A TechTuber with a fondness for older hardware has managed to get Doom to run on a 40-year-old print controller. Much of the video retelling this tale covers the work needed to add new firmware, plus display and audio out to the controller board. Once that hurdle was overcome, though, it doesn’t take long for Adrian’s Digital Basement to progress into some playful demos and, of course, get Doom up and running.

To be clear, the printer hardware here isn’t a typical old e-waste consumer device, it is actually the powerful Agfa Compugraphic 9000PS. This box would interpret the complex resolution-independent PostScript files sent to it by pre-press operators and change them into raster images that could be printed on the next piece of hardware down the chain, usually an imagesetter that produced high-resolution printing plates. That’s why the Agfa’s motherboard packed a powerful-for-the-era 68020 CPU. Interpreting and outputting work like this was computationally and resource-heavy.

This is the 4^th video from Adrian using the Agfa RIP, as the unassuming beige box holds numerous interesting components. For example, not only does the main PCB feature a 16 MHz 68020, the I/O controller board it is paired with packs its own 68000 CPU.

A significant part of this latest adventure with the Agfa concerned reverse engineering the ROM code for the now ancient and obscure Agfa hardware. A significant step forward was made after replacing the Adobe PostScript interpreter in ROM with custom firmware based on AGFA-MON (available from GitHub) to establish a monitoring app, provide some OS boot stub options, and even add a BASIC interpreter to the system.

Before demos and the mighty Doom could run Adrian also needed to install the VERA 8-Bit Video Card, designed for homebrew computer projects like this.

After about 1hr 6mins into the video we finally get some demos shown running on the repurposed Agfa RIP. Adrian started with CP/M stuff, but quickly moved to a Unix OS (Minix). The full shareware version of Doom 1.9 was run via this OS “on what was just a printer freakin’ controller,” underlines the TechTuber.

But for those with experience of a 68020 (like an Amiga 1200), Doom is unsurprisingly a slow performer on this hardware. That isn’t the worst playability issue anyway, as the game wasn’t really controllable due to lack of PS/2-compatible keyboard support, noted Adrian. The terrible FPS reminds us of the recent 4FPS Red Dead Redemption 2 gaming shenanigans.

The TechTuber ends by reiterating what an astonishing transformation the Agfa RIP has been through, from redundant “trash” hardware of a bygone era to something that can provide retro computing fun (if not playable Doom).

A new emulator makes running classic Apple Macintosh 68K software a breeze on a cheap, portable, IoT development kit. Developer amcchord has ported the popular Basilisk II Mac emulator to the ESP32-P4 / M5Stack Tab5 ($60). The device name gives away that this is a small (5-inch) tablet that relies on an ESP32-P4 SoC for horsepower. We’ve seen 68K Mac emulation on microcontrollers before, but as Hackaday points out, this represents a major step forward in performance on one of these tiny SoCs. In brief, its RISC CPU is capable of delivering 68040 Mac-level computing in OS8.1.

This ESP32-P4 / M5Stack Tab5 port of Basilisk II is particularly appealing for Mac emulation tinkerers, as it is quite a well-rounded platform. It is a tablet, and can be used as such in the emulator, with its native touch functionality replacing mouse interactivity. In computer terms, it becomes almost a touch-enabled All-in-One, with your keyboard/mouse of choice attached via USB.

First-decade Apple Macs were also most famously represented by All-in-One designs with tiny screens (9-inch 512x342 pixel mono displays). In comparison, the Tab5’s 2x scaled 640x360 resolution 8-bit color output piped to the 5-inch 1280x720 IPS touchscreen could challenge your near vision.

For processing power, the Basilisk II ESP32 is said to be up to the level of a Motorola 68040 with FPU (68881). That would be like a mid-90s professional Macintosh. This implementation is limited to a maximum of 16MB of memory, though, using half of the ESP32-P4 / M5Stack Tab5’s 32MB. That should be enough for tinkering in MacOS versions all the way up to version 8.1, but the refresh speeds will be limited to 15fps, which is fine for productivity but might irk in classic game titles.

The ESP32 here has a dual-core RISC-V architecture running at 400 MHz, and the emulator uses one core for video and I/O, with the other for the 68040 interpreter, and other low-level system function patching.

For storage, users of this IoT tab can make use of HDD and CD images that are saved on an SD card. In addition to the OS and apps you have, this is where you will put your Mac boot ROM files.

Overall, it is a very neat and portable all-in-one emulation solution. It would also be a great starting platform for modding, as you could make a mini Mac Classic with this and a 3D printer without jumping through too many hoops.

68K Mac emulation in a browser

If the above tale of cute portable classic Macintoshes has stirred something deep inside, you can very easily and quickly enjoy a quick 68K Mac fix through your browser.

A couple of years ago, we shared a guide on How to emulate an original Apple Macintosh in your browser. Check that out, and we will talk you through visiting Infinite Mac. We also discuss various Infinite Mac configuration options for those who want to have more than a fleeting encounter with a vintage Mac OS and software.

Amiga fans have several projects to watch as we near the end of 2025. Today, we're looking at the intriguing Mirari, a new mainboard that is designed to “breathe new life into the next-gen Amiga platform.” The developers are several prototypes in and currently refining drivers to prepare the Micro-ATX form factor Mirari for a mid-2026 release. Amenities will include NVMe, USB3, PCIe slots, SATA (via card), and FPGA custom logic - all in a convenient Micro-ATX form factor. Expect to pay about $600 to $700 (€500 - €600) for this AmigaOS4 and MorphOS platform when it is ready.

Mirari is designed for those of you who still cradle a ‘next-gen Amiga dream,’ rather than simply want a modern interface plus I/O remake of the classic Amigas of the 1980s and 90s. This motherboard isn’t intended for casual retro fans who just want to play some old classic 16-bit games, use Workbench from v1.X to 3.x, or dabble in undemanding pixel painters like Deluxe Paint or PPaint. That’s easy enough on old mass-produced hardware or in emulators.

Instead, Mirari tackles the Amiga computing niches where AmigaOS4 or MorphOS is desired, running on a true next-gen Amiga. This means Mirari departs from the 68K lineage and embraces PowerPC (echoing the Mac’s architecture transition).

Moreover, Mirari is a PPC native platform standard for developers and the community. It continues the lineage established by the Phase5 PPC and AmigaONE X1000/X5000/A1222 systems, with up-to-date hardware that complements the PPC processor.

You can check here to chart the progress of Mirari’s development. There, you will see the design phase began in May 2024. Mid-2025 saw the arrival of the second prototype mainboards. Since that time, work has continued apace, showing off the latest Mirari at shows and events, as well as the more serious work of getting drivers produced and wrinkles removed. Specific drives/updates have recently been produced for Intel HD Audio (Azalia) specification PCIe sound cards, the fan controller, the NVMe storage driver (now able to support booting), and the onboard NIC driver.

According to a hardware preview shared by December’s WhatIFF magazine (head to the reviews/previews section), the latest specs include a T1042 quad‑core, 64‑bit PowerPC e5500 processor, DDR3L SO-DIMM support, three PCIe slots, 2x SATA 2.0 and 2x NVMe slots, USB3 ports, and an FPGA socket for additional functionality. This will run AmigaOS4, MorphOS, or some PPC Linux distros.

The Micro-ATX form factor Mirari should be ready for mid-2026. Expect to pay about $600 to $700 for a board. Not sure if that includes the RAM, but Amiga systems only need a few megabytes, not gigabytes!

A computing enthusiast unearthed a 34-year-old Apple Mac bug that should have crippled the system at startup, but it never did, thanks to an undocumented feature in the Motorola CPU that quietly neutralized the flaw. Downtown Doug Brown discovered this Mac Classic II ROM code wrinkle after witnessing a MAME-emulated system crash (in 32-bit mode) that the original hardware would not (h/t PC Gamer). We tend to agree that “this bug in the ROM would have gone undiscovered for all eternity” if it were not for Brown’s curiosity being piqued.

Brown, who self identifies as “a combined Apple/Linux/Windows geek,” and is a big fan of the open source MAME (the Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) project. He also tells his readers that this software is “arguably the most complete emulator of 68000-based Mac models,” and that these classic Motorola CPU-based systems are his main use of the emulator. That’s pretty unusual, as MAME is most famous for facilitating classic arcade gaming fun.

MAc Machine Emulator

The story goes that Brown was indulging in his Mac emulation on MAME hobby when he noticed that an emulated Classic II wouldn’t boot with 32-bit addressing enabled. However, it worked with 24-bit addressing – no ‘sad Mac’ with the 24-bit option toggled on… What was happening? And why was the emulated Mac crashing so badly, so quickly, when the original faced no such issues?

Well, there are plenty of ways bugs can crop up in an emulator, but in this instance, it would have been wrong to blame MAME or any of the code it relies on.

An undocumented MC68030 instruction

After reverse engineering the Apple ROM, and extensive forensic debugging of the errant behavior of the emulated machine, Brown actually found that the bug was present in the Mac Classic II ROM code – nothing to do with the emulation software. The biggest difference between emulated and original systems was how the CPU handled the problematic instruction in the ROM. In the emulated system, it crashed with a ‘sad Mac’ in 32-bit mode. In the real hardware 68030-equipped system, it skipped the wrinkle nonchalantly. However, no documented feature of the 68030 explained this (lucky) operational quirk.

Brown concludes his lengthy and intricately detailed blog post by asserting that Apple devs would surely have found and fixed the 32-bit crash boot issue “if the pesky 68030 hadn’t been hiding the bug.” The computing enthusiast also cleverly characterized this secret 68030 feature as “the glue that’s accidentally holding the Classic II together.”

He was also sympathetic to the Apple ROM developers who let this bug out into the wild, as the Motorola CPU quietly fixed it in the background.

A final important point raised by Brown was that, with this undocumented bug in mind, “it’s very likely that there is not a 100% perfect Motorola MC68030 emulator or replica in existence.”

There is a small chance that an engineer who worked on this Motorola CPU might read this and reach out with information about the undocumented 68030 feature that, luckily, comes to the rescue during the Classic II’s boot process. Brown also pondered whether many other 68030-powered machines had their software quietly bug-fixed by the clever features of this processor.

The Settlers (1993) was a popular city-building real-time strategy game, originally released in the twilight years of the Amiga’s reign as the king of home computers. Perhaps understandably, then, when the sequel was being prepared to be published, the Amiga was overlooked. The Settlers II: Veni, Vidi, Vici saw a PC/DOS-only launch in 1996. Now this historic ‘wrong’ – from the dedicated Amigan point of view - has been righted, with The Settlers 2 Gold Edition being primed for release by German dev team Look Behind You (h/t Golem.de) (machine translation). The release comes 32 years after the original, and 29 years after the sequel’s DOS debut.

Some assert that the original Settlers pioneered the city-building real-time strategy game genre. Indeed, at the time, many great RTS treasures seemed to have popped up. Notably, Dune II from Westwood Studios (which went on to release the Command & Conquer series), was another twilight highlight of the Amiga titles. Also worth mentioning are Mega-lo-Mania, Syndicate, and Powermonger.

Minimum system requirement is an AGA Amiga with 68040 at 40 MHz

After reading the headline, some might excitedly go and dust off their original Amiga A500 from the attic. However, The Settlers II has some pretty steep minimum system requirements in Amiga terms. At a minimum, you will need an AGA chipset Amiga (A1200 or better) with a Motorola 68040 accelerator (at least 40 MHz) and 32MB of Fast RAM. If you have that kind of spec, the other necessities like AmigaOS 3.1 and 600MB of hard drive space are probably going to be covered.

Those specs are just a minimum, though. 68k processor-driven Settlers II gaming in resolutions above 640 x 480 pixels pushes up the recommended specs to include a graphics card(!), plus a Motorola 68060 at 100 MHz or faster.

Developers Look Behind You also shared a range of PowerPC-accelerated Amiga specs for those true devotees to the platform. Ancient processors such as the PowerPC 603e and PowerPC G3 800 get mentioned in this section.

Coming soon, but you’ve already waited ~30 years

Work continues on AmigaOS 3.2 with the stewards of this classic Motorola 680x0 friendly operating system, Hyperion Entertainment, releasing version 3.2.3 a few days ago. In a news bulletin on the official site, Hyperion highlighted that the third update for AmigaOS 3.2 includes two years of (more than 50) fixes and enhancements.

It is somewhat remarkable that work on AmigaOS 3.X continues in 2025, given that Commodore International released AmigaOS 3.0 in 1992 with the Commodore Amiga 1200, followed by 3.1 with the launch of the Amiga CD32 in 1993. Hyperion began its quest to modernize and improve this classic version of AmigaOS for Motorola 680x0 platforms in 2018 when it released version 3.1.4. The AmigaOS 3.2 lineage began in 2021.

Highlighted updates in AmigaOS 3.2.3 include:

• ReAction classes have received numerous updates. ReAction is the newest OS’s object-orientated widget toolkit engine. Originally a third-party enhancement, it is now the recommended toolkit for GUI programming under AmigaOS.
• TextEditor now allows users to define a custom menu with macros.
• 12KB of chip RAM is no longer reserved
• A new Kickstart 3.2.3 ROM is available.
• At least 50 other fixes, including updates to DiskDoctor and HDToolbox.

What about AmigaOS 4.X?

Commodore’s demise came in 1994, and this is why the development of the AmigaOS became fragmented and sporadic from that time, with licensing changing hands and no clear hardware platform to drive it forward.

1994 is the same year that Apple began its switch from the 68K to PowerPC architecture, so Amigans living through this difficult time naturally envisioned PowerPC would be the right direction for advanced AmigaOS development. Thus, you will find various AmigaOS 4.X releases - which aren’t ‘newer’ than 3.X releases - they are simply versions dedicated to the PowerPC platform.

There also exist branches of AmigaOS style and compatible OSes such as MorphOS (PowerPC again) and AROS (x86, PowerPC, Arm). These will take you even further from the classic home computer platform (and apps, games) most of you will be familiar with from the late 1980s and early 90s.

Getting and using AmigaOS 3.2

This release is provided as a free update to owners of AmigaOS 3.2. If you don’t already have this OS, you can get it now at official resellers like RetroPassion UK. Though it works with ROMs as old as Kickstart 3.1, it is recommended you also upgrade your ROMs to 3.2.3.

Nowadays, Arm-based accelerators seem to be the path forward for modern Amiga, as opposed to retro Amiga, enthusiasts. AmigaOS 3.2.3 has a feather in its cap as it also supports classic 68K Amigas boosted by Arm accelerators such as the PiStorm. However, even the most basic A500 with lowly MC68000 is capable of being updated to run this OS.

‘New’ Amiga hardware

Retrogames previouosly talked of a “new full size Amiga console launched” in Q4 2024. That time has come and gone, and we have seen murmurings about disputes regarding the software/OS side of the package.

Hyperion’s new management (December 2024) denies it has anything to do with this delay, insisting that Retrogames hasn’t reached out to them yet, but it is “happy to start discussions.”

Motorola's 68000 processor falls into the category of legendary CPUs, primarily because it was one of the first 32-bit CPU designs to appear and was deemed one of the fastest models of its time. Recently podstawek, a member of an electronics enthusiast community, resurrected the Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board by using a Raspberry Pi 4.

The Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board was made by Motorola to train engineers to implement their code on the m68k platform. However, at the time, there were no modern I/O ports like we have today, and the systems used a completely different set of I/O.

If you want to play with the board today, you'll need something to adapt it to the modern setup, and that is where podstawek's implementation with a Raspberry Pi comes to life.

The user managed to get the m86k platform running by connecting a Raspberry Pi 4 board to it. The RPi4 used the RS232 Hat for expansion, where the user connected serial and 12 V ports to the m68k for control. Upon further setup and debugging, the terminal commands made on RPi4 are sent to the Motorola board for control functions.

In the blog post and video above, the user shows the whole process of getting the board up and running and even showcases the work needed to create a small acrylic case for the Motorola board and adapt a modern ATX power supply to power the old computer. That's how he brought the 40-year-old board back to life and used it to experiment with the old technology.

Do you miss phones with slide-out keyboards? Can you pretend you miss them long enough to hear about a cool Raspberry Pi project? Ok, great, because there’s a new open-source handheld computer project that basically turns your Raspberry Pi (or similar board like the Pine H64 Model B or the ASUS Tinker Board S) into a Motorola Droid.

It’s called the MutantC v3, and it’s actually the latest iteration of a concept that’s been around since its creator, Rahmanshaber, debuted the MutantC v1 back in 2019. 

Essentially, what the MutantC v3 does is fit your Raspberry Pi into a tiny case with a thumb-friendly keyboard on top and a slide-out touch display fitted over it. In other words, you can either use it like a tablet, or slide the display up to reveal the keyboard for physical typing. The Mutant C v3 adds a trackpoint on the case’s right-hand side (along with buttons for both left and right-click), plus support for a buzzer, a real-time clock, a gyroscope, and a humidity/pressure/temperature sensor. The keyboard also uses less power, and there’s space for a 12-pin UART/12C/GPIO docking port, though there’s no official dock design yet.

Of course, being an open-source project, there’s not much official anything. It’s up to you to buy all the cables, transistors, and modules this project requires, and you’ll also need a 3D printer to get your hands on the enclosure.

Luckily, there’s also a parts list and multiple build guides over on the MutantC v3’s Gitlab page. Of note is that there are three display size options, ranging from 2.8-inch to 3.5-inch to a full 4 inches.

You won’t need any custom software or coding skill for this project, though, since it just runs off Raspberry Pi OS (or whatever equivalent OS your board uses). The most you'll need to know is how to solder and how to install the drivers for your hardware.

Be sure to check out our list of Best Raspberry Pi Projects for more cool creations from the maker community.   

With Motorola’s introduction of the Moto Mods program to go along with the new Moto Z and Moto Z Force smartphones, the company provided some extra information about how these modular devices work with both smartphones.

Communicating Chips

On the hardware side, it involves the communication between two custom chips on the smartphone and one or two of the custom chips on the module. As for the 16 pins on both devices, Jeff Snow, the head of product management for Moto devices, said that the data transfer speed is up to 6 Gbps over a bus connection.

In order to stay attached to the smartphone, Snow said, there are four magnets on each module. From what we saw at Lenovo Tech World, it seems that the magnets are able to hold modules securely in place without making it too difficult to swap one module for another.

Iqbal Arshad, the company’s senior vice president of engineering in the Global Product Development team, then provided a crucial detail about the software side of the connection: Moto Mods use the Greybus software stack.

Sounds familiar? The Greybus application layer protocol is one of the building blocks (no pun intended) for Google’s Project Ara modular smartphone and helps enable the phone’s baseplate for hot-swap functionality.

A Long-Term Investment

The decision to move to modular parts that work with the Moto Z and Moto Z Force mean that the company sees modularity as the future (or a future) of Motorola devices. In a Q&A session with some of the Motorola executives, Jim Wicks, the senior vice president for consumer experience design, mentioned that the mods are “forward and backward compatible.” This essentially means that the company is going to stick with the same form factor for quite some time.

The hope is that other companies buy into the idea of developing a modular device to work with the new smartphones. In fact, the company created the Moto Mods Developer Program. As an extra incentive, the Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group will award $1 million to an individual or company that makes the best Moto Mods prototype before March 31, 2017.

Follow Rexly Peñaflorida II @Heirdeux. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

At the Lenovo Tech World keynote, the company's Motorola wing made an appearance to show off its new Moto Z and Moto Z Force smartphones. What is important about these two phones, however, is that they feature sixteen small pins in the back. These pins are part of the company’s new modular plan, called Moto Mods.

Moto Mods allow users to attach peripherals--modules, really--to the rear of the smartphone. This includes the InstaShare Projector, which turns your phone into a large projector; the JBL Soundboost attachment that turns the phone into a boombox; or a Power Pack for additional battery life.

There are also so-called “style shells” that allow you to change the design of the phone’s back, not unlike the Moto Maker that’s been around for some time.

One major feature--or perhaps more accurately, feature omission--of the Moto Z and Moto Z Force is the absence of a 3.5mm headphone jack. Lenovo said that it was removed to ensure that both devices were as thin as possible. However, there is a single USB Type-C port on the phone. You can use the included USB Type-C adapter (with a 3.5mm jack) to use your headphones.

Prices aren’t available yet for either device, but you can get the Moto Z as early as this summer, although it will be available from Verizon. The unlocked version will be available in the fall. The Moto Z Force is exclusive to Verizon customers in the U.S., and it will be available this summer, as well. The Moto Mods will launch at the same time as both phones.

Follow Rexly Peñaflorida II @Heirdeux. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Introduction

As the constant stream of sequels arriving in movie theaters shows, it’s much easier to sell a product built around an existing franchise than trying to build brand recognition for a new product from scratch. Perhaps this is why Motorola released two different versions of its premier Moto X this generation: the Moto X Play and the Moto X Style. The Moto X Play is the additional cast member, a midrange device situated between the Moto G and the Moto X Style. There’s one additional twist, however; in the U.S., the Moto X Style uses the stage name Moto X Pure Edition.

Motorola Mobility released the original Moto X more than two years ago after the company was acquired by Google. It included several features that proved popular with mainstream users, including the ability to customize the appearance of the phone through the Moto Maker website. It also offered a close-to-stock Android experience, something that was previously only available on Google’s own Nexus phones, with a few unique features such as voice recognition and Active Notifications on the lock screen.

Similar to how “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” closely followed the original trilogy’s blueprint (maybe a little too closely) despite changing ownership from George Lucas to Walt Disney, the latest X sequel, the Moto X Pure Edition, avoids a “Star Trek” inspired reboot under new parent company Lenovo. All of its signature features remain intact. It still runs “pure” Android, and its Nexus 6 derived appearance can still be customized using Moto Maker.

Technical Specifications

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The Moto X Pure Edition comes with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 808 SoC. We discussed the pros and cons of using the 808 instead of the top-tier Snapdragon 810 in our LG G4 review, but we feel the 808 is the better choice considering it matches or exceeds the performance of the 810 in most cases while largely avoiding the 810’s power and thermal problems. The 808’s Adreno 418 GPU cannot match the peak performance of the Adreno 430 in the 810, or even the Adreno 420 GPU found in the older Snapdragon 805 SoC powering the Nexus 6, but its better frame rate stability makes it suitable for Android gaming.

The 16GB base storage option is a bit weak, but the Moto X offers both 32GB and 64GB options, along with a microSD card slot for storage expansion. It also comes with 3GB of RAM, which is the sweet spot for speedy multitasking and web browsing when running stock Android.

In a play to boost camera performance, Motorola equips the Moto X Pure Edition with Sony’s new 21MP Exmor RS IMX230 sensor, which supports advanced features such as phase detect autofocus (PDAF) and high dynamic range (HDR) when shooting both 1080p and 4K video. The front-facing 5MP camera has its own LED flash, a rarity for front shooters.

The new Moto X comes with a larger 5.7-inch QHD IPS display. The bigger screen results in a bigger and heavier phone overall compared to the previous version, but it’s still smaller than the Nexus 6P that has the same size display. The Moto X is not too much bigger than most 5.5-inch phones, with the notable exception being the LG G4, which is significantly shorter and lighter. The tapered back is thicker than most phones at its midpoint, but this does not present any comfort or usability issues.

The Moto X Pure Edition comes unlocked and works with all of the major U.S. networks, including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular, and Verizon. Buying an unlocked phone from a retailer rather than through your wireless provider is becoming more palatable thanks to bring your own device (BYOD) plans. AT&T, for example, offers a $25/month credit if you already own a compatible phone. That’s a $600 savings after 24 months, which tends to be the typical upgrade cycle. Starting at $399.99, the Moto X Pure Edition is a real value proposition, especially considering that flagship phones generally cost more than $600.

With a solid spec sheet, some tantalizing features, and a reasonable price, the Pure Edition could be a real X factor; however, it faces some stiff competition. Any odd behavior and it could end up an X-File.

Hardware Design

The Moto X Pure Edition is Motorola’s flagship device, and the phone certainly looks and feels high-end; its build quality is excellent, and its aluminum frame makes it feel sturdy, adding just enough mass to convey quality without being heavy. The corners and back are nicely rounded too, making it comfortable to hold.

The Moto X uses the same design language as other recent Motorola phones, with obvious similarities to the Nexus 6 and the current Moto G, giving it a distinct look that helps it stand out from all of the other rounded rectangles. What really sets the Moto X apart from other phones, however, is the ability to personalize the phone. Using the Moto Maker website you can mix and match a variety of colors and materials to make something that’s uniquely yours. The front bezel comes in either black or white depending on the aluminum frame’s finish, and the metal accent pieces (speaker grilles on the front and strip around camera on the back) come in a number of different colors. The back cover comes in three different materials. Genuine wood options include Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified Bamboo, Ebony, Walnut, and Charcoal Ash. There’s also genuine Saffiano leathers sourced from the Horween Leather Company that come in Natural, Cognac, Black, and Red. The finish of each leather is unique and will age over time as any leather would. For those not into wood or leather, there’s also Coated Silicone Rubber (CSR) available in multiple colors. While not as premium looking as the natural materials, it resists fingerprints, fading, and discoloration. The CSR backs have a diagonal pattern of raised ridges that combine with the rubber’s inherent grippiness to make the Moto X easy to hang on to. The downside is that dust and crumbs tend to collect in the valleys between ridges.

Motorola allowed us to use Moto Maker to configure our review unit, and it was an experience we thoroughly enjoyed. After cycling through various color and material options, some of which are more humorous than stylish, we settled on a light silver frame with white front paired with matching silver accents and a bamboo back cover. Wood is hardly the first material that springs to mind when you think about smartphones and cutting-edge technology, but when combined with the aluminum frame, it just works.

Taking a closer look at the removable back shows the new metal accent strip surrounding the camera at one end and incorporating the Motorola logo into a concave dimple—which is a convenient place to rest your index finger—at the other end, with the dual-color LED flash in between. This design element is the biggest departure from the Moto X (2nd Gen), but is consistent with the current Moto G (3rd gen). The only other feature on the curved back is a small pinhole near the bottom for a microphone.

The aluminum frame has a light satin finish and a chamfered edge that sits flush with the back. The metal buttons are located on the right edge, leaving the left edge smooth. The power button, which has a ridged pattern to help locate it by feel, sits just above the single-piece volume rocker. Our only complaint is that it’s difficult to pick up or handle the phone without inadvertently pressing either the volume or power buttons because of how close they are to the midpoint. Sliding the buttons up a little closer to the top, or relocating the volume rocker to the left edge, would definitely help.

There’s a microUSB 2.0 port centered on the bottom edge flanked by two plastic antenna bands. The 3.5mm headphone jack is centered on the top edge, with the access door for the combination Nano SIM/microSD card tray sitting to one side.

A plastic frame surrounds the 5.7-inch display, but the entire front is covered over with Corning Gorilla Glass 3. The side and lower bezels are just as narrow as the LG G4’s, giving the Moto X Pure Edition an excellent 76% screen-to-body ratio. The small bezels above and below the screen each contain a speaker grille with a raised metal bar that’s color-matched to the accent strip on the back. These metal bars are more than just pieces of flair, though; they help protect the screen when the phone is sitting face down and both speakers are functional, meaning the Pure Edition has front-facing stereo speakers.

The bezel area above the screen is a bit more cluttered than usual. Ambient light and proximity sensors flank the speaker on the left, while an infrared sensor—which activates Moto Display when it senses movement—flanks it on the right. The front-facing camera and LED flash sit in the upper-right corner.

The second speaker and microphone are centered below the screen, with two additional infrared sensors in each corner.

While most phones look more and more alike with each iteration, Motorola’s phones stand out in a good way. The front-facing speakers and metal accent strip on the back are unique design features, as are the myriad ways to personalize the phone’s appearance. The Moto X Pure Edition’s materials, construction, and smooth lines give it a premium look and feel, with button placement our only quibble.

Display And Audio

Motorola pushes the Moto X Pure Edition into phablet territory by bumping screen size up from 5.2-inches in the Moto X (2nd gen) to 5.7-inches. Screen resolution also increases from FHD (1920x1080) to QHD (2560x1440), giving the new, larger display a pixel density of 520 PPI.

The Pure Edition also ditches the AMOLED panel used in the previous generation, replacing it with an IPS LCD. AMOLED panels use less power in low APL (Average Picture Level) conditions and have superior black levels relative to IPS panels; however, IPS panels are generally brighter than AMOLED and are more power efficient in high APL conditions (think mostly white backgrounds). Both technologies can yield excellent results, but the change is a little curious considering that Moto Display is one of Motorola’s signature features. Since an AMOLED display turns on only the necessary pixels (displaying black requires no power), it will use less power than an IPS display that needs to turn on the entire backlight even though Moto Display lights a small fraction of the total pixels. This change could be just a cost or panel supply issue, but it’s more likely that IPS’ better efficiency at higher APL conditions, which are prevalent throughout Android and common apps, outweighs the power deficit relative to AMOLED when using Moto Display, resulting in a net gain in battery life. The Pure Edition’s new IPS display also supports panel self-refresh, which helps save more power by not updating the display when the content is static.

One positive trend we’re seeing more of lately are phones that offer different display modes, primarily affecting color temperature and saturation, that give users more control over how content appears on the screen. The Moto X Pure Edition offers two choices: Normal and Vibrant. We test both options and show the results in the charts and graphs below.

We’re using SpectraCal's CalMAN software and SpectraCal C6 colorimeter for display measurements. All of the charts below with a gray background were generated in CalMAN v5 Ultimate. If you would like to learn more about our display testing procedure, or gain a better understanding of how these measurements affect visual quality, please read our article about how we test mobile displays.

Display brightness ranges from seven nits to around 550 nits, an excellent value considering we have yet to see an IPS display break the 600 nit barrier. Samsung's SAMOLED panels exceed this value, but only in direct sunlight after engaging Auto overdrive mode.

The Pure Edition’s black level is also very good for an IPS display. Panels using photo-aligned crystals, like those used in the iPhone 6 and above or devices such as the OnePlus 2 and LG G4 that use JDI's IPS-NEO panels, achieve better black levels, but the Pure Edition’s level is low enough not to be an issue.

In Normal display mode, the Pure Edition tracks the ideal gamma value closely up to 80% luminance before falling off. While not ideal, it’s still very good and significantly better than the Asus ZenFone 2 and OnePlus 2, both of which suffer from poorly configured gamma curves. Similar to these two phones, the Pure Edition’s gamma curve in Vibrant mode is also too high across the full luminance range, resulting in a loss of shadow detail, muted highlights, and generally darker colors.

The Pure Edition’s display falls very close to the target color temperature in both display modes. This is a pleasant surprise considering how bright the screen gets. To get brightness above 500 nits, most phones with IPS screens “cheat” by favoring blue output (backlights use blue LEDs) over red, resulting in a familiar blue cast from the cooler color temperature. In Vibrant mode, the color temperature varies a little more, skewing slightly warm below 50% luminance.

Motorola obviously put some effort into calibrating the Pure Edition’s display. Normal mode shows a little less red than blue and green, but no color channel varies by more than 4% from ideal. The Vibrant mode is perfect at 50% luminance, with a small 3% emphasis on red at lower values. Above the halfway point, the blue and green channels are up about 4%, while red is down 5%. Overall, these are excellent results.

Grayscale accuracy in both the Normal and Vibrant modes is excellent, with average ΔE2000 error falling between about 1.6 and 2.1, respectively. In Normal mode, grayscale error remains below three, where error is visible but acceptable, across the full luminance range and below two up to 50%. The Vibrant mode is even better, creeping up to three only above 90% luminance and remaining below one, which is basically imperceptible, across most of the luminance range. This is better than any other phone we’ve seen at this price point and is even better than most flagships.

The Pure Edition’s display does a great job covering the sRGB color space. In the ongoing spec wars, many companies are equipping their phones with wide-gamut displays and boasting about their superior color rendition. This marketing hype is misleading, however, because neither Android nor iOS support system-wide color management, and neither do any of the default apps. Until software support arrives, having a display that renders colors outside of the sRGB color space results only in oversaturated, inaccurate colors.

It’s in the color saturation sweep test that we see the true purpose of the Pure Edition’s Vibrant mode. In our discussion about color gamut above, we noted how displays that extend coverage beyond the sRGB color space show oversaturated colors. While we prefer a more natural look, some people prefer the more vibrant colors of a wide-gamut display. The Pure Edition’s Vibrant mode caters to this latter group, applying moderate color compression to boost color saturation.

The Pure Edition’s Normal mode focuses on color accuracy and performs well in the color saturation sweep. It hits every target box for each tested color, which is all we can ask for.

Another test and another excellent performance. The Pure Edition’s color accuracy in Normal mode is even better than the much more expensive Galaxy S6 edge+. Color ΔE2000 error remains below three for all the tested colors, and about half of them have an error below one, which is generally imperceptible. Even in Vibrant mode the Pure Edition is still better than other phones in its class. Intermediate colors show increased error due to the applied color compression, but with the exception of red, all of the primary and secondary colors are still at or below one.

Full Size Images: [Color Palette: Moto X Pure Edition Normal], [Color Palette: Moto X Pure Edition Vibrant]

The color palette above shows the target color on the bottom versus the displayed color on the top and is a nice way of visualizing the color error discussed above [note: the color accuracy of your screen will affect the actual colors you see]. The accuracy of the Pure Edition’s Normal mode is readily apparent; it’s difficult to see any differences between the displayed colors and the targets even when comparing them side by side. The grayscale values are also very close, with an almost unnoticeable green tint.

Looking at the color palette is the best way to see the effects of the Pure Edition’s Vibrant mode. Color compression does indeed make colors look more vibrant, but they fall short of the overly-saturated, neon-like colors from a wide-gamut display. The Vibrant mode’s gamma curve is also too high, making colors and grayscale shades appear too dark.

Overall, we’re really impressed with the Moto X Pure Edition’s display. It’s bright and clear, and Motorola’s meticulous calibration results in excellent looking colors. If color fidelity isn’t your thing, there’s even a mode that creates richer looking colors to catch your eye, while avoiding the unnatural saturation levels of wide-gamut displays. Of all the devices we’ve tested, the Pure Edition has the best looking screen in its price range.

Audio Performance

Unlike the previous two versions of the Moto X, the Pure Edition has front-facing stereo speakers, similar to Motorola’s Nexus 6. The stereo speakers definitely create a wider soundstage, and with the speakers facing the front, you do not have to set the phone on a table or cup your hand awkwardly behind the phone to get the best sound.

The external speakers sound pretty good. They’re still small phone speakers, so there’s almost no bass. Kick drums are anemic and low-frequency thumps are MIA in hip-hop. The lack of low-end also makes male vocals sound a bit hollow. While music sounds overly bright, it does remain clear. Even in complex music it’s possible to pick out individual instruments.

The speakers also get plenty loud, although they are not the loudest we’ve heard—the Nexus 6 is louder. The Pure Edition’s amplifiers, like most used in smartphones, reduce distortion at high volume levels by limiting current and voltage. This works very well, with minimal distortion at max volume.

Plugging in a set of headphones nets a pleasant music listening experience. At first, I could not hear a difference between the Pure Edition and our iPhone 6 reference. Listening more closely, however, revealed some very subtle differences. Low-end notes were just a bit softer from the Pure Edition and individual sounds were not quite as distinct. Notes in quick succession also tend to run together. For example, listening to a harp in the background with the iPhone 6, I could hear all four string plucks, but I could only make out two when listening to the same song on the Pure Edition. Again, these differences were very subtle were very subtle and probably would go unnoticed without doing a side-by-side comparison.

Camera Features

Previous versions of the Moto X produced decent images in good lighting, but struggled in low-light conditions. Autofocus speed was also a bit slow. For the Moto X Pure Edition and its derivatives, Motorola looks to correct these issues and improve overall camera performance by equipping them with Sony’s Exmor RS IMX230 sensor. This is a stacked CMOS sensor featuring backside illumination (BSI) and a 1/2.4” optical format. At 21 MP it’s one of the higher resolution sensors you can get in a smartphone, which should capture a lot of detail. The 1.12μm pixel size is pretty standard for this type of sensor. We’ll see if the smaller pixels and lack of optical image stabilization (OIS) hurt low-light performance in our image quality tests.

Note: For an explanation of camera hardware and terminology, please see our Camera Phone Technology 101 article.

The Pure Edition’s new rear camera also includes phase detect autofocus (PDAF). Using up to 192 AF points on the sensor, the camera is quick to focus in most cases. Scenes with higher dynamic range trip up the PDAF routine and cause the camera to fall back to the slower contrast detect AF (CDAF) method, however.

The optical stack consists of six lens elements with an f/2.0 aperture. This gives the Pure Edition’s camera one of the largest aperture areas currently available, letting in 6% more light than the lens in Samsung’s Galaxy S6 edge+. It also lets in 9% more light than the OnePlus 2’s lens and 53% more light than either the Asus ZenFone 2 or iPhone 6s Plus. This should improve low-light performance and help compensate for the higher-resolution sensor’s smaller pixels.

Motorola equips the Pure Edition with a new front camera too. Resolution increases from 2 MP to 5 MP to capture more detail. The sensor uses 1.4μm pixels, and the wide-angle lens has an f/2.0 aperture. There’s also an LED flash, which is still a fairly unique feature for front-facing cameras. The higher image resolution, larger aperture, and LED flash combine to produce some Facebook-worthy selfies, and the wide-angle lens helps get your entire group into the shot.

Camera Software

Motorola’s camera app makes shooting pictures and videos as simple as possible. The camera controls all of the settings automatically by default, requiring you to only tap the screen to take a picture. That’s right; there’s not even a shutter button, although, you can use the volume button to snap a picture. Long-pressing on the screen activates burst-mode, which takes multiple shots (about five) per second.

The app provides minimal control over focus and exposure and that’s it. There’s no sophisticated manual mode, image filters, or artsy effects to apply. You can set the focal point manually by simply dragging the focus ring over the desired object. Sliding the sun symbol around the focus ring adjusts exposure. There’s also a 4x digital zoom that’s controlled by sliding your finger up and down the right edge of the screen.

Additional controls are accessed via swipe motions. Sliding your finger inward from the left edge of the screen opens a carousel menu of settings: HDR, flash, video mode, photo resolution, shot timer (3 or 10 seconds), panorama, geotagging, shutter sound, and Quick Capture. Sliding your finger inward from the right edge of the screen allows you to browse through your latest images and edit them.

The Quick Capture feature is a clever way to launch the camera app with two flicks of the wrist. This works from the lock screen or inside any app. Repeating the gesture with the camera app already open switches between the front and rear cameras. This feature can be turned off but is on by default.

Other than a panorama mode, the front-facing camera supports all the same features as the rear camera, including burst-mode, automatic HDR, and the manual focus and exposure control.

Video

Just like with still photos, Motorola’s camera app offers only basic video recording options. There’s no 1080p@60fps mode available, even though the camera sensor supports it, and slow motion video is limited to 720p@120fps (played back at 30fps for a 1/4 speed slow-motion effect). It does offer 1080p@30fps recording at a reasonable bit rate for both the front and rear cameras. The rear camera can also record 4K UHD videos without any restrictions on the recording duration.

