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  • meacupla - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I'm surprised they didn't pull out earlier.
    Their smartphones were uninteresting for a long time.
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    They have had all the most interesting SW and HW feature set of all phones in the market. I wonder how they are uninteresting. Maybe the new Chinese phones are super interesting I guess.
  • yankeeDDL - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I think the issue is that they kept trying to compete only in the high-end. Then, there's always someone with better cameras, better display, better SoC.

    It bothers me tremendously that after years there's no offer of high-end Android phones (very high-res, high refresh display, high-end SoC, vast amount of RAM and storage) with displays around 5.5-6.0". There are so-many high-end phones, all of the same (huge) size, and LG was yet one more of the same.
  • yetanotherhuman - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    I don't want high-end with very high res or high refresh, or high-end SoC, but I do want a normal size phone, which have completely disappeared from the market apart from the iPhone SE 2.
  • at_clucks - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    These days it's easy to not care about high end specs because mid range specs are already delivering a great experience for most people. Today's mid range phones are probably much better than the high end of 5 years ago. Anything on top of that is icing on the cake and a never ending stream of diminishing returns.

    On the other hand small phones are seen as cheap phones. Samsung made sure of this when their most expensive line, the Note, was designed to be a pocket buster. And Samsung really put that marketing budget to work. They convinced everybody that they were "the Android phone", they convinced superficial reviewers that what they offer is the golden standard. And those reviewers conformed and sang the praises of even the crappiest design decisions, like the curved edges of the screen..

    So people also conformed and took Samsung as the golden standard. LG tried to stand out with other gimmicks but in the end they had nowhere near Samsung's presence and also tried to bite more than they could chew.

    OP did it better, they insisted they're the poor man's Samsung basically, and slowly built up to being another Samsung albeit at a smaller scale. If it doesn't look like that it won't sell, unless you're Apple but that's a whole other world of marketing. The big Chinese brands did the same. LG has nothing to offer between these players because they chose to fight the wrong fight.
  • Ptosio - Tuesday, April 20, 2021 - link

    Well, to be fair to Samsung, it's them who made the last compact Android flagship in the form of S10e (142.20 x 69.90 which is perfect for me, although the battery was a deal-breaker). And their S21 is still pretty reasonably sized for the Android flagship standards at 151.7 x 71.2, though I'd prefer something smaller.

    It's the Chinese manufacturers, who undercut everyone else on price, but also rarely make anything decent which is not a 75+ wide phablet:/
    (and Huawei, the only one to escape that trend, is banned from Google)
  • Foeketijn - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Completely agree. Especially the good camera. Give me the One X back please.
  • sharath.naik - Tuesday, April 13, 2021 - link

    They mastered the art of good but never the greatest. Always behind an alternative which is cheaper. In every scenario if someone valued some feature or combination, LG phones were never in the top5 picks, but always in the top 10. For example, they are doing the same with their GRAM laptops now, Grams were unique with 17 inch and perfect resolution with expandable ram. So in their brilliance they refined the design and "Dropped expandable ram" making it never the top choice in most scenarios. They need a change of leadership put some technical folks in charge.
  • Revv233 - Tuesday, April 13, 2021 - link

    Yup - V60 was best phone this year, if you want to carry around an ipad mini as your phone.

    Had to go to sony for features and a size you can hold in your hand hopefully they stick around as they are the last brand that make full featured phones now that LG is out.

    Sad ive had to abandon every brand of phone over the year because they decontent/ charge more then the company you jump to gets the same idea and you have to jump again.
  • Arsenica - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    >They have had all the most interesting SW and HW feature set of all phones in the market

    Maybe interesting in the sense of "What the hell is that?" as with their rotating dual screen phone, but never in the sense of "I want one of those!".

