Introduction

The future of smartphones is upon us - the LG G Flex is the world's first flexible smartphone and it can be yours right now.

While the curved display on the G Flex isn't exactly new - just take a look at the Nexus S and Galaxy Nexus - the ability for the whole chassis to flex gives us a brief glimpse into what the future holds.

The future comes at a cost however, a really big cost - at least £630 SIM-free in fact.

You can always pick up the LG G Flex on contract, but a free

handset will require you to part with £37 per month for two years, giving you just 1GB of 3G data in return.

Fancy a bit of 4G action on your G Flex? Then expect to part with some cash up front as well as paying more per month. This phone is a considerably investment.

To be fair you do get a whole lot of phone for your money - a 6-inch display, quad-core processor and 13MP camera are all onboard, but that's still a lot of cash to splash.

Don't get too excited about its flexible abilities either - the LG G Flex does boast the most defined top-to-bottom curve of any smartphone (theSamsung Galaxy Round curves side-to-side), but you can't actually go about folding it up.

In fact, lay the LG G Flex face down on a flat surface and at it's most curved point the screen is still just a few millimeters above the surface - but then comes the fun part.

Apply a decent amount of pressure to the rear of the G Flex and you can flatten the handset out - actually flexing the screen, the glass and the chassis without breaking anything.

When I demonstrated this to my friends, family and colleagues I was met - without fail - by a sea of wincing faces as the G Flex made some seriously concerning creaking and crunching sounds as I performed the flattening trick.

Sure the handset does flex, slightly, but it never sounds like it's enjoying the workout and I fear that after many months of constant flexing the movement may start to take its toll on the G Flex.

In terms of the phones it's up against we have to look at the phablet market, with the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, HTC One Max, Sony Xperia Z Ultraand Nokia Lumia 1520 keeping LG's monster company - although all four are cheaper than the G Flex, making it a tough crowd to break into.