Could you use a premium phone that has 5 camera lenses to take photos wide-angle, telephoto and “normal” including for selfies? Then I have a phone for you – the LG V40 ThinQ.
LG is sometimes thought of as an also-ran behind the other, more successful, South Korean electronics company, Samsung, but many of its products are competitive, and the LG V40 ThinQ is one of them.
As you might suspect by the name, it is a relatively slim phone, 6.25-inches tall, almost 3-inches wide and less than a third of an inch thick. It weighs just under 6 ounces and is wrapped in Gorilla Glass front & back. The phone is water resistant, so it will survive both an accidental toilet drop and about 30 minutes in a few feet of water. And it claims to have been tested to MIL-STD-810G, a standard for shock resistance, such as being dropped many times from someone holding it while standing.
The LG V40 ThinQ currently runs on the Android Oreo 8.1 OS, comes with 6 GB of RAM, 64 GB of internal storage plus room for a microSD card. The battery is both Quick Charge and can be charged wirelessly or with a USB-C port.
The sound is excellent and the phone even sports the now-elusive 3.5 mm headphone jack. The phone offers many ways to boost sound volume and quality, even a virtual 3D surround sound effect.
As for those cameras, there are 3 lenses on the back, two being a 12-megapixel standard perspective and a 2X telephoto, and the third is a 16 MP super wide angle. In the front are an 8 MP standard lens and a 5 MP wide-angle. You choose your lens from the camera app, which also includes some neat photo tricks, such as taking a picture simultaneously using all 3 lenses, or simply previewing what each shot would look like, side by side.
The LG V40 ThinQ has a 6.4-inch OLED screen, comparable to the top of the line Samsungs or iPhones, although it doesn’t have as much battery life as the latest Galaxy phones. It does have a fingerprint reader on the back, which makes unlocking the phone while holding it easier.
On the other hand, I’m not a big fan of any all-glass phones, finding them slippery even when not wet, and while this LG phone is said to be shock resistant if you drop it, I’d personally opt for a fitted case to keep it safe in my hand.
One feature of the LG V40 ThinQ not found in some other Android models: a dedicated Google Assistant button, so you can just press it to ask a question or give an instruction, without having to first say “OK Google.”
Overall, this is a very good Android phone with lots of features for photographers plus premium audio. Unlocked, the LG V40 ThinQ is currently $950 at Amazon or Best Buy and of course, offered by the major carriers with various deals & discounts.
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