    Their other models were just plain boring.
  • sonny73n - Wednesday, April 7, 2021 - link

    Spot on!
  • meacupla - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I'm sorry, but I'm not in the market for $600+ phones
  • sonny73n - Wednesday, April 7, 2021 - link

    Chinese phones aren't super interesting but they're priced right and they have busted the fake values of overpriced Korean phones. I'm repairing a Samsung S20 for someone right now. I can't believe that piece of junk with terrible design and terrible softwares costs $1200. Not in a million years that I would trade my $430 Poco F2 Pro for that garbage.
  • Psyside - Sunday, April 11, 2021 - link

    "I'm repairing a Samsung S20 for someone right now. I can't believe that piece of junk with terrible design and terrible softwares costs $1200. Not in a million years that I would trade my $430 Poco F2 Pro for that garbage"

    If Samsung flagships are garbage, you need to find new job.
  • Mday - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    There were rumors floating for the past 5 years. But the writing was on the wall based on their last phone.
  • kmmatney - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I had an LG phone once - the hardware was great, but the lack of software updates made me get rid, even before my contract was up. It was my only Android phone, and only bought it for the larger screen (was just before iPhone 6 came out). There were software bugs with email, and the battery life was unpredictable - sometimes the phone would run hot and drain battery for no reason. Maybe later phones were better, but I would never buy another LG phone. it's a shame, as the hardware was really good. I tried rooting it and installing other versions of Android, but that just fixed some problems and created other ones. It was a relief to go back to the iPhone - I can't control every aspect of my phone, but at least things generally work.
  • brucethemoose - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Exactly. I would've bought into the V series myself (for the sweet audio out and OLED, amongst other things), but LG's software reputation was a huge turn off.

    I suspect LG's phone division would still be kicking if they stayed closer to stock Android.
  • andrewaggb - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I had a G7 Thinq and I liked it but the camera was awful. So I went back to samsung. The speakers on the G7 were pretty good though (better than samsungs in my opinion).
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Nope, the LG UX had everything that it needs, Up until Oreo the OS was having all necessary features, it never lags at all, granted I rooted V30, that phone had best optimization than V40 and up. Maybe V60 is more polished now.

    Samsung on the other hand has too much it's useful stuff but they shove a lot of bloatware garbage, With Stock Android it's barebone crap, you don't even have any damn thing to customize or tweak it's all stupid stock. Can you even change lockscreen ? Nope. That's pure rubbish. HTC also had solid Sense UI esp during M7 and M8 era. Stock was always damn boring, tried it many times, old Cyanogen Mod had more options than LOS but everything is always better than Google Pixel skin.

    Even LOS and Custom ROMs have tons of options and root nets you Gravity Box and Xposed, with Xposed there was a mod to bring back the KK era Lockscreen widget mod too. It's now not updated sadly as official Xposed is no more, Rovo went MIA and EdXposed is still thriving though.
  • grant3 - Friday, April 9, 2021 - link

    Which is unfortunate. I don't want an "interesting" phone, I want a phone that is so competent that it bores me into forgetting it exists.

    It feels like I'm in the minority; it seems that what attracts consumer money is fragile glass bodies, rounded screens that are harder to use, and lost features like headphone jacks & memory slots.
  • TheinsanegamerN - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Sad to see them go, the likes of the LG G2, the LG V10, and the nexus 5 were all good phones. LG tarnished their reputation hard with quality control issues, refused to embrace the mid range market when it was ablaze, and sectioned off their phones by carrier when everyone else was doing unlocked phones. I honestly thought HTC would drop out before LG.

    RIP LG phones.
  • MananDedhia - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I agree... I did own the G2 and the V20 - still have the V20. Good phone. Oh well, thanks and so long for all the phones.
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    HTC is dead and irrelevant since U11. They are gone long back. Their last great device was HTC 10 but it had battery issues vs OnePlus3. M7 was solid phone on the other hand, that Laser drilled speaker hole and milled chassis which Apple copied hard for iPhone 6.

