Hands on: LG K10 (2018) review

A mid-range phone with some nice tweaks

What is a hands on review?

Early Verdict

A fine little phone that offers a pleasant build quality and decent enough spec list - we just need to know the price to find out whether this is worth buying.

Pros

  • +

    Good screen quality

  • +

    Metal frame

Cons

  • -

    Slow camera

  • -

    Button on back not quite placed right

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The LG K10 is a very, well, mid-range phone. It's hard to say that much more about it, because without the price it just feels like a phone that's made to put some phone bits on a chassis that looks a lot like a phone, and ta-da! suddenly a phone appears.

That's not to say there's anything wrong with the LG K10 (2018) - it just doesn't really wow in any way. Then again, given it's middle of the road in terms of the likely price bracket, you wouldn't expect it to

LG K10 (2018) price and release date

We're thoroughly guessing on the price here, but if it's more than £150 then it's too expensive. The release date is going to vary by region, but we doubt you'll have to wait too long if you're going to see it in a local phone shop, Google this preview and wonder if it's worth buying.

Design and screen

Actually, we're probably being a bit mean to this handset - if it comes in with a lower cost, then it's probably worth checking out, as the metallic body is impressive and nice to hold.

It's a touch slippy, but nothing that a firmer grip won't fail to solve. The fingerprint scanner on the back functions as a power button as well, but it's not always easy to hit this and open the phone... which is something of an issue.

The screen is a 5.3-inch affair, with a1280 x 720 resolution - still HD, but a long way from the most detailed on the market. That said, the contrast ratio and brightness of it was rather good considering this should be a lower-cost phone, and you can't really tell it's that low-res compared to other phones on the market.

The LG K10 (2018) is a little bezel-heavy, but given we're in a world where the top handsets are packing long, 18:9 displays, the feeling of large bezels is always going to be easily compounded.

Camera and battery

The snapper on the LG K10 is a 13MP affair, with a decent selfie mode from the 5MP (for wide angle selfies) or an 8MP sensor. The camera itself is a little slow to fire, which we understand given the 1.5GHz octa-core Mediatek processor on offer.

The battery life on the K10 should be pretty decent though, depending on how much effort LG has made to bring the quality of the software up. With only HD-level pixels to run and a 3000mAh battery pack in there (the same as the Galaxy S9), we can see this being a rather long-lasting phone.

Early verdict

The LG K10 (2018) is a fine phone, with an attractive metal chassis and a screen the belies its low spec in terms of quality. The pronounced buttons on the side are pronounced and feel well-machined, and the overall effect is brings a pleasant feel.

However this phone will live and die by the price it brings... if it's not cheap, then there's no way it's going to pick up a lot of traction. However, hit the right cost level and we'll see something that really brings innovation to that cost bracket.

MWC (Mobile World Congress) is the world's largest exhibition for the mobile industry, stuffed full of the newest phones, tablets, wearables and more. TechRadar is reporting live from Barcelona all week to bring you the very latest from the show floor. Head to our dedicated MWC 2018 hub to see all the new releases, along with TechRadar's world-class analysis and buying advice about your next phone. 

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.

What is a hands on review?

Hands on reviews' are a journalist's first impressions of a piece of kit based on spending some time with it. It may be just a few moments, or a few hours. The important thing is we have been able to play with it ourselves and can give you some sense of what it's like to use, even if it's only an embryonic view. For more information, see TechRadar's Reviews Guarantee.