Years and years after Samsung, HTC, and Motorola started plopping bloated skins on top of stock Android, manufacturers are still trying to create semi-artificial market differentiation with their shiny software toys. While manufacturer skins have gotten more tolerable as of late (thanks in no small part to the way they've also become much more resource efficient), it's still vaguely annoying that all these companies feel the need to spend vast amounts of time and effort completely overhauling something that already works pretty well.

Which brings us to LG's UX 5.0, the latest version of its ill-defined manufacturer skin. LG seems oddly eager about this release, the way HTC used to be about the full-version upgrades of Sense. The new skin debuts with the LG G5 and will probably be the standard for all of LG's Android-based hardware for the next year or two, possibly even making it to a few older phones via an over-the-air update. The company is so pleased with itself that it's made an introduction video highlighting all the new features.

And it's... fine. It's okay. It's not the worst skin I've ever seen (Lenovo's blatant iPhone ripoff still takes that particular cake), and not the best. The biggest change is to the homescreen, which has replaced an app drawer with an iOS-style all-in-one manager page, but if you don't like it you can change back in the settings menu. There's also a rather neat feature that allows users to quickly re-install apps they've recently uninstalled, a sort of reverse buyer's remorse. Other than that, UX 5.0 has a world clock, a health app, a camera that senses when you're posing, and a bunch of other bells and whistles that are more or less standard on high-profile Android phones at this point.

There is one other unique aspect of UX 5.0, though it's more about LG's current market push than the software itself: "LG Friends." This function automatically detects LG-branded accessories, like the G5's modular add-ons or first-party gadgets such as the 360 CAM and 360 VR. Then it downloads the appropriate manager apps and automatically sets everything up for you. I suppose that could save both a little space on your phone and a little time in tedious setup.

Source: LG Newsroom

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