As expected, LG is introducing one of the most unusual smartphones of the year. The LG Wing is a dual-screen smartphone with a 6.8 inch primary display that swivels to reveal a a secondary 4 inch screen that can be positioned below or to the side.
LG positions this as a layout that can aid with typing, multitasking, or other activities.
The LG Wing comes out of the new LG Explorer Project initiative, which the company says is an effort to reimagine what a smartphone can be rather than just cranking out a new device with marginally better specs than last year’s model.
LG says the idea behind the Explorer Project is to imagine new designs, take new risks, and attempt to deliver new form factors with practical purposes. The LG Wing is just the first.
The phone is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G processor and features triple rear cameras and a pop-up selfie camera.
But the most distinctive characteristic is the dual-screen design. Among other things, LG says you can use the second screen to:
- Type a message using an on-screen keyboard without obscuring an app on the primary screen.
- Use chat or text messaging apps while watching videos.
- View media playback controls that aren’t overlaid on the screen.
- Incoming call alerts and other messages pop up on the small screen without covering the primary display.
- When you accept the call, the UI stays on the second screen.
- You can also keep GPS navigation running in full-screen while taking a call or controlling media on the second screen.
You can also create app pairs for two apps that you typically want to open together in dual screen mode. Just tap the shortcut on your home screen to launch YouTube and Chrome, for example.
LG notes that the phone’s pop-up camera automatically retracts if you drop the phone, in order to prevent damage. And since it’s not visible when you’re not using it, there’s no notch or hole in the display for the front camera. The phone also has an in-display fingerprint sensor.
The phone’s primary camera supports optical image stabilization and features 6 motion sensors to keep video recordings stable. And you can hold the phone by its smaller screen, using record, pan, and other controls without covering the larger viewfinder display.
The LG Wing’s pop-up front camera features a 32MP image sensor with 0.8 ÎĽm pixels, while the rear camera system includes:
- 64MP primary camera with 78-degree field of view and 0.8 ÎĽm pixels
- 12MP ultra-wide 120-degree camera with 1.4 ÎĽm pixels and 6 motion sensors
- 13MP ultra-wide 117 degree camera with 1 ÎĽm pixels
The LG Wing will be available first from Verizon in the United States, before hitting AT&T and T-Mobile at a later time. Pricing is said to vary by carrier, but rumor has it that the first phone from the LG Explorer Project will have a base price in the $1000 range.
While the specs are clearly not the most important thing about this phone, here they are, all in one place:
| Primary display | 6.8 inch, 2460 x 1080 pixel pOLED (20.5:9 aspect ratio) |
| Second screen | 3.9 inch, 1240 x 1080 pixel gOLED (1.15:1 aspect ratio) |
| Processor | Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G |
| RAM | 8GB |
| Storage | 128GB or 256GB + microSD (up to 2TB) |
| Battery | 4,000 mAh |
| Battery | Qualcomm Quick Charge 4.0+ Qi Wireless charging |
| Wireless | 5G WiFi 5 Bluetooth 5.1 NFC |
| USB | USB 3.1 Type-C |
| Rear cameras | 64MP primary (F1.8 / 78°/ 0.8µm) 12MP ultra-wide gimbal motion camera (F2.2 / 120° / 1.4µm) 13MP ultra-wide camera (F1.9 / 117° / 1.0µm) |
| Front camera | 32MP pop-up selfie (F1.9 / 79.6° / 0.8µm) |
| Security | In-display fingerprint sensor |
| Water resistance | IP54 |
| Dimensions | 169.5mm x 74.5mm x 10.9mm |
| Weight | 260 grams |
What sort of phone holder would work with this phone?
Question is, how would you mount such a phone?
Honestly, LG is too big of a company to make these quirky mis-steps. A company of LG’s standing should be cranking out folding phones with Samsung and going head to head with them with foldables which are the future not these T shaped impractical eyesores which are certainly not the future of smartphones. Seems like a management don’t have any sensible vision at LG and keep going down these rabbit holes which all lead to low sales and loss making smartphone division being propped up by OLED TV sales elsewhere in the company.
At the moment, further increases in pain, hatred, and regret is the only thing one can guarantee is “the future” (as long as social media exists). It still remains to be seen how reliable foldables can be and if the concept has staying power, that is, isn’t a fad that a few companies have gotten in on. They’ll have to get a lot cheaper for that to be the case, for one thing.
It’s clear that the market for glass sandwich rectangles is over-saturated and there’s be room for experimentation (I find most of those to be impractical eyesores myself), and it’s also clear that a return of headphone jacks, removable batteries, infrared, and smaller phones would be far more practical than this, but I’ve predicted so many things that were wrong in my life that I don’t think anyone who isn’t a market analyst can rightfully predict that one form factor will overtake all others causing them to cease to exist. Even if that does happen sometimes.
Sharp did such design for their domestic market, allowing japanese commuters to follow their favorite baseball team on the go. Keyboard was physical at the thime though.
You can have a pick of the type of the device @ https://www.mobilegazette.com/sharp-sx862-08x07x15.htm