The K7 LTE is more affordable than the K10 LTE, but that is reflected in its features and specifications. Priced at Rs 9,500, the K7 LTE competes with the Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus (Review), Coolpad Note 3 and the base model of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 (Review). Find out what pros and cons we found in our K7 LTE review.
Design and look
The K7 LTE is designed in a pebble finish just like the K10 LTE. It is very difficult to differentiate between the two phones. The display has curved edges which make the phone look beautiful. The rear cover of the phone is textured but the grip of the K7 LTE is good. The phone has a 5 megapixel front camera with proximity sensor. I don’t know why, but LG has removed the ambient light sensor from this phone which means you will have to adjust the screen brightness manually. The build quality of the phone is not bad as per a plastic phone.
One of the biggest drawbacks of the K7 LTE is its 5-inch in-cell touch display with a resolution of just 480×854 pixels. The screen has a density of 195 ppi which makes text and images look grainy. Viewing angles are still great and the phone is usable even in bright sunlight. The charging port and headphone socket are placed at the bottom while the rest of the buttons are placed at the rear.
On purchasing the K7 LTE, you will get a charger, data cable, headset and instruction manual. Like the K10 LTE, you will not get a flip cover with this phone. The quality of the accessories that come with the K7 LTE is good. But the K7 LTE does not feel like the K10 LTE at all, but its price is also less. The phone has compromised on a low resolution display, which is not at all good for a phone of this screen size. Despite being priced around Rs 10,000, we also do not understand the reason for the company removing the light ambient sensor. Like the K10 LTE, the K7 LTE also does not have a notification LED.
Software and Specifications
The LG K7 LTE has a Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 quad-core processor and 1.5GB of RAM. In our benchmarking tests, we got similar performance to the recently launched InFocus Bingo 10 which is priced under Rs 5,000. The general performance of the phone can be termed as decent.
Talking about other specifications, the 8 GB inbuilt storage can be expanded up to 32 GB via microSD card. The phone supports Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi b / g / n, FM radio and GPS. NFC or OSB OTG support is not provided in LG K7 LTE. K7 LTE has two nano SIM card slots. The phone supports 3G on both SIMs. Apart from this, VoLTE and VoWi-Fi support is also available but only in the first SIM. The phone has a 2125 mAh removable battery.
The software on the phone is almost identical to the K10 LTE. LG has provided a customized version of Android 5.1.1 Lollipop in the K7 LTE. There are no other apps on the phone except LG Backup and SmartWorld. Themes, fonts, ringtones, etc. can be downloaded to customize the phone. The notification shade can be toggled along with the navigation bar at the bottom. Apart from changing the lock screen effects, quick launch shortcuts for apps can also be edited.
Performance
Despite the low-end processor, the K7 LTE makes multitasking and running apps a breeze. However, there is one noticeable lag issue but that doesn’t make the phone a complete failure. Heavy apps, especially games, take a while to load and performance isn’t great. Images and text aren’t as sharp as we expected. The phone doesn’t heat up too much during normal use but it does get quite hot while gaming or charging. 4G works well and we didn’t notice any issues with call quality.
Full-HD videos play smoothly in the phone. But some audio codecs like AC3 are not supported. The music player supports FLAC audio files. The audio quality of the phone can be said to be good with the headset that comes with K7 LTE. Out of 8 GB storage, only 3.4 GB is available for use, so the user will need a microSD card.
The 5-megapixel rear camera can take decent photos in daylight. Landscape photos are not very detailed and the colours are a bit muted. We were able to take some pretty sharp photos in motion. The camera shutter has a lot of trouble which gets worse in low light. The camera does not take good photos in low light. The phone takes good close-up shots but once again, the colours are not good. The camera can record up to 720p resolution from both the rear and front cameras. Video quality is okay but if you do not keep your hands steady, the video can get quite shaky.
The camera app has very few features. Like the K10 LTE, you will not get features like HDR, panorama, filters in this phone too.
battery life
Due to the low-resolution display and low-powered processor, this phone is able to give good battery life. Good battery life is the most special feature of this phone. In our video loop test, we were able to get 11 hours and 37 minutes of playback from the LG K7 LTE. During normal use, we were able to use the phone for a full day without charging. The phone does not support quick charge.
Our verdict
LG K7 LTE is nowhere near the feature-rich budget smartphone segment available in the market today. Apart from good battery life and design, the phone falls short in all other areas. Priced at Rs 9,500, the phone is very expensive. There are phones like Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus, Coolpad Note 3 and Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 in the market that are priced lower and perform better than this.
Just like the K10 LTE, LG needs to improve the pricing of the K7 LTE. With the features it offers, it fits in the sub-Rs 5,000 category of phones in India. LG needs to make the right move.
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