    Their CEO, she failed the company when M7 was in prime, that CEO left and she took in reigns later M8 was okay but M9 with SD810 disaster HTC fell harder than a rock. U11 killed the rest of their life on top Google sucked out their division for iPixel 2016 an iPhone 6 ripoff design, even now Pixel is an iPhone wannabe failure.

    Midrange is Motorola dominated mostly, now Samsung is also popular I guess. If anyone wants to stay relevant it's Flagship not midrange.
  • TheinsanegamerN - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Staying relevant via flagship is a fools errand. Motorola doesnt even bother trying to counter the galaxy S series.

    There's plenty of room for both mid range and entry level devices. Mtorola is cheaping out on the G 2021, the moto e still isnt very good, and a decent $400 option like the OG moto z play is still MIA.

    There's also a total lack of good 5" phones. Everything today is a massive candybar.
  • deskjob - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Yep :( Sigh I still have the HTC M7 and 10 in my drawer. The CEO really sucked. And they didn't know how to market their stuff. Technically HTC isn't dead, officially. I guess as long as they're still breathing, there's always room for miracles...
  • ikjadoon - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Both the pain and publicity of the boot loop issues feel responsible in some small way.

    That would’ve sealed the deal for me a long time ago.

    How can you be boot looping Android devices? Especially people’s personal devices: instant loss of trust for any reasonable consumer.

    Imagine having an entire Wikipedia page against you brand’s specific engineering failures, while you’re a relatively small player.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_smartphone_bootlo...
  • BigDragon - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Exactly. I had an LG Nexus 5X that boot looped. I ignored all LG phones when looking for a replacement, and I told family and friends to avoid LG phones. It doesn't matter if LG fixed their quality control issues -- plenty of alternatives to choose from. No point risking another surprise hardware defect in a year or two.
  • grant3 - Friday, April 9, 2021 - link

    "how"? it was a manufacturing defect that didn't become apparent until months or years after production started.

    yes it was a dumb mistake (for a skilled manufacturer), but it's not like LG employees decided the hardware was too stable and tweaked the manufacturing process with the intent of making devices more likely to brick.

    I'd be a lot more critical of, for example, the Pi foundation designing devices that deliberately ignore the USB-C spec, and therefore cannot be powered by smart-chargers
  • ads295 - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    They could have at least made one attempt to make a smartphone that's under 5" in screen diagonal, has an AMOLED display, 4500mAh battery, waterproofing and 3.5mm jack. It would work even if it had a potato for a camera - there are simply no small phones around, even in the mid range!
  • Unashamed_unoriginal_username_x86 - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Is there some sort of napoleon complex for hands, why do people always insist that tiny phones would be a breakthrough in the market? Especially with disproportionate batteries that would make a phone chunky and unpopular
  • TheinsanegamerN - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    The success of the thicker, heavier moto power series would say you are wrong.

    Why do people always insist that 19:9 and 20:9 phones that dont fit in pockets are perfect for everyone? Some of us would like a phone closer to nexus 5 size.
  • Kamen Rider Blade - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    That's a very small market. Apple proved that the audience really isn't there for small Nexust 5 size phones.
  • Oxford Guy - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    I was satisfied with the size of the iPhone 5.
  • RSAUser - Wednesday, April 14, 2021 - link

    What many forget is that usually smaller phone users want it because they don't like the size and usually do not consume as much media. This means they are less likely to use it as a status symbol or think they need a better phone since the new thing has a feature/improvement they want.

    This means that that segment is probably a lot slower to upgrade and most likely most of those phone users are still on old, smaller iPhones with a home button.

    My brother for example bought the S10e instead of the S10, not because he can't afford the S10, but because he loved how small the S10e was as it fit nicely into his pocked even while hiking or rock climbing.
  • ads295 - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    All I suggested was that they could have tried.
    Personally I own a chunky yet small-ish phone (Samsung Galaxy M01) and I'm loving the small yet dense weight of it. Feels solid.
  • grant3 - Friday, April 9, 2021 - link

    I don't think anyone seriously suggests that small phones would be a "breakthrough" in the market. The market had small phones as standard for many years and then decided to spent its money on larger phones instead.