Rear Camera Video Modes

Front Camera Video Modes

Video quality using the rear camera is similar for both 1080p and 4K except for the obvious difference in resolution. Outdoors in good lighting, white balance is very good, and the camera adjusts exposure smoothly and quickly when transitioning from bright areas to shadows. The camera’s PDAF also works well, with almost no focus lag. The only quality issue in good lighting are noticeable compression artifacts—not just around objects but also large, flat surfaces—when moving the camera. Predictably, video quality in low-light conditions suffers. White balance is still generally good, but there’s a significant amount of noise in the video, somewhat negating the resolution advantage of the 4K mode. The camera also has more trouble focusing, frequently falling back to the much slower CDAF method.

While the Pure Edition’s camera does not have optical image stabilization (OIS), it does use electronic image stabilization (EIS) to help steady video. This removes some high-frequency jitters, but is not as effective as the methods used in some other flagship cameras.

One nice feature is the rear camera’s ability to use high dynamic range (HDR) when shooting both 1080p and 4K video. To use HDR with video you must activate it manually; auto HDR does not work. Using HDR helps brighten dark areas of the scene, but it does not compensate enough for overexposed areas. Also, using HDR tends to make the colors a bit warmer.

Like with most phones, the Pure Edition’s slow-motion video is more of a gimmick than a useful feature. The videos contain a significant amount of noise because of the higher video compression, and videos shot in anything but perfect lighting turn out darker than usual because of the shorter exposure time when recording at 120fps. The camera also seems to use CDAF exclusively in this mode, resulting in noticeable focus lag and instances where the camera fails to acquire a focus lock, resulting in mostly blurry videos. Also, there’s no audio track recorded when shooting in slow-motion.

Camera Performance And Photo Quality

It’s time to put the Moto X Pure Edition’s new camera to the test. We’ll be comparing its images to identical ones taken with the 16 MP Sony Exmor RS IMX240 camera in Samsung’s Galaxy S6. This is not meant to be a fair comparison since the Galaxy S6 is a more expensive flagship device, but as the current leader in smartphone photo quality, it will serve as the gold standard.

All of the images shown below were taken with the default camera app using the Auto mode unless noted. Also, you can view the full-sized image for each photo by clicking the text links below the images that are within a slideshow album. The Moto X Pure Edition shoots natively at a 4:3 aspect ratio, while the Galaxy S6 shoots natively at 16:9.

Outdoors

Daylight

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: daylight dragon], [Galaxy S6: daylight dragon], [Moto X Pure Edition: daylight fountain], [Galaxy S6: daylight fountain]

There’s plenty of light in the first set of images, allowing both cameras to use low ISO settings. The Pure Edition’s white balance is a bit cooler than the Galaxy S6’s, but this is partially because of a small change in brightness from the cloud cover. Zooming in reveals less noise grain in the Pure Edition’s image, especially in the background and the dark gray wall on the right, because of its additional noise reduction post-processing. This has the negative side effect of smearing away some fine detail, which is evident on the rocks at the foot of the gray wall.

The Pure Edition does an excellent job capturing the fountain in the second set of images. Its higher-resolution sensor clearly captures more detail than the S6, and its image is less noisy too. Noise reduction does smear away some detail on flat surfaces in the Pure Edition’s image, like the bricks on the road, but it’s not excessive. Comparing white balance, the Moto X captures the color of the sky better, but the S6 does better with the fountain.

Afternoon

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: afternoon giraffes], [Galaxy S6: afternoon giraffes], [Moto X Pure Edition: afternoon building], [Galaxy S6: afternoon building]

When it comes to snapping pictures of giraffes in the afternoon under an overcast sky, the Moto X Pure Edition starts to struggle. The white balance skews a bit cool, and there’s less color saturation than in the S6 image. The Pure Edition’s stock camera also appears to be using higher jpeg image compression, since its image shows more artifacts around edges. These issues are fairly minor, though, compared to the overly aggressive noise reduction processing that smears away almost all of the detail in the grass and fence in the background.

The Pure Edition’s aggressive noise reduction works to its advantage in the second image of the building taken at sunset. Where the S6 was the clear victor in the giraffe scene, the Moto X does better with the building. In general, because of how the Pure Edition’s noise reduction works, it tends to do well in modestly-lit scenes with mostly flat, smooth surfaces, like buildings or sky, but struggles when the scene has lots of tiny details, like grass and trees outdoors.

Evening

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: evening trees], [Galaxy S6: evening trees], [Moto X Pure Edition: evening parking lot], [Galaxy S6: evening parking lot]

In the first set of images with the palm trees, the sun is just dipping below the horizon, giving the cameras very little light to work with. Without OIS, the Moto X cannot take as long of an exposure as the S6, resulting in a darker image despite using a much higher ISO setting. As light levels drop, the Pure Edition’s noise reduction seems to get more aggressive, which hurts overall image quality. The bricks on the ground and the wall in the background have almost all of their detail wiped away. It does do a decent job setting white balance, though.

It’s the same story in the parking lot scene: The S6 produces a brighter image (perhaps a bit too bright) with more visible noise but also more detail.

HDR

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: stream - no HDR], [Moto X Pure Edition: stream - HDR], [Galaxy S6: stream - no HDR], [Galaxy S6: stream - HDR], [Moto X Pure Edition: cheetahs - no HDR], [Moto X Pure Edition: cheetahs - HDR], [Galaxy S6: cheetahs - no HDR], [Galaxy S6: cheetahs - HDR]

The Moto X comes with automatic HDR for both the front and rear cameras. Unlike some flagship phones, it does not display a real-time preview of the HDR effect on the screen. The HDR processing also slows down the camera, increasing shot-to-shot latency from about half a second to around two seconds, which is common for phones in this price range.

HDR quality is pretty good, but it’s definitely not as good as the Galaxy S6. The Pure Edition does well brightening the darker areas of the image, but is just a little too aggressive, over-brightening some of the lighter areas. While it compensates somewhat for the overexposed sky in the first image, it is not able to remove the glare from the building’s roof like the S6 does. In the second image with an overcast sky, the Pure Edition’s HDR mode performs better, revealing the detail of the fence and powerlines in the background.

Indoors

The staged indoor shots below were lit by overhead LED lights, a CFL lamp from the front, and an incandescent overhead light in the background.

Bright Light

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: indoor mall], [Galaxy S6: indoor mall], [Moto X Pure Edition: indoor bright], [Galaxy S6: indoor bright]

The artificial light in the shopping mall causes the Moto X to set a cooler white balance. Similar to what we saw in the afternoon shots, its noise reduction works well when removing noise grain from flat, smooth surfaces, like the walls, but smears away some detail from the bricks and floor. The higher resolution sensor captures more detail in areas not affected by noise reduction.

The staged scene is a bit more challenging because of the mixed light sources and less overall light. The Galaxy S6 sets exposure correctly, but even though the Moto X uses the same shutter speed, it sets ISO twice as high, overexposing the scene and clipping the highlights on the figurines’ heads. The Moto X does a better job setting white balance, however, avoiding the green tint that degrades the S6’s image.

Low Light and Flash

Full-Size Images: [Moto X Pure Edition: indoor dark], [Galaxy S6: indoor dark], [Moto X Pure Edition: indoor flash], [Galaxy S6: indoor flash]

In this dimly lit scene, the Galaxy S6 excels; it gets a good exposure and captures a lot of detail, all while keeping noise low. Low-light scenes are kryptonite for the Moto X, however. Its lack of OIS limits exposure time, resulting in a darker image. White balance is also too cool and colors lack saturation. The Pure Edition’s overly aggressive noise reduction further reduces image quality, creating odd yellow splotches and reducing overall sharpness.

Turning the Pure Edition’s dual-color LED flash on produces much better results. Colors look very natural, and the image looks very sharp with minimal noise.

The Moto X Pure Edition’s camera is a big step up from the previous generation. Its image quality in good lighting is superb, rivaling even the excellent camera in the Galaxy S6. As the light fades, however, the Pure Edition’s heavy noise reduction post-processing starts wiping away more and more detail. In scenes dominated by flat, smooth surfaces, this ends up being a positive, but for most scenes it ends up reducing quality. This is especially true in very low-light conditions. White balance was never a problem for the Pure Edition in our tests, but the lack of OIS limits exposure time in low-light situations, leading to darker images.

Performance And Battery Life

In this section, we evaluate system-level performance and battery life by running a series of synthetic and real-world workloads. There are several facets to overall device performance, including single- and multi-threaded CPU performance, memory and storage speed, and GPU rendering, all of which will be probed by our suite of benchmarks. If you're interested in learning more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device performance.

Instead of just running one or more CPU cores at max frequency like synthetic benchmarks do, PCMark’s varied real-world workloads migrate from small to big cores and exercise the CPU governor just like the apps we normally use do, which makes it a good indicator of overall performance. After using the Moto X Pure Edition for awhile, it’s not surprising to see it perform well in this test. For the most part, the UI remains fluid and the phone never felt slow.

Looking at the individual tests, there’s no specific area where the Moto X falls behind its competitors. It even manages to outperform the OnePlus 2 and its Snapdragon 810 SoC in most tests. In the Writing test, the Moto X uses its two higher-performing Cortex-A57 CPU cores to good effect, posting the highest score, higher even than the Galaxy S6 edge+ or the OnePlus 2, which prefers using its lower-power Cortex-A53 cores for single-threaded workloads.

Like we saw with the LG G4, the Moto X Pure Edition does not shy away from using its A57 cores, unlike the Snapdragon 810 devices. The Moto X, like the G4, can also use all six cores simultaneously for multi-threaded workloads, at least for short durations.

The extra performance from the power-hungry A57 cores takes its toll on battery life, however. In the PCMark endurance test, the Moto X lasts as long as the Asus ZenFone 2 but falls short of the OnePlus 2’s 7.5-hour mark. The Nexus 5X, with a smaller battery (and display), also lasts longer than the Moto X.

Battery life, however, is only part of the story; we also have to take performance into account. By multiplying the PCMark battery life by the overall performance score and dividing by 1000, we get a composite metric that gives us an estimate for how much total work can be done on a single charge.

The Moto X can get as much work done as the ZenFone 2 before it runs out of juice. After taking performance into account, it pulls ahead of the Nexus 5X by 14% but still comes in behind the OnePlus 2.

The Moto X’s Adreno 418 GPU cannot match the peak performance of the Adreno 430 in the OnePlus 2 or Mali-T760MP8 in the Galaxy S6 devices, but it does outperform the GPUs in the less expensive ZenFone 2 and BLU Pure XL.

In our LG G4 review, we took a more in-depth look at the Adreno 418 GPU’s performance. In addition to being slower than the Adreno 430, we also found that it’s 10% to 20% slower than the Adreno 420 used in the Snapdragon 805 SoC. Like other Qualcomm GPUs, the Adreno 418 has good ALU performance relative to its peers. Based on our tests, however, it appears that Snapdragon 808’s reliance on LPDDR3 RAM limits memory bandwidth to the GPU, especially when rendering at the Moto X’s native QHD resolution. Fortunately, most Android games render at lower resolutions before scaling up to the panel’s native dimensions. While reviewing the LG G4, which also uses a Snapdragon 808 SoC, we played several different games, including “Asphalt 8” (high visual quality), “Brothers in Arms 3” (Better Quality setting), and “Star Wars: Uprising”, and did not notice any significant frame rate issues, even after about forty-five minutes of continuous gaming.

The GFXBench 3.0 battery test focuses on the GPU and is an indicator of battery life during intense gaming. It also effectively gauges a device’s ability to dissipate heat.

The Moto X Pure Edition lasts about three hours while gaming, which is about the same as most other phones, including the LG G4 that has a similarly sized battery and screen. Because of its lower-resolution 1080p display, the ZenFone 2 achieves about the same performance level as the Moto X, but lasts 21% longer (the battery life test runs at the device’s native resolution).

Unlike the G4, which throttles back GPU frequency after about 23 minutes, reducing peak performance by a mild 7%, the Moto X experiences no thermal throttling at all. This impressive performance stability is a result of Motorola’s thoughtful design. The SoC is covered by a copper heat spreader that presses against a large metal plate, which contacts the Moto X’s metal chassis on the sides. This provides a conduction path that moves heat from the SoC to the metal chassis, which acts as a large heatsink. So while the Moto X feels warm in your hands, you’ll experience no degradation in gaming performance.

Conclusion

The Moto X Pure Edition is Motorola’s flagship phone. Its price and feature set, however, place it in the premium mid-range category with phones such as the OnePlus 2 and LG G4. This is a difficult category to compete in, but there’s more to the Moto X Pure Edition than a long name.

For starters, it has an excellent display. The 5.7-inch IPS panel’s QHD resolution makes objects and text look very sharp. It’s also very bright, reaching a maximum of 550 nits. The well-calibrated sRGB panel also boasts some of the most accurate looking colors of any phone we’ve tested. The displays in the Moto E (2nd gen) and Moto G (3rd gen) were impressive given their price point, but Motorola’s attention to detail gives the Pure Edition the best display in its class.

The camera is another piece of hardware that sees a major upgrade over the previous generation. The Sony-­sourced 21 MP rear camera takes nicely detailed photos in good lighting. A large aperture lens lets in a lot of light, but the lack of OIS limits exposure time, bounding brightness in dark scenes. Overly aggressive noise reduction processing wipes away detail, further reducing low-­light image quality.

The Pure Edition’s Snapdragon 808 SoC is technically a step down from the 810; however, with two fewer A57 CPU cores, the 808 is better able to stay within its thermal envelope, allowing it to keep its six cores online at higher frequencies. This gives the Pure Edition a small performance edge over the OnePlus 2.

In general use, the Pure Edition feels plenty fast, especially after the update to Android 6.0. The UI is fluid, with fewer dropped frames than the LG G4, and the phone does not seem to struggle when browsing the web or running apps. Driving the high­-resolution QHD display is a bit much for the Adreno 418 GPU and LPDDR3 RAM, but this is usually not a problem since most games do not render at the panel’s native dimensions. The Pure Edition also does not suffer from thermal throttling when gaming. While the Snapdragon 810 and Samsung Galaxy devices deliver better peak frame rates, the Pure Edition’s excellent performance stability means its gaming experience will not be that much different after about 15 minutes of gameplay.

This performance, when combined with a battery that’s below average size for a phablet, leads to mediocre battery life. Under moderate, continuous use its battery life is similar to the LG G4 and Asus ZenFone 2 but less than the OnePlus 2 and both new Nexus phones, the 5X and 6P.

Up to this point we’ve talked a lot about hardware but have not discussed why Motorola calls this phone the “Pure Edition.” What makes this phone “pure” is its nearly stock version of Android 6.0 Marshmallow. There’s no custom OEM launcher, duplicate OEM apps, or reimagined notification shade. The Pure Edition uses the Google Now launcher and Motorola leaves the stock Android UI intact. It also relies exclusively on Google’s apps—the lone exceptions being the previously discussed Camera app, which Motorola replaces with its own version, and the open source Gallery app, which sits alongside Google’s Photos app. It’s also worth noting that unlike Motorola’s less­-expensive phones there’s no FM radio support.

As clean as it is, this is not a Nexus phone. Motorola adds a few features of its own that are accessible through two of its apps: Connect and Moto. The Connect app allows you to interact with other Motorola products such as headsets and smart watches. The Moto app, shown in the screenshots below, is the gateway to enabling Motorola’s extra features.

We already covered the Quick Capture action in the camera section. The other interesting action is Lift for Moto Voice, which provides discrete answers to questions after raising the phone to your ear without having to say the launch phrase. Speaking of the launch phrase, it’s customizeable. Instead of the typical “OK Google,” you can train it to respond to “Heads up Jarvis” or “Wake up HAL.” The Moto X can also read incoming calls and messages out loud when it notices you’re in a specific environment, like your car.

If you want to see notifications appear on the lock screen, the Pure Edition offers a choice between Google’s Ambient Display or Motorola’s Moto Display. Details about the latter are shown in the screenshots below.

The Moto X Pure Edition is an all-­around solid phone, and we cannot find much to complain about. A bigger battery would be nice, especially considering it’s thicker than its peers. It also does not have a fingerprint scanner, which Android Marshmallow and the latest Nexus phones turned into a standard feature months after the Pure Edition launched. But unlike many phones in this price range whose impressive sounding hardware disappoints, or whose feature-­packed software just seems to get in the way, the Pure Edition’s simplicity and performance make it enjoyable to use.

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Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Follow him on Twitter.

Leonid Yankulin is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets.

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The First Mobile Phone: Motorola DynaTAC 8000X (1984)

The first mobile phone was commercialized 32 years ago in 1984. The DynaTAC 8000X, designed by Motorola, was the first cell phone small enough to be carried in one hand. Although this was a significant leap for mobile phones, it was still a huge phone by today's standards. With modern phones Apple, HTC and Samsung fight to cut off every tenth of a millimeter and gram that they can, whereas the DynaTAC 8000X weighed 790 grams (1.74 pounds) and was 25 cm tall, not counting its external antenna. Worse, its autonomy was limited, and the battery only lasted for one hour during a call!

Its launch price was $3,995, about $7,220 after taking inflation into consideration. It was a gadget for the rich, which nonetheless began the cell phone revolution.

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Nokia Mobira Senator (1982)

Motorolla's DynaTAC was a remarkable engineering feat, not only for its miniaturization, but also because it used AMPS—the first 1G cellular network in the U.S. AMPS was an analog system, and was one of the first cellular networks in the world. Japan developed an earlier 1G cellular network in 1979, and on the other side of the Atlantic, Finland established its 1G NMT (Nordisk Mobiltelefoni) in 1981.

Consumers seeking to take advantage of these earlier mobile networks used Nokia's first "mobile" phone that was released in 1982: the Nokia Mobira Senator. This phone was intended for use inside of a car and weighed 9.8 kg (21.6 pounds).

Nokia Cityman 900 (1987): Nokia Becomes Portable

Following the DynaTAC 8000X, the race to produce the smallest phone on the market began and continues to this day. Nokia responded in 1987 with the Cityman 900. This phone continued to use the 1G networks, and it weighed 760 grams. It could handle 50 minutes of talk time before the battery died, making it fairly similar to the DynaTAC 8000X. The two phones shared a similar appearance too, with the major difference being that the Cityman 900 was shorter, measuring just 18 cm high (excluding antenna). The phone was a significant success, and it helped to cement Nokia's position in the mobile phone market.

Motorola MicroTAC (1989)

Although the DynaTAC 8000X was a success, Motorola knew it needed a more travel friendly device to compete against the Cityman 900, which led to the release of the MicroTAC 9800X on April 25, 1989. Designed to fit inside a shirt pocket, it was the smallest and lightest mobile phone on the market when it launched. It was also the first phone to use the clamshell design, which helped to reduce its overall size. When the phone was opened, it still measured 23 cm tall, but it was significantly lighter, weighing just 300 grams. In order to keep the weight down, Motorola used a smaller battery, but at the cost of reducing talk time to roughly 30 minutes.

The First GSM Phone: Orbitel 901 (1992)

In 1991 the GSM mobile network standard was finalized, and the first GSM network, named the Radiolinja network, was created in Finland. The GSM network technology delivered excellent audio quality and boosted network capacity relative to the 1G NMT network. The first phone to use this network was the Orbitel 901 released in 1992, which was relatively large and weighed 2 kg. As a result, it was also considered a car phone and not really a mobile phone.

Nokia 1011 (1992)

Nokia's next major mobile phone was the Nokia 1011; its first phone designed by Frank Nuovon. Released on November 10, 1992, the phone had several advantages over the Cityman 900, including height, weight, and features. The phone only measured 19.5 cm (including the antenna) and weighed 495 grams. The phone had a monochrome LCD display to access menus and to see the numbers as you dialed. It also used the GSM network standard, which gave it superior audio quality.

Hagenuk MT-2000 (1994): Internal Antenna & Games!

In 1994 the German manufacturer Hagenuk entered the world of mobile phones with the Hagenuk MT-2000. This phone was revolutionary because it was the first with an internal antenna instead of the telescope antenna used on all earlier phones. It operated on the German D-Netz 900 network, which used the GSM 900 standard.

The Hagenuk MT-2000 was also the first mobile phone to come with a game installed, a simple variation of Tetris, opening the door for gaming on phones.

Nokia 2110 (1994): The Musical Ringtone

Nokia introduced the 2110 in 1994. This phone followed the design of the 1011, but added the ability to send text messages to other phones, becoming the first phone capable of doing so. It also was the first phone to feature a musical ringtone. The Nokia ringtone was played over a simple speaker that was only capable of producing five different tones, but it forged a path to the more musical ringtones we have today.

The First Smartphone: IBM Simon (1994)

Contrary to popular belief, Apple did not invent the smartphone. Nor did Apple invent the touchscreen smartphone. Both of these technological breakthroughs can be attributed to IBM. Incredible as it may seem, the Simon Personal Communicator, which was created in 1994, had a 4.5-inch black and white display with a resolution of 293x160 and a resistive touchscreen interface. It was capable of making calls, sending faxes and responding to emails. It also had several other non-network oriented applications, including an address book, calendar, calculator and world clock. It even came with a stylus for hand writing notes that could then be stored on the device. The software interface included several elements that are common on phones today such as application icons and a virtual touchscreen keyboard. Similar to portable computers of the time, it also supported the use of PCMCIA cards to expand the feature set and install new applications. The entire system was driven by a 16MHz x86 processor.

All of these advanced features pushed the price of the phone up higher than most people were willing to pay, however, and IBM only sold 50,000 units before the company decided to end production. There wouldn't be another smartphone until Ericcson created one in 2000.

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Motorola StarTAC 3000 (1996)

In 1996 Motorola released what would be known as one of the most iconic phones of the 1990s: the StarTAC 3000. At launch, it was the smallest mobile phone on the market by far. It weighed just 88 grams and updated the clamshell design by spreading hardware through both sections, instead of just a fold out microphone like on the MicroTAC. The phone was also one of the first to contain a vibrator.

The StarTAC originally used the aging AMPS network, but later models switched to GSM because of GSM's growing popularity and support. The phone was a huge success, selling over 60 million units.

Nokia Communicator (1996): A Smartphone Web Browser

While Motorola was attempting to innovate the mobile phone market by reducing the overall size and weight of its devices, Nokia opted to work towards adding new features and functionality to its phones. The Nokia Communicator 9000 was released in 1996 and was considered a smartphone, although its functionality was similar to what we would expect on modern day feature phones. It had a built-in browser, developed in-house by Nokia, that allowed users to surf the Web over the mobile network. The network performance was rather limited, with a maximum bandwidth of 9,600 bits/s.

The internal hardware was nearly identical to the Nokia 2110i, including a 24MHz Intel 80386 CPU, 8 Mb of RAM, and a 640x200 4.5-inch LCD display. The internal CPU and RAM are remarkably similar to what you would expect from a PC just one decade prior to the phone's release, showing a remarkable advancement in portable computing technology.

Nokia 7110 (1999): The Birth Of WAP

With the growing popularity of the Internet, the concept of being able to access the net from anywhere in the world was a powerful one, but the majority of phones in the late 1990s simply lacked the hardware support to process Web pages. This led to the invention of WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) as a means of accessing the Internet on phones that lacked native Web browsing functionality. It gave users a significantly reduced browsing experience, which often had distorted images and text, and was extraordinarily slow. Despite these problems, WAP was heavily promoted throughout the industry, and smartphones such as Nokia's 7110 were created specifically for using WAP.

Benefon ESC! (1999): The Introduction Of GPS

Benefon created the ESC! in 1999, a phone that was an instant hit, especially with hikers. The key concept was to allow users to escape off the beaten path and still be able to find their way back. The phone was the first to incorporate a built-in GPS navigation system, and it was also water resistant. The map could be displayed on a 100x160 display, and map coordinates could be sent to others via SMS.

Samsung SPH-WP10 (1999): The Phone Watch

Smartwatches are one of the hit new smart devices coming into the market today, but this concept was originally pioneered by Samsung back in 1999. Samsung's SPH-WP10 wasn't capable of nearly as much as a modern smartwatch; it was more of a phone inside of a watch instead of a phone accessory. It measured 67 x 58 x 20 mm (L x W x H), weighed 50 grams, and had a 1.52-inch display. It could maintain a call for up to 90 minutes, or last for 60 hours in standby. The watch did not sell well, however, and Samsung ceased production after a relatively short period of time.

Ericsson T36 (2000): The Arival Of Bluetooth

The Bluetooth standard was finalized in 1999. Ericsson was quick to capitalize on the new technology, announcing the first Bluetooth compatible phone, the Ericsson T36, in 2000. Ericsson ultimately canceled the T36, however, and it was never released. Instead, the Ericsson R520m became the first phone to feature Bluetooth. The T39, a phone similar to the T36, was released a year later as well. These phones opened the door to a wide assortment of Bluetooth devices by third-party manufacturers, which significantly changed the mobile phone market.

Nokia 3310 (2000)

The Nokia 3310 became one of the most successful phones in history, selling roughly 125 million units. The phone didn't feature any significant jump in technology; its most significant advancement was the ability to write 459 character SMS messages. Its immediate predecessor, the Nokia 3210, added a number of new features to the product line, including interchangeable cases and an internal antenna, but the Nokia 3310 far exceeded the 3210 in sales and went on to become an icon for the company.

The First MP3 Player Phone: Samsung SPH-M100 Uproar (2000)

The Samsung SPH-M100 Uproar was also released in 2000 and was the first phone to double as an MP3 player. It contained 64MB of internal storage space, which was quite spacious for its time, roughly enough to hold an entire CD encoded with a 128 Kb/s data rate. The battery was capable of lasting for 10 hours of continuous audio playback. Samsung bundled a set of headphones and a remote to wirelessly control the MP3 player too.

Matsushita P2101V (2001): 3G & Video Phone

NTT DoCoMo created the first 3G network (known as UMTS) in Japan, which began operation in October 2001. To take advantage of this new ultra-fast (384 Kb/s) network, companies scrambled to release a new generation of mobile phones. Of the new phones to come out around this time, the most feature rich was the Matsushita P2101V, which had a full-color LCD display and a video camera to enable video calls.

Blackberry 6210 (2003)

Although RIM (Research In Motion) had been producing its BlackBerry devices for several years, it wasn't until 2003 that RIM added cellphone functionality to its products. By combining cellular connectivity with the features already inherent in the BlackBerry product line, RIM's BlackBerry 6210 is considered to be the first modern day smartphone. It also introduced several new mobile phone features, including its iconic wheel for navigating menus and its full QWERTY keyboard.

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Nokia Communicator 9500 (2004)

By 2004, essentially all of the functions we see on a modern day smartphone had been implemented in one way or another. The last of these key features to be introduced was Wi-Fi connectivity, which debuted on the Nokia Communicator 9500. The phone carried over several features seen on older phones such as Bluetooth, a 4.5-inch 640x200 color display, an MP3 and AAC compatible music player, a 0.3 MP camera, an Office document reader and the ability to send fax messages. Its built-in modem was EDGE compatible and supported up to a 177 Kb/s data connection. The device was powered by a Texas Instruments OMAP 150 SoC, which contained an ARM925T 150MHz CPU. It also used the Series 90 OS based on Symbian, and could surf the Web on a browser developed in partnership with Opera.

Razr V3 (2004): Triumph Before The Fall

Motorola's last major victory in the mobile phone arena as an independent American manufacturer was the Razr V3. While most phones at this time were made from plastic, the Razr V3 used a sleek all-aluminum shell. This helped to further reduce the size of the phone, dropping down to 13 mm thin. The buttons were also made of aluminum, and the LCD had a glass plate on top of it to protect it from getting scratched. The phone was highly successful, selling 130 million units in four years. Ironically, it was the success of this product that caused the company to join the smartphone market late, which led to its ultimate demise.

Apple iPhone (2007)

Over the years, the cost of owning a mobile phone dropped sharply, and it became common for just about everyone to have one. At the same time, they also became increasingly sophisticated and feature rich. Although many of these phones were able to browse the Internet, the use of WAP, small screens and counter intuitive interfaces created a rather unpleasant experience. Apple recognized this problem and saw its opportunity.

The iPhone was not revolutionary for any one feature it offered; instead, it was the combination of several existing technologies bundled together into an attractive package that, most importantly, made interacting with the phone and browsing the Web an easy and enjoyable experience. The first iPhone lacked MMS, a camera and 3G connectivity. It also did not yet support third-party apps, but it nonetheless revolutionized the smartphone.

HTC Dream (2008): Enter The Android

It was in 2008 that Google unleashed its smartphone operating system, Android, into the wild. The first smartphone to use Android was the HTC Dream (G1). Its internal hardware was centered around a Qualcomm MSM7201A processor with 192 MB of RAM and 256 MB of internal storage space, which could be extended via a microSD card slot. The HTC Dream was compatible with 3G/3G+ networks, enabling reasonably high-speed Internet usage for a mobile phone. It had a HVGA (320x480) 3.2-inch touch screen display for the primary user interface, but also came equipped with a full QWERTY keyboard underneath the sliding screen.

Initially it used Android 1.1, but it had official firmware upgrades up to Android 1.6.

Nexus One (2010): Google Enters The Fray

Google released the Nexus One early in 2010, becoming the first smartphone directly marketed by Google. The phone was manufactured by HTC and was equipped with a 3.7-inch AMOLED (WVGA, 800x480) display. Its Qualcomm Snapdragon 8250 SoC contained a single-core 1GHz CPU and an Adreno 200 GPU. There was also 512 MB of RAM and 512 MB of internal storage space that was expandable via a microSD card slot. On the back of the phone was a 5 MP camera, which was rather high-end for the time. Connectivity support included 802.11g Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1 and 3G HSDPA/HSUPA.

Google's plan for the Nexus One was to show other manufacturers what a smartphone should be and to grow support for its Android OS.

HTC Evo 4G & Samsung SCH-R900 (2010): 4G Arrives

2010 also saw the introduction of the first 4G networks, prompting the release of the HTC Evo 4G, the first commercially available 4G WiMAX-compatible smartphone. Not long after, Samsung's SCH-R900 Craft became the first smartphone to feature 4G LTE support. Since neither phone was compatible with the European GSM networks, they were sold almost exclusively in North America.

Outside of the 4G network support, both phones were relatively average for the time. The SCH-R900 had a 3.3-inch 480x800 display and a relatively limited amount of internal storage (165 MB) that was expandable via a microSD card slot. It also featured a QWERTY keyboard. The HTC Evo 4G featured better specs, including a 4.3-inch WQVGA (480x800) display, 512 MB of RAM and 1 GB of storage space that was also expandable via a microSD card slot. The Samsung SCH-R900 used a custom OS, while the HTC Evo 4G ran Android 2.3.

LG Optimus 7 (2010): Microsoft's Smartphone Platform

At the end of 2010, LG launched the Optimus 7 (LG-E900), which was one of the first smartphones to come with Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 operating system installed. The Optimus 7 had a 3.8-inch screen capable of displaying a resolution of 800x480. It used a Qualcomm Snapdragon S1 SoC with a single-core 1GHz CPU and Adreno 200 GPU, combined with 512 MB of RAM and 16 GB of internal storage. It was compatible with 3G+ networks.

First Dual-Core Smartphone: LG Optimus X2 (2011)

Over time, the computational power of mobile phones grew slowly, but starting in 2011 smartphone performance began to progress more quickly as multi-core processors were introduced. The LG Optimus X2 became the first dual-core smartphone. It used the Nvidia Tegra 2 SoC, with two Cortex-A9 CPUs clocked at 1 GHz. This effectively doubled CPU performance, and made multitasking on phones considerably easier, however, it also negatively affected battery life. Despite this, the entire industry would move in this direction following the LG Optimus X2.

Over the next few years, companies would also produce tri-core, quad-core, hexa-core, octa-core and even deca-core SoCs in an effort to push performance higher.

Apple iPhone 4s And Siri (2011)

In 2011, Apple introduced another revolutionary feature to its iPhone product line: Siri (Speech Interpretation and Recognition Interface). Other smartphones had the ability to listen to your voice and convert it into text to save you time, but Siri took the next logical step with the ability to listen for command words and complete minor tasks for you.

The following year, Google would implement a similar personal assistant service called Google Now, but despite its ubiquity in Android-based smartphones, it is not as well known as Siri.

Samsung Galaxy S II (2011): The iPhone Killer

Following the release of the Galaxy S in 2010, the Galaxy S II is the phone that allowed Samsung to really compete with the Apple iPhone. Aimed at the high-end market, the Galaxy S II had advanced features to entice users to switch away from Apple. It used a Samsung Exynos 4210 SoC with a Cortex-A9 dual-core 1.2GHz CPU and a Mali-400MP4 GPU clocked at 266MHz. The SoC was supported by 1 GB of RAM and either 16 or 32 GB of storage space depending on the model. The rear camera was capable of recording video with a resolution of 1080p, and the phone also had a 2 MP front-facing camera. Network support included 3G HSDPA/HSUPA. The phone was a major success, helping Samsung to become the leading Android smartphone manufacturer in the world by October 2011.

Oppo Find 5 (2012): The First 1080p Display

Mobile device display resolutions also improved over time, transitioning from the limited text-only monochrome displays of the 1990s to full color high-pixel density displays capable of playing high-definition games. The first smartphone to feature a full HD display was the Oppo Find 5, which featured a stunning pixel density of 441 PPI.

Nokia 808 Pureview (2012): The 41 MP Smartphone Camera

While modern smartphones started to look more and more alike, one released in 2012 stands out from the rest. The Nokia 808 Pureview has all of the typical smartphone features you would expect in 2012, except for its powerful 41 MP camera. The phone is thicker and heavier than most contemporary smartphones as a result.

Because of its heavy focus on the camera, Nokia neglected other aspects of the phone. Its 4-inch AMOLED 640x360 (184 ppi) display was rather mediocre for 2012. The internal hardware was also underwhelming, with a single-core 1.3GHz CPU and just 512 MB of RAM. It also used the Symbian OS, which is no longer in development.

LG G Flex (2013): Curved Display

In 2013, LG introduced the first phone with a curved screen: the G Flex. The phone shared several features with LG's G2 smartphone, including a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 SoC, 2 GB of RAM and 32 GB of internal storage. Its key features, though, were a 6-inch curved display and flexible plastic chassis. The 720p display drew criticism for having a relatively low pixel density of 245 PPI.

Incidentally, Samsung introduced its own smartphone with a curved screen around the same time, the Galaxy Round.

Apple iPhone 5s (2013): Enter The 64-bit Era

With the launch of the iPhone 5s in September 2013, Apple brought the smartphone into the 64-bit era. It was the first smart device to use the Apple A7 SoC, a dual-core model operating at 1.3GHz paired with a PowerVR G6430 GPU. It also contains the M7 coprocessor, which collects data from various sensors inside the device.

The iPhone 5s comes equipped with a 4-inch IPS screen with a resolution of 1136x640 (326 ppi), up to 64GB of storage, an 8 MP rear camera and a 1.2 MP front-facing camera. It supports 4G LTE and 802.11n Wi-Fi.

Its other claim to fame is Touch ID, a capacitive fingerprint sensor that's used to unlock the phone and authorize transactions. Fingerprint sensors are now a common feature on most mid-range and high-end phones.

The Personal Assistant: Siri, Now, Cortana (2011 - 2014)

The notion of a voice-based personal digital assistant hit the mainstream when Apple launched Siri back in 2011 with the iPhone 4S. Google followed suit with something similar with Google Now in 2012, although that service was more about marrying app usage, search and personal preferences into a series of information-based cards at your fingertips. In 2014 Microsoft released Cortana with Windows Phone 8.1, and its claim to fame was introducing contextual awareness and inference to the digital assistant, using an entity database Microsoft calls Satori. Further, Microsoft has extended Cortana onto the desktop, and there are apps for iOS and Android. The program has been criticized for excessive data gathering.

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Follow Michael Justin Allen Sexton @EmperorSunLao. Follow us on Facebook, Google+, RSS, Twitter and YouTube.

Introduction & Updates

With our increasing mobility and addiction to information, smartphones—our powerful pocket computers that help us create, locate, communicate, and vegetate—have become an indispensable part of modern life. Our reliance on these wireless wonders will only increase as they become increasingly intelligent, filtering our data and predicting precisely when we’ll need it most, even performing actions on our behalf, eventually. This is why it is so important to pick the phone that best serves you—at least until the roles are reversed.

Updates

In the time since our last update, we've been busy evaluating new SoCs and CPU architectures. Our preview of Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 820 SoC discussed the company's focus on heterogeneous computing and how this influenced the design of its first custom 64-bit CPU, Kryo. Our performance tests showed an emphasis on floating-point performance and sequential memory bandwidth. The 820's new Adreno 530 GPU is also a beast, setting new records in nearly every graphics test.

Next, we plunged into the architecture of ARM's Cortex-A72 CPU, which replaces the Cortex-A57 as its flagship 64-bit processor. While an evolution of its previous design, ARM made a number of tweaks to improve performance and, more importantly, reduce power consumption. We got our first look at the A72 as well as ARM's Mali-T880 GPU in HiSilicon's Kirin 950 SoC that makes its debut in the Huawei Mate 8 smartphone. Our initial impression was positive, and it will help make 2016 an exciting year for mobile SoCs.

All of this testing and analysis (and CES) has kept us pretty busy lately, but we've been working on product reviews too. Our "long-term evaluation" of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus is complete, culminating in a new flagship phone recommendation. Apple has vastly improved the iPhone's user experience by increasing RAM to 2GB and adding its new 3D Touch feature.

Before choosing a smartphone, of course, you have to pick an ecosystem to play in, whether it's Apple's, Google's or Microsoft's. This choice is highly personal and depends on what you do with your phone and what criteria are important to you. Our picks focus on hardware and user experience and leave this bigger choice up to you.

Our Best Picks

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There are many factors to consider when choosing a smartphone: size, performance, features, software, price. Our comprehensive reviews give you the knowledge and data to make informed decisions, but if you do not have the time to read our smartphone novellas, or feel overwhelmed by all the charts and numbers, we also give you a shortcut. Every month, we publish our top picks in several different categories and tell you what makes these particular phones stand out.

While we could categorize phones based on ecosystem (Apple, Google, Microsoft) or screen size, we decided to differentiate based on price, with one exception. Our recommendations cover three different price tiers: Low-End (less than $200), Mid-Range ($200 - $500), and Flagship (more than $500). We also include a separate Phablet category for phones that make the best use of their larger screens.

To gain a better understanding of how we evaluate display, audio, camera, system, gaming, and battery performance, please read How We Test Smartphones And Tablets.

About Our Recommendations

• We only recommend smartphones we’ve actually tested.
• We only review phones for sale in the North American market.
• Our recommendations are based on data that we’ve collected and our own subjective experiences. We recognize that our readers are diverse, however, with different needs, preferences, and opinions, so our best picks may not be the best for you.
• The list is based on full retail U.S. prices from online retailers. We do not list carrier subsidized prices, because it’s not fair to phones that are only offered unlocked at full price (Also, why should we have to sign a two-year contract just to buy a computer?).
• The prices are for new phones only, not used or open-box.
• Prices and availability change on a daily basis, but the embedded green links provide real-time pricing.

Best Smartphones

Best Low-End Smartphone

Best Mid-Range Smartphone

Best Flagship Smartphone

Alternate Flagship Pick

Best Phablet

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Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Follow him on Twitter.

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Introduction & Specifications

Motorola discovered a winning formula when it released the original Moto G in the fall of 2013. Based on stock Android and free of the bloatware that usually clutters the app drawer, it offered a compelling user experience for less than $200. At the time, roughly similar devices in terms of features and performance, such as the Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini and the HTC One Mini, started out at well over $300.

