LG's updated and more useful portable smart TV is now available to order – I could actually see myself using this at home

• A 27-inch smart TV that's also a portable display and a tablet
• HDMI and USB-C inputs, device mirroring, and a 4-hour battery
• Available to order for $1,299 (about about £980 / AU$2,000)

If you've ever wished you could hold your smart TV in your hand and roll it around the room as well as stick it on the wall or sit it on a nearby surface, then LG's StanbyME 2 could be just what you're looking for. The newly updated StanByME is a very different kind of TV from the rest of the LG range: it's a TV that thinks it's a tablet, or maybe it's a tablet that thinks it's a TV.

Let's start with the normal bit first. The StanbyME 2 is a 27-inch smart TV with a 60Hz refresh rate and a QHD resolution of 2,560 x 1,440 with AI picture optimization.

You can use it like a normal TV, but it can do much more. Pop it off the stand and you can watch wirelessly for up to four hours, which is better than you get from most of the best portable projectors that have batteries.

If you sit it on your lap, you can take advantage of a 27-inch touchscreen to draw or play games. Or you can hang it on the wall and use it as a picture frame (or just watch TV from there). Or you can roll it around on its heavyweight wheeled stand.

LG StanbyMe 2: key features and pricing

The StanbyME is a webOS TV with all the usual smart features for accessing the best streaming services, and it also has USB-C and HDMI inputs – plus there's AirPlay and Google Cast so you can use it as a display for other devices. It works in both portrait and landscape mode, and it has both Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos support with "virtual 9.1.2 surround sound".

You can even recharge it from a power bank if there's enough juice: external recharging needs a 65W power supply, which lots of the best power banks can offer now.

I could actually see myself using this: 27 inches is the same size as my much-missed massive iMac, and that size is a really good display upgrade from a laptop. Being able to use it as an TV in a bedroom or kitchen to amuse the kids is a great feature, since you can then just hide it away afterwards. ,

The voice recognition could be especially useful for the kitchen, for when you're cooking and have messy hands. I'd describe it as 'transportable' rather than fully portable, though: at 9.5lbs without the stand, it's pretty hefty.

It should be fairly future-proof: LG promises software updates for up to five years.

The downside, which you've probably noted, is the price. Not only is the StanByME 2 quite expensive, but it's much more expensive than the first generation StanByMe TV. The StanByME 2 is $300 more than the previous model, taking the sticker price to a pretty hefty $1,299 – the same as an Apple iMac M3, and that's got a computer inside it as well.

The StanByMe is available now in the US and will launch in the UK, Germany, France and Spain in August 2025. Pricing for those countries hasn't been announced just yet.

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