LG launched three variants of Q6 with different RAM in early July. And the Q6 with 3GB RAM has been introduced in India. The LG Q6 smartphone has been launched with an aggressive price of under Rs 15,000. And LG hopes that budget customers will like this price. However, will the Q6 be able to succeed on the basis of display? Let’s find out.
LG Q6 design and build quality
Sporting a 5.5-inch display, the LG Q6 is certainly one of the most comfortable smartphones we have used in recent times. And all thanks to its extremely slim screen borders. The display has curved edges like the G6, but the Gorilla Glass is flat instead of 2.5D curved. The screen has a resolution of 2160×1080 pixels. However, there is no notification LED or always-on display to catch any missed notifications, so you will have to keep turning the display on to see notifications. There is a blank space above the screen for the front camera and sensors, while there is just an LG logo at the bottom.
The phone is made using 7000 series aluminium sheet, which is impressive as this type of metal is usually used for more expensive phones. The edges of the phone are also curved to suit the display. The rear of the phone is made of plastic and it gets stained easily. And the phone can look a little unsightly during everyday use. The phone also gets scratched easily, so you have to be careful while using the phone.
The power and volume buttons on the left side of the phone are fine to operate. The phone has slots for two nano-SIM cards and one microSD card. One nano SIM and one microSD card can be used in the first slot while the second SIM card can be used in the second slot. This phone has a headphone jack and a micro-USB port at the bottom. There is a mono speaker on the rear. The lack of a USB Type-C port in the phone is disappointing, while the phone only works at USB 2.0 speed. The good thing is that the camera module on the rear is flat and we did not see any problem due to any kind of protrusion during the review.
If you haven’t noticed yet, the Q6 has one big drawback: the lack of a fingerprint sensor. For some unknown reason, LG has not included this security feature in the phone. Instead, the phone has face recognition, which works well but there are some flaws in the phone that you have to be aware of. By default, face recognition works pretty fast – all you have to do is hold your phone in front of your face and the phone will unlock automatically. However, the phone can also be easily unlocked by placing a picture of a user in front of the camera. Also, the user is allowed to register only one face, but you can technically store someone else’s face as well by going to the ‘Improve face recognition’ option. However, to use this feature, you will need a pattern or PIN.
Apart from this, ‘Advanced face recognition’ is another way to make face recognition more secure. With this enabled, a 2D image cannot be used in place of your face, but this takes time to unlock the phone. Also, this entire process does not work in low light.
Overall, the Q6 is a good looking device, and this is thanks to the display. The phone has a good build quality, feels stable in the hand and the overall design is comfortable. But we were disappointed by the lack of a fingerprint sensor, USB Type-C port and notification light.
LG Q6 specifications and features
The Q6 is not a very powerful smartphone and it is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 435 processor which is also found in the sub-Rs 10,000 category phone Xiaomi Redmi 4 (Review). This phone has a 64-bit octa-core processor that comes with a maximum speed of 1.4GHz. Talking about the graphics, the phone has an Adreno 505 GPU. The benchmark figures of the phone are quite average.
Talking about other specifications, the phone has 3GB RAM, 32GB storage, Bluetooth 4.2, Wi-Fi b/g/n, USB-OTG, FM radio and 4G VoLTE. The dialer app of the Q6 does not have the option of direct video call, which is usually seen in Samsung phones. We were happy to see the latest version of Android in the phone, the company has given Android 7.1.1 Nougat in the Q6. The phone also receives security patches quickly and quickly. (July 1, during our review)
LG’s default themes aren’t very subtle, but you can customize them and get a more or less stock Android feel via the Settings app. The phone has onscreen navigation buttons at the bottom of the screen that can be customized and re-ordered. There’s also a fourth button to switch SIMs or pull down the notification shade. The default single layer look can be replaced with a more traditional app drawer layout. There’s also Google Assistant.
The phone comes with LG Mobile Switch app that lets you send data from your old device to the Q6 easily, RemoteCall Service lets users control your phone to contact LG customer care for troubleshooting, LG Smart World is a portal for LG product information and themes. Smart Doctor lets you check your phone’s battery, storage, and RAM usage. There’s also a toggle in the notification shade called Capture+ that lets you draw and type text on screenshots.
The Settings app is divided into two tabs to make it easier to find a feature. Downloaded apps can be adjusted to scale to an 18:9 screen. Same goes for game apps, switching the aspect ratio but doing so will restart the app. Fonts, text size and thickness, and blue light filter can be changed among other settings.
LG Q6 performance, camera and battery life
Despite the poor benchmark numbers, the Q6 handles all important tasks with ease. We liked the interface. Surprisingly, multitasking was easy and apps loaded quickly. The phone doesn’t heat up during normal use, but the metal frame does get warm when playing games. Most 3D games can be played on the Q6 with a playable frame rate. Games like Xenowerk run smoothly, but games like Asphalt 8 are a bit laggy.
LG has provided a feature called ‘Game battery saver’. It can adjust the quality of graphics rendering and framerate to reduce battery consumption. We noticed a slight improvement in the framerate of Asphalt 8 but the game did not run as smoothly as expected. There is also a feature called ‘Break time’ which pauses the game when the phone is not in use and reduces screen brightness and processor performance.
The display on the Q6 is good for media playback. However, the phone does not play 4K video files. The screen reflects a bit but the brightness is good and the colours are well saturated. The speakers get quite loud when playing games or watching and listening to media, but since the speakers are at the back, the experience is not the best.
The 13-megapixel rear camera takes landscape and macro shots with good detail. The colours are good and focusing is also quite fast. The Q6 camera’s viewfinder has a DSLR-style green square that shows the autofocus point, but this doesn’t always mean the subject is in focus. It’s best to tap on your subject in the viewfinder to get proper focus. The camera takes good photos even in low light, but there is some noise and information like text in the background is still readable.
The quality of the recorded videos is good but the resolution is limited to 1080p. Using a ‘Steady recording’ toggle in the settings keeps the footage pretty steady. The 5-megapixel front camera produces pretty average selfies but you do get a wide-angle mode that lets you fit a lot of people in the frame easily.
The camera app is simple and easy to navigate. All the buttons and toggles are placed as expected. The phone has a square camera mode which is similar to the one on the G6. This lets you use half the screen as a viewfinder and the other half to frame your shot. LG has also provided a hidden cursor for quick sharing on social media.
Battery life is good but the 3000mAh battery drains quickly when watching videos continuously. In our video loop test, the battery lasted less than 10 hours, which is not good. The lack of fast charging support is also disappointing.
Our verdict
The 18:9 screen aspect ratio is definitely going to be a hit in the smartphone world. And the LG Q6, despite its budget price tag, comes with this premium feature and that’s its biggest selling point. In fact, the Q6 should probably look modern even after a few years. It’s not the most powerful smartphone in its category, but if you’re looking for a phone with powerful specifications, you’ll want to consider the likes of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 (Review), Honor 6X (Video Review) and Samsung Galaxy J7 Prime (Review) are options available.
The Q6 stays in the race with its design and display, and we also liked the level of customization of the custom Android UI. Apart from these things, there are some other good things in the phone. The budget level processor limits the more demanding games and apps on the phone. The rear camera is good but the front camera could have been better. Battery life is also not very good. Apart from this, the lack of fingerprint sensor also makes the phone inconvenient.
We would recommend the LG Q6 if you are looking for a phone with a beautiful look and want to trade in a bit of performance.