    Some people (a minority of the market) just want smaller phones. Does it matter why they want it?
  • kmmatney - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Apple sort of tried that with the iPhone mini, and it is not selling well. While I like the idea of a small phone, I would never buy one. The iPhone 11 or XR are small enough, while still giving a nice usable screen. and lower cost. The iphone 12 is smaller still and OLED.
  • grant3 - Friday, April 9, 2021 - link

    My understanding is that only Sony is seriously attempting to make a flagship small(er) factor phone.

    Everyone else is selling their smaller devices as discount devices, forcing a rough tradeoff between power/features, and small size.
  • SarahKerrigan - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    "At one point, LG had plans to deploy their own in-house design “Nuclun” SoCs into their mobile devices, announcing their partnership with Intel Custom Foundry to produce a leading-edge design on Intel’s 10nm process node. Unfortunately, the project burned to the ground along with Intel’s 10nm struggles, with the chips never seeing the light of day."

    Are you sure Nuclun2 was intended to be 10nm? Rumors had pretty consistently suggested it was going to be on Intel's 14nm node, which also lines up well with the timeline it was being worked on.
  • Arsenica - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    The linked 2016 PR mentions that:

    "LG Electronics will produce a world-class mobile platform based on Intel Custom Foundry’s 10 nm design platform. We’re pleased to welcome them as a customer."
  • SarahKerrigan - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Thanks! Serves me right for not clicking on the link. :)
  • eastcoast_pete - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Intel's PR blurb about Nunclun at the time mentioned "10 nm" alongside 14 and others. However, what was probably a lot more lethal than Intel not getting its act together on 10 nm at that time was that (AFAIK) they couldn't get others to commit to their custom SoC; given LG's lacking track record here, probably not so surprising.
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    LG made Nexus 4 and Nexus 5 which were fantastic devices. Google had wireless charging on Nexus 4 but with their iPixel trash they couldn't get it until recent iterations. How damaged Google is internally shows that.

    LG pioneered the high quality DAC AMP combos in the phones with V10, their V20 upped even further to include the ESS SABRE 9218 chip which had powerful AMP on top, then they even pushed further to make it have professional audio recorder with Low cut filters, High wind noise filters and gain settings on the damn fly, plus move them to SD card with karaoke mix option in 24Bit FLAC. It didn't even stop there, they added all of that to their Manual camera controls which have Focus peaking and exception UI on V20 / V30. Basically a powerhouse. And the UWA lens started by LG V20 copied by others.

    Dual Display technology which actually fucking works ? vs the gimmick $2000+ garbage foldable plastic screens with high failure chance.

    V30 is their best designed phone, it had solid bezels without any bullshit notch or hole punch and proper proportions they called it "Balanced Design" still have that phone, amazing HW for fantastic feature set. Even have that CineLog RAW Video capture format and tons of options damn, the 9218P chipset for Audio added the ESS Filters for impulse responses.

    A big shame was their G3 and G4 bootlooping HW problems caused a lot of problem which caused lot of people to move away, they changed a lot during V20, ti had back glass camera lens shatter issue but it was the last true high power SoC removable battery device, it even has latest LineageOS. With the mobile department changes they abandoned the BL unlock program, V30 was the last it was having unofficial method probably stuffed in by Developers themselves as the OS optimization on V30 was fantastic it runs just like Day 1 I never had such experience with Samsung or OnePlus phones.

