Smartphones are enjoying a mid-life crisis at the moment: the trouble is they’re all too good.

If anyone can walk into a phone store and pick up a fantastic handset at random, then how is one device meant to stand out above the fray? Sure, you can make a better phone than last year’s model with the best screen, the most powerful processor and the longest battery life, but that’s all a bit boring. Isn’t it? Splashing out on a second-hand Porsche never cured male-pattern baldness and jazzing up a camera sensor won’t fundamentally change how a smartphone looks or works.

That’s why LG’s G5 has undergone a full-on metaphorical hair transplant. Compared to its chief rival – Samsung’s Galaxy S7 – the G5 is pretty much identical on first impressions. Both devices can make calls, send texts and indulge your narcissism via the magic of social media.

Dig a little deeper, and you’ll find the two devices are radically different. That’s because LG’s new flagship phone is modular, allowing you to swap out its parts for improved ones, such as a bigger battery, physical camera controls and Bang & Olufsen audio tech. Now that’s what we call innovation.

So much so that it’s easy to get carried away with what the G5 is capable of: the ability to customise a phone so that it’s even more suited to you. Amazing stuff, but what about the here and now? All that tech wizardry counts for nothing if the G5 isn’t much cop to start off with. No pressure then. We’re only talking about reinventing the smartphone as we know it.