While it was a good bargain, the original version was not perfect. One of the main criticisms was that it did not support LTE. About half a year later, in the spring of 2014, Motorola updated the Moto G to support LTE, removing this deficiency but adding $50 to the price. The updated version also brought microSD support, another much requested feature.

In the fall of 2014, the company launched the second-generation Moto G, which improved the cameras and bumped the screen size from 4.5-inches to 5-inches. The larger screen, however, led to a decrease in battery life as the battery size remained the same as the original. It also used the exact same Snapdragon 400 SoC at a time when other phones were moving to the 64-bit Snapdragon 410. This oversight made the Moto G (2nd gen) a harder sell, especially when Motorola launched the Moto E (2nd gen) in the spring of 2015 with the higher-performing Snapdragon 410 at a lower price.

Specifications

The new third-generation Moto G fixes many of the issues it experienced during its sophomore slump. For starters, it now supports 4G LTE in its base configuration. It also gets upgraded to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 SoC, which has four 64-bit Cortex-A53 CPUs and an Adreno 306 GPU.

Sticking to a 5-inch 720p IPS screen makes the Moto G easy to use with one hand and small enough to slip into a pocket. The overall dimensions are up slightly, including the thickness, due in part to a larger battery that increases capacity from 2,070mAh to 2,470mAh. In theory, this should more than offset the higher power draw of the A53 cores and give the new Moto G an overall increase in battery life.

Motorola makes a few other hardware improvements too, especially to imaging. The rear camera gets a dual-LED flash, for more natural-looking colors in low light, and now uses a 13 MP Sony IMX214 Exmor RS sensor, the same sensor used in the Nexus 6 sans OIS. Around front, camera resolution increases to 5 MP. It also gets IPX7 certification for improved water resistance.

There are two different storage options for the Moto G (3rd gen): an 8GB model with 1GB of RAM for $179 and a 16GB model with 2GB of RAM for $219. Both models support storage expansion using microSD cards up to 32GB as well (including UHS-I cards).

Cellular

The integrated modem inside the Snapdragon 410 SoC supports LTE Category 4 (LTE-FDD, LTE-TDD), which means downlink speeds of up to 150Mbps and uplink speeds of up to 50Mbps. It also supports UMTS (WCDMA, TD-SCDMA), CDMA1x, EV-DO Rev. B, and GSM/EDGE.

Hardware Design

In terms of look and feel, not too much has changed since the last generation. In fact, the new Moto G preserves Motorola’s design language originally seen with the Moto X in 2013. It still uses an all-plastic construction too, although it feels plenty sturdy.

The most obvious change is the new metal accent strip on the back, which stretches from the recessed Motorola logo at one end to the camera at the other. The removable back also gets a new pattern of diagonal ridges that, like the more rubbery surface on last year’s Moto G, make the phone easy to hang on to. The one complaint we have about the new backplate is that crumbs and other detritus tend to get stuck between its ridges. Ultimately, we prefer the back of the new Moto G to the older one because it’s less slippery and it does not gather fingerprints.

Popping off the backplate reveals the micro-SIM and microSD card slots along the top-left side. The larger 2,470mAh battery is still non-removable, however.

The power button and single-piece volume rocker are both made from metal and are located just above center on the right side. Like the current Moto E, the power button has ridges on its face to give it a slightly different feel. The left side of the phone is smooth and bare.

The audio jack and micro-USB ports are centered on the top and bottom, respectively. The micro-USB 2.0 port also supports USB OTG (On-The-Go), which means you can connect other peripherals to it such as keyboards, flash drives, external drives and so on. A second microphone for noise cancellation is on the top, and a small relief on the bottom helps with removing the backplate.

The bezels surrounding the 5-inch 720p screen are a bit larger than what we’re accustomed to seeing on current flagship phones, but they’re a typical size for this price point. The single speaker used for audio playback is located below the screen, while the slightly smaller speaker above the screen functions solely as the phone’s earpiece and does not work when playing music, watching videos, or using the speakerphone. In the upper-right corner is an ambient light sensor and the 5 MP front-facing camera.

One of Motorola’s signature traits is the ability to customize the appearance of its phones using the Moto Maker website, a capability that now extends to the Moto G (only in the U.S.). By combining either a white or black front with one of 10 different colored backplates, you can give your Moto G a very personal look. The metal accent strip on the back also comes in 10 different colors, allowing for some interesting color combinations. Plus, being able choose and preview different color combinations adds a bit more fun to the buying process.

Even though the screen remains the same size as the previous generation, the overall dimensions for the new Moto G have grown slightly, including the thickness (11.6 mm versus 11 mm), to accommodate the bigger battery. Despite the larger size and 6g increase in weight, it somehow manages to feel slightly lighter than last year’s Moto G. This could be because the older Moto G seems to have less space between the backplate and the body itself. On the new version, this air gap seems to be larger, which is noticeable when you press on the backplate as it makes a small creaky sound.

Another bonus for the Moto G (3rd gen) is IPX7 water resistance. As long as the backplate is snapped on snugly, it can withstand immersion in fresh water up to 3 feet for 30 minutes. The Moto G will not actually work while submerged, and it’s not dustproof, but it should survive the occasional spill or dunk in a toilet.

Display And Audio

The Moto G (3rd gen) comes with a 5-inch IPS display protected by Corning’s Gorilla Glass 3. Its 1280x720 HD resolution results in a 294 PPI pixel density that is common for a ~$200 smartphone. The screen is reasonably sharp, but you can see individual pixels if you look closely.

Motorola has been taking screen quality seriously on its recent phones, even calibrating the screen on its budget-priced Moto E (2nd gen). To see if Motorola gives the Moto G the same attention, we used SpectraCal's CalMAN software and SpectraCal C6 colorimeter for display measurements. All of the charts below with a gray background were generated in CalMAN v5 Ultimate.

The third-generation Moto G’s display gets pretty bright at 450 nits and is 10% brighter than the previous generation. It’s even brighter than the more expensive Asus ZenFone 2 and LG G4, making the Moto G’s screen bright enough to see in most situations.

Black level is also very good, as it is on all of Motorola’s recent displays, which leads to a respectable contrast ratio that is a slight improvement over the previous generation. At this point, we’re already seeing a trend develop: The screen on the new Moto G seems to be an improvement over the older model.

Here we see the first evidence of Motorola’s attention to detail when calibrating its displays. The average gamma of 2.18 is very close to the ideal value, and there is almost no variation over the full luminance range. With such an accurate gamma curve, the Moto G’s screen will preserve shadow and highlight detail and will help it display more accurate colors.

The display’s color temperature remains above the standard of 6,500 K, which is the color of white light outdoors on an overcast day, but is still an improvement over the previous generation Moto G that had a significantly cooler color temperature and an obvious blue tint to its display. It’s also substantially better than the Z8’s display that looks as blue as the TARDIS.

A display’s performance depends heavily on RGB balance. Since IPS displays use blue LEDs for the backlight, we always see a strong spectral emission for blue and usually significantly less for red. The Moto G’s display is no different, but we see a better balance between the three primary colors than usual. There’s a slight emphasis on blue and green and about an 8% deficit in red at 100% luminance, which is what causes the cooler color temperature. Since there’s an excess of both blue and green, we should expect a slight greenish-blue tint when viewing a white screen.

With the green output so similar to blue and a smaller difference than usual between blue and red, it’s likely that Motorola is sacrificing max brightness for display accuracy by reducing the output of blue pixels.

The average grayscale ΔE2000 error falls just below three, a threshold below which error is difficult to notice. This is a very good result considering more expensive devices such as the Asus ZenFone 2 (3.85), iPhone 6 (3.97), LG G3 (4.02), and LG G4 (6.19) all show significantly more grayscale error.

In the Moto G’s case, grayscale values below 50% luminance show an error less than three and even the maximum error stays below five, which is noticeable but considered acceptable. These results tell us that a white screen will start to take on a greenish-blue tint for brightness values above 50%.

sRGB is the color space standard for mobile devices and the only color space mobile operating systems understand. The Moto G (3rd gen) does a good job adhering to the sRGB color space, although it does extend a bit too far in blue.

In the color saturation sweep, we see that there is not any color compression, shown by the fact that we have relatively equal spacing between the saturation levels of a particular color, but red is slightly undersaturated. The only significant issue here is a slight shift in the secondary colors. Magenta is shifted slightly towards blue and red and yellow are skewed towards green. This is due to the RGB imbalance discussed above, where the extra blue and green output influences the surrounding colors.

In average color accuracy, the Moto G (3rd gen) is similar to the Moto E (2nd gen), but significantly better than the previous Moto G. Most of the tested colors show an error level below three, which is the point where error starts to really be noticeable. It’s only the warmer tones (reds, oranges, yellows, browns) that exhibit larger, but still not unreasonable, error values. Looking at the color accuracy plot above, you’ll notice that all of these colors lie between red and green. The reason error is higher for these colors then relates back to the RGB balance: The higher green output combined with a deficit in red shifts all of the intermediate mixed colors towards green.

Full Size Image: [Color Palette: Moto G (3rd gen)]

The color palette above shows how the Moto G’s screen displays the tested colors on the top half compared to how the colors are supposed to look on the bottom half. As the previous tests predicted, shades of white show a small greenish-blue tint. Red appears slightly undersaturated (darker), as seen in the color saturation sweep chart, and the extra green component in the yellow, orange, and brown tones is also apparent.

Despite these issues, the new Moto G’s display is a definite upgrade over the previous model, and it will be difficult to find a brighter, more accurate display at this price point. The Moto G’s performance is better even than some flagship phones such as the HTC One M9.

Viewing angles are good with no obvious color shifting or dramatic loss in brightness, however, images do not have that “painted on” quality we’re used to seeing. Instead, the screen appears to have a grainy coating that reduces sharpness and vibrancy. We cannot tell if this is caused by the screen polarizer or an anti-reflection layer Motorola adds, but it does degrade the viewing experience.

Audio Performance

Even though it looks like it has stereo front-facing speakers, only the speaker below the screen plays audio; the smaller speaker above the screen functions solely as the phone’s earpiece. Despite this limitation, it gets just as loud as the Moto G (2nd gen).

One small issue with the external speaker is that starting around a 25% volume level, you can feel vibrations on the back of the phone, something that does not happen even at the maximum volume level on the Moto G (2nd gen).

As expected, music sounds a little tinny, but also a bit distorted, when using the external speaker, which might have something to do with the vibrations it creates inside the phone. This makes the sound less clean than on the Moto G (2nd gen). There does not seem to be any differences that are easily discernable between either Moto G when using headphones, though. The Moto G (3rd gen) sounds alright for a phone at its price point, but its performance will not impress music lovers.

The Moto G’s earpiece gets plenty loud too, sometimes to the point where you have to lower the volume because it’s almost as if you had it on speaker.

Camera Features

Although the first Moto G had a run-of-the-mill 5 MP camera that you could find in any phone at its price level, the second generation Moto G had one of the best cameras in its class. Low-light performance was poor, but in good light it could take some impressive photos relative to its competitors. The Moto G (3rd gen) raises the bar again, inheriting a camera sensor seen on flagship phones from a year or two ago.

The Moto G is not the first mid-range phone, even one that costs as little as $180, to come with a 13 MP camera, but its camera sensor is the same one used in the high-end Nexus 6: the 1/3.06” Sony IMX214 Exmor RS sensor with 1.12µm pixels. The Nexus 6 does come with optical image stabilization (OIS), a feature that can improve low-light performance by mitigating motion blur during longer exposures, while the Moto G does not. However, the Nexus 6 does not take full advantage of OIS, so this difference may be moot.

The 13 MP rear camera is paired with an f/2.0 aperture lens that lets in more than twice as much light as the lens on the Moto E (2nd gen), which should definitely give it the edge in low-light performance. However, the Moto G’s lens captures 7% less light than the Asus ZenFone 2 and significantly less light than the lens systems on modern flagship phones.

The front-facing camera has the same resolution as the original Moto G’s rear camera: 5 MP. It’s a Samsung S5K5E2 sensor (1.12µm, 1/5") that’s paired with an f/2.2 aperture, fixed-focus lens with a 72° field of view.

Camera Software

Motorola’s Camera app remains one of the simplest and most intuitive to use—just line up the shot and tap the screen to take a picture. It remains largely unchanged from previous iterations, but it does add a few new features such as native QR code scanning.

Camera controls are basic and simple. The 4x digital zoom is controlled by sliding your finger up and down from the bottom side of the screen. Setting the focus is done by simply dragging the focus ring over the desired object. After enabling the new fine-grained exposure control, touching the sun symbol next to the focus ring and sliding your finger in a circular motion achieves the desired effect.

While tapping the screen to take a picture is simple, it’s also easy to tap too hard and jiggle the phone, resulting in a blurry image. Activating the usual shutter button with your thumb allows for finer control, but there is not one available in Motorola’s Camera app. You can also long-press on the screen to activate burst-mode, which takes multiple shots per second.

Additional controls are accessed via swipe motions. Sliding your finger from the left edge of the screen to right opens a carousel menu of settings: HDR, flash, manual exposure and focus control, Night Mode, video mode, photo resolution, shot timer (3 or 10 seconds), panorama, storage location (local or microSD), geotagging, shutter sound, and quick capture. Sliding your finger inward from the right edge of the screen allows you to browse through your latest images and edit them.

It’s nice to see Motorola provide an automatic HDR mode, a useful feature that many more-expensive phones lack. There’s also the handy “Quick capture” feature that allows you to open the Camera app with two flicks of the wrist. While it does get you to the camera quicker than more traditional methods, we could not help but feel a little weird doing it in public. Once the camera is open, repeating the gesture switches between the front and rear cameras.

The front-facing camera supports all the same features as the rear camera, including burst-mode and the manual exposure control. One additional feature is the ability to use the screen as a selfie flash, a perk found in LG’s flagship phones and more recently the iPhone 6s.

Video

Video recording options are pretty basic considering the limited capabilities of the Snapdragon 410’s image signal processor (ISP). The rear camera offers two modes: 1080p@30fps and 720p slow motion. HD video quality is decent, with results similar to what’s seen in the camera’s still pictures. Slow motion video is captured at 120fps and played back at 15fps, creating a 1/8 speed slow-motion effect. The slowed down video does not include an audio track, however.

Rear Camera Video Modes

Front Camera Video Modes

The front camera supports the same video modes at the same quality settings as the rear camera. However, the video does show more noise and is almost unusable in lower-light conditions.

Camera Performance And Photo Quality

To see how the Moto G’s new rear camera actually performs, we’re comparing its pictures to those taken by several other similarly priced phones. For reference, the Moto E (2nd gen) uses a Samsung S5K5E2 5 MP sensor (the same one the Moto G uses for its front camera). The Asus ZenFone 2 comes with a 13 MP Toshiba sensor and the NUU Z8 uses the same 13 MP Sony IMX214 Exmor RS sensor as the Moto G. We’re also including the much more expensive Samsung Galaxy S6, which has the best performing camera we’ve tested, to serve as a reference.

All of the images shown below were taken with the default camera app using the Auto mode unless noted. Also, you can view the full-sized image for each photo by clicking the text links below the images that are within a slideshow album. All of the phones shoot natively at a 4:3 aspect ratio except for the Galaxy S6, which takes 16:9 pictures.

Outdoors

Daylight

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): daylight restaurant], [Moto E (2nd gen): daylight restaurant], [Asus ZenFone 2: daylight restaurant], [NUU Z8: daylight restaurant], [Galaxy S6: daylight restaurant], [Moto G (3rd gen): daylight waterfall], [Moto E (2nd gen): daylight waterfall], [Asus ZenFone 2: daylight waterfall], [NUU Z8: daylight waterfall], [Galaxy S6: daylight waterfall]

In the first series of images taken outdoors, the photos from the Moto G (3rd gen) show better white balance than those from the Moto E (2nd gen) and the NUU Z8, both of which render the sky more purple than blue and show a reddish tint on the building’s metal siding and the clouds in the sky. The Moto G’s photos have a slight yellow tint, especially the waterfall photo, but its color imbalance is less noticeable. The ZenFone 2 tends to overly saturate colors, which the Moto G avoids.

The restaurant photo captured by the Moto G, Z8, and ZenFone 2 is underexposed and a little dark. However, both of the Moto G’s images show less noise in the sky than the Moto E (2nd gen), Z8, and ZenFone 2. This is partially because of the post-processing the Moto G performs to smooth noise grain. We do see some haloing around the logo on the restaurant awning and words on the white poster in the door as a side effect, though.

Evening

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): dusk posters], [Moto E (2nd gen): dusk posters], [Asus ZenFone 2: dusk posters], [NUU Z8: dusk posters], [Galaxy S6: dusk posters], [Moto G (3rd gen): night waterfall], [Moto E (2nd gen): night waterfall], [Asus ZenFone 2: night waterfall], [NUU Z8: night waterfall], [Galaxy S6: night waterfall]

The pictures of the movie posters were taken at sunset, so the light was more yellow than usual. Both the Galaxy S6 and the Moto G (3rd gen) produce images with nice looking colors, while the Moto E (2nd gen) and Z8 struggle with white balance here. The ZenFone 2 gets the white balance close, but underexposes the photo and creates the darkest image of the group.

Once again the Moto G keeps noise to a minimum, but its noise reduction algorithm smooths away much of the detail on the wall. The ZenFone 2 image is significantly noisier and the Moto E’s lower resolution camera captures much less detail. While the Galaxy S6 produces the best image, the Moto G (3rd gen) is the best of the rest.

While mid-range phones are capable of taking decent images in bright sunlight, it’s really in low-light or dark environments where they really fall behind the more expensive devices like the Galaxy S6, which uses its larger aperture lens and a longer exposure, thanks to optical image stabilization, to capture more light in this night scene. Without OIS, the Moto G (3rd gen), along with the other phones in this test, must use a faster shutter speed to minimize blur and compensate with higher ISO, leading to more image noise while still failing to match the brightness of the image from the Galaxy S6.

The Moto G’s image shows less noise and more shadow detail than the Moto E, but it picks up an ugly green tint. The ZenFone 2 performs better than the Moto G in this very dark scenario, producing a brighter image with better color. You can also see more detail in the ZenFone 2 image like the bricks on the ground that the Moto G’s noise reduction smears away.

HDR

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): pond - no HDR], [Moto G (3rd gen): pond - HDR], [Moto E (2nd gen): pond - no HDR], [Moto E (2nd gen): pond - HDR], [Asus ZenFone 2: pond - no HDR], [Asus ZenFone 2: pond - HDR], [NUU Z8: pond - no HDR], [NUU Z8: pond - HDR], [Galaxy S6: pond - no HDR], [Galaxy S6: pond - HDR], [Moto G (3rd gen): courtyard - no HDR], [Moto G (3rd gen): courtyard - HDR], [Moto E (2nd gen): courtyard - no HDR], [Moto E (2nd gen): courtyard - HDR], [Asus ZenFone 2: courtyard - no HDR], [Asus ZenFone 2: courtyard - HDR], [NUU Z8: courtyard - no HDR], [NUU Z8: courtyard - HDR], [Galaxy S6: courtyard - no HDR], [Galaxy S6: courtyard - HDR]

Motorola’s High Dynamic Range (HDR) algorithm is more aggressive than the one Samsung uses for the Galaxy S6, resulting in brighter, less-natural looking images. However, both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E (2nd gen), which appear to use the same algorithm, avoid many of the common side effects of HDR post-processing. We do not see a significant loss of detail or purple fringing along sharp edges, for instance, and Motorola’s HDR mode does not desaturate colors like we see in the NUU Z8’s HDR image. The Z8 also appears to apply a sharpening filter after the HDR process that amplifies image noise in the sky, which the Moto G and Moto E avoid.

Motorola’s phones fall short of HDR perfection, however, since both the Moto G and Moto E suffer from an anomaly that darkens the sky above the trees. The light, but not overexposed, sky surrounded by the dark trees seems to trick the HDR algorithm into darkening the sky.

In the second set of HDR images taken just before sunset, the Galaxy S6 handles the shadows in the foreground well but lightens the already bright areas too, including the glare on the umbrella and the reflection from the store windows. Both of Motorola’s phones tend to over-brighten the foreground a little, but they handle the brighter areas in the background better than the Galaxy S6, actually reducing the glare on the vending machine and umbrella.

Like the Moto G, the Z8’s HDR is a bit aggressive, but it makes both the foreground and background too bright. The Z8’s white balance is also a bit too cool. The ZenFone 2’s HDR image is similar to the two Moto phones, but it shows more noise in the background than the Moto G.

Overall, Motorola’s HDR processing performs pretty well, giving the Moto G (3rd gen) the advantage over the NUU Z8 and ZenFone 2.

Indoors

The staged indoor shots below were lit by overhead LED lights, a CFL lamp from the front, and an incandescent overhead light in the background.

Bright Light

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): indoor bookshelf], [Moto E (2nd gen): indoor bookshelf], [Asus ZenFone 2: indoor bookshelf], [NUU Z8: indoor bookshelf], [Galaxy S6: indoor bookshelf], [Moto G (3rd gen): indoor bright], [Moto E (2nd gen): indoor bright], [Asus ZenFone 2: indoor bright], [NUU Z8: indoor bright], [Galaxy S6: indoor bright]

The first indoor scene with the bookshelf is lit by fluorescent lights, which generally emit light with a strong greenish-yellow component. This skews the white point for both the Galaxy S6 and Moto G (3rd gen). The Moto E (2nd gen) shows even worse color, with the whole image showing an obvious red tint. The image with the most accurate white point actually comes from the ZenFone 2.

Image noise is similar across both sets of photos, with the Moto G doing better than the Moto E and ZenFone 2, but showing more noise than the Z8 and Galaxy S6.

In the second set of photos, most of the cameras struggle with white balance. The Moto G once again looks a little too yellow, while the Moto E and Z8 are a little too red. The ZenFone 2 manages to get the white balance correct in this scenario, but its camera is the only one that underexposes the photo.

Low Light and Flash

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): indoor dark], [Moto E (2nd gen): indoor dark], [Asus ZenFone 2: indoor dark], [NUU Z8: indoor dark], [Galaxy S6: indoor dark], [Moto G (3rd gen): indoor flash], [Asus ZenFone 2: indoor flash], [NUU Z8: indoor flash], [Galaxy S6: indoor flash]

In low light we see the more expensive Galaxy S6 pull ahead of the pack again. At the other end of the scale in both price and performance is the Moto E (2nd gen). It produces a very dark and noisy image with a heavy red tint.

The Moto G (3rd gen) sits right in the middle. Its image is also dark but is still brighter than the ZenFone 2’s image. Colors look good and image noise is similar to the ZenFone 2 but better than the Moto E and the Z8, which uses a much higher ISO. The Moto G also avoids the noise reduction artifacts seen in the Z8’s image, where faces show yellow splotches.

The Moto G and Galaxy S6 images show similar brightness when using the flash, but the Moto G needs a much higher ISO increasing noise. Both the Z8 and ZenFone 2 set the wrong white point and the Moto E does not have a flash. The Moto G ends up with the second best image of the group when using its flash.

Front-Facing Camera

Full-Size Images: [Moto G (3rd gen): front camera indoors], [Moto G (3rd gen): front camera outdoors]

The first picture using the front camera was taken indoors with natural lighting. Despite the pale yellow wall for a backdrop, the Moto G’s new front camera gets the white balance correct. There’s sufficient detail to make out the pattern on the shirt, and while there is some noise, it’s not too bad.

The other picture was taken in bright sunlight outdoors. Again we see another good picture with accurate, nicely-saturated colors. The front camera also gets the exposure right, managing to avoid overexposing the highlights on the face and clouds in the sky.

After shooting a bunch of photos and comparing some of them to those taken by a few of its peers, the Moto G (3rd gen) ends up having one of the best cameras in its price range. It manages to outperform the NUU Z8 and ZenFone 2 in almost all of the scenarios shown above and is a significant step up from the camera in the Moto E (2nd gen), as expected.

The Moto G performs its best in bright conditions or when using its flash. In these conditions, image noise is low but there’s a noticeable loss of detail from the noise reduction processing. Color accuracy is pretty good, although white balance skews towards yellow frequently.

In lower-light scenarios, the Moto G, like its peers, struggles to capture enough light and image noise becomes more of a problem. Its performance ends up being about average for phones with 13 MP cameras.

Software

The Moto G (3rd gen) comes with Android 5.1.1 out of the box, but it’s on Motorola’s list of devices to be upgraded to Android 6.0 Marshmallow in the future. Ever since Google bought Motorola and launched the Moto X in 2013, the company’s phones have kept a rather clean and close-to-stock Android UI. It seems that Lenovo, the latest parent company of Motorola, has decided to keep to this strategy for the time being, which has helped Motorola provide faster software updates than most of its competitors and for longer periods, too, at least at this price level. Most competitors rarely, if ever, provide updates for phones that cost $200 or less.

The operating system UI looks just like you’d expect from stock Android, starting with a clean, uncluttered home screen. Because it’s using the Google Now launcher, the left-most screen will be reserved for the Google Now feature if activated. Swiping down from the top opens the notification shade. Swiping down again reveals the quick settings pane for controlling wireless connectivity and toggles for auto-rotate, location services, flashlight, and the ability to cast the phone’s screen via Chromecast. If these controls are not to your liking, you’re out of luck, because they cannot be customized.

The Moto G (3rd gen) comes with all of the standard Google apps and relies on them almost exclusively. Motorola does replace Google’s stock camera app with its own version and includes the open source Gallery app in addition to Google’s Photos app.

Motorola supplies a few more apps as well such as Migrate, which helps you transfer data from your old phone. For existing Android users, your apps, Wi-Fi settings, contacts, and photos (only if syncing is enabled in the Photos app) can be synced from your Google account. The Migrate app just fills in the gaps by transferring your text messages, call history, SIM contacts, and any local photos, videos, and music. The app can also transfer contacts over Bluetooth for feature-phone users, but iPhone support, which was provided by a third-party service, has been discontinued.

The Moto app is the gateway to enabling a few Motorola specific features. Moto Assist provides additional controls based on locations or activities. For example, you can create a “Sleeping” activity to mute the phone and keep the screen turned off so it does not wake you.

Moto Actions provide gesture based shortcuts such as opening the camera app by twisting your wrist twice and turning on the flashlight by making a chopping motion with your hand. Like the Moto E, the Moto G lacks the sensors that would allow you to wave your hand over the screen to activate Moto Display, and it also lacks the hardware to enable Motorola’s always-on voice controls.

Moto Display is similar to Android Lollipop’s Ambient Display feature, which was modeled after Moto Display. It will show notifications on the lock screen as they arrive in a simplified black and white motif. This is a nice power-saving feature for phones equipped with AMOLED screens, but since the Moto G uses an IPS display, it still needs to activate the whole backlight, negating this benefit. Moto Display’s ability to turn on the screen by tapping on it or by picking up the phone is a nice convenience feature, though.

Another feature the Moto G shares with the Moto E, and one that’s not very common on smartphones, is an FM radio. The phone uses the headphone cable as an antenna, so you cannot listen to the radio with the external speaker. Despite this minor restriction, it’s a feature that some people will certainly enjoy.

Even though the Moto G (3rd gen) comes with 64-bit CPUs, it’s still running 32-bit Android, thereby negating any of the benefits included in AArch64, including access to ARM’s new instructions for accelerating cryptography. This means that full disk encryption is disabled by default, and enabling it would incur a significant performance penalty. Not having a viable disk encryption option leaves your data vulnerable if the device is stolen.

Ultimately, there’s not a lot to say about the Moto G’s software since it’s basically stock Android. If you prefer an uncluttered software experience that adheres to Google’s vision and will not miss the extra features and user interface tweaks found in other OEM skins, then you’ll be happy with Motorola’s light-handed approach.

CPU And System Performance

In this section, we evaluate system-level performance by running a series of synthetic and real-world workloads, along with some browser-based Web tests. There are several facets to overall device performance, including single- and multi-threaded CPU performance, memory and storage speed, and GPU rendering, all of which will be probed by our suite of benchmarks. If you're interested in learning more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device system performance.

Most of the devices we’ll be comparing are using ARM’s Cortex-A53 CPU cores. However, there are differences in core count, clock speed, and GPUs. Both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E LTE (2nd gen) are using Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 410 SoC. The older, second generation Moto G uses a Snapdragon 400 SoC, which uses lower-performing Cortex-A7 CPU cores. While the Snapdragon 400 series is based around a quad-core CPU configuration, the MediaTek MTK6752 inside the NUU Z8 and the Snapdragon 615 inside Sony’s Xperia M4 Aqua are octa-core SoCs.

With both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E (2nd gen) using the same Snapdragon 410 SoC, it’s no surprise to see them perform similarly in the System and Graphics tests. The new Moto G’s A53 CPU cores give it a 36% advantage over the previous Moto G’s A7 cores in the System test. It also performs up to 26% better than the Moto E and its predecessor in the Web test, which suggests the third-generation Moto G holds a memory bandwidth advantage over the Moto E. Because the System test probes both single- and multi-threaded CPU performance, the NUU Z8’s four extra cores give it a significant advantage over the Moto G. Curiously, the Xperia M4 Aqua’s eight cores go underutilized, performing no better than the Moto G’s quad-core SoC.

Turning to the Graphics test, the Adreno 306 GPU in the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E (2nd gen) ends up being a slight downgrade from the Adreno 305 in the older Moto G. While the architectural differences are likely minimal, the older GPU actually has a 12.5% advantage in clock speed. Both the Z8 and Xperia M4 Aqua easily outperform the three Moto’s in GPU performance.

The Memory test results are a little misleading without some explanation. The test is supposed to measure internal NAND storage performance, but because of the way the test is designed, this does not always happen. We’ve found that for devices with only 1GB of RAM, like the second-generation Moto E and Moto G, the Memory test does seem to measure storage performance. However, for devices with 2GB of RAM or more, including the Moto G (3rd gen), NUU Z8, and Xperia M4 Aqua, the operating system caches disk I/O in RAM before writing the data to NAND in order to improve performance. This accounts for the large disparity in Memory performance between these two groups, and also highlights a non-obvious advantage to having more than 1GB of RAM in an Android phone.

Overall, the Moto G (3rd gen) does well, posting a 28% improvement over the previous generation. It even manages to outperform the theoretically faster Snapdragon 615 equipped Xperia M4 Aqua.

With the cpu-centric CoreMark-HPC test, we see results similar to the Basemark OS II System test. Namely, the Z8’s eight CPU cores gives it the advantage in these multi-threaded scenarios. We also see the Moto G (3rd gen) outperform the older Moto G by a similar 32% margin.

Memory performance is another differentiator for the third-generation Moto G. It offers a large 68% increase in memory bandwidth over the previous generation and a more modest 10% advantage over the Moto E, confirming our suspicion that the Moto E is using less expensive RAM with lower performance. The more expensive Z8 offers an additional 25% throughput over the Moto G.

It’s nice to see that Motorola is also using decent quality NAND, boosting the new Moto G’s internal storage speed to levels similar to more expensive mid-range phones. The 68% improvement over the previous generation results in noticeably quicker app load times.

The AndEBench Pro Platform test uses a realistic workload that stresses CPU, memory, and storage performance, and is more indicative of everyday performance. It’s encouraging then to see the Moto G (3rd gen) top the chart with a substantial 63% improvement over the last generation. Faster memory and storage performance also gives it a clear edge over the cheaper Moto E.

In the single-core test, the Z8 pulls ahead of the Moto G (3rd gen) by 52% despite having only a 24% advantage in max CPU frequency. The Z8’s 64-bit capable operating system and its ability to harness the new features introduced in the ARMv8 architecture, particularly the additional instructions for speeding up cryptography, is the source for this extra performance. Both the Moto G and Moto E run 32-bit versions of Android, so they miss out on these performance enhancements.

With twice as many CPU cores, the Z8 and Xperia M4 Aqua widen their lead over the Moto G in the multi-core test. However, with most apps being single-threaded and rarely more than four cores active at any one time during normal use, these results are mostly just for bragging rights.

PCMark is the best test we currently have for predicting real-world performance. The CPU governor, which controls how many cores are active and at what frequency they run at, has a significant impact on overall performance, whether searching your inbox or just scrolling in a Web page or the app drawer. The PCMark results are generally a good indicator of how each OEM tunes the CPU governor, trying to balance performance and battery life.

The Moto G (3rd gen) performs well overall, just like we saw in the AndEBench Pro Platform test, essentially tying the Z8 for top honors and outpacing the older Moto G by a noticeable 30%.

Diving into the individual test scores, the Moto G (3rd gen) achieves the highest score in the Writing and Video Playback tests and is second only to the Z8 in Web Browsing. In these tests, the Moto G routinely keeps four CPU cores online running at or near peak frequency. The Z8 in contrast generally utilizes only two cores and maintains them at a lower average frequency.

These browser benchmarks gauge JavaScript performance and are influenced by CPU speed and memory bandwidth. Once again the Moto G (3rd gen) does well, consistently outperforming the previous generation by a large margin, but falling a little behind the Z8.

After a litany of tests, it’s safe to say that the Moto G (3rd gen) offers a significant performance improvement over the previous generation. Max CPU performance increases by about 35% on average and both memory bandwidth and internal storage speed increase by almost 70%. These gains are noticeable in everyday use too, and hold up well even when compared to more expensive mid-range devices.

GPU And Gaming Performance

Mobile GPU performance is becoming increasingly important as people begin to see their phones and tablets as portable gaming machines. This section explores GPU performance with several synthetic and real-world game engine tests. To learn more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device GPU performance.

Both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E (2nd gen) use an Adreno 306 GPU clocked at 400MHz. The previous version of the Moto G uses an Adreno 305 GPU clocked at 450MHz. It’s unclear what architectural differences exist between these two GPUs, if any at all, but the 12.5% higher max frequency might give the older Moto G an advantage.

The NUU Z8’s Mali-T760 GPU is about 2.6x faster than the Moto G (3rd gen) in the graphics test. The Adreno 405 GPU in the Xperia M4 Aqua also shows more than twice the graphics performance as the Moto G. As predicted, the Adreno 305’s max clock speed advantage gives it a slight edge in graphics performance over the Adreno 306 in the Moto G (3rd gen).

The Physics test shows the Moto G (3rd gen) with a 30% advantage over the previous generation Moto G. Considering the Physics test is based on the performance of the CPU, this sort of delta was expected based on the previous CPU tests.

The GPUs in the two more expensive phones again show a significant overall performance advantage. It appears that the Adreno 306 in the Moto G (3rd gen) is a slight downgrade from the older Moto G’s GPU, which scores 11.3% higher overall, a value that happens to be very close to its clock speed advantage.

Moving to the high-quality test shows that none of these devices handle Basemark X well at 1080p. What’s interesting here, however, is that the Adreno 305’s clock speed advantage is nullified by the older Moto G’s limited memory bandwidth, allowing both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto E (2nd gen) to jump ahead in offscreen performance. The finishing order in the onscreen test gets shuffled a bit due to the different display resolutions.

The GFXBench Manhattan test is an OpenGL ES 3.0 game simulation that uses many of the advanced effects seen in modern games. It should be clear by now that neither the latest Moto E nor Moto G are gaming powerhouses. The Mali-T760 GPU in the NUU Z8 outperforms the Moto G by a factor of three in the offscreen test.

In T-Rex, which is an OpenGL ES 2.0 game simulation that eschews deferred rendering for post-processing effects such as motion blur, parallax mapping, planar reflections, specular highlights, and soft shadows, the Mali-T760 in the Z8 maintains its 3x performance advantage in the offscreen test, while the Adreno 405 is more than twice as fast. The third-generation Moto G’s older sibling also holds onto its slim lead thanks to its higher clock frequency.

The GFXBench Alpha Blending test stresses memory bandwidth and rasterization. It’s no surprise then that the third-generation Moto G pulls ahead of the other Moto devices once again. What’s significant here is that the Moto G (3rd gen) performs better than the NUU Z8 in this test. This suggests that the Adreno GPU in the Moto G might actually have more ROPs than the Mali-T760 in the Z8.

Qualcomm’s Adreno GPUs are the current king in ALU performance. The Sony’s Adreno 405 GPU flexes its compute muscles and powers ahead of the Z8. The Moto G (3rd gen) closes the gap some with the Z8 but still falls far behind. There does not appear to be any difference in the number of ALUs between the Adreno 305 and 306 since the second-generation Moto G pulls ahead of the newer model by virtue of the difference in clock frequency.

What all of these tests are showing is that GPUs that can now be found in higher-priced mid-range devices, such as the Adreno 405 found inside the Snapdragon 615 or the Mali-T760, easily have double or triple the gaming performance of the latest Moto G. Although Adreno 305/306 may have been more appropriate for last year’s mid-range devices, it feels like this year the new Moto G should’ve gotten a bigger graphics boost.

For now, the Moto G (3rd gen) plays many of the latest 3D games alright, including Modern Combat 5: Blackout, Real Racing 3, Dead Trigger 2, and Marvel Contest of Champions. There are some hiccups in the heaviest animations and game scenes, though.

These days, developers can optimize their games for low-end hardware by splitting it into multiple versions, making it easy to remove certain graphics features for less-powerful hardware. So even if the Moto G (3rd gen) can play a game, you may be missing out on some of the features and realism from the fully-enabled version.

Battery Life And Thermal Throttling

Battery life may be the most important performance metric for a mobile device. After all, it does not matter how quickly a phone or tablet can load webpages or how many frames per second the GPU can crank through once the battery runs down and the device shuts off. To learn more about how we test this critical facet of mobile computing, please read our battery testing methodology article.

The Basemark OS II battery test represents a worst-case scenario for CPU power draw. Here we see that the Moto G (3rd gen) has the least efficient CPU in this test. Both the new Moto G and the Moto E (2nd gen) use a Snapdragon 410 SoC, but the Moto E runs its cores at a lower max frequency and comes with a smaller screen, which help it achieve a 17% higher score.

In our review of the Moto E (2nd gen), we noted that an A7 CPU core, like the Snapdragon 400 in the Moto G (2nd gen) uses, has roughly a 10-20% performance per watt advantage over an A53 core. In this test, however, the second-generation Moto G only pulls ahead of the newer model by 8.6%. The latest Moto G’s larger battery at least partially compensates for the A53 core’s power penalty, but not all of it. Still, running the CPUs near 100% load for hours is unrealistic, so we should not give up hope yet.

PCMark runs a varied, real-world workload that is a better predictor for actual battery life. As a full system-level test, the power efficiency of the screen, CPU, GPU, RAM, and NAND all factor into the battery life results. Since the Moto G’s screen, like all of the phones we’ve seen in this price range, does not support Panel Self-Refresh, the display system will draw a bit more power during normal use than more expensive panels.

When the CPU is not running flat-out, the Moto G (3rd gen) exhibits excellent battery life, lasting 8 hours and 27 minutes in the PCMark battery life test. This is a 66% improvement over the previous Moto G. What’s even more impressive is that it lasts as long as it does while still achieving a high level of performance, essentially equaling the speed of the NUU Z8 but with 54% more battery life.

The GFXBench 3.0 battery test focuses on the GPU and is an indicator of battery life during intense gaming. It also effectively gauges a device’s ability to dissipate heat.

