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LG Electronics took to the 2018 iteration of Mobile World Congress to showcase several new offerings, and while the V30S ThinQ was the star of the show, the company was also demonstrating its new K8 (2018) and K10 (2018) announced in the run-up to the Barcelona, Spain-based show. Both smartphones are meant to compete in the mid-range segment of the market and run Android 7.1.2 Nougat out of the box, though it’s currently unclear how long their future owners will have to wait for an upgrade to Oreo once they buy them this spring. The duo is meant to succeed the K8 (2017) and K10 (2017) introduced at last year’s CES, being the third generation of the company’s K lineup.
The LG K8 (2018) is both a more straightforward and weaker of the two as it comes in a single configuration with 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, and an unspecified quad-core chip clocked at 1.3GHz. The metal unibody design with a glossy finish still sits in the hand just as well as the previous device did, whereas its 5-inch HD screen is as compact as smartphone displays get in 2018. The 2,500mAh battery should easily get you through an entire day on a single charge given the low energy footprint of the overall package. As an added bonus, the LG K8 (2018) has a removable battery, a feature that’s becoming increasingly rare in today’s day and age. FM radio is also included, as is an 8-megapixel rear camera and a 5-megapixel front one. While certainly on the lower end of the mid-range spectrum, the LG K8 (2018) is expected to be priced in an extremely aggressive manner and should be an attractive proposition for budget-conscious consumers.
Things get a bit more complicated with the LG K10 (2018), with the device being available in three variants: the regular K10, K10 Alpha, and the K10 Plus. The latter is the most powerful of the three, coming with 3GB and 32GB of internal flash memory. It also shares a camera setup with the regular K10, boasting a 13-megapixel rear sensor and an 8-megapixel wide-angle one on the front. The K10 Alpha comes with a more modest 8-megapixel camera on the back and has the same memory configuration as the K10 – 2GB of RAM and 16GB of storage space. All three front cameras can generate bokeh effects which aren’t industry-leading but are surprisingly solid for devices with otherwise modest specs.
The trio features 5.3-inch HD screens and is powered by an octa-core chipset clocked at 1.5GHz whose maker has yet to be disclosed. NFC is also part of the package here, as is a microSD card supporting up to 2TB of expandable memory. In practice, you’ll be able to add as much as 400GB of storage to any K10 model as larger microSD cards still aren’t available for purchase. All things considered, neither the K8 (2018) nor the K10 (2018) series will be the top of the mid-range class this year in terms of performance but you can expect to see them on quite a bit of best-value lists in the near future, and from what we experienced at MWC – rightfully so.
LG K8 (2018)
LG K10 (2018)
