If you were around in 2007, you remember the red glow. It was everywhere. Verizon was leaning hard into the "Chocolate" brand, and the LG Chocolate 2—officially known as the LG VX8550—was supposed to be the refined, perfect successor to the original slider that took over high school hallways.
It was sleek.
But honestly? It was also a bit of a disaster for some people.
The LG Chocolate 2 (VX8550) wasn't just a phone; it was a fashion statement during the peak of the "feature phone" era, right as the original iPhone was starting to suck the air out of the room. LG was trying to bridge the gap between a high-end MP3 player and a reliable cell phone. They almost got there.
The Spin Wheel That Changed Everything (And Broke Frequently)
The biggest change from the original VX8500 to the LG Chocolate 2 was the navigation. The first Chocolate had these sensitive touch buttons that were notorious for "phantom dialing" if you so much as looked at them wrong. LG listened to the complaints and swapped the touch D-pad for a physical, tactile scroll wheel.
It felt like an iPod.
That was the point. Verizon wanted you to use V CAST Music. They wanted you to buy songs for $1.99 and spin that wheel to find your favorite Akon or T-Pain track. The wheel had this satisfying mechanical click, but it was also a massive point of failure. Dust got in there. The sensor would lag. Sometimes, the wheel would spin and the software just wouldn't keep up.
Compared to the contemporary Motorola RAZR, the LG Chocolate 2 felt much more modern, yet it lacked the industrial durability of the Moto. It was "boutique" tech.
👉 See also: Tesla Robot Gen 3 Explained: What Most People Get Wrong
Why the Design Still Hits Different Today
You have to remember what phones looked like in 2007. They were mostly silver plastic or matte black. Then came the LG Chocolate 2 in "Black Cherry," "Blue Mint," and "Ice Blue." These weren't just colors; they were vibes. The finish was incredibly glossy—a total fingerprint magnet—but when it was clean, it looked like a piece of jewelry.
The sliding mechanism was the star of the show. It had this spring-assisted flick that never got old. You could answer a call with a thumb-slide that felt like opening a high-end lighter.
However, the screen was tiny. Even for the time, a 2-inch QVGA display was starting to feel cramped. While the iPhone was showing off a 3.5-inch multi-touch glass panel, LG was still asking you to squint at 240 x 320 pixels. It’s funny looking back at it now because we were so impressed by such a small window into the internet.
The Weird Proprietary Stuff
LG was king of the proprietary port. You couldn't just use any headphones with the LG Chocolate 2. You needed a specific LG adapter or a pair of LG-branded headphones that plugged into their weird side port.
- Charging: Proprietary LG 18-pin connector.
- Audio: No 3.5mm jack without a dongle.
- Storage: MicroSD, but it only officially supported up to 2GB cards.
Imagine only having 2GB of music. That’s maybe 300 songs if you’re compressing them into low-bitrate MP3s. In a world of Spotify and 1TB iPhones, that seems claustrophobic. But back then, 300 songs in your pocket was a revolution.
The V CAST Ecosystem: A Walled Garden
Verizon was the gatekeeper. To get the most out of the LG Chocolate 2, you had to play by Verizon's rules. V CAST was their flagship service, and it was... expensive.
If you wanted to watch a "video," you were essentially watching a highly compressed, pixelated clip that took five minutes to buffer over a 3G (EV-DO) connection. Yet, it felt like the future. We were watching 30-second clips of The Daily Show on a bus and thinking we were living in Blade Runner.
The software on the VX8550 was the standard Verizon "Red" UI. It was utilitarian. It wasn't pretty. It clashed horribly with the sleek, high-fashion exterior of the phone. It was like putting a tractor dashboard inside a Ferrari. LG’s own international versions of this phone (like the KG800) often had much prettier, custom UIs, but US carriers at the time insisted on branding everything with their own clunky menus.
What People Get Wrong About the Battery
There’s this myth that old feature phones lasted a week.
Not the LG Chocolate 2.
💡 You might also like: iPhone SE 3rd generation: What Most People Get Wrong
Because of the bright LED lights on the front and the constant use of the music player, most people were lucky to get two days of moderate use. If you were actually using the V CAST features or the 1.3-megapixel camera (which, let’s be real, took photos that looked like oil paintings), you were charging it every night.
The 1.3 Megapixel Camera Struggle
Speaking of the camera, it was "fine." It didn't have a flash. It had a tiny mirror next to the lens so you could take selfies, which was actually quite forward-thinking. But the lag was incredible. You’d press the button, wait a full second, and then the photo would capture.
If your subject moved? Blurry mess.
If the lighting was dim? Grainy mess.
But for 2007, having a camera on your phone was still a bit of a novelty for a lot of people. We weren't documenting our lives in 4K; we were taking "blurry night out" photos to post on MySpace.
The Legacy of the LG Chocolate 2
Why does this phone matter in 2026?
It represents the last stand of the "form factor" era. Before the "black glass slab" took over the world, companies like LG were actually taking risks. They were trying to figure out if a phone should be a circle, a slider, a flipper, or a swivel. The Chocolate 2 was the pinnacle of the "Slider as Fashion" trend.
It also marked the beginning of the end for LG’s mobile dominance. They got so good at making these stylish feature phones that they were slow to pivot to the smartphone revolution. They kept trying to make "smarter" feature phones while Apple and Google were rebuilding the entire concept of a mobile computer.
Practical Steps for Collectors and Tech Historians
If you’re looking to grab an LG Chocolate 2 today for a nostalgia trip or a collection, there are a few things you need to know.
First, don't pay more than $30 to $50 for one. They aren't rare. Millions were sold. Look for the "Black Cherry" version, as the plastic on that specific model seems to have aged better than the "Mint" or "White" versions, which tend to yellow over time.
- Check the slider: The ribbon cable inside the slider is the first thing to fail. If the screen flickers when you open the phone, the ribbon cable is frayed. Avoid it.
- Battery swelling: These old lithium-ion batteries are notorious for swelling. If the back cover looks like it’s bulging, remove the battery immediately and dispose of it at a proper recycling center.
- The Verizon factor: You cannot activate these on modern networks. The CDMA networks they relied on have been shut down for years. It’s a paperweight that plays MP3s now.
To actually get music on it today, you'll need an old Windows XP or Windows 7 machine (or a VM) and a specific version of LG’s drivers, as modern Windows 11 systems won't recognize the 18-pin USB connection properly.
The LG Chocolate 2 was a flawed, beautiful, annoying, and iconic piece of mid-2000s tech. It reminds us of a time when phones had personality, even if that personality was sometimes a bit temperamental. It was the "it" phone for a generation that was just starting to realize that their mobile device was going to become the center of their universe.
If you find one in a drawer, don't throw it away. Charge it up, spin that wheel one more time, and remember what it felt like when the coolest thing you could do was slide a phone open to say hello.