New images of the LG Optimus G Pro have leaked online: this is the same smartphone that LG is expected to announce at a media event on May 1 in NYC.

The LG Optimus G Pro has already been released in Korea and Japan, so we have a pretty good idea of what to expect at LG's event. The LG Optimus G Pro is LG's answer to Samsung's Galaxy Note 2, but with better specs. These are the first pictures of the AT&T-branded LG Optimus G Pro. As you can see, LG took some design inspiration from Samsung, complete with the same button layout and physical home button.

There have been rumors that AT&T would begin selling the LG Optimus G Pro sometime in May, so it makes sense that it would be announced next week. The LG Optimus G Pro is going to face some very stiff competition with the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 in the Android world.

The specs of the AT&T LG Optimus G Pro are not known, but if we go by the current specs of the international LG Optimus G Pro, we should expect the same or something very similar. The LG Optimus G Pro features a 5.5 inch 401 ppi (pixels per inch) 1080 x 1920 True Full HD IPS Plus LCD capacitive touchscreen with 16M colors, Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean, 1.7 GHz quad-core Krait 300 Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor, 32GB of internal storage, 2GB of RAM, 13-megapixel rear camera with LED flash and auto focus, 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera, full HD 1080p video recording at 30fps, 4G LTE radio, Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, Wi-Fi Direct, DLNA, Bluetooth 4.0, and a 3,140 mAh battery,

AT&T and LG both declined to comment on the leaked photos. They probably would prefer to announce this smartphone at the event next week. Get ready to add another name to the growing list of phablets on the market.