The Moto G (3rd gen) lasts almost as long on a charge in this test (7 hours and 52 minutes) as it did in the PCMark battery test. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it only achieves this milestone because it’s the slowest phone in the group. The Moto E (2nd gen) shows better performance because this is an onscreen test and its display has a lower resolution, and the Moto G (2nd gen) is faster because its GPU runs at a higher frequency.

As with other phones running Snapdragon 400 family SoCs, we do not see any thermal throttling over the full length of the GFXBench 3 battery test. Also, the peak skin temperature on the back of the phone stays below 100 °F, so the Moto G never gets warm in your hand. 

After using both the Moto G (3rd gen) and Moto G (2nd gen) as our primary phone, it does seem like the new Moto G gets significantly better battery life in both usage as well as idle time. By sticking to the basics and increasing the battery size, the Moto G’s best feature may be its battery life.

Conclusion

When Motorola launched the first Moto G, it struck a chord with people who did not want to pay $600 or more for a smartphone but needed a basic phone that “just worked.” Now in its third generation, the Moto G has evolved, overcoming many of its earlier shortcomings.

The upgrade to Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 410 SoC brings a 4G LTE modem and a significant boost to system performance. The user interface is more responsive, web pages load quicker and scroll more smoothly, and overall lag is reduced. More memory bandwidth and faster internal storage also help apps launch quicker and help the Moto G feel more mid-range than entry-level. This is especially true if you spend the extra $40 to get the model with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage.

While overall system performance improves, graphics performance takes a small step backwards. The Moto G (3rd gen) is about 10% slower when playing games compared to the previous generation, whose performance was hardly stellar. Most casual games and 2D scrollers should play smoothly, but more intense 3D titles, while mostly playable, will experience some stutters and possibly be missing some graphical features.

One area where the Moto G (3rd gen) really shines is battery life. It’s relatively large 2470mAh battery, 400mAh bigger than the previous Moto G, makes it one of the longest-lasting phones we’ve tested while running a moderate workload. In normal use, we were getting anywhere from one to three days of battery life depending on how frequently we turned it on and how bright the screen was.

Speaking of the screen, Motorola continues to place an emphasis on display calibration, improving on the previous generation and giving the Moto G what's likely the most accurate display of any mid-range phone. Color accuracy is better than on some of the flagship phones we've tested. Screen brightness and viewing angles are also good, but one flaw tarnishes an otherwise good display: a hazy coating reduces sharpness and vibrancy.

The Moto G’s new rear camera is capable of shooting some nice photos, especially in bright light or when using its flash. In these conditions, image noise remains low but noise reduction processing smears away fine detail. Its color accuracy is generally good, but there’s a tendency for photos to appear a little too yellow. The Moto G’s HDR mode presents a similar story: It produces some nice results, although its results can look a bit less natural than other cameras. With less light available, the Moto G’s camera performs on par with other 13 MP shooters.

All of this hardware is wrapped in a simple but attractive package. The third-generation Moto G keeps to the design language used by Motorola on previous phones, but gets an updated removable rear cover with a pattern of ridges, making the phone easy to grip. There's also a new metal accent strip surrounding the rear camera. What really sets the Moto G and other Moto phones apart from the crowd, however, is the ability to customize the appearance through Motorola's Moto Maker website. Combining different colors for the front, back, and rear accent strip is a fun way to custom order a phone that satisfies your personal taste.

The Moto G runs 32-bit Android Lollipop as it comes from Google, providing a clean and uncluttered experience that’s free of the typical OEM and carrier bloatware. Motorola does replace the stock Android Camera app with its own simplified version and adds its Moto app for controlling the few features it adds such as gesture-based controls for quickly opening the camera or turning on the flashlight and Moto Display, a different spin on Android’s Ambient Display feature. The only downside is that stock Android is missing a few capabilities most OEM skins add, including customization options. You’ll need to be comfortable installing third-party solutions if you want more control over how the operating system looks and works.

The well-calibrated display, quality internal components, good cameras, solid build quality, and uncluttered software experience give the Moto G a polished feel many phones in this price range lack. Combining this with a relatively large battery that lasted longer than nearly every phone we’ve ever tested, makes Motorola’s latest mid-range phone a compelling choice.

Lucian Armasu is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering News. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Follow him on Twitter.

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Back in the dog days of summer, Motorola announced a handful of new smartphones. Those phones were the Moto X Style/Pure, Moto G (2015) and Moto X Play. Although we've taken a closer look at the first two devices (our Moto G hands-on and Moto X Style hands on), we haven't talked much about the Moto X Play, other than doing a comparison of it with its bigger brother.

That's because until now, this phone wasn't available in the U.S.; it was only being sold internationally (including Canada). Well, that changed on Tuesday with Verizon's announcement of the Droid Maxx 2, the Moto X Play's rebranded twin.

Although we haven't had a chance to check out the new Droid in person yet, we have been able to play with the Play extensively. Because they are basically the same phone, other than the color options and software load, having a closer look at the Play will give you a pretty good idea what to expect from this new Droid.

It's important to remember going into this that the Moto X Play and Droid Maxx 2 are mid-range devices, so adjust your expectations accordingly. Even so, with the mid-range becoming almost more important a market segment than the high-end, we do still expect OEMs to produce a phone as well-made as its price-point allows.

Note that while we will mostly be talking about the Play, everything applies to the Maxx 2 unless specifically noted.

Specifications

Hands-On Video

Not Enough Graphical Horsepower

The Moto X Play is powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 615 SoC. This mid-range octo-core chip provides adequate horsepower to make the overall experience of using the Play smooth and pleasant (which is also helped by its almost-stock Android software). However, the 615's GPU is seriously underpowered when compared to its competition.

Although you shouldn't expect the same level of performance from a mid-range phone as from a high-end device that costs considerably more, the Adreno 405 is slower that the Adreno 330 GPU of last year's Snapdragon 800/801 SoC. The Play's scores landed around 8,016 in 3D Mark when we tested it; by comparison, the 801-powered OnePlus One scored 19,691, which is more than double. Although this deficiency doesn't impact the performance of general application usage, it does mean that graphically demanding games are going to chug on the Play – which is ironic, given the device's name.

The problem with using the 615 is that it doesn't seem to be matched properly to the rest of the phone's specifications. When we tried the new Moto G, which uses a slower Snapdragon 410 SoC, its GPU is better matched to its 720p display, and Android runs buttery smooth on it. Still, this isn't necessarily Motorola's fault, and the blame lands more on Qualcomm, whose mid-range SoC offerings this year have been lackluster. To hit the price point it wanted, Motorola didn't have any other choice than to use the 615 in the Moto X Play and Droid Maxx 2.

The balance of the Play's specs are as expected for a 2015 mid-range device, and it's good to see that Motorola is still a believer in expandable, removable storage.

Display And Screen-To-Body Ratio Leadership

Although we weren't too impressed with the Play's chipset, its 1080p, 403ppi IPS screen is another story. No, it's not a high-end Quad HD screen, but it is crisp enough and very bright. Further, its color accuracy, at least from our eyeball test, looks to be excellent. At 5.5 inches, it hits the size sweet spot for a 2015 phone, and it is also important to note that the screen-to-body ratio of the Moto X Play is class-leading, at 76 percent. This makes it compact for a big screen device.

Super-Sized Battery Means Super-Long Battery Life

Of course, the leading feature of the Moto X Play and Droid Maxx 2 is the huge (non-removable) 3,630 mAh battery -- hence the "Maxx" moniker. We haven't been able to properly test its battery life, but the Futuremark PCMark benchmark does report the average battery life shown below for the Play, and we expect the Maxx to perform similarly. The other results are from devices we have tested ourselves with PCMark, not averages from Futuremark's database.

(*Average battery life of Moto X Play as reported by Futuremark)

As you can see, the Play bests the battery life of all the 2015 phones we have tested, and clearly this is its most impressive feature. Keep in mind, though, that the PC Mark battery test continuously runs a series of tests that simulates normal device use but doesn't take into account periods of inactivity. Motorola claimed up to 48 hours of use, which is likely an exaggeration, but it's still an indication that you'll easily be able to get over a day and a half of use from a single charge, which is impressive.

The Play and Maxx 2 also support Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0 tech (Motorola calls it "TurboPower") but do not have wireless charging capability. It's also disappointing that the battery is non-removable – the Play isn't that slim, so you'd think that a replaceable battery wouldn't be too much of an engineering challenge.

Attractive, Highly Customizable Design

The Moto X Play continues to use the Motorola design DNA set in 2013 with the first Moto X. For 2015, there is a new metal bar that runs down the spine of the phone from the camera to the Motorola logo. The overall construction of the Play and Maxx 2 is plastic, though the aforementioned bar does have a metal applique.

Although it is an all-plastic device, the quality of the materials used is excellent, and the faux-metal finish of its sides fooled us initially into thinking they were metal. The Play feels like more of a premium device when compared with many other mid-range phones that we've tested.

The back of the phone, which has a nice soft-touch finish, is removable, so you can replace it with your choice of color. In markets where Motorola's Moto Maker service is available, the Moto X Play can be customized with a choice of 14 different back colors. The color of the metal bar can also be customized. In markets without Moto Maker, or if you buy the Play from a retailer or carrier, it is available in black or white.

Here lies one of the main differences between the Play and the Droid Maxx 2: Although the Moto Maker is available in the U.S., the Maxx 2 cannot be customized on it. It comes in either white or black with a Deep Sea Blue back from Verizon. You can still customize the Maxx 2 after purchase by choosing from seven different colored optional backs, though.

Class-Leading Camera

One of the weaknesses of previous Motorola phones has been their cameras, and on its 2015 devices, Motorola has sought to address this by equipping them with class-leading hardware. The Moto X Play has a 21MP camera that uses the new Exmor RS IMX230 sensor, which by all accounts is one of the best currently available. It supports Phase Detect Auto-Focus (PDAF) for fast focusing, and Motorola has combined it with an f/2.0 lens. This means that its low-light performance should be substantially better than its predecessors'.

Our experience with the Play's camera bears this out. For a mid-range device, the camera is excellent, producing detailed daylight shots with pleasing dynamic range, and better low-light photos than its competition. However, it still can't compare to the photographic performance of flagship devices like the LG G4 or Samsung Galaxy S6, due to some issues.

First, camera hardware is only half the story on a smartphone. The image processing done by the SoC's ISP (image signal processor) also plays an important role in how well a picture turns out. Unfortunately, the Snapdragon 615's ISP isn't as powerful as the ISPs found in higher-end phones (which is also the reason the Play can't record 4K video), and this does impact overall image quality.

Second, the Moto X Play's camera software is subpar. We found its UI a little confusing, and it offers only very limited control over the shooting process. More egregiously, Motorola has not supported Google's Camera2 API in the Play's software build, even though it's a feature of Lollipop. This means there are no manual camera controls, and even if you download a third-party camera app that includes them, they won't work on the Play.

Although we haven't been able to test the Maxx 2 to see if the same limitations apply, we don't expect it to be any different.

Stock Android, Almost

In another life, Motorola was owned by Google (Lenovo is now its parent company), so its devices for the past few years have come with a version of Android that is close to stock without being a Nexus device. When the Play was announced in the summer, Android M had not been released, so it was running the latest version of Android at the time. Unfortunately, now that Google's latest OS is available, the disadvantages of running only close-to-stock Android means that the Moto X Play is now an OS step behind.

Another issue is that Motorola was previously one of the best OEMs when it came to delivering speedy updates, but it seems that this commitment has changed under the new ownership. Looking at its upgrade page, at the moment it has committed to updating only six phones in the U.S. to Marshmallow, and left off the list are most of the carrier versions of phones from 2014, apart from the Droid Turbo.

So, while the time difference between the release of the Moto X Play and the launch of Android M means that it is highly unlikely that the Play won't be updated to Marshmallow particularly soon, it's hard to say what the update situation will be for it later in 2016. As for the Droid Maxx 2, it's in the same boat as the Play – we expect to see it updated to Android 6.0, but whether it gets any further updates beyond that is questionable.

Irrespective of the OS update situation, the version of Android on the Play is superior than that found on most other mid-range phones. The Motorola additions to the OS are minimal and consist only of its useful suite of Moto software enhancements, Moto Assist, Moto Voice, Moto Display and Moto Actions. Again, because we haven't had a chance to use the Droid Maxx 2 yet, we aren't sure if the software on it is the same, but we expect it to be, other than the addition of all that Verizon bloatware.

Great Mid-Range Values, With Reservations

The Moto X Play and Droid Maxx 2 both seem to be impressive values and are certainly two of the better mid-range Android offerings on the market today. They are well-designed phones with great screens, class-leading cameras, and some of the best battery life of any smartphones on the market. That battery life will be one of the prime reasons to consider these phones for many users, as the Achilles heel of many of 2015's Android offerings has been the battery life, with the new generation of SoCs using significantly more power than 2014's devices.

Unfortunately, we do have a few reservations – namely, the Snapdragon 615 SoC, with its too-weak GPU, and the question surrounding OS updates. We appreciate that Motorola is selling phones with an almost-vanilla version of Android, with the only software additions (other than the aforementioned carrier bloat) being a suite of Moto applications that only enhance Android further, but its lack of commitment to keep its phones up-to-date is of concern.

The Moto X Play is available internationally and in Canada from Bell Mobility, Koodo, TELUS, Videotron and Wind Mobile, starting at $0 on a 2-year term contract or $400-450 CDN outright. In the U.S., the Droid Maxx 2 is exclusive to Verizon and is $16 per month for 24 months or $384 outright.

Alex Davies is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones, Tablets, and Virtual Reality. You can follow him on Twitter. 

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Motorola unveiled its new Droid Maxx 2 smartphone, which is targeted at mid-range smartphone users. The company also unveiled the new Droid Turbo 2 to compete in the high-end.

The Droid Maxx 2

The Droid Maxx 2 is centered around the Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 SoC. The SoC contains a total of eight ARM Cortex-A53 CPU cores, half of which operate at 1 GHz while the other four can run at up to 1.7 GHz. It also includes a Qualcomm Adreno 405 GPU clocked at 550 MHz, and a Hexagon V50 DSP operating at up to 700 MHz.

There's also 2 GB of RAM. The smartphone contains 16 GB of internal storage, but it can be expanded with up to a 128 GB MicroSD card.

The display measures 5.5" (with FHD 1080p resolution), with a pixel density of 403 ppi. The smartphone uses Corning Gorilla Glass 3 to protect the display against scratches or other damage. The phone is also water repellent to further reduce the chance of damage.

The rear camera on the phone is capable of taking pictures at 21 MP, and it uses an f/2.0 aperture lens, which is designed to improve light levels in pictures. The lighting is further improved by the use of a dual-LED system, which should produce a more naturally lit effect. The front-facing camera is a common 5 MP module.

Motorola boasted that the Droid Maxx 2 has excellent battery life, capable of lasting 48 hours of mixed usage. The battery inside is rated at 3630 mAh, which helps explain the remarkably long battery life claim.

The smartphone also supports Motorola's Flip Shell, allowing you to customize the Droid Maxx 2 with one of seven different colored interchangeable backs.

How does it stack up?

Although the smartphone contains relatively high-end features, it is still clearly spec'd below other Android devices such as the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge and the HTC One M9. These competing smartphones take advantage of faster ARM Cortex-A57 CPU cores and higher-performance GPUs, but also cost considerably more. Both of those smartphones are priced at $649, but the Droid Maxx 2 only costs $384.

HTC, especially, has reason to be concerned, as the Droid Maxx 2 offers a larger screen, longer battery life, and a slightly better camera (according to the hardware specs), all for a lower price.

The Droid Turbo 2

Unlike the Droid Maxx 2, the Droid Turbo 2 is targeted at the high-end smartphone market. It features a higher performance Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 SoC. This SoC implements ARM's big.LITTLE architecture, with four high-performance ARM Cortex-A57 cores clocked at 2 GHz paired with four more energy-efficient ARM Cortex-A53 cores.

The phone also has a much higher-performance Adreno 430 GPU clocked at 600 MHz, which will be needed to drive the 1440p display.

Motorola makes the same 48-hour battery life claim for the Droid Turbo 2, but also claimed that the smartphone is the world's first with a shatterproof screen.

Both smartphones are available starting October 29. The Droid Maxx 2 is priced at $384 off contract with free shipping, while the Droid Turbo 2 will cost $624.

______________________________________________________________________

Michael Justin Allen Sexton (or MJ) is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware. As a tech enthusiast, MJ enjoys studying and writing about all areas of tech, but specializes in the study of chipsets and microprocessors. In his personal life, MJ spends most of his time gaming, practicing martial arts, studying history, and tinkering with electronics.

Follow Michael Justin Allen Sexton @EmperorSunLao. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Motorola unveiled which of its devices will get the next major version of Android (Marshmallow). The upgrade includes all the major new features in Android 6.0, as well as some that are replicating older Motorola features, making those unnecessary.

All of the 11 smartphones that will receive the Android Marshmallow update seem to be from 2014 or earlier:

2015 Moto X Pure Edition (3rd gen)2015 Moto X Style (3rd gen)2015 Moto X Play2015 Moto G (3rd gen)2014 Moto X Pure Edition in the U.S. (2nd gen)2014 Moto X in Latin America, Europe and Asia2 (2nd gen)2014 Moto G and Moto G with 4G LTE2 (2nd gen)DROID Turbo2014 Moto MAXX2014 Moto TurboNexus 6

The owners of the above phones will be happy to receive all of the following Android Mashmallow features:

Doze Mode

This new feature puts the phone in deep sleep when it's not being used, which ends up significantly increasing the standby battery life, as well as the overall battery life by about 30 percent, according to Google's David Burke at Google's recent keynote.

Android Pay

Android Pay allows users to make store purchases with a single tap, without having to open an extra app. Android M also brought native fingerprint authentication, but none of these phones have fingerprint sensors, so the feature will use a PIN, passphrase or pattern for authentication instead (the same authentication necessary for unlocking the phone).

Direct Share

The new version of Android allows users to share photos, news, links and so on more easily with favorite contacts.

Simpler Volume Controls

Android volume controls have been hit and miss over the years, and Android 6.0 takes another shot at making the volume controls easier to use.

Now On Tap

The Now on Tap feature is an extension of Google Now, which instead of using only data Google already has on its servers through the different services Android phone owners use (such as Gmail, Maps, Google search, etc.), it can also see the information coming from other active applications, and make recommendations based on those.

Deprecating Motorola Features

Android 6.0 brings many other features, and some of them, such as a Do Not Disturb setting, Motorola Migrate, as well as Moto Assist, have been replicated by native Marshmallow features, making them redundant. The Google Chrome extension found in Motorola connect will also be retired, as multiple third-party applications found in the Play Store can now replace this functionality.

Motorola hasn't given an exact timeline for when these phones will receive updates, but it promised it will unveil more details about release details in the coming weeks.

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At the end of July, Motorola announced three new smartphones: the Moto X Style/Pure, Moto X Play and Moto G (2015). The Play is a mid-range phone that is not coming to the U.S. -- it's available only in Canada, in North America.

Even so, it is rumored to be the basis for the upcoming Verizon Droid Maxx 2 (which has been widely leaked). Therefore, what we learn about the Play is applicable to the U.S. too, because other than cellular band support and pre-installed software, we don't expect the Droid and Play to differ. (Of course, for our Canuck readers, any news about the Play is relevant.)

At the launch event, Motorola focused part of its presentation on imaging. With the cameras long being one of the weaker areas of its phones, Motorola said for this year it is making sure each of its new phones have class-leading cameras. To help achieve that, it equipped both the Moto X Style/Pure and Moto X Play with Sony's new 21MP Exmor RS IMX230 sensor.

On paper, this sensor is impressive and supports advanced features such as phase detect autofocus (PDAF) and HDR video. In its presentation on the Moto X Style, they even called out PDAF as a key feature of the new camera, allowing for "faster focus." We initially wrote about this technology in our Galaxy S5 review, and it is now found in most high-end phone cameras and does significantly impact focus performance.

Because it was noted that the Style and Pure use the same camera sensor, we then assumed that the Play would also have PDAF. However, it soon became clear that we couldn't be certain; starting with the specification slide shown at the event, and continuing to the spec pages on all of Motorola's websites worldwide, there was no mention of PDAF in the Moto X Play's specs. We thought it strange that such an important camera spec would be omitted, so assumed that the Play does not support it.

As for why, as Motorola hadn't offered up any explanation, we initially hypothesized that it was something to do with the ISP (Image Signal Processor) of the Play's Snapdragon 615 SoC. Although the IMX230 sensor does support PDAF in hardware, perhaps the 615's ISP has some issue controlling it – after all, the Moto X Play also doesn't support 4K video and HDR video because of ISP-imposed limitations. It wasn't just us either; other outlets and Motorola fans were writing that PDAF was a feature that the Play lacked for the same reason.

However, that theory was proven wrong when we read this post on Qualcomm's blog. The chip manufacturer specifically called out PDAF as something supported by the 615 and even gave an example of a 615-powered phone with PDAF, the Oppo R7. This left us confused, because it meant there is no physical reason why the Play can't support PDAF. 

After reaching out to both Motorola Canada and Motorola US, we have finally cleared up this mystery. Yes, the Moto X Play does support phase detect autofocus, and it looks as though, for whatever reason, it was simply an omission from the specs of the phone. In fact, it looks like there are a few other camera specs that were also missed or incorrect, too. The specs will have "Closed loop processing," "Phase Detect Auto-Focus (PDAF)," and "Video Stabilization" added, and "Quick Capture" replaced with "Quick Launch Instant ON." We expect these to be added to the Motorola websites soon.

The Moto X Play is already available in Canada, and we have one in hand. Our initial impressions are quite favorable, and although it is unfortunate that U.S. readers won't be able to buy one, the Droid Maxx 2 isn't that far off (as long as you're a Verizon customer). Of course, Canadians can go out and pick one up now from Bell Mobility, Koodo, Telus, Videotron and Wind Mobile.

Motorola announced that it will create and release a patch for the Stagefright vulnerabilities to carriers today, August 10. The company hasn’t announced whether it will also continue to release security patches for its devices every month, the same way Google, Samsung and LG promised last week.

The Stagefright vulnerabilities (found by the security team at Zimperium, who later alerted Google about it) allow malicious attackers to send an MMS message with embedded malware that is automatically retrieved by most SMS clients or IMs with SMS capabilities.

The malware would then require no action from the user in order to install itself on the phone, which, combined with the vast distribution capability of the MMS infrastructure, is what makes it so dangerous.

Motorola said it was notified by Google in June about the bugs, and its newly announced smartphones including the Moto X Style, Moto X Play and Moto G 3rd gen will include the patch. In some regions, where the Moto G 3rd gen has already started shipping, the patch isn’t integrated into the software, but those phones will be updated soon.

As for the other phones, Motorola will offer an update to the carriers for testing and approval. The list of smartphones that will receive it includes:

Moto X Style (patched from launch)Moto X Play (patched from launch)Moto X (1st Gen, 2nd Gen)Moto X ProMoto Maxx/TurboMoto G (1st Gen, 2nd Gen, 3rd Gen)Moto G with 4G LTE (1st Gen, 2nd Gen)Moto E (1st Gen, 2nd Gen)Moto E with 4G LTE (2nd Gen)DROID TurboDROID Ultra/Mini/Maxx

Motorola will begin sending this update to carriers today, but the company also said that the carriers have different requirements, which result in unique variants of the software. According to Motorola, there are over 200 variants of software that the company is working to patch, test and deploy. The company will prioritize the software that covers the largest groups of users at first.

When the patch is available, users should receive a notification about an update. They can also check periodically at Settings>About Phone>System Updates to see if they received an update.

If you’re not one of the the lucky ones to receive an update, Motorola recommended the following instructions to protect yourself against this type of exploit for the listed apps.

Messaging: go to Settings. Uncheck “Auto-retrieve MMS.”Hangouts (if enabled for SMS; if greyed-out, no need to take action): go to Settings > SMS. Uncheck auto retrieve MMS.Verizon Message+: go to Settings > Advanced settings. Uncheck Auto-retrieve. Uncheck “Enable weblink preview.”Whatsapp Messenger: go to Settings > Chat settings > Media auto-download. Disable all video auto downloads under “When using mobile data,” “When connected on Wi-Fi” and “When roaming.”Handcent Next SMS: go to settings>Receive message settings. Disable auto retrieve.

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Last week, Motorola announced three new phones: the Moto G (3^rd gen), Moto X Play, and Moto X Style. No, scratch that. If you want to get technical (beyond the fact that two of them are called Moto X’s even though they are completely different devices), there is also a fourth device: the Moto X Pure, which is simply the U.S. name for the unlocked "pure" Android version of the Style. Confused yet?

Naming conventions aside, the fact is that there are two different Moto X’s, the Play and Style, and clarity on their differences would be useful. The Moto X Style (check out our hands-on) is the premium flagship phone with all the bells and whistles. It will be available in Europe, Latin America and North America (and as the unlocked "Moto X Pure" in the U.S.).

The Moto X Play is a midrange flagship with lower specifications that will be also be available in Europe, Latin America, and Canada, but not the U.S. It is a little confusing that both phones are called Moto X’s,however. Only the Style is proper follow-up (as in premium device) to last year's Moto X. Although we get that Motorola wants to leverage the cachet of its flagship brand, we do wish that perhaps the Play was called a Moto S or something similar. This would make it clear to potential buyers that it is a mid-range device.

Now that we've hopefully explained at a high level what the differences between the two Moto X’s are, let's have a look at their specifications in detail and compare them.

Hardware Specifications

Looking at the Moto X Style and Play, you can see the first major differentiator is the choice of the SoC. The Style uses the Snapdragon 808, a hexa-core chip in a big.LITTLE configuration. This chip has an Adreno 418 GPU that, although it's not as fast as the Adreno 420 found in the older 805 or Adreno 430 in the newer 810, is still more than capable of powering a Quad HD display.

Although we haven't published our results yet, our time testing the 808-powered LG G4 has shown that it is probably the best and most balanced mobile SoC currently available. It suffers none of the throttling issues that plague its big brother, the Snapdragon 810. Of course, there are still a few compromises in addition to the GPU – the 808 also only supports DDR3 RAM and has a less powerful ISP (Image Signal Processor).

In contrast, the Moto X Play is equipped with Qualcomm's best mid-tier SoC, the 615. This is an octo-core chip, but while that sounds more impressive on paper than the 808's six-core, the 615 has eight slower cores. Instead of a big.LITTLE CPU configuration, it runs two clusters of four Cortex-A53 CPUs at different clock speeds. The 615's performance shows that more cores doesn't always necessarily mean more power.

Although we haven't spent enough time with a 615-powered device to draw any final conclusions, our initial impressions are not too favorable. It simply isn't a very fast SoC. Although it should be adequate to power the Full HD display of the Play, its slower CPU cores and GPU put it at a marked disadvantage to the 808 of the Style. In fact, our initial results show that the Snapdragon 801 found in last year's Moto X (2014) is faster than the 615! So in the SoC department at least, the Play is a downgrade from its predecessor.

Both the Play and Style have bigger screens than the Moto X (2014), at 5.5- and 5.7-inches, respectively. The Style's larger screen is a Quad HD IPS LCD, and the Play's is a Full HD IPS LCD. The move to LCD over AMOLED this year should mean brighter displays and hopefully more accurate colors. It does mean though, that the power consumption of the ambient mode of the Moto Display app is going to be higher.

It is also important to note that despite these larger displays, the screen-to-body of both models is excellent. The Moto X Style boasts a ratio of 76 percent, one of the best of any current smartphone, and the Play's is not that far behind. These excellent ratios mean that the Style and Play are two of the most compact large-screened devices out there. The Style is slightly smaller than the Note 4 and much smaller than the iPhone 6 Plus, and the Play is about the same size as the Moto X (2014) despite having a 0.3-inch bigger screen.

The camera is one area that Motorola has paid a lot of attention to, with its intent to offer "best in class" imaging experiences on all of its new phones. Both the Style and Play use Sony's latest 21MP Exmor RS IMX230 sensor. This is a large 1/2.4" sensor that has advanced features such as Phase Detect Auto-Focus (PDAF) and HDR in 4K video. Motorola has combined this sensor with a wide f/2.0 sensor and Dual Color Correlated Temperature (CCT) flash. The wider optics will help in low light, and the CCT flash will produce flash-lit images with more accurate colors.

Although it is impressive that Motorola didn't skimp on the camera hardware in the cheaper Moto X, the Play's camera does have one big issue. The ISP in the 615 SoC is not as powerful as the Style's 808 ISP. This means that the Moto X Play, unfortunately, cannot shoot 4k video. There is also some confusion about whether the Play supports PDAF. Motorola told us that it does, and the Qualcomm spec PDF for the 615 does mention PDAF support. Even so, there is no mention of this feature on the Play's spec pages, so we'll need to get to the bottom of this.

On the front, both phones have 5MP shooters, but the Style benefits from better optics with a wider lens and also a front facing (regular, not CCT) flash. Perfect for overlit washed out selfies!

Both models have adequate internal storage options, the Style available with up to 64 GB, and it is good to see that both have microSD slots. As for power, the combination of a 3,000 mAh battery, 808 SoC and QHD display means that the Style's battery life should be similar to the LG G4. Our testing of that phone has shown that it is good for a 2015 device, but it's still down on some of last year's best devices.

On the other hand, one of the big strengths of the Play is its huge 3,630 mAh battery. A battery this size combined with an FHD display and lower-powered SoC means that the Play should last a long time. Motorola claims up to 48 hours of "mixed usage," and we are sure it is not too far off from reality.

Along with the battery size, because neither phone has a removable battery, Motorola's answer to better battery life, like everyone else this year, is fast charging. Both Moto X's support Motorola's TurboPower charging, which is its name for Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0 tech. The speed at which Quick Charge can juice up a battery is determined by the output of the charger.

From what we were told, the Moto X Pure will come with a 25-watt Turbo Charger, and the Play gets a slower 15-watt Turbo Charger. We are not sure if the Moto X Style outside the U.S. will also come with the 25-watt or a 15-watt unit. Unfortunately, neither phone supports wireless charging. Admittedly, this is a niche feature, but it would still be nice to have. Still, including it, even on the higher-end Style/Pure, would probably have impacted the cost too much, and that $400 starting price would go up.

For connectivity, the Style/Pure supports an almost overwhelming number of LTE frequencies. You should be able to use it on almost every carrier in the U.S. and Europe, including CDMA carriers like Verizon and Sprint in the U.S. The Moto X Play isn't blessed with as many bands, and there are two models supporting different frequencies. The Canadian model will work on any GSM U.S. carrier like AT&T or T-Mobile.

The last feature we want to highlight -- well, it's more like missing feature -- is a fingerprint reader. Neither phone has one, which is surprising; we expected to see one on at least the Moto X Style/Pure. Again, like wireless charging, a fingerprint reader is currently a niche feature. However, when Android Pay launches later this year, it will be an almost essential feature to have on your device to authenticate mobile payments.

Motorola boasted about the "pure" stock Android nature of the software it installs on its devices, and the next version of Android (Android M), is going to include integrated biometrics. With the expectation that the new Moto X's will get Android M sooner than most other OEM's devices, not being able to use one of its core new features is going to be disappointing.

Design And Customization

The overall look of both the Style and Play is similar, and both contain Motorola's traditional design DNA. They have a new metal bar that runs down the middle below the camera, ending in the characteristic Motorola logo dimple. This dimple looks nice and is a comfortable place to rest the end of your index finger when holding the phone. The build quality of both phones is superb, and they are both very attractive devices.

Where the two Moto X's differ is the shape of the back and the materials used. The Style has a rounded back, similar to that of the Nexus 6 and Moto X (2014) surrounded by a metal frame. The Moto X Play is, unfortunately, all plastic and has a flat back surrounded by "vacuum metalized paint finished resin." We guess that sounds a lot better than simply saying painted plastic. The standard material of the back of both models is what Motorola is calling "coated silicone rubber" (CSR). This material has a nice smooth, soft touch finish that resists fingerprints.

As you can see from the chart above, both the Moto X Style and Moto X Play are among the most customizable of any phones on the market. Using Motorola's Moto Maker site, you can order the Style/Pure in 10 different CSR colors and four different woods or leathers. You can combine those options with seven metal accent colors and three different metal frame colors (that determine the color of the bezel surrounding the screen). The wood and leather backs will add around $25 to the price of the phone.

The Moto X Play comes with only CSR back choices. You cannot get it in wood or leather, which makes sense because of its price point. The Play is available in 14 different colors with seven metal accent color choices.  

One important thing to note is that Moto Maker is only available in certain countries, and only for unlocked devices ordered directly from Motorola. Those countries are the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Mexico and Brazil (and not Canada). If you buy a Moto X Style or Play from a carrier or another retailer, your color choices are limited to black, bamboo and white for the Style, and black and white for the Play. Well, that is unless you live in the Great White North. There the Play only comes in black. At least it never goes out of fashion.

Availability And Pricing

Let's just say right off the bat that the pricing for the Moto X Pure Edition is fantastic. A phone with its specs for $400 (even if it is just the 16 GB model) is an incredible bargain, and there is no phone that comes close to its value. Even the higher storage tiers are reasonably priced, and don't forget that it also has a microSD slot. It's a pity, then, that this value only applies to the U.S. The Moto X Style in Europe (if you convert the GPB and Euro costs to USD) is quite a bit more money for an identical device.

The Moto X Play's pricing is a different story. Although at $400 CDN ($305 U.S.) it is a reasonably priced phone, at that outright price I would rather just spend the extra $100 and get the much better X Pure. Of course, that would be if you could buy the Play in the U.S.

At the end of the day, though, the outright price of a mid-range carrier device like the Play isn't important. Most Moto X Plays will find themselves in someone's pocket tied to a contract, and it will probably be a $50 CDN phone with one. In Europe it does look like there is enough of a price difference between the Style and Play that the latter is a good value for its market.

The Moto X Play is coming out in August and will be available in Europe, Latin America, and Canada, but not the U.S. Unfortunately, 16 GB of storage along with the black back is the only configuration of the Play for Canada.

The Moto X Style/Pure is coming out in September and will be available in Europe, Latin America, and North America. It is interesting to note that Motorola said "North America" for the Style, not just the U.S. While the Play is the only device officially announced for Canada at this time, we are sure that the Style will be coming to Canada, too.

What Canadians will not get, though, is the unlocked Pure Edition. Canucks will only be able to get one from a carrier. Also, we don't expect the Play to ever come to the U.S. market, even later in the year. Motorola said in its blog that they'll instead "have more choices for you all later this year," probably referencing new Droid-branded phones coming in the fall.

We do want to say for U.S. readers that if you are a Motorola fan and are considering crossing the 49th parallel to get a Moto X Play, don't. Because of the deficiencies of the 615 SoC, the Play is not an upgrade from the Moto X (2014), which is still available from Motorola unlocked for $300.

The Play is slower, made from plastic and built to be a mid-range phone. Last year's Moto X is still a flagship. The only two features the Play has over the older X is its bigger battery and better camera. Also, any software updates and enhancements the Play has or gets will more than likely come to the Moto X (2014), too.

That's why, with the hardware choices and pricing, Motorola's decision to call the Play a "Moto X" is confusing. It still looks to be a great mid-range phone, but it should be called something else so as not to muddy the "X" brand. Still, we will want to wait until we test the Moto X Play properly before passing final judgment on it.

As for the Moto X Style/Pure, after my brief hands-on with it at the New York launch event, I'd have to say it is my most anticipated smartphone. It appears to be almost the perfect Android phone. It's made from premium materials with an excellent build quality and has a wide variety of customization options. Its hardware specs were intelligently chosen to offer a balance of performance and efficiency, and it has everything I want, apart from a fingerprint reader. Its camera looks great on paper and from the sample shots we've seen, which is very important to me, and it runs almost stock Android. It also starts at only $400.

Last week, Motorola held an event where it announced three new phones, the Moto X Style/Pure, Moto X Play, and Moto G (3^rd gen). Although it spent a fair amount of time on all the new hardware features and the level of customization offered using the Moto Maker site, Motorola spent very little time on the software of the phones. Motorola reinforced the stock Android-like "pure" nature of its version of Android and recapped some of the features of its Moto suite of enhancements but didn't talk about any new features.

However, in conjunction with the presentation to the media and public, Motorola also briefed its small Moto Maker team of super-fans/brand advocates about the new phones. This included more information about some new software features coming to the two new Moto Xs, and a couple of the Makers have been sharing what they learned on Twitter and the Moto X subreddit.

Apparently, Motorola is fine with this, so it's a little odd that it has left the dissemination of these enhanced features to social media, rather than covering them at the global event. Still, we owe a big thanks to KILLPREE on Reddit for the explanations of the new features and @TylerRochwerg for the images.

Discreet Voice For Moto Voice

The banner new feature is an update to Moto Voice, Motorola's enhanced voice control and personal assistant for Android. Unlike the stock "OK, Google" voice control of stock Android that only works when you are using the phone, Moto Voice listens to your command continuously, even when the phone is in standby.

You assign a unique command to wake the Moto X (the default is "Hello, Moto"). You can then control it with voice commands, such as telling it to call a contact or play a song. You can also ask the phone questions like "When is my next meeting?" or "Will it rain today?", and it will speak the answer back to you.

This is, for lack of a better word, a pretty cool feature, but talking to your phone out loud in public can be socially awkward. Then there are privacy issues when the phone reads back potentially sensitive info over its speaker. On the new Moto Xs, Voice now has a discreet mode. You can lift the phone to your ear to activate voice control (with the screen on or off), and the response audio comes through the earpiece.

While this is a new feature for the new Moto Xs, we are sure that it will also come through a software update at least to the Moto X (2014) if not the first Moto X.

Always Aware Camera

The second new feature, which is also found on the Moto G (2015) adds automatic barcode and QR code scanning to the Motorola camera app. You simply point to the code in the viewfinder, and an icon appears that links you to the content embedded in the code. The camera app will now also scan business cards and save the info to your contacts.

Moto Assist Places

The last enhanced software feature is to Moto Assist. Assist is a contextual application that automatically changes the phone's setting depending on time of day and location. For example, if the phone detects that you are driving, it can be set to turn on hands-free mode and read incoming texts to you. If you are in a meeting, Assist will silence the phone and send out automated "I'm busy" replies to incoming calls and texts.

Right now, Assist is aware if you are sleeping (determined by time of day), when you are driving, when you are at home and when you are in a meeting. The enhancement to Assist adds more places for it to be aware of. However,  the information shared on Reddit was a little light on the specifics of what places have been added.

Another addition is a motion-activated delay to the sleep mode – the phone can tell if you are still up past the hour set in the app to put the phone into this mode.

Motorola's additions to the stock Android experience significantly enhance, rather than detract from, the core Android experience. This cannot be said for the vast majority of additions that other OEMs add to Android. Moto Display, Voice, and Assist already work very well on the current Moto X, so these improvements will only make these features better on the new Moto X Style/Pure and Play.

The Discreet Voice feature is probably the most significant, as it will address the problem of the social stigma of talking to your phone in public. (We can't wait until we can try this out in person.)

