With regards to design and performance, LG has taken a completely different approach to the G5 when compared with
its predecessor. It probably has more in common with the Nexus 5X and 6P than anything else, which is no bad thing.
Unibody design, hidden antennas and an all-metal design with those buttery smooth edges on the rear.
LG has forgone placing buttons on the rear of the device this time round, instead opting for a more
traditional placement on the sides. The fingerprint sensor retains a position on the back much like
the Nexus 5X, though this time around it also doubles up as a nifty power button.
The company was keen to stress that it struggled to keep up with camera technology, but it felt
that this was one area where improvement could be made. With the front camera especially, it
can be hard to fit everybody in shot when using a standard shooter. Our field of vision is roughly
120 degrees, while most cameras can only reproduce a fraction of that. LG did the smart thing
and made their front camera ultra-wide-angle - higher than human vision. With 135 degree field,
you should be able to get more of them group photos with less effort. The rear camera was
16 megapixels and felt like a good performer but a true hands-on will be needed to truly put it
through the paces.
Unsurprisingly, the G5 uses top level components and from what we
could tell, it flew in our short time with it. Animations were snappy,
the UI felt modern (though the app tray has vanished!) and the
screen was excellent. Using a 5.3-inch QHD IPS Quantum display,
it ranks among one of the best panels we’ve seen. The Snapdragon
820 coupled with 4GB RAM is lavish and should help it to remain
future-proof for a good amount of time. Add to this expandable
storage via microSD (which no doubt doubles up as a dual-sim) and
you’ve got a pretty complete package.