    Their failure was marketing team, absolute garbage. The HW was not even advertised properly, while Samsung made a lot during S8 era even though LG launched the new aspect ratio first. And the added mobile dept CEO changes further reduced their focus and they abandoned the notchless perfect balanced design to a hole punch, I think still in 2019 they had 13% N.A marketshare vs iPixel's less than 3%, in that bucket chinese OnePlus was one, the rankings were Apple, Samsung, and 3rd being LG followed by Motorola and Huawei (Honor brand) then you have the less than 3% trash with Pixel, OnePlus phones. SW updates is another problem they should have released those security patches at-least since people wanted more of that secure feeling, Android updates are a shitshow anyways, 10 and 11 completely kill the filesystem and induce a nightmare for devices with SD card slot, which is why Xperia 1 Mk II doesn't have that garbage from what I read.

    Thanks to Chinese manufacturing, cheap crap flooded the Asian market and other EU places LG couldn't take more loss, their phones had solid sale prices after 6 months, on B&H, massive discounts on brand new box pieces. I got G8X for $400 with dual display that was the case for V20, V30, V40, G8 and G8X. So they had to close the shop due to all the problems,

    V50 had that stupid Sprint bs and V60 doesn't even have Carrier Unlocked phone in US. EU had them with BL unlock but no NA market is no XDA mods or others, still their phones were top at Head Fi forum for best Audiophile DAP replacement devices.

    Now we have Chinese garbage, even here on AT every month we only have Samsung or that OnePlus and Xiaomi. No LG phones to be found, shame since they had much better HW for cost. And now we won't have 3.5mm jack and SD slot on a flagship on one less brand. Sony is the only one left now.

    Android itself is becoming like iOS now, with all the UI changes and tough scene on custom ROM mods and rooting, filesystem issues, API blocks and more. Google's focus is lost completely, they are now just aping Apple hard on SW and HW and marketing, Samsung also same, Chinese OEMs are even worse MIUI is a total rip off of iOS. I wish Pixel closed their stupid shop than LG.

    End of an Era.
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    LG audio capabilities -
    http://www.lgnewsroom.com/2016/11/three-reasons-wh...
    http://www.lgnewsroom.com/2017/08/from-delicate-ch...

    That ESS9218P is specifically packaged for LG phone without EMI interference issues and works wonders.
  • TheinsanegamerN - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    The G8 was a good idea, but for $800 it was lacking compared to similar phones, and being carrier locked was not doing LG any wonders.
  • GeoffreyA - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Never had an LG phone but it is sad to see them go. Agree that Android is becoming more like iOS. Sadly, everyone just copies Apple's choices as if they're infallible.
  • zodiacfml - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Sad to see this as I'm still using a Nexus 5 to this day and the display is sharper and cleaner than Samsung's Amoleds. My gripe with LG is premium pricing, always at the level of Samsung despite declining interest over LG brand and growing Chinese competition.
  • eastcoast_pete - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    In some ways, too bad. I had and mostly liked the V20, and still think the Wing is a design worth saving, although more as a phone for working (wide screen on top, keyboard on the smaller screen in the handle of the T-bone) than gaming.
    What made me sour on LG was their abysmal software support, really more the absence thereof. LG took longer to update Android or even just security updates than even smaller Chinese brands; not the premium experience one expected from premium-priced phones.
  • Oxford Guy - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    There is just no excuse for:

    • Not keeping software completely up-to-date with security.

    • Not making it possible to upgrade the OS to the latest version.

    Anti-virus companies can deliver patches on an hourly basis, or faster. It's complete incompetence for a phone company to not make security patches available for an OS as standardized as Android is.
  • eastcoast_pete - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    Also, if LG wants to leave the smartphone market in a true blaze of glory, how about giving people of all current LG phones the ability to easily (OTA) root their phones - no muss, no fuss. Plus, release the drivers required to operate the double screen or swing-out screen of the Wing so that they can be incorporated into free and open Android flavors. This way, LG would get a lot of goodwill (corporate image!) and LG phones become great devices for alternative/open source OS variants. Plus, it's not like LG will provide OS or even security updates going forward. They were pretty bad about doing so when they had a smartphone business, so they are unlikely to start now that they're closing it.
  • Silver5urfer - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    US Carrier Mafia, they blocked it hard. Tmobile V30 was locked very bad with it's RSA signatures vs the other V30 phones, V40 had an exploit, G8 had another same and even V50 too, V60 I don't know. They had undergone so many changes in the mobile heads who control, in that they stopped unlocking US phones bootloaders, a big shame.

