LG G Flex 2 Hands-on: Gorgeous Curved Display

At the beginning of last year LG released its first curved and flexible smartphone in the LG G Flex. Now, just one year later at CES 2015 the company has debuted a new and improved LG G Flex 2 with a beautiful 5.5-inch curved P-OLED display running the latest Android 5.0 Lollipop.

The original LG G Flex was a surprising smartphone that wowed many, but not without plenty of flaws. However, here in 2015 the new and improved G Flex 2 has fixed all those issues, and is finally a phone many buyers will want to check out.

Read: LG G Flex 2: 5 Things You Need to Know

We took a few minutes to get our hands on the new LG G Flex to test out just how well the curved display worked, check out the latest Android 5.0.1 Lollipop update running on an LG phone, and put it through the paces. Below are a few additional pictures and our thoughts of the LG G Flex 2.

Last year the LG G Flex was an interesting product that was actually revealed in late 2013 and finally hit carrier shelves in the early months of 2014. AT&T, Sprint and a few others offered the phone to buyers, but it wasn’t as popular as many, LG included, had expected.

Being the first retail-ready curved smartphone it had a few challenges to overcome, and those have finally been concurred with the new G Flex 2 announced this week. For one, the original only had a 720p HD display, but was on a massive 5.7-inch screen. It also had some ghosting issues, blurring, and our own review units developed light but noticeable horizontal lines on the display. Likely caused from the flexing or curved nature of the screen.

We can’t say whether those lines will be a problem with the new LG G Flex 2, but the phone and its new 5.5-inch 1080p HD display certainly looks much better than the original. The screen is crisp, vibrant, and had no noticeable flaws.

LG’s new G Flex 2 is an odd device. Its design and overall look and feel is similar to the flagship LG G3, only they’ve tossed the latest and greatest mobile technology inside, and of course curved the screen. It’s smaller than last years model while delivering better specs, a crisp higher resolution display, and a better design. Meaning it finally is something we’d call ready for mass market, and thankfully it’s headed to at least 3 carriers in the United States. AT&T, Sprint, and US Cellular have all confirmed they’ll carry it. Here’s the full specs for those curious.

LG G Flex 2 Specs

• 5.5-inch 1920 x 1080p full HD Curved Display
• 2.0 GHz Octa-core Snapdragon 810 processor with 2GB of RAM
• 16/32GB of storage and micro-SD support
• 13 Megapixel OIS+ rear camera with laser auto focus, 2.1 front camera
• Android 5.0 Lollipop with 64-bit support (thanks to Snapdragon 810)
• 3,000 mAh built-in battery
• Size: 149.1 x 75.3 x 7.1-9.4mm
• Rear facing buttons
• more

The LG G Flex 2 has a rather neat design with sleek bezels, rear facing buttons, and a beautiful screen. While we only had a few minutes with it we felt right at home after previously using the LG G3 from 2014. It really is a very similar design, only with a curved screen and a few small changes.

One thing absolutely worth nothing is the speed of Android 5.0.1 Lollipop. It was quite poor. While LG is already busy sending updates of Android 5.0 Lollipop to the LG G3 outside of the US, this is a pre-production unit running non-final software. Going from screen to screen was not very smooth, often delayed, and just wasn’t as quick as we’d expect. Especially considering it has a 2.0 Ghz 8-core processor, 2GB of RAM, and runs what should be the fastest version of Android yet.

We aren’t too concerned with performance, as this will likely be all fixed and butter smooth one the phone is officially released in the United States. That said, it was worth mentioning in case the display wasn’t able to keep up with everything else, but we don’t think that is the case. LG told is the software isn’t final, but that’s all they had to say.

LG’s new smartphone delivers a neat design, a beautiful display, powerful specs and Quick Charge features so you shouldn’t ever have to worry about battery life, comes in three different colors, and even has a self-healing coating on back to keep it looking new for years.

All said and done the most impressive aspect of the phone is the design and display. The screen looks stunning, even if it’s only 1080p, which is still plenty, and the rear buttons continue to be a trend users enjoy.

While we can’t say too much after spending such little time with it, the LG G Flex certainly looks to be one of the better devices released in the first half of 2015, and if LG’s announcement is accurate, it should be available within the next 2-3 months in the United States. We’ll keep an eye out for more details regarding the release date, and update once things are made official and you’re able to get one yourself.