Despite being a few years old now, the LG G4 is still a great phone with features like a brilliant camera, super sharp screen, and a genuinely different design that both sits nicely in the hand and, should you go for the leather variant, offers a real alternative from all the boring blocky designs on offer. Unsurprisingly, it's not a patch on the LG G6 however.

And now it's also one of the easier phones on the wallet, as LG likes to try and undercut the competition where possible - especially with its older phones.

But it's no longer an easy phone to find on the shelves. Contract options have now finally dried up on the LG G4, so you'll have to buy the SIM free handset upfront and then grab one of our cheap 30-day or 12-month SIM only deals. Check out the comparison table below to find the cheapest price on the LG G4 handset.

Techradar's LG G4 review highlights:

The LG G4 is a phone that's designed to keep building the head of steam LG's creating in the smartphones space, building on the worldwide success of the LG G3 sales.

The brand should be applauded for trying something different with the design: the leather back and curved chassis are just the sort of thing that anyone looking to not be a 'me-too' brand should be doing.

There's a lot going on with the LG G4, and for the most part it's rather positive indeed.

We liked

The LG G4 has a large, expansive and rich screen – one of the best on the market, without doubt. I'm going to label it as a positive as while there's not really enough content out there to make use of it (and therefore the battery sucking aspects are more annoying) the great colour reproduction and sharpness generally make everything look that much better.

The camera errs on the side of sharpness too much for our liking, and LG has repeated its usual trick of mudding the edges of some darker snaps, but overall we got great pictures time and again – the low light capabilities are exquisite at times.

The curved chassis might be thick, but that doesn't mean it felt large in the hand, and we still believe the rear buttons make sense from an ergonomic point of view.

We disliked

The battery life is still too poor – what on Earth has Google done with Android to make Lollipop so thirsty on the power?

We never, ever got through a whole day on battery with the G4, no matter what we were doing, and quickly found ourselves topping up at 4PM just to make sure we could make it through the commute home. Not good enough, especially when a slower processor was chosen to help with battery drain.

The leather back just doesn't work. Some out there will like the novelty, but it's not even nice feeling leather. When you feel it for the first time it doesn't feel like a quality leather wallet but more plastic leather – thin and grainy. Plus it's leather on a phone – miles away from the premium feel of the HTC One M9 or iPhone 6.

The plastic options are just too cheap-feeling to be used on a flagship phone - and while this is still a better interface than Samsung's TouchWiz, it's still not as fast or fluid as we'd expect from a phone of this ilk.

It's not the fastest out there among the flagships either. It's not the slowest, but for general zipping about this is a middle-of-the-road phone.

Verdict

We know the number of LG fans is growing, and for good reason: the South Korean firm is working hard on bringing the best from its labs into a smartphone. The screen and camera on the LG G4 are really good additions and are genuine upgrades from last year's G3.

However, the brand still hasn't shown us it can make a truly market-leading smartphone. The decision to use leather and plastic is awful – LG needed a premium design and failed badly in trying to be a little different.

Those that value a removable battery need to realise that an all-in-one design comes at a price - so if you value the option of being able to swap out a power pack, you'll have to accept a lowering of design prowess.

It feels slightly churlish criticising the G4 in some ways, as it's a strong phone with a lovely screen and decent elements that people really want. The issues are around the ergonomics the larger phone brings, the poor choices in leather and plastic and the battery life - and although the new super-low price means the G4 is a better proposition with the power on offer.

The overall package is just slightly too rough around the edges to say this is a really brilliant phone, although with the new lower price it's a much, much more attractive proposition - with the cuts, you should definitely consider this as your new phone if you want a flagship phone while paying a lot less.

First reviewed: April 2015