LG G6: A perfectly fine phone ruined by terrible decisions

As you probably know, LG G6 got unveiled a few days ago and the only two kinds of reactions I can gather are: "Meh" and "This is a perfectly fine phone. Why so much hate? What else do you want in a phone?" And what I want to say is that both the opinions are kind of correct. 


So what exactly is so underwhelming about this phone, which generates such lukewarm reaction. Let's try to analyze. 


Note: This is an opinion piece which is entirely my own opinion based upon what I know about the market and what I feel about the device. I have tried to keep as objective of an opinion as possible but I'm human and nothing is truly objective and unbiased on the internet. 

Let's look at the points LG failed on: 


Old tech at new tech price

Let's look at the specs: SD821, 4GB RAM, 32GB storage.... This phone could have just as well be possible in 2016, and it was. Most of the 2016 phones have the exact same specs as the G6, and most of them can be yours for a much cheaper price than the G6 is. 

I understand that these specs are good enough to run android silky smooth, I know SD821 is a perfectly capable processor, I know you don't need more than 4GB of RAM, and about 32GB being perfectly adequate storage solution. But what I don't get is the fact that why can't this phone be made available cheaper than last year's phone. I'm sure those components are cheaper now due to yield improvements. 

Cutting corners

This is the one thing that turned me off from recommending this phone. LG is trying to cut corners on this very expensive phone. When I go to buy a phone, I need to have no compromise phone. Using gorilla glass 3 on the front, using a 13 MP camera with smaller(1/3") sensor than last year, having regional configurations(see next section), and older specs. 

Didn't LG already cut enough corners by using SD821? I know they had to launch the phone early and beat the S8 to market, but I still don't see it in market yet even after almost a month of unveiling. It just grinds my gears to see so many cut corners in an expensive phone. 

Regional exclusivity and fragmentation

This is by far the biggest issue here. LG is restricting the Quad DAC to korea, wireless charging to US only and 64GB configuration to certain undisclosed markets. All it does is creates a lot of variants of the device with different firmwares. 

I can already see someone with an exclusive variant like 64GB Quad DAC variant not getting update because it didn't sell enough units. Not to mention the confusion and in general frustration this causes. 

Conclusion

Do I hate LG G6? Absolutely not. It's one of the few android phones that gets mostly everything right. The screen is gorgeous and innovative, the design is beautiful, the phone is fluid and LG's update track-record has been pretty good in recent years. The phone in a vacuum is an excellent device. 

But would I recommend it? At this price: No. You can get an S7 edge or a Oneplus 3T for cheaper which will do better for most users. 

This is just an example of poor decisions by LG which have set up this amazing phone for failure. Or an example of wrong pricing at wrong time. What were the executives at LG thinking? We will launch last year's tech 20 days before 2017 flagships arrive and get all the market. It doesn't work like that. 

What do you think about G6? Write in comments below. 

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