    Sadly now all those devices are lost in time. Fantastic HW ruined by this bullshit locks.
  • Oxford Guy - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Unlocked hardware is slightly more difficult to run all the spyware vectors on.

    Of course, what people actually need is completely transparent (completely open source) hardware, software, and networks.
  • hescominsoon - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    The biggest problem was their nearly non-existant updates. Tying themselves to the carriers didn't help either. The writing had been on the wall for a very long time unfortunately.
  • RaistlinZ - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    I'm still rocking my LG V30. Great device. My previous phone was a Nexus 5. Guess I'll use my V30 until it bites the dust then sell my soul to Samsung. ::sigh::
  • phoenix_rizzen - Monday, April 5, 2021 - link

    End of an era, indeed!

    Our very first Android device was an LG Eve running Android 1.5 that my wife picked up way back when. We updated that to 1.6, then ran a bunch of custom ROMs to get 2.0 and even 2.1 running on it. The hardware keyboard was a godsend!

    I got an Optimus G which died an early death and was replaced under warranty with a G2. That was one of my favourite phones, especially running custom ROMs (tried about a dozen different ones over the years). That phone lasted for at least 3 years, if not 4, before the OLED screen developed a dead space across the whole width.

    Picked up a used V20, mainly for the removable battery. Replaced the screen once, and it's all cracked up again, but the phone continues to run. Our youngest uses it for gaming nowadays. There hasn't been any updates to it for a long time. :(

    That was always the downfall to great LG hardware: piss-poor software support. Not really surprised they're folding, but will be sad to see them go.
  • danbob999 - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    I had a couple LG phones. They were pretty much like everyone else's. Nothing really special. They should have stayed with stock Android.
    What I liked was the fact that they were heavily discounted because nobody wanted them. I got brand new G6s for about $60.
  • vortmax2 - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Less competition is usually a bad thing, so I'm sad to see them bow out.
  • peevee - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    Another one ultimately doomed by the Intel's 10nm...

    What a dumpster fire.
  • airdrifting - Tuesday, April 6, 2021 - link

    About time. Everything after G2 has been a failure.
  • JustAnotherPCEnthusiast - Thursday, April 8, 2021 - link

    LG actually made pretty good phones, I think the core problem is that they failed to provide a compelling reason to get their phones over the competition.

    On the one hand, they did try to put some interesting enthusiast features on their phones to differentiate and attract the enthusiast crowd, but had absolutely terrible bootloader unlocking support (in the US at least) and often some other critical design oversight which pretty much killed that niche. I've tried several LG phones over the last few years and ended up returning them because of how confusing it was to know if a particular model supported bootloader unlocking or not.

    On the other hand, a lot of their phones were generic clones of whatever the current market trends were. They were good phones, but not the best, and generally priced too high, and were eaten from both sides by truly high end phones on the top end and flagship killers on the bottom.

    It's sad to see them go, but based on my experience with their phones in the past I'm actually surprised they've stayed in the market this long trying the same failing strategy over and over.
  • ozzuneoj86 - Friday, April 9, 2021 - link

    This is too bad.

    I always buy used phones and I had a G2 which I used for years after buying it used, then switched to a V30+. That has been a good phone as well. I have a very hard time justifying a phone over $200 or so, and LGs tended to drop quickly in price so I could get a 1 1/2 year old top of the line phone for under $200.

    I'm not sure what my next phone will be. The options are dwindling for those of us in areas where GSM coverage is lousy... even more so if you like to root your phone.

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