MORE:

• Moto X Style/Pure Edition Hands On
• Motorola Announces Two Moto X Handers, New Moto G
  
• Motorola Moto G (2015), Hands On

Alex Davies is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones, Tablets, and Virtual Reality. You can follow him on Twitter. Follow Tom's Hardware on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

The third phone announced at last Tuesday's Motorola event was the third-generation Moto G. Although it is officially called the Moto G (3^rd gen), we'll be referring to it as the Moto G (2015).

The Moto G was launched in late 2013, and it, along with its follow-up the Moto G (2014), quickly became Motorola's top-selling device. The Moto G was Motorola's biggest selling product in India, and at this week's event it announced that it was the best-selling phone in Brazil for 12 straight months.

In fact, the G is probably single-handedly the handset that has kept Motorola in business. Its higher-end phones like the Moto X, while very well received, haven't exactly been flying off the shelves. So the new Moto G has some pretty big shoes to fill.

The challenge for Motorola has been how to improve an already great budget device while still keeping the price low. It also has to make sure that there are clear differentiators between the G and its mid-range devices, like the new Moto X Play and Moto X Style. If the G is too well equipped but still well-priced, it would potentially eat into the sales of the higher-margin flagship phones.

The Moto G (2015) is already on sale through both carriers and unlocked online from Motorola, Amazon and Best Buy. Read on for our initial impressions of the device.

Hardware Specifications

The Moto G (2015) uses the same quad-core SoC as the Moto E (2^nd Gen) 4G we recently reviewed. It is a 64-bit chip, though how much that impacts performance on a low-end device like this is questionable. Its 1.4 GHz clock speed is higher than the Moto E's, which ran at 1.2 GHz. In comparison, the Moto G (2014) had a Snapdragon 400 SoC that also ran at 1.2 GHz and utilized slower Cortex-A7 cores rather than the A-53s of the 410. So you should see a performance boost on the new Moto G, but not by a huge amount. Also, the Adreno 306 GPU of the 410 SoC isn't any more powerful than the 305 of the 2014 G's 400 SoC.

Seeing as this hardware still only has to push pixels on an HD screen, the Snapdragon 410 is still sufficiently powerful for the class of phone that the Moto G (2015) is. It also helps that it is running clean, almost-stock Android that isn't as much of a drain on the a phone's resources as the custom UI's of other OEMs.

Despite that, it would perhaps have been nice to see the new Moto G with an even bigger jump in performance over its predecessor, and be equipped with the octo-core Snapdragon 415 that has a much better Adreno 405 GPU. However, with that SoC only being announced in February of this year, there probably wasn't enough time to incorporate it into the 2015 G.

The Moto G (2015) still has an HD screen of average quality. In fact, it looks to be the same panel as the 2014 model, so isn't particularly bright. It is covered in Gorilla Glass 3, not some cheaper unbranded scratch-resistant glass that doesn't have the same feel. Cost cutting in this area is something that other budget phones are usually guilty of.

Frustratingly, the model with 8 GB of storage only has a paltry 4 GB of free space. This makes the entry-level Moto G (2015) almost useless without a microSD card. At least there is a microSD slot, though, something that many other phones have dropped in 2015. Still, 16 GB of storage should have been base model, and the next up should be a model with 32 GB.

Another cost cutting measure is 1 GB of RAM on the base G. This low amount won't affect application too much because most apps have been optimized to run just as smoothly on lower-end phones. However, it will impact multitasking performance on the G. We suppose including 2 GB of RAM on the base model would impact the margins too much, not allowing Motorola to get to the sub-$200 price point and still keep the (probably expensive) 13MP camera sensor.

The Moto G (2015)'s non-removable 2,470 mAh battery combined with the 410 SoC and HD screen should mean awesome battery life. This increase in size is a nice step up from the 2,070 mAh of the 2014 model. Motorola claimed that it should last up to 24 hours with mixed use. There is no mention of Turbo Charge (Motorola's name for Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0) support, but the Snapdragon 410 does support it. However, the Moto G is not listed among the devices that support it on Qualcomm's site. So while the SoC does support it, either Motorola just isn't advertising this feature or hasn't included some required circuitry to enable it.

There is no support for NFC, and one other major strange regression from the 2014 model is that the new Moto G does not have stereo speakers (even though the front design gives the illusion that it does). We don't understand the rationale of removing this feature, which had made the previous Moto G stand out from its other budget competitors.

As for connectivity, there is no 3G-only model anymore, which is good. Every Moto G (2015) model will support LTE. Unlike the Moto X Pure Edition, the new G is not universally LTE banded, so you can't use the unlocked variant on every carrier. The unlocked XT1540 model supports six LTE bands (2, 4, 5, 7, 12, 17) and will work on AT&T, T-Mobile in the U.S., and all Canadian carriers. It won't work on Verizon or Sprint.

There is also an XT1548 CDMA model sold as a prepaid phone by Sprint, US Cellular, and Virgin Mobile. It supports seven LTE bands (2, 4, 5, 12, 17, 25, 26), but crucially, not Verizon's band 13. The Snapdragon 410's Gobi 7-mode modem supports CAT4 LTE, with up to 150 Mbps download speeds.

Hands-On Video

Design

The Moto G (2015) doesn't look too different from the 2014 model, and it has the same design DNA as the Moto X with its curved back. The new Moto G also has the new metal "bar" that runs down the middle of the phone with the logo "dimple" at its end. We were told that it is metal, even though the Moto G is a budget device, which is a nice touch. The power button (which is textured) and volume controls are on the right of the phone and are well placed.

Up top is the headphone jack, and on the bottom there is the USB 2.0 charging port.

The plastic back panel of the Moto G (which is removable for customization) has a nice textured soft-touch finish that resists fingerprints, as do the satin-finished sides. Too many budget phones have high-gloss finishes that look good in the showroom but get ruined the minute you pick the phone up. Also, despite its all-plastic build, the Moto G (2015) is a very solidly-built device that also has a nice amount of weight that adds to its premium feel.

A big addition for the 2015 model is water resistance. Previous Moto Gs had a splash-resistant nano-coating that would allow the phone to survive a spilled drink or rain, but couldn't handle being submerged in water. The IPX7 rating of the new model means that is can be submerged in up to 1 meter of water for 30 minutes. This feature is a great value-add for a budget phone. Most other water-resistant phones are much more expensive flagships, such as the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact.

Customization

The Moto G (2015) is the first G to support Moto Maker – Motorola's customization site where you can order a phone customized in your choice of color. Moto Maker is already available in the U.S., UK, France, Germany and Mexico. With the launch of the Moto G (2015), it is also coming to Brazil, which makes sense because the 2014 Moto G was one of the top selling phones in that market.

Through Moto Maker, you can order the new Moto G with either a white or black front bezel, and choose from the different colors for the removable back. The choices are lime, golden yellow, black, white, raspberry, cherry, navy, turquoise and blue cabernet (the color of the unit in our photographs). You can also customize the metal bar below the camera. Like the back, there are ten colors to choose from: lemon lime, dark chrome, light chrome, red, champagne, purple, orange, blue, black and pink.

Unlike the Moto X, there are no other metal parts of the phone that can be customized, and the Moto G's back panel is user removable. If you don't care about changing the color of the metal bar, you will be able to buy the different colored backs yourself and apply them to the phone. This is especially useful if you buy the G in a market without Moto Maker, or from a retailer or carrier that only carries the black or white models.

Another option that can be added on Moto Maker, or purchased separately, is a colored Flip Shell. This accessory comes in black, crimson, raspberry (shown above), blue and turquoise.

Camera

The other big new feature of the Moto G (2015) is its much-improved camera. At the event, Motorola admitted that the cameras on its phones haven't always been the greatest. For 2015, its goal is to give each of their devices a best-in-class camera.

With that goal in mind, the new Moto G comes equipped with the same 13MP camera as the Nexus 6, which is also made by Motorola. This sensor is the 1/3.0" Sony Exmor RS IMX214, a mid-range image sensor also found in the OnePlus One and a number of other phones. While it wouldn't be considered top-end today, it is certainly better than the sensors found in every other budget device.

This sensor has been combined with an f/2.0 lens, which is a pretty decent aperture for a lower-end phone, and the lens has an IR filter coating to help prevent lens flare and chromatic aberrations. Motorola also included the same dual-LED CCT (color correlated temperature) flash as found on the new Moto X Pure and Play. This helps produce more color accurate images when shooting with the flash.

Despite the better camera sensor, the Moto G is still a low-end phone, so you won't find any additional camera features like phase detect autofocus (PDAF) or optical image stabilization (OIS) on it. Around front, the new Moto G has a 5MP camera, which, again, is good for a phone in this price range.

While we haven't had enough time to test out the Moto G (2015)'s camera, it should produce similar results to the Nexus 6, so you can read our review of that phone's camera here. Although there are phones with better cameras available, there aren't any that cost $180!

Software

The Moto G (2015) runs an almost stock version of Android 5.1.1 Lollipop, like the Moto X Style and Play. Motorola has included its own camera and gallery apps and added a suite of its value-add features, but other than that this is stock Android in every other way. In many ways, this makes the Moto G a budget Nexus phone for those looking for the pure Google experience, unencumbered by carrier bloat.

Also, while OS updates still won't come from Google, Motorola has historically delivered them much faster than most OEMs, and there are no carriers standing in your way. Well, that is if you buy the unlocked model. Both the 2013 and 2014 Moto Gs have been updated to Android 5.1, so you can be confident that the new Moto G will receive Android M and probably other future versions of Android. Many budget phones only ever get one OS update at most, and it often takes an excruciatingly long time to be released due to carrier involvement.

In addition, because the unlocked model won't have any carrier involvement, there won't be any useless bloatware or carrier apps. Unfortunately, the models sold by carriers (prepaid in the U.S.) are likely to come with some carrier bloat, though with the limited storage space available on the phone, we hope common sense will prevail and they won't be packed with useless apps. The Canadian demo unit we are testing is mercifully free of bloat too, though we are not sure if what we received has the same software build as the final unit you'll buy from the carrier.

Motorola's value-add to Android are its Moto apps, found on the Moto G (2015) in the Moto 3.0 application. Here is where you configure Moto Assist, Moto Actions and Moto Display. Assist is a simple location-based task app that can automate things like muting the phone when your calendar says you are in a meeting. Actions are gestures controls, like a double twist of your wrist while holding the phone to open the camera apps. Moto Display shows minimal notification icons on the screen when the phone is sleeping.

Still missing on the Moto G (2015) is Moto Voice. Moto voice takes voice control a step further by being able to continuously listen for your voice command without having to interact physically with the phone. This feature is probably not included on the Moto G because of the additional hardware cycles needed to do this on a low-end device, which may impact performance. You can still use the standard "OK, Google" voice control, though.

Availability And Pricing

The new Moto G with 8 GB/1 GB is available from Best Buy and Amazon in either black or white. If you order it directly from Motorola.com, you can upgrade to the 16 GB/2 GB model for an extra $40, and you can, of course, customize it as well. The prepaid model coming from Sprint, US Cellular, and Virgin does not seem to be available at press time.

In Canada, Motorola only sells the 8 GB/1 GB model, and only in black. It is available from Bell, Koodo, Sasktel, Telus and Virgin Mobile. There is no unlocked Moto G (2015) in Canada. The Canadian version is $200 outright at all the carriers, apart from Telus which has it for $230. Because this is a subsidized device in the GWN (Great White North), it is also $0 on a 2-year term.

The Wrap Up

In conclusion, there is a lot to recommend with the Moto G, and it remains one of the best budget phones you can buy. However, Motorola's quest to improve the camera has come at a bit of a cost. We guess the price of the Sony IMX214 sensor drove up the bill of materials for the new Moto G a fair amount, enough so that the stereo speakers were dropped, and 8 GB of storage and 1 GB of RAM is still the base option.

We would have rather seen work on the optics, image processing and capture software with a cheaper 8MP sensor to keep the costs low enough to bump up some other specs of the phone and keep the stereo speakers. The base model's 8 GB of storage isn't enough for anyone, especially as there is only 4 GB of useable storage left once you account for the space taken up by the pre-installed applications.

This practically forces you into buying a microSD card, and although they aren't that expensive, it would have been better if Motorola had simply made 16 GB the base storage option, with 32 GB on the upgraded model. This issue is especially frustrating in Canada, where the 8 GB model is the only option.

In the grand scheme of things, though, the North American market for the Moto G isn't particularly important to Motorola. The bulk of the sales of the previous models were made in emerging markets, and we're pretty sure that the Moto G (2015) is going to be another successful device for Motorola.

Those markets are getting tougher, though, with other OEMs upping their budget phone game, and of course, there is the influx of solid but low-priced Chinese phones (Xiaomi, Meizu, etc.). With the new Moto G not substantially differing from its predecessor, will the addition of water-resistance and a better camera be enough to hold its Asian competition at bay? It's also a little ironic, then, that Motorola's new owners are Lenovo.

The Motorola Moto G (3^rd gen) is available now.

Alex Davies is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones, Tablets, and Virtual Reality. You can follow him on Twitter. Follow Tom's Hardware on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

Motorola announced three new phones: the Moto X Style, the Moto X Play and Moto G (3^rd Gen). The Moto X Style is the premium device in its new lineup and the one we are most excited about. It's coming out in September, so we only had a small window of time at the event to go hands-on with it. You can read our impressions and watch our hands-on video below.

One point of clarification that does need to be made is the naming convention of this new Moto X. The phone will be known as the "Moto X Style" in all the markets it will be released in apart from the U.S. Here, it will be called the "Moto X Pure Edition" and will only be sold unlocked by Motorola, Amazon and Best Buy. The reason for this name is that it offers an (almost) Pure Android experience in the same way that Google's Nexus series of devices do.

While we were looking at the Pure Edition specifically, our hands-on is relevant to the Moto X Style, too, because it is an identical phone available through a different sales model. (This is not to be confused with the Moto X Play, which is a different device entirely.)

Hardware Specifications

It is interesting that the specs of the Moto X Pure Edition are very similar to the LG G4, which uses the same Snapdragon 808 SoC, 3 GB of RAM, QHD display and 3,000 mAh battery. That means you should expect similar performance from the Moto X, which is very good. While we haven't finished our review of the G4 yet, we have spent quite a bit of time with it, and have been impressed by the Snapdragon 808, which bodes well for the Moto X Pure Edition. It is also good to see that Motorola hasn't ignored the needs of many Android phone users by including a microSD slot.

Another impressive feature is the amount of LTE bands that the new Moto X supports. Motorola said that it has "universal" LTE support for all U.S. carriers, including Verizon and Sprint, which is impressive. There are 14 bands listed, and the X supports Category 6 LTE speeds of up to 300 Mbps. This means that not only will it work through the U.S., but if you are a frequent traveler, you should be able to get LTE connectivity most anywhere in the world.

We are a little disappointed to see that Motorola did not include a fingerprint sensor. Although its usefulness would be limited at present, by the time the phone is released in September, Google's new Android Pay mobile payment solution should be launched. Having a fingerprint reader to authenticate when using Pay is an important feature that the Moto X is missing.

The combination of a 3,000 mAh screen, Snapdragon 808 SoC and QHD display means that the Moto X's battery life should be similar to the LG G4's. Which is to say good, but not great.

The Moto X uses Motorola's TurboPower technology, which is Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0 rapid charging tech. This has already been available on other Motorola phones using the optional 15 W Turbo Charger. We were told that the Moto X Pure Edition will come with an even faster charging 25 W charger in the box. We are not sure if the Style version of this phone will come with the same. This faster charger allows the Moto X to get 50 percent more power in 15 minutes than competing fast charging solutions such as Samsung's Adaptive Fast Charging.

Hands-On Video

Design

The Moto X Pure Edition contains the same design DNA as previous Motorola phones such as the Moto X (2014) and Nexus 6. It has the same metal sides and curved non-removable back. One thing that has changed is the surround for the camera, and all of the 2015 Motorola phones including the Moto X Play and Moto G have a metal "bar" that runs down the middle of the back below the camera. A nice touch is the return of the Motorola logo dimple that becomes a natural, comfortable resting place for your index finger when holding the phone.

Up top, we find the headphone jack and the combination slot for the Nano SIM and microSD card.

On the bottom is the microUSB 2.0 port. It is a little disappointing that the new Moto X doesn't use a USB Type-C port. This reversible port is the connector of the future, and it will soon become the standard for all smartphones, and we'd wish Motorola had been a little more forward-thinking.

The default back finish is new this year and is what Motorola calls "coated silicone rubber" (CSR). It has a nice, smooth touch matte finish and does not show fingerprints. You can also get the Moto X with an optional wood or leather back. It has a water-repellent nano-coating -- which is not water-resistant, mind you. The fine print on Motorola's site specifically says, "Not designed to be submersed in water, or exposed to pressurized water, or other liquids; Not waterproof."

Despite having a huge 5.7-inch screen, the Moto X is still reasonably compact for a big phone, having a screen-to-body ratio of 76 percent. This is substantially higher than the iPhone 6 Plus' 68 percent, as well as the Galaxy S6's 71 percent and LG G4's 72.5 percent. In fact, it is one of the highest of any smartphone. So despite having a bigger screen, the Moto X is still physically overall a smaller device than the iPhone 6 Plus.

Customization

Motorola's phones are the most customizable on the market today. Using its Moto Maker website, you can change the color and material of the back, and choose from three different colors for the metal sides. You can also customize the color of the metal accents around the camera and the speakers.

There are 10 different CSR color choices, many of which you can see in the image above. The metal accents are available in seven different colors. The choice of side metal color is determined by your color choice for the front lens, either black or white.

The Moto X can also be customized with either a wooden or leather back (for an extra cost). There are four wood choices – bamboo, walnut, ebony and charcoal ash (which you can see above on the right). The leather used is Saffiano leather sourced from Horween, "one of the finest U.S. leather companies." Saffiano leather has a hard texture finish that is scratch-resistant and much more durable that regular leather. One of the negatives of the leather used on last year's Moto X is that it soon got quite scuffed up with use. The leather color options are red, black and natural (shown above) and cognac (not shown).

If you buy the Moto X Pure Edition from Amazon or Best Buy, you will not be able to customize it. Those sellers will have it in white with champagne gold metal accents, bamboo with silver metal accents, and black with dark gray metal accents.

Camera

One of the biggest weaknesses of previous Motorola phones were their cameras. For the 2015 models, Motorola went back to the drawing board and stated that its new devices will have best in class cameras. While we haven't (of course) been able to verify this yet by testing the Moto X's camera, its specs do at least look great on paper. The Moto X Pure Edition uses the new 21MP Sony Exmor RS IMX230 sensor. This is a big 1/2.4" stacked CMOS sensor that has phase detect autofocus (PDAF) with 192 focus points. Its size means that its pixel size shouldn't be too small, despite the megapixel count, allowing for decent low light performance. This sensor can shoot 4K video in HDR, too, which is a nice bonus.

Motorola has combined the sensor with an f/2.0 lens with a blue glass IR filter that helps reduce lens flare and chromatic aberrations. It has a dual LED CCT (color correlated temperature) flash for better color balance when shooting with the flash. Unfortunately, the Motorola camera app does not have a full manual mode – you can adjust the exposure levels, but not ISO, shutter speed and so on. You should, however, be able to download third-party camera apps that leverage Google's Camera2 API to get full control of the camera.

Image quality with this sensor should be very good, and DXOMark has already tested it and rated it higher than every other smartphone apart from the Note 4 and Galaxy S6. This is a big improvement over the camera in the previous Moto X. However, this rating didn't take into account the LG G4, which in my opinion has the best camera of any phone on the market. It will be hard for Motorola to beat the G4's performance.

The front-facing camera is 5MP and has an 87-degree wide angle with front facing flash. The "double twist the phone to start the camera" gesture has returned on, and now you can double twist again to activate the front camera instead.

Software

The Moto X Pure Edition runs an almost stock version of Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. Motorola has included its own camera and gallery apps and added a suite of its value-add features, but other than that, this is stock Android in every other way. Also, because this is going to be sold unlocked without any carrier involvement, there won't be any useless bloatware or carrier apps.

The standard suite of Motorola apps included are Moto Assist, Moto Voice, Moto Display and Moto Actions. These are the same as last year's Moto X, and they do add some useful features to the smartphone experience, such as improved voice control. We are not sure if there are any major changes or improvements to the versions installed on the Moto X, as we didn't have too much time to test out the software.

One area of concern though is the Moto Display feature. This displays notifications that appear while the screen is off. Moto Display is activated by picking the Moto X up or reaching your hand towards the screen. Previous Motorola phones had AMOLED displays, where these minimal white notifications showed up on the powered-down screen and only the pixels needed to display the white text were lit.

This meant that there was minimal impact to battery life. However, because the new Moto X now uses a TFT LCD screen, the entire screen now needs to turn on to show the notifications. This is because of the difference in the way LCD and AMOLED screens display black pixels. Now, if Moto Display is turned on in the Moto X Pure Edition, there will be a much more significant impact on battery life.

Availability And Pricing

As mentioned, the Pure Edition of the new Moto X will be the only model available in the U.S. In other markets, it will be sold as the Moto X Style, possibly unlocked and by carriers, though Motorola did not provide any details.

The Pure Edition will be sold online by Motorola (where it can be customized), Amazon, and Best Buy. It will also be sold in Best Buy retail stores. Pricing starts at $400 for the 16 GB model, with an extra $50 for each additional level of storage (32 GB or 64 GB). This makes the Moto X an incredible value, because unlike some competing budget flagships, there seem to be no compromises (like the removal of NFC as on the OnePlus 2). However, the aforementioned lack of a fingerprint reader will impact it when Google Pay launches later this year.

The Pure Edition even fills the need for a stock Android phone to replace the discontinued Nexus 5, for those who find the Nexus 6 too big (though in all honesty, the new Moto X isn't that much smaller). I'd even see it as a viable competitor for the Note 4/5 for those who don't have any need for the S Pen. I own a Note 4 and love its size, but really rarely, if ever, do I use the S Pen, and I would love to replace it with a similarly-sized premium device running stock Android.

The Motorola Moto X Pure Edition will be available in September.

Alex Davies is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones, Tablets, and Virtual Reality. You can follow him on Twitter. Follow Tom's Hardware on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

Motorola has traveled a bit of a rocky road over the past few years. Though it was one of the early innovators in the phone and smartphone space, it lost its way and was snatched up by Google. Despite an emphasis on producing well-priced, quality devices running almost stock Android, Google didn't seem to get what it wanted from Motorola and recently sold it off to Lenovo.

This transaction was completed in October 2014, so the first phone launched after that time, the Nexus 6, was in development prior to the change in ownership. It wasn't until now, many months after Lenovo took over, that we expected to see if the Chinese OEM would have any impact on Motorola's direction.

After seeing the devices at today's event, I can say, yes, but perhaps not detrimentally.

At today's events, which took place in London, New York and Sao Paulo, Motorola introduced three new phones, with each city's speaker covering a device. London talked about the Moto X Play, New York covered the Moto X Style, and Sao Paulo the new Moto G. The choice of cities for each device also reflected the market that they are aimed at.

Before it dove into the actual phones, Motorola President Rick Osterloh recapped their strengths, emphasizing their customization options and the "86 percent customer satisfaction" level it has. Osterloh also said that a survey reported Motorola as one of the top three brands in the US. Although that's perhaps a bit of a stretch, the strategy does seem to be working, with a reported 118 percent growth in sales. This is, of course, surely made up by more of the lower-end phones such as the Moto G and Moto E that have done very well, especially in emerging markets like Brazil.

Next, Adrienne Hayes, SVP of Marketing, came on stage to talk about the relationship we have with our smartphones, and how Motorola is aiming to improve that. She threw up some statistics that showed how attached we are to our mobile devices, such as 40 percent of respondents saying they ask their phones things they wouldn't ask a friend. However, even though we love our devices, Hayes said that they often don't necessarily love us back, and many of us are not happy with our phones. Motorola aims to fix that by focusing on five key areas.

The first is "Meaningful exchanges" with our phones, meaning that Motorola wants to use features like Moto Voice and Moto Assist to enhance how we interact with them. The second is "Making and sharing memories" by giving its new phones best-in-class cameras. The third area is "Self expression" that lets you use its Moto Maker to customize the look of your phone to make it unique to you. The fourth is a phone that is "Always there for you," and Motorola hopes to achieve this with long-lasting batteries and fast turbo charging. The last tenet is phones that won't "Empty your wallet." Hayes said that Motorola believes that you should get more for less. This usually either means you have to sign a contract, or get something cheap and be disappointed. Motorola hopes that with its latest devices, you won't be forced into this compromise.

Moto X Style

The first phone announced was the flagship Moto X style. This phone is a direct successor to last year's Moto X, continuing the same design language (that was also used on the Nexus 6). It still has the attractive metal frame with a non-removable curved back. Around front, there are stereo speakers, and the Moto X now sports a big 5.7-inch QHD screen.

Despite its big screen, the Moto X Style does have a class-leading screen-to-body ratio of 76 percent, making it reasonably compact for a phone with such a big screen. Like previous versions of the X, you can customize the look of the Moto X by changing the back cover's color or material and by changing the color of the metal.

The default material for the Moto X Style's back is a new coated silicon rubber available in 10 different colors. This new material has a nice smooth, soft-touch finish that resists discoloration, so you can be confident that the blue from your jeans won't ruin your white X. The Moto X Style can also be customized (for an extra fee, of course) with either a wood or leather back. There are four wood colors and four types of leather to choose from.

The Moto X Style uses Motorola's turbo charging tech (which is Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0) that the company claimed charges faster than Samsung's Adaptive Fast Charging. When compared to the Galaxy S6, the Moto X Style gets 50 percent more charges in 15 minutes (reaching 34 percent vs. 26 percent for the S6). This is supposed to give you 10 more hours of use, but we all know that this is an inflated number that doesn't reflect real-world battery life.

One of the biggest weaknesses of Motorola's phones has always been their cameras. Although they're by no means terrible, they just couldn't quite compete with cameras on other leading devices. For this year's models, it has gone back to the drawing board to equip the Moto X Style with a class-leading camera. The X Style uses Sony's new 21MP Exmor RS IMX230 sensor (as far as we know it's the first phone to be equipped with it). This new sensor in addition to improved image processing means better low-light performance, faster focus, faster capture and better color accuracy. Motorola said that DXOMark has rated the Moto X Style to be "One of the top 3 smart phone cameras in the world." Another camera innovation is the inclusion of a front-facing flash for better selfies. The X Style does not have OIS.

Motorola didn't go over the other specs in detail, but it did put up this slide quickly that shows that the Moto X Style uses a Snapdragon 808 SoC; has 3 GB of RAM; comes with 16, 32 or 64 GB of storage; and has a microSD slot. It also has a 3,000 mAh battery, runs Android Lollipop 5.1.1, has a water-repellant coating and has universal LTE banding.

This last spec is a big deal, because the unlocked Moto X will work on any U.S. carrier – AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon. That is an impressive feature.

Although the Moto X Style will be available in other markets through more traditional means (such as carriers), in the U.S. it will only come as an unlocked Pure edition, either directly from Motorola, or from Best Buy and Amazon. You can only take advantage of the Moto Maker customization if you buy it from Motorola. It only comes in white, black or bamboo from the other retailers.

The last, and some might say the most important, piece of information is the price. The Moto X Style Pure edition will be $400 for the 16 GB model, and an extra $50 more for each storage tier. This is a very competitive price for what on paper seems to be an excellent device. However, it will not be coming until September.

Moto X Play

The second phone announced today is the Moto X Play. Motorola said that the Play has almost the same specs as the Moto X Style (well, "almost" is relative), but it's less expensive. It has the same 21MP rear camera, but the front-facing camera doesn't have the flash. It also has a smaller 5.5-inch full HD screen and runs a slower Snapdragon 615 SoC.

Its design language is also quite different than previous Motorola phones, eschewing the metal sides (they're plastic coated to look like metal), and this, at least to me, points to its origin as being more Lenovo that Motorola. Perhaps the new owners wanted to release an "almost" flagship with slightly lower specs that the margins are higher on. What it does have is a larger 3,620 mAh battery.

The Moto X Play will not be available in the U.S. though -- just other markets, including Canada. Pricing will be less than the Moto X Style, so you can expect the equivalent price in USD to be $300-350. In Canada it will be $400 CDN outright. Unlike the Moto X Style, the X Play will be mainly sold through carriers, but you can still order a Moto Maker-customized one from Motorola. The Moto X Play will be released in August.

Moto G (2015 Edition)

The last phone to be announced is the new Moto G. Although there is no official name change, to make it easier we'll refer to it as the 2015 edition. The original Moto G and 2014 version of the Moto G have been Motorola's best-selling phones, with millions sold. Since its release, its competitors have stepped up their game in the mid-range space, but Motorola said today that the only real "Moto G killer" is the next Moto G.

The Moto G offers flagship-like performance and features for 1/3 of the cost of flagships. Last year's model is an excellent mid-range device, but one of its primary weaknesses was its camera. Motorola has addressed this on the new model by equipping it with the same 13MP Sony Exmor RS IMX214 as the Nexus 6.

Costs had to be cut, though, so there is no OIS. One other big change for the new model is that it can now be customized in Moto Maker, and in conjunction with this, Motorola announced the availability of Moto Maker in Brazil, one of the largest markets for the Moto G. While you will be able to customize the color of the new Moto G, unlike the Moto X Style, there won't be wood or leather options.

Another new feature is that the Moto G is now IPX7 rated, making it water resistant in up to a meter of water for 30 minutes. This is usually a feature reserved for much more expensive phones. The new Moto G is powered by a quad-core Snapdragon 410 SoC (the same as the Moto E that we recently reviewed), and it has a 5-inch HD display, comes with either 8 or 16 GB of storage (with a microSD slot), 1 or 2 GB of RAM, and a 2470 mAh battery.

The new Moto G is available in 60 countries (including the U.S.) starting today for $180 for the 8 GB model. The 16 GB model with 2 GB of RAM will be $220.

Event Wrap Up

Today's announcement showed that Motorola isn't really deviating much from its strategy, at least with its most successful device, the Moto G. On the higher end, while the Moto X Style itself isn't dramatically different than its predecessor (apart from the much-improved camera), how Motorola wants to get it to consumers is very different, at least in the U.S. market.

By eschewing U.S. carriers and selling only the Pure edition, Motorola is taking a page from the Chinese (OnePlus, Xiaomi) smartphone playbook. This is likely influenced by its new owners, and it will be interesting to see how this new sales model works. Further, with the lack of a smaller lower-end Nexus phone right now, the new Moto X Style takes over the slot occupied by the Nexus 5 for those looking for a pure Android experience (at least until Google releases an actual successor).

The Moto X Play is the most unusual phone announced today, as we're a little unsure of its place in Motorola's phone lineup. Being priced close to the flagship phone, but with some significant negatives (slower SoC, plastic construction, lower-res screen) means we wouldn't recommend it over the Style. It seems there will be markets like Canada where the Play will be the only option (at least for now) for those looking for a new Moto X.

The Moto G isn't a big step up from last year's model, but that's okay. All a new Moto G needs to do is keep on trucking with the same good mid-range specs and features for an excellent price. The addition of a better camera and Moto Maker customization is just icing on the cake.

Stay tuned for more coverage of these phones.

Alex Davies is an Associate Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones, Tablets, and Virtual Reality. You can follow him on Twitter.

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Introduction

Flagships get all the glory and all the latest technology: blazing fast 64-bit octa-core processors; large, retina displays; wireless charging; high-resolution cameras with OIS and swift phase detection autofocus. While these premium phones may captivate our attention, not everyone needs their cutting-edge features or their extravagant prices. Fortunately, technology’s rapid pace of development has pushed once fanciful features into lower-cost phones.

Two years ago, Motorola launched the well-received, mid-range Moto G smartphone that cost only $179 for the 8GB version and $199 for the 16GB version. It had a quad-core Cortex-A7 processor, a 4.5-inch HD (1280x720) screen, and 1GB of RAM. These specs were seen in devices that cost almost double at the time such as the HTC One Mini or the Galaxy S4 Mini. With similar specs for half the price, the Moto G offered great value to customers looking for a low-priced, mid-range smartphone.

Then, about six months later, Motorola launched the even cheaper Moto E. Aimed at the 3G only market, it cost just $129 and came with a dual-core Cortex-A7 processor, a 4.3-inch qHD (960x540) screen, and also 1GB of RAM.

However, this device did not deliver the same value as the Moto G. It had a significantly worse camera with no flash, which is important for many customers in emerging markets, and no front-facing camera either. Motorola cut too many corners to create a device that was “only” $50 cheaper, which is why most people still recommended the Moto G over the Moto E. The Moto G was a much better package overall.

For the second generation of the Moto E, Motorola is offering two different versions that get several significant upgrades. There’s still a 3G only version for $120, but now there’s a 4G LTE version too for $150. Both models include 8GB of internal storage (twice as much as the original Moto E) and support microSD (up to 32GB). Battery size has also increased substantially from 1980mAh to 2390mAh, a 20% improvement. The new Moto E also adds a front-facing camera—a serious omission on the first generation—and the rear camera gets autofocus. Each version comes in either black or white.

The display has grown compared to the last generation Moto E, increasing from 4.3-inch to 4.5-inch. However, it keeps the same 960x540 resolution (245 PPI). Considering that the competing Lumia 635 comes with an even lower 854x480 resolution, the Moto E’s qHD resolution seems adequate for this price range.

Motorola Moto E Tech Specs

The second generation Moto E 3G still uses a Snapdragon 200 SoC like that found in the original version; however, it moves from a dual-core to quad-core Cortex-A7 CPU.

The Moto E 4G LTE, which we’ll be focusing on in this review, uses Qualcomm’s latest low-end SoC, the Snapdragon 410, which is the successor to the Snapdragon 400 found inside both generations of the Moto G. It has a quad-core 64-bit Cortex-A53 CPU and an Adreno 306 GPU.

This puts a bit of a kink in Motorola’s product lineup, since the Moto E 4G LTE should offer better system performance than the Moto G (2nd gen). Add in LTE support and it starts looking like a great value compared to the 3G only Moto G that costs $30 more. But what the Moto G lacks in system and wireless performance it makes up for with a larger, higher-resolution display, stereo front-facing speakers, and better cameras front and rear (with LED flash). The Moto G really needs LTE support to make it the clear mid-range option.

These jumbled system specs are a result of the staggered six-month release schedule, which gives the Moto E access to newer hardware. With LTE support becoming ubiquitous, we suspect this idiosyncrasy will disappear in Motorola’s third generation products.

Cellular

The Snapdragon 410 SoC in the Moto E 4G LTE version includes Qualcomm’s third-generation Category 4 LTE modem on package. Functionally equivalent to the Qualcomm MDM9225 baseband processor, it offers 150 Mb/s down and 50 Mb/s up with carrier aggregation. It also supports HSPA+ Release 10 for 84 Mb/s down using dual-carrier HSDPA, along with most major radio modes, including GSM/EDGE, UMTS (WCDMA, TD-SCDMA), LTE (LTE-FDD, LTE-TDD), CDMA1x, and EV-DO Rev. B. It does not support CDMA2000, however.

We were unable to confirm this, but it’s likely that the primary transceiver is paired with the WFR1620 receive-only transceiver, since this baseband generation can’t support full Category 4 LTE speeds on its own.

The two 3G variants utilize the Qualcomm baseband integrated into the Snapdragon 200 SoC, delivering 3G speeds up to 42 Mbps. It supports GSM/EDGE, WCDMA, CDMA1x, and EV-DO Rev. A.

Moto E (2nd Gen) Hardware Design

The slightly larger second generation Moto E is an evolution of the original all-plastic design and has the same style as Motorola’s other phones from the past couple of years. The latest Motorola devices all share similar traits such as a slightly curved and smooth back, rounded corners and edges, a depressed circle with the Motorola logo on the back, and front-facing speakers (only one for the latest Moto E). It also feels quite solid and well-built, typical for Motorola’s latest smartphones, although it’s slightly more hollow feeling than the Moto G (2nd gen).

At 12.3mm (the same as the old Moto E), it’s almost twice as thick as some of the latest flagship smartphones, but it’s not a major issue for day to day use. The bezels are slightly thinner, improving the screen to body ratio to 64.3% versus 63% in the previous generation. This is still a bit chunky compared to the Motorola-made Nexus 6, which has a ratio of 74.1%. However, reducing bezel size adds to the cost, and the Nexus 6 has more internal volume to accommodate the motherboard.

Centered above the screen is the single earpiece/speaker, flanked on either side by the front-facing camera and ambient light sensor. The lack of the second speaker on the front does make it look less Moto’ish.

The depressed circles on the back of Motorola’s phones have been praised for their ergonomics, making it comfortable to rest your finger on the phone’s back during a phone call. In the Moto E’s case, this dimple is more aesthetic than functional because of its size. Even with small hands, the index finger ends up resting closer to the camera rather than the dimple.

The Moto E (2nd gen) does not have a removable back like the older model. Instead, Motorola offers colored bands to liven up and personalize your phone. The plastic bands have the metal volume and power buttons built into them, and are easily snapped on and off by placing a fingernail in a small gap in one of the corners.

The base white and black phones come with a matching colored band, although the black band is of a slightly lighter black than the phone itself. Additional bands can be purchased in two packs of three for $20. The first pack includes turquoise, purple, and raspberry (pink), while the second pack contains red, blue, and yellow.

If you would like to add some protection to the phone while adding some color, Motorola sells optional Grip Shells. The shells also have a colored plastic band around the perimeter, but add a color-matched, translucent plastic shell to protect the back of the phone. The Grip Shells attach directly to the sides of the phone in the same way the bands do. They cost $20 each and come in the following colors: blue, yellow, charcoal, turquoise, and raspberry.

The SIM card and microSD slots are located on the left side opposite the power and volume controls. In order to access them, the band or Grip Shell needs to be removed.

Display And Audio Performance

The Moto E (2nd gen) comes with a 4.5-inch IPS LCD screen that is slightly larger than the original Moto E’s screen; however, it retains the same qHD 960x540 resolution, giving it a pixel density of 245 PPI. While not high enough to qualify as a retina display, text is reasonably clear but pixels are still noticeable, giving the screen a slight grainy appearance.

Thanks to continuous advancements in display technology, displays for even low-end smartphones have become quite good. The new Moto E’s display has good viewing angles, with some shift in brightness but not color.

One thing that betrays the phone’s budget provenance is the rigidity of the screen, which, despite using Corning Gorilla Glass 3, bends when you press on it rather than feeling like hard glass as most smartphone screens do these days. This is reminiscent of the old days of resistive-type screens which actually needed some amount of pressure to work.

There’s also significantly higher friction when swiping on the screen compared to other devices, which can make some touch usage, such as scrolling, slower and less enjoyable.

We’re using SpectraCal's CalMAN software and SpectraCal C6 colorimeter for display measurements. All of the charts below with a gray background were generated in CalMAN v5 Ultimate.

The new Moto E gets reasonably bright, but falls shy of the 400 nit milestone and the Moto G (2nd gen). This makes the screen a little hard to see in direct sunlight. It does have a respectable black level, similar to the Moto G, giving it a decent contrast ratio that’s better than the higher priced Nokia Lumia 830.

The Moto E’s average gamma level of 2.22 comes very close to the ideal of 2.2, easily surpassing the Moto G and the more expensive Lumia 830 and HTC Desire Eye. However, gamma begins to rise at the 50% grayscale mark, eventually spiking to nearly 2.6 at 90% grayscale, leading to darker shadows and a loss of highlights.

