After months of leaks and rumors, it's finally time for us to take a look at the real LG G2. The successor to last year's Optimus G was just officially announced and, as you have come to expect from the usual flagships, it's loaded with plenty of specs and clever features, not to mention some interesting new smartphone design approaches. The new device, which runs Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean, comes with a larger display than its predecessor, packing a 5.2-inch 1080p IPS panel. It also offers a 2.26GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 SoC. Additionally, you can expect to find a 13-megapixel camera with optical image stabilization (as well as a 2.1MP front-facing cam), 24 bit/192kHz HiFi playback, a non-removable 3,000mAh battery, 2GB of RAM and your choice of 16GB or 32GB internal storage. It'll come in white and black, and LG tells us that the G2 will be rolling out to markets around the world over the next eight weeks, and we have confirmation that all four major US carriers have committed to adding the device to their lineup.
What about those unique design traits? As you may have already seen in the leaked images (or if you happened to look at the press image above), the backside of the phone is much busier than on most other handsets. LG opted to put the volume rocker and power button just below the rear camera rather than the edge of the phone. The idea for this, we're told, is to make the handheld experience a little less awkward on such a large phone. Since the device is wider than smartphones of olden times, LG wanted to put more controls in a place that your fingers naturally rest. LG is also boasting thinner bezels -- 0.1-inch thick, to be precise -- thanks to a new dual-routing method in which the touch sensor uses two connectors.
On the software side, LG has done more than just throw in a few ringtones from the Vienna Boys' Choir. It offers features like AnswerMe, which answers incoming calls when you put the phone up to your ear, and Slide Aside, which lets you do a three-finger gesture to "slide" open apps off the screen for multitasking. Text Link is another interesting idea, where the phone takes relevant text and inserts embeddable links to them in other apps -- of course, this is similar to what we've seen on iOS previously. There's also Guest Mode, which allows another user to access the phone (LG refers to this as a type of Kid Mode) by drawing a different gesture on the lock screen. We lay out the software in more detail here, so check it out for more info. If you're interested in the full spec sheet and how it compares to other flagships, we've got that here. We also have our hands-on here for more impressions of the device, as well as a press release and gallery below.
Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile, LG
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