LG Stylo 6 – Review 2020

Six iterations in, the LG Stylo 6 looks better than ever, with an attractive, modern design and a high-resolution 6.8-inch display. Throw in a built-in stylus for taking notes and drawing, solid stereo speakers, and a battery that can easily get you through the day, and the Stylo 6 seems like a good deal for $219.99. Unfortunately, it really falters on the performance front, with a low-end processor that drags the entire experience down. If you’re shopping for an affordable phone with a stylus, we recommend spending a bit more on the $299.99 Moto G Stylus.

Design, Display, and Durability 

The LG Stylo 6 looks nothing like its predecessor, which is a good thing. Instead it sports an updated design that’s so sleek that it can easily be mistaken for a flagship.

Measuring 6.74 by 3.06 by 0.34 inches (HWD) and weighing 7.73 ounces, the Stylo 6 is a big phone. Its weight is well distributed, making it easy to hold for long stretches of time, but people with small hands might find it a little cumbersome. 

The front of the phone is dominated by a 6.8-inch display with a teardrop notch for the selfie camera. The bezels are on the thick side, but not overly so. Resolution comes in at 1,920 by 1,080, for a density of 344 pixels per inch. It looks crisp, has excellent color accuracy, and is bright enough to use in direct sunlight. While it isn’t quite as sharp as the $250 Moto G Power’s screen (399 pixels per inch), you can’t really notice the difference with the naked eye.

The back of the phone is constructed of reflective white glass, and while it easily shows fingerprints, it looks so chic we’re willing to give it a pass. At the top you’ll find a horizontal camera arrangement above a responsive fingerprint sensor. A monochromatic LG logo sits at the bottom.  

The top edge of the phone is bare, while the bottom is home to a speaker, a stylus port, a USB-C charging port, and a headphone jack. On the left you’ll find the Google Assistant and volume buttons, as well as a hybrid SIM/microSD card slot, while the power button is on the right. The buttons are easy to reach and provide a satisfying click when pressed.

The phone is constructed of NEG glass, a scratch- and shock-resistant material that’s similar to Gorilla Glass. It should be able to withstand minor drops, but there’s no water protection, so you should put the phone in a case to be safe. 

Network, Call, and Audio Quality

The Stylo 6 is available through a number of carriers. We tested a model for Boost Mobile with support for LTE bands 1/3/7/13/20/25/26/38/41. Bluetooth 5.0, dual-band Wi-Fi, and NFC round out your connectivity options.

Network speeds were poor in testing, but not out of line with what we’ve seen on Boost recently, with averages of 5.6Mbps down and 2.4Mbps up.

Call quality is good. Earpiece volume peaks at 82dB, and we were able to make a call from a construction zone without any problems. Noise cancellation works well, though it isn’t able to completely eliminate loud sounds. 

The phone has stereo speakers with a maximum volume of 90dB. They’re loud enough to fill a room, and make for a surprisingly immersive soundstage. While the sound signature skews a bit bright and the bass is lean, the phone still sounds excellent for the price.

Cameras 

The Stylo 6 has three rear camera sensors, including a 13MP primary lens with an f/1.8 aperture, a 5MP wide-angle lens with f/2.2 aperture, and a 5MP depth sensor with an f/2.4 aperture. 

The primary lens performs well in most lighting scenarios. In good light shots are crisp, with solid color accuracy and depth of field. There’s a loss of fine detail in low-light shots, however, as well as some edge noise.

The wide-angle lens does an acceptable job in good light. We noticed some edge distortion as well as soft backgrounds, but most of our photos were fine for social media sharing. Low-light photos were noticeably worse, with significant noise, muddy colors, and an overall flat look.

The 13MP front-facing camera does well in good light, with excellent color accuracy and depth of field. In low light, however, all of our test photos were dark, flat, and muddy. Noise creeped into all the shots and there was unnatural blurring around hair and glasses.    

Specs and Performance 

The Stylo 6 sports a MediaTek Helio P35 chipset with 3GB of RAM. There’s 64GB of storage on board, of which 41GB was available out of the box on our review unit. You can add up to an additional 2TB of storage with a microSD card. 

Unfortunately, performance is poor compared with other similarly priced phones like the Moto G Power and the TCL 10L ($250). Apps can take seconds to open, screen transitions lag, and there’s even a noticeable pause when using the keyboard.

We opened Asphalt 8 to test gameplay, and it took nearly eight minutes to load. Once it loaded, there were dozens of skipped frames and the game crashed once over the course of 30 minutes.

Benchmark tests underscore our experience. On PCMark 2.0 Work, a suite of tests that emulates typical smartphone tasks, the Stylo 6 scored 4,055, far behind the Moto G Power’s 6,751.

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On a brighter note, the Stylo 6 is powered by a 4,000mAh battery that should easily get you through the day. In our battery drain test, which streams HD video over Wi-Fi at full brightness, the Stylo 6 managed to hold out for 12 hours and 9 minutes. While that’s hours less than the Moto G Power (18 hours, 11 minutes), it’s still a solid result. 

Stylus

The Stylo 6’s stylus is responsive, with almost not lag, and palm rejection works better than it does on the Moto G Stylus.

If you remove the stylus when the phone is locked, a notepad appears so you can quickly jot down ideas. Remove it when the phone is unlocked, and you’ll see a menu appear on the left side of the phone that allows you to quickly take notes, write on the screen, or even compose emails by hand. And if you forget to put the stylus back in the phone when you’re done, a reminder pops up, making you far less likely to lose it.

Software

The Stylo 6 ships with Android 10 along with LG’s UX 9.0. The custom skin is a significant improvement over past versions, and looks a lot like Samsung’s One UI. It’s clean, easy to use, and allows for some welcome customizations. 

You’ll find LG’s suite of productivity apps on the phone, which are largely superfluous, and the Boost model we tested comes with even more bloatware on top of that.

While the Stylo 6 ships with the latest version of Android, there’s no word on whether the phone will receive an update to Android 11 after it comes out. Considering the Stylo 5 recently got an update to Android 10, we’re optimistic this phone will receive an update in the future.

Conclusions

From its attractive design to its genuinely useful stylus, the LG Stylo 6 could easily be a winner if only it weren’t so slow. While we actually prefer the stylus experience here, the Moto G Stylus remains a better bet in just about every other aspect, especially performance, making it the stylus-equipped phone to get. If you don’t need a stylus, meanwhile, you can score an even better deal with the Moto G Power or the TCL 10L, both of which are far more powerful than the Stylo 6.

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