Most mobile displays tend to show colors on the cool side of the color temperature spectrum and the Moto E is no exception. With an average color temperature just under 7,000K, and values even closer to the ideal as we move up the grayscale graph towards white, the Moto E avoids the blue tint that plagues other displays.

Checking the RGB balance confirms what we saw in the color temperature graph above. Most gray levels have slightly more blue content, with a bit more green at 100% (white). Still, these are good results, avoiding any noticeable color tinting except at the 100% white level.

Average grayscale ΔE2000 falls just above three, a value that’s noticeable but considered acceptable. It’s similar to Motorola’s Nexus 6 (3.02) and better than both the Moto G and LG G3 (4.02).

Grayscale error hovers around two over a wide range of grayscale values, but spikes near 100% white. This is because the Moto E’s display shifts towards green at this end of the spectrum.

The Moto E display does a good job covering the sRGB color space. Without an operating system or apps that support color management, there’s no need to support a wider gamut.

In the color saturation sweep, we see that red and blue seem to be somewhat undersaturated. In other words, the measured color falls short of each 20% box. We also see that the Moto E misses the blue corner of the sRGB triangle, unable to represent a true 100% blue.

In the color accuracy test, the Moto E does very well with an average error below three and a maximum error of 5.89 for white. This shows that the Moto E’s display was color calibrated and has a high degree of color accuracy, better than the Moto G and sitting between the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 (2.23) and the LG G3 (3.05).

The color palette above shows the target color on the bottom and the color displayed by the Moto E on top. We can see a slight green tint on the white swatch, as suggested in the grayscale tests. The Moto E’s 100% blue is also a bit light like we saw in the color saturation sweep. For most of the colors, however, the actual color and the target color are very close to each other.

For a lower-cost phone, the display in the Moto E (2nd gen) is actually very nice. We were surprised by how well calibrated the display is, easily beating the color accuracy of more expensive devices, including Motorola’s own Moto G (2nd gen) and Nexus 6. Our only complaints are that max brightness falls short of 400 nits and whites display with a slight greenish tint.

Audio Performance

For the new Moto E, Motorola decided to remove the bottom-front speaker, either because the company did not want to pay double for the speakers or it was a design choice meant to streamline the device and make it slightly more compact. This does not seem to make a major impact on the loudness nor the clarity of the speaker compared to the Moto G which comes with two.

The external speaker on the Moto E (2nd gen) keeps distortion to a minimum at max volume. At normal listening levels, it’s still possible to hear individual notes and instruments when listening to heavy metal, but sounds start blending together with multi-layered electronic music, making it sound a bit garbled. Folk music, or music centered on vocals, plays to its strengths.

Bass notes, of course, are soft. With the EQ turned off, the midrange is strong, which is important for vocals or just listening to someone on a phone call, but trails off at higher frequencies. The “Brilliant” EQ setting sounds too tinny, but “Bass punch” helps shore up both the low and high ends a bit, and is probably the best setting.

Plugging in a set of good headphones provides a similar listening experience. Relative to the iPhone 6, bass has less punch and the Moto E lacks clarity; the signal-to-noise ratio seems lower.

Just like with the external speaker, vocals start blending together with instruments when listening to multi-layered electronic music. With the EQ turned off, the output sounds flat and lifeless. There’s no power behind the vocals and it’s just not really fun to listen to. Activating the “Home theater” EQ setting livens the sound up a bit, but the low-end has too much emphasis and sounds too rumbly. The “Live stage” EQ setting seems to be the best compromise, shoring up the bass and midrange without the rumbling heard with “Home theater.”

Overall, the sound is not bad for a phone in this price range. It’s certainly not fair to expect the same level of audio performance as an iPhone, Sony Z3, or Nexus 6. With some EQ help, the Moto E (2nd gen) provides an acceptable listening experience for casual use, but will not thrill music buffs.

Update [09:02 6/17/2015]: Fixed signal-to-noise ratio reference.

Camera Hardware And Software

The Moto E (2nd gen) comes with a 5MP rear camera, the same resolution as the previous generation. This is fairly typical for phones in this price range, although we are starting to see some devices that are even cheaper come with 8MP cameras now.

The Moto E (2nd gen) uses the Samsung S5K5E2 1/5" CMOS sensor for its rear camera, which is the same sensor the HTC One (M8) used for its front-facing camera. Its 1.12μm pixels could hinder the camera’s low-light performance. This is a weak point for other phone cameras in the $100-$150 price range, which may take decent pictures in well-lit conditions, but produce unusable results in low light.

Further hampering its low-light capability is the lack of an LED flash. Most of the Moto E’s competitors come with a flash, a useful feature not just for taking pictures in the dark, but to use as a flashlight alternative too.

The rear camera for the Moto E (2nd gen) does have one significant improvement over its predecessor: autofocus. With only a fixed-focus rear camera, most of the photos taken with the original Moto E ended up being blurry, rendering the camera next to useless. It’s hard to believe an OEM would include a rear camera without autofocus, but it still happens at the low-end of the market.

Another improvement for the new model is the addition of a front-facing camera. The sensor is an Aptina MT9V113 that measures 1/11” in size and uses 2.2μm pixels, which are even larger than HTC’s “Ultra Pixels.” Resolution is only VGA (640x480), but in this price range it’s difficult to do much better.

Moto E (2nd gen) Camera Software

Starting with the Moto X, Motorola introduced a very simplistic and intuitive camera application that it has been using ever since. The app is designed to work automatically, leaving little for you to tinker with. You just point and shoot.

To take a picture you just have to tap once on the screen. If the camera is in focus, then it will take the picture very quickly. If it is not, then it it will wait anywhere from a fraction of a second to a second to focus and capture the image. Long pressing the screen activates burst mode, taking about four pictures per second and making it easier to capture a good image of a moving target.

Changing the focus and exposure is done by simply dragging the focus ring over the desired object. This is the extent of the camera controls exposed through the stock camera app and even this can be turned off.

The camera supports a 4x digital zoom, which is activated by sliding your finger up or down on the screen. It’s use should be limited, however, as the resolution is already quite low by default and digital zoom will only make it worse.

Sliding a finger from the right edge of the screen to left allows you to browse through your latest images and edit them.

Sliding a finger from the left edge of the screen to the right will open a carousel-like menu, where you can change the HDR setting, enable manual exposure and focus control, select the video mode, take a panorama, turn on a shot timer, and enable geotagging. There’s also an option for choosing where to store the files.

Finally, there’s the “Quick Capture” setting that allows you to open the Camera app with two flicks of the wrist. This functionality also appeared for the first time in the Moto X. It’s quite useful as it does save some time opening the camera app, although not as much as I would’ve liked (the camera app is still a little slow to load). With the camera app open, repeating the gesture switches between the front and rear cameras.

Video

Shooting video with the Moto E (2nd gen) is about as basic as it gets. It records video at 720p@30fps, which is actually an improvement on the first Moto E’s 480p@30fps video mode. It can also do slow motion video at 720p. In either case, the video produced is not particularly good, but better than nothing.

Rear Camera Video Modes

Camera Performance And Photo Quality

We’ll be comparing the quality of the photos taken by the Moto E (2nd gen) to those of the HTC Desire Eye, an upper mid-range phone with a 13MP Sony IMX214 sensor and f/2.0, 28mm lens. This is not a fair comparison, but we just did not have any other phones in this price range available at the time. Instead, think of this as a comparison between the Moto E and any near-flagship phone from last year that might be available now for free on contract. The iPhone 6 images are included for reference, since it produced some of the best images out of the group of phones tested.

For the indoor pictures, we add the Nokia Lumia 830 (10MP, OIS) and Moto G (2nd gen) (8MP, f/2.0) to the mix for a better comparison.

All images were taken using the Auto mode with the stock camera app unless noted. Also, you can view the full-sized image for each photo by clicking the text links below the images that are within a slideshow album. Both the Desire Eye and Lumia 830 shoot natively at a 16:9 aspect ratio, while the other phones shoot in 4:3.

Outdoors

Daylight

Full Size Images: [Moto E: daylight Mustang], [HTC Desire Eye: daylight Mustang], [iPhone 6: daylight Mustang], [Moto E: daylight boxcar], [HTC Desire Eye: daylight boxcar], [iPhone 6: daylight boxcar]

The first picture of the Mustang was taken late in the afternoon with the sun low in the sky. In these conditions, the iPhone 6 gets the white balance right, capturing the yellow light from the sun. Both the Moto E and Desire Eye set the white balance a bit too cool, missing this detail. In the Moto E image, the car looks a bit orange and the yellow chairs in the background are undersaturated. Noise is similar between the Moto E and Desire Eye, but both have significantly more than the iPhone 6.

In the second picture of the boxcar, the Moto E selects a shutter speed that’s too fast, leading to an underexposed image and more noise in the sky.

Zooming into the full-size images reveals the difference in detail and aliasing when going from 13MP to 8MP to 5MP. With only a 5MP camera, the Moto E makes it difficult to get a good image after using the digital zoom or cropping the photo.

While the Moto E obviously trails the more expensive phones in daylight photo quality, it still manages to produce decent shots, especially if the photos will primarily be viewed on mobile devices or shared on the web where its lower resolution is not a serious handicap.

Dusk

Full Size Images: [Moto E: sunset Corvette], [HTC Desire Eye: sunset Corvette], [iPhone 6: sunset Corvette], [Moto E: sunset Mustang], [HTC Desire Eye: sunset Mustang], [iPhone 6: sunset Mustang]

The two scenes above were taken right at sunset, and in the fading light, we start to see the Moto E struggle. Its image of the Corvette interior clearly shows more noise than the other two. It also holds the shutter open longer, overexposing the chrome highlights on the dashboard.

All three images of the blue Mustang are pretty noisy, but the Moto E uses the highest ISO of the group, resulting in the most noise. The Moto E’s low resolution and high noise level conspire to erase detail (under the hood) and blur edges (side mirror). Both the iPhone 6 and Moto E do worse than the Desire Eye at capturing the dynamic range of the scene based on the overly white sky.

Night

Full Size Images: [Moto E: night], [HTC Desire Eye: night], [iPhone 6: night]

In this night shot, the Moto E’s image is a bit darker than the other two. However, it uses a lower ISO level than the Desire Eye, producing an image with less noise. Both the Moto E and Desire Eye exhibit more bloom around highlights than the iPhone 6.

HDR

Full Size Images: [Moto E: no HDR], [Moto E: HDR], [HTC Desire Eye: no HDR], [HTC Desire Eye: HDR], [iPhone 6: no HDR], [iPhone 6: HDR]

With HDR turned off, the Moto E produces an overly dark image. Fortunately, its HDR mode is very effective, producing a better image than both the Desire Eye and iPhone 6. The sky is still a bit dark and the image is a bit noisier overall, but the colors are accurate and there’s no purple fringing or haloing around highlights. The image looks very natural.

In contrast, the Desire Eye produces an image with cooler colors and there’s weird light colored streaks on the green baggage car on the right. There’s also noticeable purple fringing artifacts around highlighted edges (top of baggage car, pole on the right, light on top of yellow car).

Indoors

The staged indoor shots below were lit by overhead LED lights, a CFL lamp from the front, and an incandescent overhead light in the background.

Bright Light

Full Size Images: [Moto E: indoor bright light], [Moto G: indoor bright light], [Lumia 830: indoor bright light], [HTC Desire Eye: indoor bright light ], [iPhone 6: indoor bright light]

This indoor scene is not nearly as bright as the outdoor shots, so it’s no surprise we see the Moto E struggle, creating the worst picture of the group. The autofocus could not lock onto an object in this lighting, creating a generally blurry image. We took half a dozen different shots of this scene and they were all the same. The image is also overexposed, washing out the blacks and missing detail on the faces. The Moto E sets the highest ISO of the group and creates the noisiest image.

The Moto G (2nd gen) produces a much better picture than the Moto E, although it too is a bit overexposed and suffers from noise. The Lumia 830 sets the exposure correctly, but colors are far too cool and there’s some purple fringing artifacts in some locations.

Low Light

Full Size Images: [Moto E: indoor low light], [Moto G: indoor low light], [Lumia 830: indoor low light], [HTC Desire Eye: indoor low light], [iPhone 6: indoor low light]

Turning off the overhead LED lights and CFL lamp leaves a very dark scene all phones have trouble with. The Lumia 830 performs the best here thanks to Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), which none of the other devices have. It allows the camera to use a much slower shutter speed and to hold a lower ISO level, which leads to a brighter image with less noise.

Despite using the same shutter speed and ISO as the Moto G, the Moto E produces an image that is basically unusable. It’s so dark that we can barely see the Third Doctor or the black Dalek on either side. It’s also extremely noisy.

In order to reach this price point, some sacrifices need to be made. For the Moto E (2nd gen) this applies to the rear camera. The addition of an autofocus at least makes it more than a toy and it is capable of producing decent images in good lighting that are at least suitable for viewing on mobile devices and sharing on the Web. Its HDR mode is also very good.

However, as the light begins to dim, so do your chances of getting a decent shot. Its low-light performance is generally poor and the lack of an LED flash makes it unsuitable for evening or dimly lit indoor usage.

Software

The Moto E (2nd gen) runs Android 5.0.2 out of the box, although an update to version 5.1 should come soon. Even though the 4G LTE version uses the 64-bit Snapdragon 410 SoC, the less expensive 3G version still runs 32-bit Cortex-A7 CPUs. Rather than maintain two different firmwares for the Moto E, Motorola goes with the lowest common denominator and loads both versions with 32-bit Android. This will not impact the 4G LTE’s performance dramatically, but it does miss out on the new SIMD cryptography instructions included in AArch64.

Motorola comes very close to providing a stock Android experience. Similar to a Nexus device, Google Now is the launcher and all the usual Google software offerings are present. Motorola does provide its own camera app and a few additional features.

For starters, there’s the Motorola Migrate app, which lets you easily transfer your data from another phone. If you’re coming from another Android phone, your apps, Wi-Fi settings, contacts, and photos (only if syncing is enabled in the Photos app) can be synced from your Google account. The Migrate app helps you transfer all the other data that Google does not backup, including text messages, call history, SIM contacts, and any local photos, videos, and music.

After installing the Motorola Migrate app on the old Android device, you use it to scan a QR code displayed by the Migrate app on the Moto E. The phone then initiates an ad-hoc Wi-Fi connection that helps you transfer the files.

For those with Apple devices, it can also transfer contacts and calendar data from iCloud, but requires you to divulge your Apple ID to a third-party service. Even feature-phone users can transfer their contacts via Bluetooth.

The included Motorola Alert app can be used to let family or friends know where you are by notifying them when you arrive or depart from a location. You can also use the app to send a text message to someone, telling them where to meet you. There’s a “follow me” mode as well, which allows you to broadcast your location periodically to your emergency contacts.

The Moto Assist app serves as a control panel for Motorola’s added features. Since the Moto E lacks some of the sensors of the more expensive Moto X, some options, like waving your hand over the phone to wake the screen, are missing. Moto Assist can still keep the Moto E from becoming a distraction while you’re trying to sleep or in a meeting by extending Android’s Downtime feature.

You can also use Moto Assist to configure Moto Display. Similar to Android Lollipop’s Ambient Display feature, which was modeled after Moto Display, it turns on the display if you tap on it or pick up the phone. It will also activate the display when new notifications arrive. The Moto E (2nd gen) does not come with an AMOLED display, so the whole display will be turned on for a few seconds each time you receive a message. This can drain the battery if you tend to get a lot of notifications.

The Moto E includes a feature we do not see very often on smartphones: an FM radio. The phone uses the headphone cable as an antenna, so you cannot listen to the radio with the external speaker. While most people stream music via the internet these days, or just load an SD card with songs, it’s nice to have an extra option. This is especially true for a phone at this price point, where people are more likely to opt for less expensive and more restrictive data plans.

Motorola provides one of the least cluttered Android builds of any OEM for the Moto E. It tosses in a few useful features, although it lacks some of the nifty tricks included on the Moto X.

CPU And System Performance

In this section, we evaluate system-level performance by running a series of synthetic and real-world workloads, along with some browser-based Web tests. There are several facets to overall device performance, including single- and multi-threaded CPU performance, memory and storage speed, and GPU rendering, all of which will be probed by our suite of benchmarks. If you're interested in learning more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device system performance.

We’re including the HTC Desire Eye in our performance charts for the same reasons we included it in our discussion of camera quality. Plus, it will be interesting to see the difference in performance between last year’s Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 (4x Krait 400 @ 2.26 GHz, Adreno 330, 2GB RAM) and the new low-end Snapdragon 410.

In our first test, the Snapdragon 801 outscores the 410 by a margin of two in the single- and multi-threaded CPU System test and overall, which is pretty close to the difference in CPU frequency. The performance delta between the Adreno 330 (578MHz) and the Adreno 306 (400MHz) in the Graphics test is a more substantial 6.5x.

The overall score for the Moto E (2nd gen) is very close to the Moto G (2nd gen). However, the newer Cortex-A53 CPUs in the Moto E manage to outperform the Cortex-A7s in the Moto G by 19% in the System test. The Moto G does perform 28% better in the Memory test, which tests the speed of the internal storage.

Performance in AndEBench looks similar to what we saw in Basemark OS II, with the Desire Eye out front by a margin of ~2x and the Moto E very close to the Moto G.

Narrowing in on CPU performance, the out-of-order architecture of Krait 400, with nearly twice the clock speed, gives it about twice the performance of the narrower, in-order A53 in the Moto E. We also see the Moto E outperform the Moto G in CPU performance again, albeit by a slimmer 13% margin in CoreMark-HPC. Since both have the same number of cores running at the same frequency (1.2GHz), we can see the advantage of the A53’s architectural tweaks. Based on the A7 design, the A53 is still dual-issue, but the limitations on the second issue slot have been removed (the A7 cannot issue load/store or FP/NEON operations from its second issue slot). ARM made several other improvements to the A53’s front-end design, including improved conditional and indirect branch prediction and more instruction and data prefetching.

Despite having the same 4.2 GB/s of theoretical memory bandwidth, the Moto E gets 50% better throughput than the Moto G in the Memory Bandwidth test. Some of this advantage may be from the memory modules themselves, but a lot of it is probably due to the improved front-end design of the A53.

The Moto G outperforms the Moto E once again in storage performance, this time by 22%. Looking at the test breakdown in the table above shows that the NAND in the Moto E performs better with larger blocks of data, actually performing about 4% better than the Moto G at 256KB. Still, these numbers are less than half of what we see in flagship phones, translating to slower app launch times.

The ~2x delta between the Snapdragon 801 and 410 shows up again in both the single- and multi-core Geekbench results. We also continue to see the Moto E outpace the Moto G: about 30% on average in single-core and about 20% on average in multi-core.

Performing well in synthetic tests is all well and good, but the results are not directly transferable to everyday use cases. This is certainly evident in PCMark where the Moto E outperforms the Moto G by only 8% and is nearly equal to the Desire Eye.

The reason for the discrepancy in scores between the synthetic tests and the more real-world PCMark has to do with the behavior of the CPU governor. Some OEMs will optimize for performance, routinely pushing the CPU cores to max frequency. Others will opt for a more balanced mixture of performance and battery life, limiting the CPU’s max frequency for less demanding workloads like those we see in PCMark.

The HTC Desire Eye uses a fairly aggressive CPU governor optimized for battery life. In the Writing and Web Browsing tests it more or less uses a single core clocked at a conservative 960MHz, with very short spikes up to 1958MHz. In the Photo Editing test, where we see a much wider gap between it and the Moto E, it uses a single core clocked at 1728MHz with frequent spikes to 2265MHz, its max clock frequency.

Performance scores fluctuate a bit more in the web browsing tests although the order remains the same. The Moto E is between 15-43% slower than the Desire Eye, but between 13-24% faster than the Moto G.

Our tests show the Moto E (2nd gen) pull ahead of the Moto G (2nd gen) in both CPU performance and memory bandwidth thanks to the improvements in its newer A53 CPUs. Its internal storage performance generally lags behind the Moto G by 20-25%, however.

Using it in the real world, the Moto E (2nd gen) definitely feels faster than the Moto G (2nd gen). This is quite a strange turn of events as now Motorola’s low-end phone is faster than its latest mid-range device. When the Moto G (2nd gen) was announced, our biggest criticism of it was that it did not include the A53 CPU, when other competitors’ devices did at the time.

GPU And Gaming Performance

Mobile GPU performance is becoming increasingly important as people begin to see their phones and tablets as portable gaming machines. This section explores GPU performance with several synthetic and real-world game engine tests. To learn more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device GPU performance.

It is no surprise that the Moto E outperforms the Moto G in the CPU-bound Physics test by 16%, but it is surprising to see the Adreno 305 in the Moto G ahead of the newer Adreno 306 in the Moto E. While Qualcomm’s Adreno GPUs are something of a black box, based on the product numbering it is reasonable to suspect the 306 is just a slightly tweaked 305, with maybe a few performance optimizations. There is one big difference between two, one that can potentially explain intuitively reversed results: clock frequency. The Adreno 305 in the Moto G (2nd gen) runs at up to 450MHz, while the Adreno 306 in the Moto E (2nd Gen) runs at up to 400MHz. Not taking into account any architectural changes, or the fact that performance never scales perfectly with frequency, this is a 12.5% advantage for the Moto G.

The Moto E is definitely not a gaming powerhouse, trailing the Desire Eye by a factor of 5.5x overall. Compared to the Moto G, we see about a 12% deficit that’s consistent between Dunes and Hangar, equaling the GPU clock frequency spread between the two.

The Lumia 830 manages to squeeze past the Moto G in both graphics tests despite using the same Snapdragon 400 SoC. Since the benchmark uses Direct3D feature level 9_3 when running on Windows instead of OpenGL ES 2.0 for Android, the small difference could be due to the graphics API overhead.

In the onscreen tests, the Moto E pulls ahead because it renders at a lower 960x540 resolution versus the Moto G’s 1280x720.

The performance gap between the Adreno 306 and the Adreno 330 remains the same when moving to the high quality tests. However, we see the Moto E swap places with the Moto G. This is likely a combination of the Moto E’s higher memory bandwidth and better CPU performance.

The Lumia 830 could not run the high quality tests because of insufficient memory.

Both of the Moto devices choke on the pixel shader heavy GFXBench Manhattan test. They still fare better than the Lumia 830, which refused to run it at all.

Once again we see a 12% deficit between the Moto E and Moto G, although neither perform well.

In GFXBench 3.0 Alpha Blending, the Moto E (2nd gen) falls behind the Moto G by a wider 28% margin in this test of texturing capability. This test is usually memory bandwidth sensitive, so it is odd that the Snapdragon 410 does so poorly here. Granted, it is still 3x faster than the Lumia 830.

The ALU test stresses fragment shader computing. Here we see the familiar -12.5% delta between the Moto E and Moto G. Nearly the same delta shows up again in the Driver Overhead test.

By now it should be clear that neither the Adreno 305 or 306 are capable of playing the most demanding Android games. Fortunately, most mobile games are not nearly as demanding as the graphics benchmarks we use. The lower screen resolution of the Moto E (2nd gen) also helps it outperform the the Moto G in onscreen tests, and it is still capable of handling some casual gaming.

The Moto G (2nd gen) maintains about a 12.5% advantage over the Moto E (2nd gen) in graphics performance at the same resolution, the exact same difference in GPU clock frequency between the two. It’s unfortunate that the Adreno 306 in Snapdragon 410 is slower than the Adreno 305 in the older Snapdragon 400 head-to-head. I suspect the lower GPU clock for the 306 is a result of squeezing the A53 CPU cores, which have a lower performance per watt than the A7 cores, into the same power envelope.

Battery Life And Thermal Throttling

Battery life may be the most important performance metric for a mobile device. After all, it does not matter how quickly a phone or tablet can load webpages or how many frames per second the GPU can crank through once the battery runs down and the device shuts off. To learn more about how we test this critical facet of mobile computing, please read our battery testing methodology article.

The Moto E (2nd gen) comes with a 2390mAh battery, which is 21% more capacity than the 1980mAh battery inside the original Moto E. This gives the Moto E a larger battery than both the second generation Moto G (2070mAh) and Moto X (2300mAh) as well as the Lumia 830 (2200mAh), all more expensive 5-inch class phones.

Combining a large battery with a smaller 4.5-inch display gives the Moto E just over 8 hours of battery life in PCMark, a 59% advantage over the Moto G. Not only does the Moto E last longer than the G on a charge, but it actually offers slightly better performance while doing so. While the Moto E lacks panel self refresh, which is a hardware feature that saves power when displaying a static screen, it does not seem to hold it back in this test.

The Basemark OS II battery test is sort of a worst case indicator of battery life under CPU intensive workloads. While the Moto E (2nd gen) fares better than the other devices we are comparing it to, it only outscores the Moto G (2nd gen) by 8.2%, far less than the 59% advantage we saw in the more realistic PCMark load cases, despite having a 15.5% larger battery and smaller screen.

Because this is primarily a CPU test, we can use it to get a rough estimate for the difference in power efficiency between the A7 and A53 cores running at the same frequency and built on the same 28nm LP process node. Comparing the difference in score to the difference in battery size shows that at a system power level, the Moto E is 7.3% less efficient than the Moto G. The Moto G’s system power draw will be slightly higher than the Moto E because of its larger screen, giving the A7 CPU core a greater than 7.3% performance per watt advantage over the A53 core (We did not get a baseline power draw before we had to return our evaluation units, but after accounting for the difference in screen size, this figure should be in the 10-20% range.). This tells us that ARM has reached a point of diminishing returns trying to get extra performance out of the narrow, in-order A7/A53 architecture, and probably why we do not see a new LITTLE core to accompany the A72.

In the GPU and gaming focused GFXBench 3.0 battery test, the Moto E keeps the fun going for 7.8 hours, which is more than double the 3.5 hours for the Moto G. The Moto E’s lower GPU frequency and resolution (this test is rendered onscreen) provide the edge in battery life. The lower resolution also helps with performance, allowing it to post better frame rates than the Moto G and Lumia 830.

The Adreno 330 in the HTC Desire Eye provides 1.8x the performance (after some thermal throttling) of the Moto E, but there’s a price to pay: it only lasts for ~3.5 hours compared to the 7.8 hours of the Moto E.

The battery drain and performance graph from the GFXBench battery test shows no hint of thermal throttling over the 28 minute duration of the test, since the performance remains constant the whole time.

Using the device in the real world, it’s quite obvious that the latest Moto E has significantly better battery life than the Moto G (2nd gen). With moderate use it lasts about a day or more longer than the Moto G (so two or three days total). With light use it should last three or four days. If that’s not impressive enough, the device can easily last a week in idle mode.

As you can see above, even with 70% battery charge left, it should still last another week. However, it should be noted that the device was on minimum or less than half brightness levels the whole time.

The bottom line is that the Moto E (2nd gen) has great battery life. The combination of an efficient SoC (even if Cortex-A53 is slightly less efficient than Cortex-A7), a relatively low resolution, a small screen (at least by today’s standards), and a large battery gives the new Moto E the edge over most smartphones on the market.

Conclusion

There’s no shortage of inexpensive Android phones in the market, but most combine subpar hardware with outdated software to create a truly lamentable user experience. Motorola broke the status quo with the first Moto G by combining decent hardware with a current version of Android—along with the promise of regular updates—all for an affordable $180 price. It then created the Moto E, an even more affordable phone targeted at first-time smartphone users.

Motorola made too many compromises with the first Moto E, however. It had a slower processor, less storage, smaller screen, lower resolution, no front-facing camera, and a next to useless rear camera with no autofocus or LED flash. Far too much to sacrifice for a mere $50 savings.

For the second generation, Motorola fixes many of these shortcomings. Performance gets a boost from the new Snapdragon 410 SoC and its improved Cortex-A53 CPU cores. System performance is about 10-20% better than the more expensive Moto G, a difference that is noticeable in real-world use.

The Moto G offers more raw GPU performance, but because of the Moto E’s lower screen resolution, it actually offers better onscreen graphics performance. You might not be able to play the most intense 3D games on the Play store, but the Moto E can handle the more casual 2D games that are prevalent.

The new Moto E also sees its internal storage double to 8GB, the same as in the Moto G. Only 4.58GB are available to the user out of the box, but this can be expanded with a microSD card. We did find the Moto E’s internal storage a bit slow, but it did not appear to affect overall performance substantially.

Motorola’s simple and intuitive camera app powers an upgraded camera experience. There’s now a low-resolution VGA camera on the front, which is better than nothing, and the rear camera gets autofocus. It produces decent images in bright light, but the 5MP rear sensor produces dark and very noisy images in less than perfect lighting. Without an LED flash to brighten up the scene, the Moto E’s camera is essentially unusable in the evening or in romantically lit rooms.

A similar dichotomy exists for the new Moto E’s display. Size increases from 4.3-inches to 4.5-inches, but it retains the same 960x540 resolution as the first generation, reducing pixel density to 245 PPI. This gives the screen a bit of a grainy look, but the color accuracy is quite good. We were surprised to see such a well calibrated screen at this price point, especially considering how poor the screen on Motorola’s flagship Nexus 6 looks.

We did find it disappointing that the screen bends slightly even under light pressure. The problem with this is that your fingers will slide with greater friction on the screen, just enough to make it a little frustrating to use. The Moto G’s rigid cover glass makes using the touchscreen much more accurate and enjoyable. The potential upside to the Moto E’s semi-flexible screen is that it might be more resistant to cracking if dropped.

Like the screen and internal storage, the Moto E’s battery size has also been increased. The battery held out for more than eight hours of continuous use in the PCMark battery test, and we were able to get two to three days of moderate use on a single charge, significantly more than with the Moto G.

While not perfect, the Moto E 4G LTE is a solid smartphone and a good value. For $30 less than the Moto G (2nd gen), you get better performance and battery life, not to mention the Moto G is 3G-only. Sure, there are similar phones that are even cheaper, but they can’t match the polish of the Moto E 4G LTE and its overall user experience. That is why it comes Editor Recommended.

Lucian Armasu is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware, covering News. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Follow him on Twitter.

Follow Tom's Hardware on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.

Although some of Motorola's newer phones are starting to get Android 5.1, the first generation Moto G is only now getting the Lollipop OS upgrade. However, it's the older Android 5.0.2 version and not Android 5.1.

Android Lollipop was a major upgrade from KitKat, both in terms of UI and in terms of under the hood changes. Google refreshed Android's UI with the "Material Design" language and added more smooth animations to the system's operations.

There were also many architectural improvements, such as replacing the Dalvik runtime with ART (Android Runtime), which quickly compiles the applications to native code, thus improving the performance and battery life of the device. However, there are some indications that the next version of Android will receive an even bigger upgrade to the Android Runtime.

The camera API was also overhauled in order for it to communicate much faster with the camera hardware. There were several security improvements and feature additions as well, such as the Smart Lock, which pairs the phone with another Bluetooth-enabled device in order to keep it unlocked as long as the two are near each other.

The Android 5.0.2 update should appear as a notification, which you can click on and follow these instructions:

1. Select "Yes, I'm in."
2. After the software is downloaded, select "Install now."
3. After the software is installed, your phone will restart automatically.
4. Your phone is now updated.

If you haven't received the system upgrade notification yet, you can manually check for it in system Settings > About phone > System updates, and if the update is available the above instructions will apply.

If you haven't received anything yet, then it's possible Motorola is rolling out the update in stages in different countries, and your update could be arriving soon.

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Introduction

In our Nexus 6 review, we saw its Snapdragon 805 SoC deliver strong CPU and GPU performance while running the initial Android 5.0 release. Internal storage performance however, was a point of contention.

With Android Lollipop, Google announced that full disk encryption (FDE), an optional feature available since Android Honeycomb, would be enabled by default. This requirement was later revoked due to performance issues on certain classes of hardware, the Nexus 6, having shipped with FDE enabled, being a prime example.

At the conclusion of our initial performance analysis, Google released the Android 5.1 update, which includes some patches meant to address the performance impact of using FDE on the Nexus 6, in addition to changes that affect overall system performance and battery life.

In light of these changes, it's worth taking a second look at the Nexus 6, comparing performance after installing the Android 5.1 update to the initial 5.0 release.

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CPU And System Performance

Google has made a couple of changes in the 5.1 update specific to the Nexus 6 that will impact system performance. For starters, Qualcomm’s thread migration boost feature has been disabled. Prior to the update, the task scheduler would notify the Qualcomm driver whenever a thread migrated from one CPU core to another, and in an effort to increase system responsiveness, the destination core’s frequency would be boosted to the lesser of the origin core’s frequency or 1.7GHz. The boosted core would remain at the higher frequency for at least 20ms. Given the frequency with which threads migrate across cores—sometimes dozens of times per second—this feature has a nontrivial influence on performance and battery life. The similar but different feature that boosts CPU frequency briefly when a touch event is detected is still active, however.

Some of the performance loss (and battery life gain) from disabling the thread migration boost may be offset by the second big change. The Nexus 6 running Android 5.0, like all of the other devices with four or more cores we’ve tested, only kept two cores online, shutting down the other two to reduce static power drain. An updated Nexus 6 will now keep all four cores available, which eliminates the latency involved when activating cores. It should also help the OS spread system load more evenly and possibly improve responsiveness since running processes are less likely to interrupt each other.

System Performance Benchmarks

Looking at the results in the table above, we see a mixture of plusses and minuses. Most of the deltas are small, less than plus or minus 3% and within the tolerance band for these tests; Since many of these synthetic tests keep all available cores fully active, they are not affected by the changes included in the 5.1 update. Where we do see a small loss in performance are less intense CPU-centric workloads such as AndEBench Platform, Basemark OS II System, and PCMark Writing. These tests do not keep all of the cores fully tasked, and subsequently are more sensitive to the thread migration boost. Also, with all four cores active in 5.1—with one or two cores focused on the foreground app and the remaining cores handling storage I/O or processing a background task for example—there’s less thermal/power envelope to set individual cores to their max frequency. This is what happens in the PCMark Writing test, where two or more cores are generally active (there’s several small, interspersed storage reads/writes) but no single core goes above 1497MHz. Running Android 5.0, the Nexus 6 holds two cores at max frequency (2649MHz) for the duration of the test.

The Basemark OS II System test provides another example of the differences in frequency scaling. Both the Math and Multi-Core tests load all available cores at 100%, so we don’t see any difference in behavior or performance between the two different OS versions. Performance in the Single-Core test varies quite a bit when running the 5.1 update, sometimes scoring a little better and other times a little worse than the initial release. It’s the XML Parsing test where we see a significant performance drop-off when running the 5.1 update. With Android 5.0, two cores run at max frequency for the duration the test. After the update, the max frequency is achieved only sporadically, with both cores at max frequency for just a couple short bursts. The end result is less average processing power available in this particular scenario due to the changes made in 5.1.

Web Browsing Benchmarks

The update does not seem to impact JavaScript performance in our browser benchmarks.

MobileXPRT 2013

MobileXPRT 2013 shows a worst case scenario for the updated Nexus 6. All of the content related tests read and write small amounts of data to disk and don’t fully task the CPU cores. The lower scores here likely reflect the loss of thread migration and a small reduction in storage performance for certain workloads (more on this in the next section).

The user experience tests are unchanged except for Browser Scroll, which sees a significant reduction. Investigating further reveals that the Nexus 6, running either Android 5.0 or 5.1, sets the CPU frequency to a fixed 1497MHz during UI interactions such as the List Scroll, Grid Scroll, Gallery Scroll, and Zoom and Pinch tests. When running 5.0, the Nexus 6 sets the CPU frequency to a minimum of 1497MHz during the Browser Scroll test but frequently spikes to its max frequency of 2649MHz. The 5.1 update changes this behavior, with the CPU governor frequently letting the frequency drop to 300MHz during the Browser Scroll test, which accounts for the lower score.

To see if these results are valid when using a real web browser, I fired up Opera and loaded a simple page without ads (Wikipedia’s home page). I then continuously scrolled up and down while monitoring the CPU usage and frequency. The Nexus 6 running the 5.0 release locks the CPU frequency at 1728MHz with two cores active. Running 5.1, the CPU frequency is locked at 1497MHz, which is the same frequency as the Browser Scroll test and equal to the touch input boost frequency.

For comparison, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 running Android 5.0.1, which also uses a Snapdragon 805 SoC, behaves quite differently during these tests. The CPU governor allows the frequency to bounce around quite a bit during all of the user experience tests except for Browser Scroll, where the frequency is set to 1190MHz. With a lower average CPU frequency, the Note 4 performs worse than the Nexus 6 in these tests. I also performed the same basic browser scrolling test in Opera on the Note 4, and it also set the CPU frequency to 1190MHz.

These results suggest that UI responsiveness remains essentially unchanged with the OS update, with the Nexus 6 maintaining its lead over the Note 4 in this critical area. However, these benchmarks fail to capture the effect of having all four CPU cores active all the time. In the real-world, there will be several background tasks running, performing tasks like checking for new email, social media news, and app updates. It’s these uncontrolled scenarios where having the additional cores available will help balance the load and help keep these other processes from interrupting UI update threads. So while peak UI responsiveness is unchanged, or even slightly reduced, the effective responsiveness seen in normal use may be better with the 5.1 update.

Storage Performance

The specific issue vexing the latest Nexus is that the hardware encryption engine provided by its Snapdragon 805 SoC is disabled, forcing all file system encryption/decryption to be executed in software on the CPU.

In November and early December of last year, during the development of the 5.1 update, there was a series of software commits enabling and disabling the hardware based encryption engine. Ultimately, hardware encryption was disabled again for the Nexus 6 5.1 update. We asked Google about this decision, but they would not provide an answer.

Even though file encryption is still funneled through the CPU, the update should still improve storage performance. The encryption engine can now utilize NEON instructions and has additional threads at its disposal. Previously, with only two CPU cores online, the encryption driver was allocated only two threads to handle file read and write requests. The 5.1 update however, keeps all four cores active all the time, which means the encryption driver now has up to four threads to perform its work.

AndEBench Pro Storage Test

The results from the AndEBench Pro storage test show nice gains reading larger blocks of data, just over 30%. Unfortunately, reading and writing smaller blocks of data generally show a performance regression. Increasing the file size parameter does improve the numbers, causing a few negatives to flip positive, but the overall trend remains. Based on these results, it appears that disabling Qualcomm’s thread migration boost feature has a greater impact on file encryption performance than adding more threads or using NEON instructions.

What this test fails to capture, however, is the storage performance in real-world scenarios. Reading and writing to storage does not happen in isolation. Instead, the encryption driver must fight threads from the active program, background tasks, operating system, user interface, etc. for CPU time. Having all four cores active all the time means more resources are available to the system and eliminates the latency involved in bringing the other cores online. In theory at least, storage performance in these noisy scenarios should at least be more consistent with the 5.1 update.

Even with the uplift in some scenarios, the Nexus 6 running Android 5.1 still trails the Galaxy Note 4 by a significant margin. If FDE is going to be a viable option, which it needs to be, then Google needs to resolve the issues surrounding full hardware encryption.

Battery Life

The changes discussed above will also affect battery life. Disabling the thread migration boost feature should provide a net power savings. Having all four cores active means less CPU pressure, so the governor can keep individual core frequencies lower on average, again reducing dynamic CPU power. Of course keeping those extra two cores online will increase static power draw due to leakage, offsetting some of the battery life gains.

