide the screen into those two perfect squares. So when you look at a contact, their picture takes up the top half of the screen and their contact details take up the second half. The same principle applies when you look at messages in landscape view and elsewhere in the interface. It’s really lovely, and the perfect symmetry is oddly satisfying.

You can also make the icons uniform in size and shape with a feature that puts irregular icons in rounded square frames — AKA squircles (square + circle = squricle). The icons look so much better when they’re all the same size and shape. It’s like how icons look on the iPhone. You can turn it off, if you hate it, but I loved it.

More: Android Wear is back in business with two new watches from LG

Also of note are the 10 included wallpapers. LG designers made them by hand using pieces of paper and layering them in creative ways. For example, the hero wallpaper shows a subtle number 6.

Availability and pricing

LG has yet to announce availability and pricing for the G6. We will keep you updated here. Overall, the G6 impressed us as a powerful, well-made phone with a slick user interface. It is a solid phone, though it lacks any major surprise features. Pricing and competition are the only unknown challenges for the LG G6. We are guessing it will be in the $650 – $850 price range, like Galaxy phones and iPhones. It will likely hit shelves in April or May.

Highs

• Gorgeous design
• Solid specs
• Beautiful big screen
• Comfortable to hold and use one-handed

Lows

• Not the latest processor
• Glass design is fragile and fingerprinty