LG is getting out of the mobile phone business

There are basically three markets nowadays.

1. Ultra luxurious $1000+ phones. These phones are bought purely based on brand name. As a result they generally have a smaller set of features and put the users through some amount of pain. For example, the latest iphone does not have headphone jack, does not come with a charger, does not have expandable memory, does not have a fingerprint sensor, has outdated 5 year old-looking screens with a huge notch, etc. You cannot compete in this category with good, technically sound products. People will pay $1200 for a brick with an apple logo on it, but not for a genuinely advanced phone packed with features, just because it ain't from apple.

2. Mid tier phones. These phones are bought based on a mixture of features and brand value. It is possible to compete here because the customers are making some sort of logical decisions. That is the reason Oneplus is able to gain significant share here. But these also have started falling into the trap of removing features and making users suffer a bit for the brand.

3. Cheap commodity phones. These are extremely cheap, the software is barely acceptable and the hardware is decent. Once again, it is difficult to compete here because these customers will buy the absolute cheapest phone there is with the set of features they want. They will entirely disregard any software polish, any brand association, anything that requires attention to detail. As a result, chinese manufacturers are absolutely killing it in this space.

So the only place for LG to fit here is the 2nd one. This is a downgrade from earlier when they used to be in the flagship game, before apple fucked it up. I guess they are not able or ready to adapt to the new reality of the market. Sony did the same. I respect the decision on some level.

Samsung phones work well, they have one of the best cameras, the best screens, the best batteries, usually the most features. LG phones are famous for boot-looping.

> different (shitty) UI

It is a matter of opinion. I much prefer Samsung's UI over the garbage that is google's, and even slightly better than iphone.

> Samsung versions of all the core Google apps (but worse)

Every Samsung app that replaces a google app is 2x better. The browser is faster, better than chrome. The contacts app is so much better. The dialer is like 10 years ahead. Gallery is at least 10x faster and less buggier than google photos. I always try to delete as much google bloatware from my phone as possible, and use the samsung apps.

> the stupid bottom button placement

What button? There are no buttons on Samsung phones for the past 3-4 years. The navbar is fully customizable (unlike google), and hidable.

> non-remappable Bixby button

Similar to the non-remappable squeeze button on pixels and siri button on iphones?? And the bixby button is remappable with an app nowadays.

> aggressively killing apps for power management

Samsung is hardly the worst offender here. And I can't blame them for trying to fix the clusterfuck that google has created with android.

> Do people actually like all those Samsung annoyances?

I can't speak for others, but your "annoyances" are useful features for me. The alarm app turns on my bedroom lights in the morning automatically. Bixby routines automatically cranks the brightness and enables auto rotate when I play a video. Samsung health auto-tracks my sleeping schedule and tells me which apps are keeping me awake. Samsung browser blocks all ads and has an automatic dark mode for every website. Samsung pay lets me pay with my phone at any credit card terminal, not just the ones with NFC.