Battery Benchmarks

Battery life is generally difficult to quantify due to the huge variation in potential workloads, and becomes even more difficult when trying to assess the impact of the specific changes included in the 5.1 update. The best test we have for this is PCMark, which performs a few common tasks instead of purely synthetic loops. Here we see more than a 7% gain in battery life, which equates to a noticeable 25 minutes of runtime.

GPU And Gaming Performance

The 5.1 update brings support for OpenGL ES 3.1 to the Nexus 6, which was missing from the initial 5.0 release. Beyond this, I could not find any other changes that should affect GPU performance.

GPU Benchmarks

The 5.1 update on the Nexus 6 reduces 3DMark and Basemark X performance by up to 15%. Even though these tests primarily stress the GPU, the CPU still plays a supporting role. To understand this better, we logged CPU and GPU frequency while running Basemark X.

As expected, the GPU runs at its max frequency of 600MHz during each test segment regardless of OS version. With the initial Android 5.0 build, the Nexus 6 keeps two cores offline and the other two above the 1497MHz threshold most of the time and at least one core at max frequency fairly often. CPU behavior with the 5.1 update looks very different. No single core runs at max frequency for very long, with cores taking turns jumping from 300MHz to 2649MHz and back down again. There’s also several gaps where all four cores are sitting at 300MHz. Looking at the raw data also shows that only one or two CPU cores are above idle at any given time, so having all four cores online does not provide any performance advantage in this particular benchmark.

Things aren’t all bad, however, as we see small performance improvements in the GFXBench Manhattan, T-Rex, and Alpha Blending tests, indicating that some games will see an uptick in performance.

Conclusion

The Android 5.1 update brings several improvements to the Nexus 6, including a number of bug fixes and UI refinements. It also enables OpenGL ES 3.1 support and the Qualcomm VP8 hardware video decoder. Unfortunately, it does not enable hardware based storage encryption or fix optical image stabilization for the rear camera. There’s also no improvement in display calibration.

The other Nexus 6 specific changes are a mixed bag. Utilizing NEON instructions for the encryption engine does speed up data reads for larger block sizes, but seems to hurt performance when reading and writing smaller data blocks. Disabling Qualcomm’s thread migration boost feature reduces performance by up to 20% in specific workloads where the CPU cores aren’t fully utilized. However, this did contribute to a noticeable gain in the PCMark battery life test.

The final big change in the 5.1 update for the Nexus 6, keeping all four cores online all the time, is harder to evaluate. Typically, our phones perform a number of tasks in the background keeping us updated on events happening in the world. With only two cores generally available, which was the case when running the initial 5.0 build, these tasks could interrupt the foreground app or UI interaction, producing a noticeable lag and hurting the user experience. Having more cores available to service these background tasks should improve responsiveness. The downside is that static power drain is increased, reducing the battery life gained from disabling the thread migration boost, and the thermal/power envelope is decreased, which can keep cores from reaching max frequency and reducing performance.

In the end, the performance penalty seen in specific cases is not enough to outweigh the benefits from the 5.1 update. It’s important to have realistic expectations though. I don’t expect these changes to be permanent, but rather stepping stones on a path to a more efficient CPU governor.

Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Follow him on Twitter.

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The Bigger The Better?

A “nexus” is a point (or series of points) that links multiple things. It’s a great name for a smartphone line, alluding to this one device linking you to, well, anything you like. In that regard, little has changed in the five years that Google has been cranking out Nexus designs through its OEM partners. The design intent that started with HTC, progressed through Samsung and LG, and now lands on Motorola remains consistent: create the best device to showcase Android's latest features. Whether any of the six models to date have, in fact, been the best remains open for debate, but there’s no getting around the fact that the Nexus 6 is a fine bit of pocket paraphernalia.

Of course, the Nexus 6 now forces us to ask: will it fit in your pocket? The Nexus One measured 119.0 x 59.8mm, while the Nexus 6 stretches to 159.3 x 83.0mm—a footprint increase of over 85 percent. On a hip holster, this is starting to look less like a communication device and more like body armor. Are we complaining? Yes and no.

Remember when, once upon a time, back in the RAZRlithic Epoch, the drive was on to make phones as small as possible? Some prototypes in Asia were little more than two credit cards hinged together. We liked that. Small tech fades more easily into the background, leaving people free to be plain old humans in the foreground. That’s old school. It also reflects a time when voice communication was the killer app for phones.

The introduction of touchscreens, along with higher data rates and faster processors, reversed this trend. Today, large screens are the norm, and the Nexus 6 is no exception, pushing the brand into phablet territory, a class of device that sits at the, well, nexus of phone and tablet. People want the form factor convenience of a phone but the larger screen benefits of a tablet. More glass is better for consuming entertainment, reading everything from websites to Kindle ebooks and being more productive with apps thanks to greater visibility of data and (in some cases) having the ability to incorporate stylus-written input. Consider the resolution evolution in the Nexus line. The Nexus One gave us 480x800 at 254 ppi and the Nexus 6 delivers 1440x2560 at 493 ppi. That’s a lot more data on the screen displayed with much finer detail. Even small text and graphics remain sharp and viewable.

Back when we reviewed the LG G3, we wondered if it would become the basis for the Nexus 6. While the two certainly compete for that same premium end of the phone market, Google instead opted to let Motorola craft the Nexus 6 as a super-sized Moto X. You get the same build quality and svelte, curved back, but designers dispensed with the funky back panel substances and instead one-upped each of the phone’s critical components.

Technical Specifications

Internal hardware is similar to the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. Both are powered by a Snapdragon 805 SoC with 3GB of RAM, have at least 32GB of internal storage and support 802.11ac MIMO Wi-Fi and Cat. 4 LTE. The 805 should deliver excellent performance. However, 64-bit support is one of the new features in Android 5.0, so it's unfortunate that a 64-bit CPU didn't materialize in time to allow the Nexus 6 to be Android's 64-bit launch vehicle.

There’s not much Motorola could do with the Nexus 6’s power source while still keeping size and weight down. Nevertheless, the phone does feature a 3220 mAh battery. This compares favorably to the LG G3’s and G Flex 2's 3000 mAh batteries and matches the unit in the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. While it does support Qi wireless recharging, the Nexus 6’s battery is not removable, a shortcoming not shared by the G3 or Note 4.

The Nexus 6's rear camera uses a Sony IMX 214 13MP sensor (the same as the OnePlus One), which is a nice bump in pixel count compared to the Nexus 5. The updated sensor uses smaller pixels, however, reducing the amount of light received per pixel and hurting low-light performance. The Nexus 6 does move to a f/2.0 aperture, which lets in more light, and adds optical image stabilization (OIS), both of which could offset the smaller pixel penalty. The front camera also receives a small increase in pixels, but is still a fairly standard 2MP.

Cellular

There are two different models of the Nexus 6: one for the North American market and one for everywhere else. The only differences between them are the baseband processor and frequency band support, with each model catering to regional differences. All of the major American carriers are supported by the XT1103 model, including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon.

Qualcomm's MDM9x25M baseband is at the center of the Nexus 6's RF solution, a third-generation Category 4 LTE modem offering 150 Mb/s down and 50 Mb/s up with carrier aggregation. It also supports HSPA+ Release 10 for 84 Mb/s down using dual-carrier HSDPA. Both basebands are built on a 28nm HPm process. The MDM9625M incorporates all major radio modes, including GSM/EDGE, UMTS (WCDMA, TD-SCDMA), LTE (LTE-FDD, LTE-TDD) and CDMA2000. The only difference between it and the MDM9225M in the international model is that the MDM9225M drops support for CDMA2000.

The basebands are paired with Qualcomm's WTR1625L transceiver and WFR1620 receive-only transceiver. Both chips are necessary in order to bond two 10MHz channels and reach full Category 4 LTE speeds, a requirement when carriers don't have 20MHz LTE channels.

The RF front-end employs Qualcomm's QFE1100 envelope tracker, which dynamically adjusts voltage to the power amplifiers, wasting less energy and reducing heat generation. However, the Nexus 6 does not employ the other components in Qualcomm's RF360 suite.

Options

The Nexus 6 comes with either 32 or 64GB of internal storage, but lacks support for removable microSD cards, limiting max storage space and flexibility.

The only other option besides storage size is color: Midnight Blue or Cloud White.

Past Nexus devices were an attractive buy, offering mostly flagship-level hardware at mid-range prices. The Nexus 6 however, is flagship all the way, with retail prices of $650 (32GB) or $700 (64GB). With its value proposition gone, the Nexus 6 needs to compete with other flagships based on features and user experience alone.

We head into this review of the Nexus 6 with hopes as large as the phone itself. Let’s see if it is, in fact, the point that connects all things digital here in the first part of 2015.

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Update [18:03 4/17/2015]: Corrected pricing info.

Hardware Design

The Nexus 6 inherits design elements from Motorola's Moto X and is a well-made device, congruous with its premium price. Its perimeter is framed in aluminum and the inner support frames for the mainboard and screen are plastic. This combination gives it a rigid feel, eliminating the creak and flex of some all-plastic designs, and keeping weight under control, both extremely important for a large six-inch phone.

The front is all glossy black with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 from edge-to-edge. Motorola smartly keeps all buttons on-screen rather than extending the lower bezel with physical buttons. The company also confines its branding to the back of the device, which we appreciate considerably.

Those slim bezels give the Nexus 6 a 74.1% screen-to-body ratio, almost matching the LG G3’s 76.4%. If there’s wasted space on the Nexus 6, we couldn’t guess as to where it might be. The screen is this Nexus' biggest hardware feature (pun intended), and Motorola's design does well to emphasize it.

That large 5.96-inch display is flanked top and bottom by stereo front-facing speakers. This is definitely a feature we appreciate, especially since larger phones like this are great for watching video. The front camera is to the right of the upper speaker, with a couple of sensors discreetly placed below the cover glass to the left. Hidden behind the speaker grille is a non-functional LED light. If you don't mind rooting your phone and want to enable this little gem for notifications, here are some instructions.

The plastic back is glued into place and has a smooth, non-glossy finish. There's a gentle curve, but this is probably to accommodate the thickness of the rear camera module rather than for ergonomics. Due to its width, holding this phone in one hand means you end up using your fingertips to press the lower corner into your palm, and the back of the phone never really touches the rest of your hand. The curvature isn't that noticeable when holding it with two hands.

Surrounding the rear camera, which is centered near the top edge, is a clear ring. Dual LEDs live inside this ring on either side of the lens creating a flash ring of sorts, which is pretty cool. I initially thought there was a small chip in the edge of the ring, but apparently this is where the noise-canceling microphone is located.

Below the rear camera is a shallow divot the same diameter as the camera flash ring and adorned by Motorola’s logo. The recessed, lower-case “nexus” branding carries over from the Nexus 5, but now with silver-colored inserts. The landscape orientation of this identifier makes more sense on the Nexus 6, since it will see significant two-handed use.

Interestingly, this reviewer’s sample arrived from the Tom’s Hardware labs with noticeable scuffing on two corners and the straight line of the “u” in “nexus” missing. This may not bode well for long-term cosmetic endurance.

A microUSB port and some faint FCC markings are on the slightly-tapered bottom edge.

Just above center on the right side is the volume rocker and power button. This is our preferred button layout for phablets, since it simultaneously places them within easy reach and prevents inadvertently squeezing the power button when changing the volume, which can happen when they're placed on opposite sides. Button presses are fairly shallow and soft; it would be nice to have a more definitive "click", but we're nitpicking here. A lined texture on the power button differentiates it from the volume controls below.

The top edge is tapered like the bottom, with some of the aluminum edge spilling over onto the back. The headphone jack sits in the center with the SIM tray alongside to keep it company.

With the physical description complete, let's talk size—the elephablet in the room, if you will. At 159.3 x 83.0 x 10.1mm and 184g, the Nexus 6 is a beast. I made the mistake of stashing it in a sweat-jacket pocket, and it jiggled right out all on its own during a walk. Back pocket? No way, it’s too long and rigid, making it dangerous to sit on. Front shirt pocket? Won’t fit. So where do you put it? We have no idea. Maybe one of those leather billfolds with a stylus and slots for your credit cards, but then you’re still stuck carrying it around and forgetting it on tabletops everywhere you go. A purse or briefcase would work, or maybe one of those cool packs you wear around your waist—a fanny pack I think they're called.

Despite its larger screen, the Nexus 6 isn't much taller than the iPhone 6 Plus thanks to its smaller bezels. However, height isn't the real issue. Width is. This author wears a men’s XL glove size, and I found one-handed operation continuously annoying. Yes, you can operate the Nexus 6 with one hand so long as you keep the pad of your index finger nestled in the little divot on the phone’s back. It’s a stretch. Your thumb won’t cover the whole screen unless you’re freakishly flexible. But Google’s new Android 5.0 OS anticipates this and gives you the chance here and there to double-swipe and essentially drag the feature you want down to your thumb. The device’s center of gravity leaves the majority of its weight on your index finger, where you’re strongest, but still distributes well over the remaining three fingers, especially when you nestle its lower-right corner just above the heel of your palm. It’s a more stable arrangement than you’d think, but I never grew comfortable with it. You know how it’s possible but awkward to cradle a notebook in one arm and type with the other hand? It’s stable, and for short bursts, it’s not too annoying, but you’d never want to work that way for more than a minute or two. Inevitably, I ended up switching to two-handed use for anything requiring more than a quick glance. You’re fine using one hand to check for new emails, but you’ll want two hands to actually interact with them.

Don’t let these quibbles give the impression that we didn’t like the Nexus 6. If you accept the baggage that goes with its physical dimensions—and you should if you’re going to own it—then it remains handsome and effective.

Display And Audio Performance

If you’ve spent enough time with hardware, you know that some specs matter, and some specs, carried to the extreme, cease to matter. Smartphone resolution is definitely nearing this limit. No one would accuse the iPhone 6 Plus’ HD screen of being a slouch, yet it offers “only” a 401 ppi density. The Nexus 6 however, packs in 493 ppi, which falls just shy of 534 ppi on the LG G3. You know how much difference we saw when viewed at a one-foot distance from screen to eye? None. Nada. Stare as long and hard as you like, but your naked eyes are not going to perceive any difference in pixel size or density unless you get really, really close. Every advance in resolution and pixel density gets us that much closer down the asymptote of diminishing benefits.

As the Nexus 6's biggest hardware feature, the 5.96-inch AMOLED display will largely set the user experience, and is probably the reason why someone would be interested in buying it in the first place. With its 2560x1440 resolution, images and text are crisp, which is expected. However, with all flagships, and even most mid-range phones, coming with "retina" displays, color accuracy has become the new quality differentiator. Google's last generation of Nexus devices placed heavy emphasis on display calibration and achieved good results. And so we begin our analysis of the Nexus 6 with high hopes.

In an effort to improve our mobile reviews, we are now using SpectraCal's CalMAN software and SpectraCal C6 colorimeter for display measurements. Not only does this bring improved accuracy and repeatability, but it also adds color accuracy measurements, which our previous reviews were sorely lacking. All of the charts below with a gray background were generated in CalMAN v5 Ultimate.

We are now reporting two different brightness levels for AMOLED displays: APL=50% and APL=100% (APL stands for Average Picture Level). If you are unfamiliar with APL, here is a good article explaining what it means. Basically, the brightness of an AMOLED display changes depending on what content is actually being displayed. The APL values we chose to measure provide a good upper and lower bound for what's practically achievable.

At an APL of 100%, the Nexus 6 falls well below 300 nits, which certainly isn't good and will definitely impair outdoor viewing. With an APL of 50%, peak brightness increases to about 387 nits, which is comparable to what other flagship phones using LCD displays achieve. In actual use, as long as we were not viewing a mostly white screen, we found it bright enough for easy reading outdoors in overcast conditions. Under a sunny sky, there’s no getting around that white screen looking gray. But when we angled the phone away a bit, we were surprised by how much detail and contrast remained, even when viewing slender fonts on a dark background. All things considered, the Nexus 6 holds up fairly well outdoors.

Black levels are truly black, only a few shades off from the bezel itself, since the display pixels actually turn off. This makes the contrast ratio mathematically infinite.

Most displays achieve an average gamma close to the ideal value of 2.2, with the iPhone 6 Plus coming the closest. The gamma curve for the Nexus 6 falls below the ideal value, dipping to under 1.9 at an 80% gray level, leading to a minor loss of shadow detail (shadows and highlights will appear brighter than intended).

Most mobile devices have cooler color temperatures above 7000K. The Nexus 6 display follows this trend, though not to the same degree. Color temperature also remains constant for the different gray levels. While the screen skews slightly blue, it's not enough to be noticeable.

The RGB balance at each gray level shows a slight preference for blue at all levels, increasing as the screen approaches white (100), consistent with the color temperature results.

While it doesn't match the Note 4's stellar performance, the Nexus 6 still does well in grayscale accuracy, easily beating the iPhone 6 Plus. Looking at the ΔE2000 chart, we see that error at each gray level remains below the yellow line, which is noticeable but generally considered acceptable. Error values below three (the green line) are considered good, and values below one are essentially imperceptible.

Here's where the Nexus 6 display falls apart. The content you're going to view on a mobile display is targeted to the sRGB color space. Even if the content includes an embedded profile for AdobeRGB or another color space with a wider gamut, Android and iOS don't support color management. Thus, there's no reason for a mobile display to exceed sRGB—at least for now.

The Nexus 6 covers 125% of the sRGB color space. Unlike the Note 4, which also uses an AMOLED screen with wide-gamut support, the Nexus 6 does not include an sRGB screen mode. This means that colors are mapped into the larger color space and don't render as intended, producing overly vivid, neon-like colors. Everything from icons to photos to webpages look horribly wrong. Some people may like the effect, but others will find the eye-searing colors to be distracting, basically ruining the phone's best hardware feature.

The color saturation sweep shows some color compression (unequal spacing between points). It's not as severe as what we saw with the LG G3 prior to the Lollipop update, and it’s mostly overshadowed by the gamut issue.

Based on the discussion above it should come as no surprise that the Nexus 6 does poorly in the color accuracy test. Grayscale accuracy again is decent, but almost every color tested shows an error above five, with a peak error of 20.75 for 100% red. This is really unacceptable for a flagship device. I find it puzzling why Google/Motorola does not calibrate the screen for the Nexus 6, but does perform a screen calibration for the $150 Moto E (2015).

The color palette above shows the target color on the bottom versus the color displayed by the Nexus 6 on top. You can see the effect of the wider gamut, and what I mean by neon colors, by looking at the 100% colors in the upper-right corner. There's also a pretty big difference in the displayed Dark Skin and Light Skin colors, which manifests in unnatural looking skin tones in photos and video.

At least viewing angles are good. You’ve got to crank the phone quite a bit to the left or right to get image colors to skew, making it easier to display content to groups.

Overall, the display on the Nexus 6 is disappointing. It's unfortunate that there wasn't any attempt to calibrate the screen, because the hardware is fine. Color perception is a tricky thing however, and people's preferences vary. One reviewer liked how the colors had more "pop", while another thought they looked ridiculous and ruined the experience of looking at photos or video.

Audio Performance

Far and away, one of our favorite Nexus 6 features is its audio. No doubt, you’re familiar with the usual mono speaker fare offered by most phones. There are a few exceptions, but most models fire their speaker to the rear, which might be easier to implement, but it’s the opposite of what users actually want. Do you mount speakers on the back of your monitor? Of course not. Phablets are supposed to be, among many other things, media devices. So it only makes sense that they should have stereo front-firing speakers.

Sony’s Xperia Z3 is one of the few examples in this space of a product that does front-firing right. The Nexus 6 adds one more to the list. The Nexus 6 does give a noticeable amount more volume than a conventional phone (it gets seriously loud), which really pays off when you’re in a car battling road noise or need to hear it from across the room. Music tends to get tinnier at max volume, but the sound is cleaner and fuller overall because the speakers are generally aimed at your ears. Try it and you’ll appreciate the psychoacoustic effect of finally having discernible stereo channels in your palm. The Nexus 6 doesn’t quite match something like HTC’s BoomSound, as found on the Nexus 9, but it’s close. The mid-range is a little anemic with male vocals sounding distant. Cymbals also don't sound as crisp as they should. Adjusting the equalizer definitely seems to help the external speakers, but curiously it boosts overall volume too, not just the frequency band you're adjusting.

Powering this audio experience is the NXP TFA9890A, which includes a class-D audio amplifier rated at 3.6W RMS output with a 3.6V input and driving an eight-ohm load at THD+N=1%. It can also deliver up to 7.2W peak output under the same conditions. To keep things under control, it employs sensors to track the temperature and voice coil excursion of the speakers and tailors its output to reduce the risk of damaging them.

Plugging in a nice set of headphones into the Nexus 6 is also a treat. It's one of the best-sounding phones we've listened to, right up there with the iPhone 6 and Sony Xperia Z3.

Update [13:35 4/18/2015]: Updated sRGB color gamut charts with measurements from C6 colorimeter.

Camera Hardware And Software

The iPhone seems to get most of the smartphone camera accolades, while the Nexus line of phones have been closer to the other end of the spectrum. Both of these positions are shifting, however. The Nexus 6 isn’t going to set Canon or Nikon on edge, but it doesn’t suck like most of its predecessors. It is, by and large, OK.

The Nexus 6’s rear-facing camera boasts 13MP with a dual-LED flash and optical image stabilization (OIS). The front-facing camera is 2MP. While these are good specs, they’re by no means trailblazing in a field where you have Nokia's Lumia models running around with 20MP and even, in the case of the Lumia 1020, 41MP cameras. But if you know digital photography, you know that the megapixel number is not the only thing that matters. The size of the light wells in the sensor array and the aperture of the lens are also extremely important. Adding megapixels is stupid if all it means is reducing cell size and suffering with lifeless, noisy images.

Motorola uses Sony’s IMX214 CMOS sensor and pairs it with an f/2.0 aperture lens to let in more light and improve imaging in lower-light conditions. OIS also helps improve low-light performance by allowing the shutter to remain open longer, reducing blur caused by normal hand tremors. If nothing else, the sensor and lens changes are a big improvement over the 8MP camera in last year’s Nexus 5.

Most of Lollipop’s benefits are buried behind the scenes, including improved security and support for higher-performance graphics. Occasionally, these advances come to the fore. One example is the revamped Camera2 API. Lollipop’s native Camera app does provide some nifty HDR, panorama and exposure control. But the API also allows for more advanced controls in RAW capture, flash control and other features that software developers can leverage.

If you’re content to run with Google Camera (also available for other Android devices from the Play Store), you’ll find a simple interface. On top of the live preview (which accurately reflects what the 4:3 aspect ratio image sensor will capture), there is only a shutter button and an ellipsis located in the corner. Tapping this brings up icons for the timer, grid overlay, HDR, flash and front/rear camera flip in a bar along the edge or bottom of the display depending upon orientation. For more, swipe from the screen’s left edge. This menu provides access to Photo Sphere (a 360-degree image capture tool), Panorama, Lens Blur and toggling between camera or video mode.

Tapping the gear icon brings up a settings screen for changing image and video resolution and quality. There's also a toggle for geo-tagging and an “advanced mode,” which only serves to unlock the -2, -1, 0, 1, 2 exposure control and nothing more.

Video

The Snapdragon 805 in the Nexus 6 is capable of encoding and decoding up to 4K UHD H.264 video in hardware, which brings better performance and lower power consumption. It's also capable of decoding 4K UHD H.265 video in hardware. Since H.265 encoding is still done in software, video recording on the Nexus 6 opts for the more sensible H.264 option.

Rear Camera Video Modes

Front Camera Video Modes

The Nexus 6 records 4K video at 42 Mb/s, which is higher than the LG G3's 30 Mb/s bit rate but lower than both the Samsung Galaxy S5's and OnePlus One's 57 Mb/s average bit rate. At 1080p, the Nexus 6 records at 17 Mb/s, the same bit rate as the Galaxy S5 but less than the 20 Mb/s of the G3 or OnePlus One. This results in video that's good but not great. White balance, and thus color reproduction, is accurate and fine detail is captured nicely. Some noise does creep into the video when shooting indoors or in lower light, but at least there are no weird, blurry artifacts from heavy-handed noise reduction algorithms.

Poor autofocus performance hurts video quality more than anything else. The camera will only refocus when it's not moving, which makes for blurry transitions as it moves from one object of interest to the next. When the autofocus is finally triggered, it zooms way out and then back in. This occurs slow enough (around one second) that it becomes distracting. Shooting outdoors in bright light minimizes this undesired effect, but does not completely eliminate it. Fortunately, video from the front-facing camera is free of this problem.

Other than 4K video support, shooting video on the Nexus 6 is a no-frills affair. It doesn't support HD video at 60 fps at any resolution, so action scenes aren't as smooth as they could be. Slow-motion video is not an option either.

Camera Performance And Photo Quality

Noisy low-light pictures are a problem for the OnePlus One, which uses the same image sensor and f/2.0 aperture as the Nexus 6. Will the addition of OIS improve the Nexus 6's low-light performance?

All images were taken using the Auto mode unless noted. Also, you can view the full-sized image for each photo by clicking the text links below the images that are within a slideshow album.

Outdoors

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: outdoor daylight], [iPhone 6 Plus: outdoor daylight], [LG G3: outdoor daylight], [Galaxy S5: outdoor daylight], [Nexus 6: flower stand], [iPhone 6 Plus: flower stand], [LG G3: flower stand], [Galaxy S5: flower stand]

In the first series of images, both the LG G3 and Galaxy S5 hold the shutter open a little longer and produce images that are slightly overexposed. The Nexus 6 does better with its exposure, but the color balance is too cool. The reddish paver bricks on the ground and the green leaves look washed out and the concrete is too gray, not reflecting any hint of yellow from the afternoon sun. All three higher-megapixel sensors deliver better detail than the iPhone 6 Plus, which is easily seen by examining the buildings in the background.

The Nexus 6 does a nice job handling the partly shaded flower stand; both exposure and white balance are set well. In fact, it's the only phone that doesn't overexpose the white roses on the back-left side, clearly displaying the $12 price sign, which gets lost in a white glow in the other images.

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: outdoor night Yoda], [iPhone 6 Plus: outdoor night Yoda], [LG G3: outdoor night Yoda], [Galaxy S5: outdoor night Yoda], [Nexus 6: outdoor night building], [iPhone 6 Plus: outdoor night building], [LG G3: outdoor night building], [Galaxy S5: outdoor night building]

I found this homage to Yoda on my last trip to Coruscant. Compared to the iPhone 6 Plus, the Nexus 6 shows significantly more noise and the same shift to cooler colors as before. It's missing the yellow tint on the streetlights and yellow writing on the heart. Greens are also undersaturated, although the iPhone seems to emphasize green a bit too much.

The G3 and Galaxy S5 both have long exposure modes that auto engage in low-light conditions, and neither report Exif data in this mode. Both phones produce much brighter images, but are susceptible to motion blur. This is apparent in the G3 image, where we see ghosted pedestrians and blurry leaves. The S5's long exposure mode performs much better, arguably producing the best image of the group.

The iPhone 6 Plus effectively leverages its OIS by leaving the shutter open three times longer than the Nexus 6, allowing it to keep ISO, and thus noise, low. With a faster shutter speed, the Nexus 6 needs to drive ISO to almost 1200 to achieve about the same light sensitivity. These shutter speed and ISO values are what I would expect from a camera that does not have OIS. It's almost like the Nexus 6 is not using OIS at all here.

In the second set of low-light pictures, the Nexus 6 does well with exposure and has excellent color. The iPhone, in contrast, is too yellow, while the G3 is overexposed. Again we see the Galaxy S5's long exposure mode outperform the G3, producing a nicely lit building with only a little too much glow from light sources.

Once again we see the iPhone hold its shutter open three times longer than the Nexus 6 and with a significantly lower ISO too. OIS seems to be MIA on the Nexus 6.

HDR

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: HDR off], [Nexus 6: HDR on], [LG G3: HDR off], [LG G3: HDR on], [Galaxy S5: HDR off], [Galaxy S5: HDR on]

HDR mode on the Galaxy S5 is extremely impressive, basically eliminating the heavy shadows without overexposing the much lighter overcast sky. The Nexus 6's HDR mode is not nearly as effective. It does reduce shadowing, but the image still looks rather dark and dreary, similar to the G3.

Indoors

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: indoor bright], [iPhone 6 Plus: indoor bright], [LG G3: indoor bright], [Galaxy S5: indoor bright]

In this well-lit indoor shot, the Nexus 6 image has a slight purple tint. There's little noise, but the image is a bit blurry overall. It's difficult to tell if this is due to the noise reduction algorithm or if it's just a little out of focus. Both the G3 and S5 have noticeably more noise than the Nexus 6. We've noticed that the S5 struggles with noise in lower-light shots that are not dark enough to engage its long exposure mode.

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: indoor dark], [iPhone 6 Plus: indoor dark], [LG G3: indoor dark], [Galaxy S5: indoor dark]

The Nexus 6 does not handle this dimly lit hallway well. It produces the darkest image of the group and its colors again appear too cool. This scene is dark enough that both the G3 and S5 engage their long exposure modes, which produce much brighter images.

Again we see the iPhone hold its shutter open three times longer than the Nexus 6 and achieve a much lower ISO setting. This results in less noise creeping into the iPhone image. I took several other low-light images (some of which can be seen below) and they all followed this trend. Either OIS is completely disabled on the Nexus 6, or the camera software has not been tuned to use it.

Additional Sample Images

Full Size Images: [Nexus 6: construction], [Nexus 6: flowers], [Nexus 6: building], [Nexus 6: toys], [Nexus 6: building at night], [Nexus 6: stairs]

Software

If you haven’t already, you might want to take a minute to review our introduction to Android 5.0 (Lollipop). There’s something in its flat, bold approach (dubbed Material Design) that’s reminiscent of Microsoft’s Metro, but with more of an emphasis on the simplicity of white backgrounds and empty space, used to guide the eye into key bits of prioritized information. The idea is to make navigation intuitive so users can get more done. This is highlighted in how notifications are displayed, prioritized and even made interactive right from the lockscreen. Honestly, one of our favorite improvements is the square icon in the bottom-right of the UI, which cascades all of the open app windows a la the Aero Flip 3D function in Windows. The addition of a guest mode, so that others can’t fiddle with your apps and data, is another welcome change.

If you’ve gotten used to some of the auto-active knickknacks of other devices, you might be a little put off by the Nexus 6’s Spartan approach. Whereas the Samsung Galaxy phones offer features like face detection, gesture control and an “air view” that shows contextually helpful info when you hover a finger over the screen, the Nexus 6 has none of that. The phone does support voice input and text-to-speech output, but not Motorola's Moto Voice. The Nexus 6 also does not get those nifty next-gen sensory features provided by Moto Actions.

What the Nexus 6 does get is a new capability called Ambient Display, which is similar to Moto Display. This feature displays the clock or notifications, if available, on the lockscreen in white on black and utilizes the AMOLED screen's ability to only light up necessary pixels, thus saving power. Tapping on a notification turns on the full-color screen and you can then interact with the messages as normal. Otherwise, the screen turns off again after awhile and turns on briefly when the phone is picked up. If you don't find this to be useful, it can be turned off in the display section within Settings.

We did find Google Fit on our Nexus 6. Fit is the company's answer to Samsung’s S Health, Fitbit’s eponymous activity tracker, iOS’s Health app and the dozens of similar apps in this field. Fit synchronizes with both Android Wear devices and the phone’s internal sensor reports such as pedometer counts. Fit is not a great fitness app, but it’s better than nothing if you want to use your phone as a fitness tracker and also want a cloud-based desktop version to sync with the phone app. It provides goal versus actual graph reporting and provides recommendations based on past performance.

The other standout inclusion on our plain Nexus 6 was Google Wallet. In a nutshell, Wallet is Google’s attempt to take on PayPal, plus a bit more. A Wallet account can act as an umbrella for your debit, credit, gift and loyalty cards. To checkout at an NFC-enabled register, you can use an NFC-enabled phone like the Nexus 6 to replace an old school card swipe. Also, as with PayPal, you can use Wallet to send money to people. Secondary functions in Wallet make it easy to review your purchasing history with the app and track purchase shipments.

Apple has its easy-to-use Touch ID fingerprint scanner, but Lollipop adds some convenient security options too. Google's Smart Locks feature lets you do the usual PIN entry for unlocking the phone, but if you happen to be near a Bluetooth device, such as a speaker or fitness band marked as trusted, the phone will automatically unlock. This way, you only have to enter a PIN when you’re away from your stuff. Slick, right? Smart Locks also incorporates Face Unlock, which uses facial recognition as a security mechanism and adds an option for creating trusted places. Using GPS, the device recognizes when it reaches a trusted place, like your home or office, and automatically unlocks.

Unfortunately, the Nexus 6 lacks any software features that take advantage of its large display or make it easier to use. Samsung's Galaxy Note series has S Pen for taking notes and drawing on its expansive screen. It also has Multi Window Mode, which allows multiple resizable and repositionable apps to share the screen, a feature also present on LG's G3. Another missing feature is any kind of one-handed mode for shrinking or moving screen elements so they can be accessed while holding the phone with one hand. Without this, using the Nexus 6 is almost strictly a two-handed affair.

There are still benefits to having such a large screen. Content is easier to see and more of it can fit on the screen at once. Still, we can't help but feel like something is missing from this phablet experience.

CPU And System Performance

In this section, we evaluate system-level performance by running a series of synthetic and real-world workloads, along with some browser-based Web tests. There are several facets to overall device performance, including single- and multi-threaded CPU performance, memory and storage speed, and GPU rendering, all of which will be probed by our suite of benchmarks. If you're interested in learning more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device system performance.

The Nexus 6 and Galaxy Note 4 both use Qualcomm's Snapdragon 805 SoC, with four Krait 450 CPU cores running at up to 2.65GHz. There's also an Adreno 420 GPU on-board paired with two 64-bit channels of LPDDR3-800 RAM for a total of 25.6 GB/s of throughput (the same peak bandwidth offered by the newer Snapdragon 810 and Exynos 7420 with LPDDR4 RAM). Based on hardware specs alone, the two phones should perform similarly. Differences in software or elsewhere in the design could upset this equilibrium, however.

For the overall score in Basemark OS II (the number shown in black on the far left), we do see nearly equal performance between the Nexus 6 and Note 4. The Web test is basically the same, but the Nexus 6 holds a 24% advantage in the single- and multi-threaded CPU System test. Positions flip in the Graphics GPU test, where the Note 4 outscores the Nexus 6 by 18%.

The Memory test, which is meant to measure the speed of the internal NAND storage, has morphed into a RAM test. In order to ensure the benchmark would work across a wide range of devices, the dataset had to be kept small. However, in higher-end devices the operating system uses a RAM cache as a buffer to speed up reads and writes to internal storage. For modern flagships like the Nexus 6, this memory cache is large enough to hold the benchmark dataset and it never actually hits the NAND. Therefore, the Memory test represents the speed of the memory cache rather than NAND, and it's why the results do not agree with those from the AndEBench Storage test below.

In the CPU-centric CoreMark-HPC test, we see the Nexus 6 pull ahead of the Note 4 again, albeit by a slimmer 12% margin. We also see the Note 4 post a higher 3D graphics score, with a similar 16% margin.

Internal storage performance is where the Nexus 6 really falters. Overall, it's 2.4x slower than the internal NAND in the Note 4. The table below shows the breakdown of the storage test.

AndEBench Pro Storage Test

*First letter: S=sequential, R=random
**Second letter: R=read, W=write
***Values in KB/s - Higher is better

For the numbers in the table, the Note 4 was running Android 5.0.1 (update arrived after these charts were made), although the scores did not change significantly compared to KitKat. Write performance for the Nexus 6 running the original Android 5.0 build hovers around one-half that for the Note 4, while read performance takes an even larger 3.5-4.5x hit. After we completed all of our charts (of course), the Android 5.1 update for the Nexus 6 appeared, which is supposed to improve storage performance. Overall, we do see some modest gains for reads (now only 2.5-3.1x slower than the Note 4) and a couple of regressions for writes. The read values did fluctuate a bit more than usual, with the 256KB reads ranging from 18761-38985 KB/s. The relatively small differences in CPU and GPU speed shown above should not be noticeable in everyday use, but the Nexus 6's reduced storage performance definitely impacts app load times.

The cause for the low storage performance is Android's Full Disk Encryption (FDE), which has been an option since Honeycomb. This is no longer an option for the Nexus 6 however, since it's enabled by default. The snag is that the Nexus 6 performs the file encryption/decryption on the CPU rather than dedicated hardware, which hurts performance and battery life. At least your files remain secure if the device is lost or stolen.

The Nexus 6's CPU performance advantage over the Note 4 disappears in Geekbench 3. Whatever small difference there is, its origin is elusive. There does not seem to be a clear pattern between benchmarks, whether they are single- or multi-core, integer or floating-point, or stress cache or memory bandwidth.

It's also interesting to see the older Snapdragon 800, running four Krait 400 CPU cores at 2.26GHz, perform nearly as well as the 2.65GHz Krait 450 cores. In the Single-Core test, the Snapdragon 805 is only 9% faster for integer operations and 4% faster for floating-point. Krait 450's 17% clock rate advantage doesn't translate into much higher performance.

PCMark is a new addition to our benchmark suite, which is why we have limited data for comparison. Unlike our other tests, PCMark is based on real-world use cases rather than being purely synthetic or algorithmic.

Here we see little variation in terms of the total score; the Nexus 6 only scores 14% higher than the LG G3. Looking at the individual workloads shows more variation. The Nexus 6 performs well on the Writing test, but falls behind on the Video Playback test.

We see similar performance between the Nexus 6 and Note 4 across our browser-based tests. The Nexus 6 manages a meager 15% improvement over the Nexus 5, basically reflecting the clock rate difference between the two.

In terms of CPU and system performance, the Nexus 6 does not offer much more than the Nexus 5. Its small gains will be hard to notice in everyday use. What will be noticeable, is the lower internal storage performance due to FDE. Informal testing relative to the Note 4 showed apps launching anywhere from under a second to several seconds slower on the Nexus 6.

GPU And Gaming Performance

Mobile GPU performance is becoming increasingly important as people begin to see their phones and tablets as portable gaming machines. This section explores GPU performance with several synthetic and real-world game engine tests. To learn more about how these benchmarks work, what versions we use, or our testing methodology, please read our article about how we test mobile device GPU performance.

The Nexus 6 does well with Ice Storm Unlimited, posting both the highest Graphics (GPU) and Physics (CPU) scores. Despite using the same Adreno 420 GPU as the Note 4, the Nexus 6 easily outperforms it on the Graphics test. The reason is simple: thermal throttling. Throughout testing, the Note 4 consistently showed a tendency to overheat and throttle back the GPU pretty quickly.

Adreno 420 shows off its gaming prowess by improving upon the Nexus 5's Adreno 330 GPU score by 52%. The Physics score sees a 41% improvement over the previous generation, helped along by the Nexus 6's superior memory bandwidth.

The iPhone 6 Plus remains at the top of the Basemark X Medium Quality chart based on its strong performance in the Hangar test. Likewise, the Nexus 6 outperforms the Note 4 in Hangar due to thermal throttling.

The difference between the Nexus 6 and Nexus 5 is once again close to 50% in offscreen rendering. The Nexus 6 and Note 4 both fall behind the Nexus 5 in the onscreen tests, a consequence of rendering at the higher WQHD resolution.

Moving to the High Quality tests, we see the higher memory bandwidth provided by the Snapdragon 805 push the Nexus 6 past the iPhone 6 Plus. It even manages to squeak past the Nexus 5 in the onscreen tests as the Adreno 330 and its lower memory bandwidth choke on the higher-resolution textures.

In the lighting- and shading-intensive GFXBench 3 Manhattan test, the Nexus 6 performs twice as fast as the Nexus 5. Among its many improvements, the Adreno 420 adds more texture and shading units, which are put to good use in this OpenGL ES 3.0 benchmark.

Manhattan is less prone to causing thermal throttling, which allows the Note 4 to achieve its full performance. The Adreno 430 GPU in the LG G Flex 2 only scores 12% higher than the Nexus 6.

The Adreno 420 again shows impressive gains over the 330 in the Nexus 5, and the LG G Flex 2 is a mere 11% faster than the Nexus 6. T-Rex is notorious for causing throttling, and the Note 4 becomes just another of its victims.

Turning to the GFXBench 3 synthetic tests, we see the Snapdragon 805-powered devices top the chart in the memory bandwidth-intensive Alpha Blending test. Curiously, they even best the G Flex 2; however, LG's latest flagship redeems itself in the ALU test. ALU performance was a point of emphasis for Adreno 430 and that shows here. The Nexus 6 performs as expected in the remaining tests.

The Nexus 6 turns out to be a solid performer in our GPU and gaming tests. It's a significant upgrade over the Nexus 5, offering improvements of 50% or more in several tests. It also proves more resistant to thermal throttling than the Note 4.

In addition to our usual benchmarks, we also tried running the recently released GFXBench 3.1 and Basemark ES 3.1, which, as their names suggest, include tests supporting the new features included in OpenGL ES 3.1. The updated graphics standard requires Android 5.0 and a qualifying GPU. Since Adreno 420 is Qualcomm's first GPU with ES 3.1 support, the Nexus 6 meets both requirements.

However, on the original Android 5.0 build both benchmarks show the Nexus 6 only supporting up to OpenGL ES 3.0 and indeed, neither would run. The Android build sheet (/system/build.prop) for the Nexus 6 also shows ES 3.0 support. After updating our Note 4 to Lollipop, it ran GFXBench 3.1 just fine (although it consistently crashed near the end of Basemark ES 3.1), so we know the Adreno 420 is capable. It appears that the Nexus 6 shipped with an out-of-date graphics driver.

The good news is that the Android 5.1 update includes an updated graphics driver, finally bringing OpenGL ES 3.1 support to the Nexus 6. In the new GFXBench Manhattan ES 3.1 test, the Nexus 6 and Note 4 are dead even. Like the Note 4, the Nexus 6 has trouble running Basemark ES 3.1, crashing to the home screen at the beginning of the first test.

Battery Life And Thermal Throttling

Battery life may be the most important performance metric for a mobile device. After all, it doesn't matter how quickly a phone or tablet can load webpages or how many frames per second the GPU can crank through once the battery runs down and the device shuts off. To learn more about how we test this critical facet of mobile computing, please read our battery testing methodology article.

The Nexus 6 runs this real-world workload for 5.5 hours. But despite having the same SoC and the same size battery as the Note 4, it runs out of power thirty minutes sooner. Its 5% performance advantage won't be noticeable and does not make up for the 9% battery life deficit.

Normally, we would turn to the Basemark OS II Battery test to see how CPU performance affects battery life. However, the results for the two Snapdragon 805-based devices look suspect, so we're withholding them pending further investigation.

The Nexus 6 will hold out for a three-hour gaming session, the same as the iPhone 6 Plus and one-half hour longer than the Nexus 5. It would appear from the first chart that the Note 4 offers better battery life while gaming, since it outlasts the Nexus 6 by almost 30 minutes. But looking at the performance chart tells the other half of the story. The Note 4 lasts longer only because thermal throttling forces it to reduce GPU clock rate more than the Nexus 6. The iPhone 6 Plus and Nexus 5 also have fewer pixels to render for this on-screen test, which improves both their performance and battery life.

Looking at the graph above, we see that the performance of the Nexus 6 gradually decreases to about 75% of its original value during the roughly 30-minute T-Rex loop. While not immune to thermal throttling, it does fare better than the Note 4, which loses over half of its performance 8.5 minutes into the test before recovering to about 70% of the original value over the last half.

The Nexus 6's back cover skin temperature reaches 113 °F, certainly warm but not uncomfortable and about average for this group. Looking at the thermal image of the back cover, taken during the GFXBench 3.0 Battery test, shows why the Nexus 6 throttles less than the Note 4. It more evenly spreads the heat load over it's whole chassis, using the larger surface area to better dissipate heat buildup to its surroundings.

Battery life for the Nexus 6 is not bad, at least compared to the Note 4. In PCMark, the Nexus 6 trails by about 9%, which coincidentally, is almost equal to the difference in screen area between the two devices.

Conclusion

Recent Nexus devices have delivered great value, offering flagship hardware at mid-range prices. In order to reach the lower price point however, some compromises had to be made. For the Nexus 6, Google chose to go in a different direction, eliminating the compromises and the value. With a starting price of $650, it must compete with the other expensive flagship phones on pure performance and user experience. Based on the history of the Nexus brand and Motorola's input, we had high hopes for the Nexus 6.

One of the primary draws for any Nexus device is getting the latest pure Android experience. Lollipop brings a redesigned interface and a new Java runtime environment, among many other improvements, to this Nexus. The clean look of Lollipop's Material Design language is a refreshing change, as is the improved functionality of the lockscreen. There's now a proper do-not-disturb mode, and the profile feature previously available on tablets is now available for phones too. The scrollable recent apps menu works great until too many open apps accumulate, which makes it difficult to locate the one you want. There's also no way to just close all apps at once, definitely a UI oversight.

Ambient Display is a simple but excellent addition to the Nexus 6. It basically eliminates the need to hunt for the power button. If the phone is sitting on a table, simply rocking it on its curved back shows the time and notifications with minimal power draw. Picking up the phone or taking it out of your pocket will do the same. It's really a great convenience feature.

Drawing design inspiration from Motorola's Moto X, the Nexus 6 is an attractive, well-made phone. The combination of aluminum and plastic strikes the right balance between rigidity and weight, both extremely important in such a large device. While we like having the power and volume buttons on the same side, a little more space between them would make them more distinguishable and easier to operate, but this is a minor quibble.

The lack of a removable battery and microSD support are more serious offenses. With the Nexus 6, you're limited to a maximum of 64GB of storage. That's enough for many road warriors, but not all. Having the battery sealed inside will eliminate this Nexus from many people's wish list, though some will find solace from the Qi wireless charging and the included power adapter that supports Qualcomm's QuickCharge 2.0 technology that gets you from near-dead to over 20% in only 15 minutes.

After living with the Nexus 6 for awhile, we can say that the initial misgivings about its size dull. Yes, nothing changes the fact that its dimensions can be inconvenient, and it can be difficult finding places to stash this beast. However, by minimizing the bezels around the screen, it's really not much taller than the iPhone 6 Plus. Its significant width all but eliminates one-handed use, though.

This brings up one of our pain points. The Nexus 6 lacks any phablet-specific software features that make it easier or more productive to use: no special stylus features, no one-handed modes and no multi-window capability. Since stock Android does not offer any of these large-screen enhancements, why use a phablet as Lollipop's showcase device?

Existential questions aside, the Nexus 6 is packed with high-performance hardware, including the Snapdragon 805 SoC. The Adreno 420 GPU, along with copious amounts of memory bandwidth, showed greater than 50% improvement over the previous-gen Adreno 330 in several of our tests. CPU performance was not nearly as impressive, its bump in clock rate offering barely tangible gains over the Snapdragon 801 while consuming more power. We did find that the Nexus 6 was less prone to thermal throttling than the Galaxy Note 4, which also uses a Snapdragon 805 SoC.

Google's decision to enable Android's Full Disk Encryption (FDE) is terrific for security. Unfortunately for the Nexus 6, it's not capable of performing the file encryption/decryption in hardware. The end result is a drastic reduction of the internal storage performance. While the use of a RAM cache will mitigate the impact somewhat, apps take longer to load on the Nexus 6 versus its competitors.

We found the audio experience on the Nexus 6 to be pleasantly surprising. The dual, front-facing speakers have enough separation on a six-inch device to provide a decent stereo effect. Driven by powerful amplifiers, they get seriously loud without garbling the sound with distortion. The positive sonic experience carries over to the headphone jack, which is nearly indistinguishable from an iPhone or Z3.

Unfortunately, the Nexus 6's camera performance is merely OK. With good lighting, it captures images with plenty of detail and proper exposure. White balance is generally good, although we did notice a slight blue shift in some cases.

It's when the light dims that camera performance fades. The Nexus 6 fails to utilize OIS to improve low-light performance, producing darker, noisier images than competing cameras. The iPhone 6 Plus, for example, uses OIS to hold its shutter open three times longer than the Nexus 6, holding a much lower ISO and minimizing noise. It's not clear if the Nexus' camera software just is not optimized to work with OIS or if the feature is not actually enabled.

The 5.96-inch AMOLED display is both the Nexus 6's most distinguishing feature and its biggest disappointment. Lacking a proper sRGB display mode and not performing any screen calibration is unacceptable in this price tier. Even the $150 Moto E comes with a decent-looking, calibrated screen. The overly saturated neon colors will degrade the user experience for many people.

Considering the uncalibrated screen, missing OIS, slow internal storage and outdated graphics driver, we can't help but feel that the Nexus 6 was rushed to market. The good news is that these problems can be fixed with software updates. In fact, the Android 5.1 update includes a new graphics driver and improves the storage read performance, at least somewhat (see how the Nexus 6 performs with Android 5.1). The bad news is that the screen and OIS issues persist. The Galaxy Note 4 offers equivalent or better hardware and phablet-optimized software, making it a more compelling choice. However, if you want a large phone, don't mind the vivid colors and prefer getting your software updates directly from Google, the Nexus 6 is your beast.

Update [11:45 5/17/2015]: Added a link to our article that discusses the Nexus 6 specific changes made in the Android 5.1 update, including a thorough performance comparison.

William Van Winkle is a Senior Contributing Writer at Tom's Hardware. Contact him as williamvw on the forums and follow him on Twitter @copywriterWVW.

Matt Humrick is a Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware, covering Smartphones and Tablets. Contact him as MobileEditor on the forums and follow him on Twitter @digitalOut_net.

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Motorola announced the new Moto E (2nd generation), the latest iteration of the company's budget handset, and Motorola said that this version was developed with low cost in mind while attempting to bring the performance and features common in higher-end devices.

"When we were designing this new generation of Moto E, we went back to consumers who bought the first generation. We really listened to what they liked and how we could make this affordable device even more useful and more powerful. We were able to pack in a quad-core processor, an all-day battery, a new front-facing camera, and a 4.5" qHD display—and still keep the phone at an ultra affordable price," said Kristin Arnold, research design director at Motorola.

The smartphone features an ergonomic design that Motorola claims will fit comfortably in your hand. The company also designed what it calls a "Grip Shell" that goes along the edge of the device. Besides adding grip to the phone, it also comes in several colors that are easily changeable, allowing you to personalize the device.

Inside, Motorola has opted for a Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 SoC, over the Snapdragon 200 SoC used in the older Moto E. Although both are quad-core chips running at 1.2 GHz, the 410 moves on from the ARMv7 instruction set to ARMv8, giving it 64-bit compatibility.

The smartphone also adds built-in 4G capabilities and features an Adreno 306 GPU instead of the Adreno 302 GPU in the previous-gen Moto E, which should give the handset a minor speed boost.

The device resolution remains the same with at 960x540 (245 ppi), and the smartphone has a 2,390 mAh battery, which Motorola claims can last up to 24 hours. Other features include two 5 MP cameras, 1 GB RAM and 8 GB of storage, with a micro SD card for expansion up to 32 GB.

Unfortunately, although the phone has 4G capabilities, it only supports 4G LTE. In most of the world this won't be much of an issue, but it could be a problem in Korea and China where other LTE standards are sometimes used.

Users will be happy to see that Motorola opted to load the new Moto E with Android 5.0 Lollipop.

Motorola has also included its exclusive software features such as Moto Display, which will display the time and your notifications with just a slight nudge, and Motorola's Quick Capture, which activates the camera with the flick of your wrist.

Motorola will release the new Moto E today in 50 nations around the world, starting at $149.99 USD unlocked. The old Moto E will continue to be sold for $119.99.

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When Motorola launched the original Moto G, the company tried to make the device as low-cost as possible while still offering enough performance and features that appeal to customers in emerging markets. LTE chips still add significant cost to a device, so early on, Motorola decided to put a 3G modem inside the Moto G. However, due to high demand for LTE support, Motorola later went back on its decision and launched a more expensive LTE version a few months later.

Motorola launched the 2nd-generation Moto G last fall, and now the company is launching a 4G LTE version, as well. As expected, the device doesn't come with major changes other than LTE support, although it does get a much-needed increase in battery size. The new Moto G 4G gets a 2,390 mAh battery, compared to the original Moto G 2nd gen, which had the same 2070 mAh battery as the smaller 1st-gen Moto G.

Adding a bigger screen but keeping the battery size the same has led to criticism of the Moto G 2nd gen, and that's likely the reason for the change. Motorola didn't put a bigger battery in the first Moto G 4G, so LTE must not have a significant impact on battery life compared to 3G on that device.

The other specs for the Moto G 4G (2015) are the same as for the Moto G 2nd-gen. It has a 5-inch 720p screen, quad-core 1.2 GHz Cortex A7 CPU from Qualcomm (the Snapdragon 400 -- still no Cortex A53-based Snapdragon 410, unfortunately), 1 GB of RAM, microSD support, 8MP rear camera, 2MP front-camera, FM radio and dual-SIM support. There won't be an 8 GB version, so the device comes with 16 GB by default. The phone will run Android 5.0.2 out of the box, which should make potential customers happy. (Motorola has already started updating older Moto Gs to Lollipop, so it wouldn't have made much sense to release the latest model with KitKat, anyway.

The Moto G 4G has only started selling in Brazil so far, on Motorola's local website, for a price of R$ 899, which is $336 USD. That's significantly more than a regular Moto G 2nd gen, although that price includes the upgrade to LTE, more storage, a larger battery and VAT and high Brazil tax imports.

Despite higher prices than in the U.S. or even Europe, previous Moto G models have been popular with Brazilians because they are still great, relatively low-cost options. Motorola hasn't said yet when the Moto G 4G will be available in other countries, but we don't anticipate that it will be much longer.

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Today, Motorola announced that the stable version of the Lollipop upgrade for the Moto G 2nd Gen (in the U.S.) and the Moto G 1st and 2nd gen (in India) will begin rolling out. Not everyone will get it at the same time, though, as the update will be delivered in phases.

Moto G owners living in the U.S. and India should be receiving a notification with the update, or they can check for it themselves in the phone's Settings. (Settings > About Phone > System update.)

Motorola did some "soak tests" for its Moto G devices late last year, weeks after Google made the Lollipop version public. The tests were meant to ensure a smoother update process for all Moto G customers once the final version would roll out. It was completely voluntary for those who wanted to get a taste of the new Android version a little earlier, because these soak test versions may have also had some bugs in them. Whatever bugs Motorola found must have been fixed by now if the company is ready to push a stable version out.

Even though Motorola seems to have the Lollipop upgrade ready for the first generation Moto G, which is now being rolled out in India, it seems American Moto G owners are left waiting. This may be a typical U.S. carrier problem. The U.S. carriers often make the phone update process longer than it needs to be because they don't let phone makers upgrade devices without their approval.

The good news is that if Motorola has started rolling out the update for its Moto G devices, then it won't be long until its customers from more countries will get it as well.

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Today, Motorola announced that its acquisition by Lenovo from Google is now complete. The $2.9 billion acquisition was announced earlier this year, in January. Google bought Motorola Mobility in 2012 for $12.4 billion, and it has since already sold Motorola's set-top box division to Arris Group for $2.35 billion. The smartphone division along with 2,000 patents was sold to Lenovo.

Lenovo said it will keep the Motorola brand for western markets, which seems like a good move. The Lenovo brand is basically non-existent in the western mobile markets. Motorola's brand, while not as strong as it was in the RAZR days, is still remembered fondly by many. Under Google's stewardship, Motorola has also started to improve its image as an Android OEM.

“The acquisition of such an iconic brand, innovative product portfolio and incredibly talented global team will immediately make Lenovo a strong global competitor in smartphones. We will immediately have the opportunity to become a strong global player in the fast-growing mobile space," said Yang Yuanqing, chairman and CEO of Lenovo.

Three of the factors for its recent success (at least in terms of image, if not sales) were the usage of stock Android (with a few of Motorola's own apps, and slightly different camera software), the selling of a high-value phone such as the Moto G, and quick updates.

It will be interesting to see whether Lenovo can continue using those strategies, or if it will decide to create its own skin on top of Android. Motorola's COO, Rick Osterloh, said in a blog post that he doesn't believe Lenovo will alter the software on the Motorola phones, but that's something that remains to be seen. Lenovo will probably only keep that strategy if it believes it works.

Motorola has been losing money for the past several years, which has also impacted its ability to advertise its products properly, and that in turn led to fewer sales and fewer high discounts. Lenovo is currently the number one PC vendor globally, and it should have enough money to strengthen Motorola's position in the mobile market.

The two companies have 8 percent global market share between them, according to Strategy Analytics. When Lenovo announced the acquisition in January, its CEO Yuanqing Yang said that he hopes Lenovo will surpass both Samsung and Apple in the mobile market.

Lenovo will be getting 3,500 new employees as part of the deal, with 2,800 from the U.S. alone, although seeing how the manufacturing will be moved to China, there may be some layoffs soon, as is often the case with mergers.

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The Nexus 6 opened up for pre-order just a couple of hours ago, but either Google didn't expect a high demand and didn't prepare well for it, or the demand was much greater than anticipated, because the phone has already sold out.

The Nexus 6 has been quite controversial so far, mainly due to its large screen size. At 5.96" it's bigger than even Samsung's 5.7" Galaxy Note 4, and of course bigger than Apple's iPhone 6 Plus as well, although the difference in total size is smaller than you'd imagine. The nearly-6" Nexus 6 is only 1 mm taller than the 5.5" iPhone 6 Plus, but 4 mm wider. Width isn't usually the problem with "large phones," though, but height is, so if you're fine with an iPhone 6 Plus, you'll probably find Nexus 6's size acceptable.

Data shows that people use "phablets" or large smartphones much more than smaller phones, which makes sense, considering you have bigger screen real estate that you can use. Motorola also said at the launch of its new Moto G that most of its customers would prefer bigger screen sizes for their next-generation phones.

If you can live with the size, the Nexus 6 sounds compelling, despite its more "regular" flagship price of $650 for the 32 GB version, compared to the much cheaper $350 Nexus 5 before it.

The device comes with a cutting edge Snapdragon 805 (which is still based on the 32-bit ARMv7 architecture), 3 GB of RAM, 32 GB and 64 GB storage options (no microSD support, as usual with Nexus devices), a 6" screen with 1440p resolution and a 3220 mAh battery.

The rear camera has a 13MP sensor with OIS (Optical Image Stabilization), and it is supposed to be much better than on previous Nexus phones and potentially better than most other flagships, too. It uses the newer IMX214 Sony sensor (unlike the new Moto X that uses an older IMX135 sensor), but perhaps more importantly, it comes with Android 5.0 Lollipop which has much improved camera software and support for RAW files.

If you want to check out when it's available again for pre-order, you can try the Play Store, or you can wait until it's available in stores and on Motorola's site "in November". The Nexus 6 will also be available in 28 countries from Europe, Asia Pacific and North America later this year.

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Republic Wireless, the MVNO that puts an emphasis on cheap unlimited data plans with its WiFi-optimized handsets, announced that it will offer the budget-friendly Moto E smartphone for only $99, starting next month. The device joins other Motorola best-sellers on the network, such as the 2013 versions of Moto X and Moto G.

The phone will be available on Republic Wireless with the following “no-contract” plans:

• Unlimited talk, text, and data on Wi-Fi only - $5/month
• Unlimited talk and text on Wi-Fi and cellular, and unlimited data on WiFi - $10/month
• Unlimited talk, text and data on Wi-Fi, plus 3G cellular - $25/month

The Moto E comes with a dual-core 1.2 Ghz Snapdragon 200 (based on Cortex A7 CPU cores), 1GB of RAM, 4.3” screen, qHD (960x540) resolution, 5MP rear camera, 4GB of internal storage, microSD slot with support for up to 32GB, FM Radio and a 1980 mAh battery, and it runs Android 4.4.  It also comes with Gorilla Glass protection, a feature not usually found on such low-priced devices. Motorola also gives the option to pick from many shells of different colors.

In many ways, the Moto E is similar to the recently unveiled Android One smartphones from India. Moto E initially launched as a $129 phone from Motorola, and while the price was reasonable for its features, it didn’t feel nearly as a big of a breakthrough as the Moto G did when it was launched, in terms of value per dollar.

This is why most reviewers were still recommending that users pay $50 more and get the Moto G instead. A price point of $99 would’ve made a much bigger splash in the media and could’ve given the phone a bigger boost in popularity. Republic Wireless appears to understand this, which is why it’s offering the phone at that $99 price point.

The carrier believes Moto E is “not an iPhone killer but a flip phone killer”. Many people still use feature phones, or want a budget smartphone for their children, and the Moto E looks like the right choice for them, especially when coupled with one of the low-cost unlimited plans from Republic Wireless.

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Today, Motorola made four product announcements for the new Moto X and Moto G smartphones, for the much-awaited Moto 360 smartwatch, and finally for its "Moto Hint" Bluetooth headset; but all of them seem to have some deal-breaking flaws.

Let's take the Moto X, which effectively is Motorola's attempt at a flagship handset. It comes with a Snapdragon 801 processor, which isn't even the latest Qualcomm chip (Snapdragon 805), and it's not even a 64-bit ARMv8 processor, which is something that seems to be long overdue in Android flagships. The lack of such a chip for this holiday season seems like a major disappointment considering that Apple has already had one for a year in its iPhone.

The Moto X has a 1080p resolution, which is probably just about ideal for a high-end smartphone these days. However, the disappointment here comes with the 5.2" screen size, which is too large for most of the customers who bought the Moto X last year precisely because it was a smaller phone than so many phabet-type devices. Now the Moto X is 5.2" just like all the other competition at the high-end, losing its major size differentiation appeal.

The battery has barely improved, too; Motorola raised the capacity from 2,200 mAh to 2,300 mAh, while the competition is now more in the 3,000 mAh range. The Moto X could get away with the smaller battery last year thanks to its lower resolution 720p display, but now it has double the pixels, and even though it features a more powerful GPU, the battery life may suffer compared to the previous model.

Finally, the device retains the small storage options of 16 GB and 32 GB despite the plummeting costs of flash storage over the past few years. To make matters worse, it still doesn't offer a microSD slot, which would be handy for the higher-resolution pictures.

There are some things that have improved over the previous model such as using a newer-generation Super AMOLED panel; a metal frame that improves the in-hand feel of the device; and a 13MP Sony camera that has been in Galaxy S4, LG G2 and LG G3.

It also comes with a price tag of $500, which is lower than those Samsung and LG devices, but $500 doesn't feel like it's low enough to compensate for the Moto X's flaws this year. The Moto X's price quickly fell to $300-$350 last year, which many felt was a much more appropriate price point considering its good-but-not-great specs. For this year's model, $400 rather than $500 feels like a much better price for this device; the Moto X wouldn't make it as high-end handset against competing smartphones out there, but at least it would be great value for the price.

Then there's the new Moto G, which disappoints even more than the new Moto X because the device has barely improved at all. The main changes to the new Moto G are a higher-resolution 8MP camera (up from 5MP), a 2MP front-camera (up from 1.3MP), an increase in screen size to 5" (up from 4.5"), the addition of front speakers and 802.11ac connectivity.

However, the Moto G comes with exactly the same Cortex A7-based Snapdragon 400 processor, storage and RAM as last year, which means there will be no improvement in terms of performance. It's especially disappointing that the Moto G doesn't have the ARMv8-based Snapdragon 410, which is the successor of the Snapdragon 400 processor that is being used by some of HTC's recently announced phones. There's also no word about an LTE version yet, so customers in LTE countries could find that a deal-breaker.

While the storage is the same as last year, with only 8 GB and 16 GB options, this year the new Moto G does bring microSD support up to 32 GB, just like this year's Moto G 4G model. MicroSD's are going to continue to remain an important feature on Android devices, whether internal storage increases or not.

Finally, the battery remains the same, despite the new Moto G being a larger device. This, combined with the higher-resolution camera that requires more processing power, could lead to slightly lower battery life compared to the old Moto G, too.

The much-awaited Moto 360 does indeed look like the best smartwatch money can buy right now, especially the beautiful design that should appeal to a wide range of people (not just tech nerds). However, the deal-breaker could be its battery life; even Motorola seems to be recommending that users charge it at night, which means it won't even last 24 hours. If a smartwatch becomes just another thing people have to worry about charging, then it won't be especially appealing.

The main reason why most of the new smartwatches can't break even two days of battery life is the display technology they are using. A smartwatch can't be treated like a smartphone, because then it will have the same battery life as a smartphone, or perhaps even less than that.

The smartwatch should have a display panel that allows the device to last days or even a week on a single charge. Right now, the only candidates for that are Qualcomm's Mirasol display technology, transflective LCDs (that Pebble is using), and e-ink (that e-readers use). An operating system like Android Wear, which is heavily animation-dependent, may not work as well with e-ink (which works better with very static content), but the other two should be appropriate.

Motorola has also launched a new Bluetooth headset called the Moto Hint that looks to be as attractive a Bluetooth headset as you could want. The Moto Hint hides in your ear, rather than covering your whole earlobe like most other Bluetooth headsets do. Its price is probably not what everyone wanted to see for it, though; at $150, it's only $100 less than a Moto 360 smartwatch, so that could be a deal-breaker for many.

Overall, while both of its phones have improved in some ways, and Motorola has introduced a couple of new products, it doesn't feel as though Motorola is making nearly as a big of a push as it could have this year. Motorola is still owned by Google right now, so perhaps Google didn't feel the need to try too hard with Motorola's product pipeline this year. We'll have to wait and see if Lenovo handles the company any better next year and makes its products any more competitive.

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Earlier rumors about the Nexus 6 pointed to a 5.9" screen size, 1080p resolution and a Snapdragon 801 processor. While we still don't know for sure what the Nexus 6 will have, those rumors seemed a little strange and unrealistic; the jump in screen size was just too big, and the processor may be a little too old by November 2014, too.

A new rumor, or rather an AnTuTu benchmark, says the Nexus 6 will have a 5.2" screen, a Snapdragon 805 processor and a 2560 x 1440 resolution. This sounds a lot more believable, but keep in mind this one could be just as fake (or real) as the initial rumors.

A 5.2" screen size makes more sense because it's not a big jump from the 5" Nexus 5. The Snapdragon 805 processor also makes sense, as Google has picked the latest cutting edge chip from Qualcomm for the past two generations of Nexus phones, so it's possible the company is going to do it again.

The QHD resolution rumor is also believable if indeed Google is going with a bigger screen, and the company seems to like high-resolution displays (Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 10, Chromebook Pixel). However, considering that it's a Nexus phone, and it probably won't even have a 3,000 mAh battery, I don't think this resolution would be the best decision for this phone, and the 1080p resolution should be more appropriate.

At the same time, the phone will come with Android L, which seems to have significantly better battery life than previous versions, so the new phone is not likely to be a downgrade in battery life, even if the battery isn't large enough to accommodate the higher resolution.

The new processor should also be more powerful and more efficient even with the higher resolution. The Snapdragon 805 CPU can be clocked at 2.5-2.7 GHz, and the new Adreno 420 GPU should be 40 percent faster than Adreno 330. That may not quite make up the difference between the demands of a 1920 x 1080 resolution versus 2560 x 1440 (78 percent more), but it helps.

This leaked benchmark also points to a 13MP camera on the back and a 2.1MP camera on the front. With Android L's significant improvements to the camera API, the Nexus 6 may be the first Nexus phone to actually have a great camera. Of course, it will still depend on Google to put a really good 13MP sensor in there, and not a very cheap one, but things look promising. After all, what better way is there to showcase how good the new camera API in Android L is than with a really good camera?

The Nexus 6 has been rumored to be made by Motorola; so far, that rumor hasn't been denied. As we're getting closer to a November launch (which is usually the month of new Nexus/Android launches), we should be getting more rumors either confirming or denying the ones we have right now. So far, these latest ones seem to be the closest to reality yet.

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Motorola has officially announced the Moto E, its latest budget smartphone. The Moto E follows on from the launch of the Moto G last year and is a durable low-cost solution for the masses. Of course, as with the Moto G, the compromise here is specs. You’re not getting a device to rival the Galaxy S5. So what’s under the hood?

 
The Moto E is based on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 and packs a 4.3-inch, 960 x 540 display, and 1 GB of RAM. It’s got a 5-megapixel camera in the back, 4 GB of storage, a MicroSD slot for up to 32 GB of storage, a built-in FM radio, and a 1980 mAh battery. The price is set at $129, which is incredibly cheap. However, when you compare this phone to the $179 Moto G, which boasts a 4.5-inch 720p display (329 ppi), Snapdragon 400 CPU, 1 GB of RAM, a 5-megapixel camera in the back, a 1.3-megapixel lens up front, 8 GB or 16 GB of storage, and a 2070 mAh battery for just $179, the Moto E doesn't seem all that great. We've reached the point where a lot of companies are balancing specs and price instead just going right for the best spec sheet they can put together, but it is a balance, and the Moto E, on paper does seem just a little too low end.

Still, you can't judge a book by its cover, so we went hands on with the Moto E in Toronto this morning. The device is strong and solidly built. It doesn't feel cheap in terms of construction though the display is a little on the small side, especially when you put it side-by-side with the Moto G. It's not of poor quality, but given a small display is one of the hallmarks of a budget smartphone, the size of the phone in your hand does do the device something of a disservice in that regard. It's also not as vibrant as the display on the Moto G when you look at the two side-by-side but that's to be expected.

As with the Moto G, the volume rocker is on the right, underneath the power/sleep button, which might be a bit jarring for users that are used to the more traditional left-side positioning. Luckily, the buttons are far enough apart that you don't (or shouldn't) accidentally press volume up when trying to put the device to sleep, and it does make taking screenshots an awful lot easier (Android uses a simultaneous press of the power button and volume down key to capture). Performance wise, the phone is snappy enough, and can switch apps easily. For Cut the Rope 2, the performance wasn't quite as smooth as the Moto G we had on hand, and the screen wasn't quite as responsive. We could tell that running the WiFi hotspot and Cut the Rope 2 was a little bit taxing, as the phone started to warm up after just a few minutes. Again, no problems with the Moto G in that regard until we started shooting continuous video while operating the WiFi hotspot functionality.

The snap covers were easy to apply but hard to remove. At least two women within earshot asked male attendees to remove the cover, mentioning they didn't want to break a nail taking it off. It shouldn't be too much of a problem, given most people won't change the covers very often, but its worth mentioning. Once you do get the cover off, you'll see that while the battery isn't built in, Motorola is preventing users from replacing it themselves with a plastic barrier that locks the battery in place. Not totally unusual, but it might pain those who enjoy the freedom of being able to buy a new battery should the need arise.

In the short time we spent with the device, we'd say the difference between the Moto E and the Moto G day-to-day performance is enough to warrant spending the extra money on the Moto G if you have it and performance is something you care about. It's a great budget smartphone and it's perfect for those looking to enter the smartphone world for the first time. But, all things considered, the issue is that the price of the Moto G and the price of the Moto E are not far enough apart, especially in Canada where the Moto E costs $179, and the Moto G costs $225. We'd love to see the Moto E priced at $109. That would really seal the deal for us. As it stands, it's a decent phone at a decent price, but we're not wowed like we were when Motorola introduced the Moto G last year. Which would you go for, the $129 Moto E with 4 GB of storage (only 2.2 GB of storage is usable!), or the 8 GB Moto G for $179? Let us know in the comments below!

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Motorola has just dished out invitations for a mystery event set to take place a couple of weeks from now. The event is scheduled for May 13 in London, England, and while the invitation didn’t give a lot of information away, Motorola did say that the device on show will be a smartphone and that it will be affordable for all.

This is Motorola's first phone post-Google (the company was purchased by Lenovo earlier this year). Rumor has it this will be the Moto E, which will be quite similar to the Moto G (pictured above) in that it will be priced extremely competitively without compromising on specs. The Moto G is the cheapest Motorola smartphone available, but the specs are anything but low-end. It might not stand up to the flagship phones out there but the beauty of the Moto G is that it doesn’t stiff customers on a budget with entry-level hardware, either.

Read more: Lenovo Buys Motorola from Google: What Does it Mean?

It’s thought the Moto E will be something of a younger sibling to the Moto G and even more affordable. Rumors so far have mentioned a 4.2-inch 720p display, 1 GB of RAM and a 1.2 GHz dual-core CPU. It also packs everything into an uber slim form factor that is apparently 50 percent the thickness of the already slim and sexy Moto G.

We’ll bring you the latest on the day, so stay tuned!

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When we first heard about Project Ara, it was a Motorola project, and Motorola was owned by Google. Six months later, Google has made plans to sell Motorola to Lenovo, but the search giant retained the rights to Project Ara (along with Motorola's Advanced Technology Group), so work on the modular smartphone concept continues despite the sale to Lenovo. Back in October, Motorola teased an MDK or Module Developer's Kit in 'a few months.' Now, Google is delivering v0.10.

Google's calling the first release of the Project Ara MDK 'a very early version' but says it's hoping to get feedback from the developer community to ensure the final MDK is up to par.

MORE: Lenovo Buys Motorola from Google: What Does it Mean?

That's not all, though. Google also intends to host the first Project Ara Developers Conference at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View.  Developers are invited to attend in person to talk about the MDK. This event will also be live streamed for those who can't make it (though you still need to register to "attend" online). Registration closes on Friday, so if you're interested, click here. This is the first of several developer conferences for Project Ara this year.

The MDK can be downloaded at projectara.com/mdk. Head to projectara.com/ara-developers-conference for more on the conference. You can also sign up for the mailing list and join the Project Ara forum.

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Two similar reports were published on Tuesday, both of which state that Sony is trying to sell off its PC division. Nikkei reports that Sony is talking with investment fund Japan Industrial Partners, whereas Reuters hears that Sony is in talks with Lenovo. Sony merely states that it's looking at various possibilities for the VAIO line.

Sources told Nikkei over the weekend that a new plan between Japan Industrial Partners and Sony would see the establishment of a new company that would purchase the VAIO lineup. This company would not only continue the sale of VAIO devices, but handle the after-sales service. The sale price is estimated at $391 million USD to $489 million USD.

Sources also said that Sony will take a small stake in the new company to facilitate the transfer. Meanwhile, the company will attempt to solidify its business base at home and maintain operations in overseas markets where the VAIO brand is popular. Other countries and regions will no longer see VAIO devices.

If Sony does take this route, a large number of the company's nearly 1,000 PC division workers will be transferred over to the new company, including executives, while the rest of the crew will be moved to other departments within Sony. Currently, all parties involved with the rumored sale are discussing whether Sony's PC site in Nagano Prefecture would still handle production and R&D in the new company.

As for Reuters' side of the story, sources state that Sony is trying to sell its PC business to Lenovo. The Chinese company declined to comment on the report, and Sony indicated that the report is inaccurate. The latter comments seem to point at the previous Nikkei story.

Just last month, Lenovo revealed an agreement to purchase IBM's low-end server business for $2.3 billion. Then last week the company announced its intentions to purchase Motorola's handset business. Naturally, it's easy to assume that talk of purchasing Sony's VAIO unit would fit into Lenovo's current spending spree. But investing in what seems to be a declining market just doesn't make sense: buying into the smartphone and server business does.

Then again, according to Reuters, Lenovo earns around 80 percent of its revenue from PCs. However, on the mobile front, Lenovo struggles when it comes to the global smartphone market due to a lack of patents and distribution network. The Motorola deal should help Lenovo beef up its global presence, which currently is just above 6 percent.

So what does all this mean for VAIO customers? That depends on which route Sony plans to take. If Sony were to retain some ownership, customers should still receive the same level of assistance with technical issues, and buyers should still see the same quality and innovation that makes the VAIO name popular.

Should Sony really be in a selling mood, VAIO fans might not have anything to worry about if Lenovo picked up Sony's PC business. After all, Lenovo purchased the notebook business from IBM and so far hasn't disappointed even the most faithful of ThinkPad fanatics.

Lenovo has announced a $2.91 billion deal to acquire Motorola Mobility from Google. Motorola's handset business was sold to Google in 2012 for $12.5 billion, but hasn't made any money for the search giant.

Google said that it purchased Motorola Mobility for its patents, most of which aren't included in the sale to Lenovo. Instead, Lenovo will receive a license to the portfolio of patents and other intellectual property. On the surface, Lenovo getting Motorola for less than a quarter of what Google paid for it sounds like a steal (after all, are those patents really worth $9 billion?), but this Chinese company is after more than just a bargain. Lenovo is plotting world domination – at least in terms of computers and electronics. Less than a week ago, Lenovo acquired IBM's x86 server business.

Lenovo's new product onslaught at CES 2014 demonstrated that the company wants to leave no market segment untouched. Smartphones is still an area that the company is just dabbling in, and only in limited markets. We saw a handful of Lenovo smartphones running Android at CES, but none of them were position for the North American market.

Yang Yuanqing, chairman and CEO of Lenovo, said that the company would be making a big push into the US and western European markets in 2015. With Samsung virtually uncontested in the Android market, Lenovo sees an opportunity here to steal a piece of the pie, especially in the western markets where consumers see the phone choices simply as "iPhone" or "Galaxy."

“The acquisition of such an iconic brand, innovative product portfolio and incredibly talented global team will immediately make Lenovo a strong global competitor in smartphones. We will immediately have the opportunity to become a strong global player in the fast-growing mobile space,” said Yang Yuanqing in a prepared statement.

This sale dashes any hopes of there being a true Google-made phone from Mountain View. While Nexus devices are a collaboration between hardware partners such as Samsung and LG, with Google providing the software support, the sale of Motorola Mobility to Lenovo means that we'll probably never see a phone that's designed top to bottom by Google.

This could also mean an end to devices like the Moto X and Moto G, which weren't quite Nexus devices, but shared a lot of design philosophy in creating a pure Google experience. Moto X and Moto G owners enjoyed a near-stock build of Android, which meant timely updates to the latest updates of the mobile operating system.

With Motorola Mobility in its stables, Lenovo instantly gains the #3 position in the U.S. among Android smartphone manufacturers, behind Samsung and HTC. According to Opera Mediaworks, Samsung has 58.45% of Android device marketshare, with HTC at 10.88% and Motorola at 8.7%.

While a long ways away from Samsung's lead, Motorola's relationship with carriers, particularly with its DROID brand, will help Lenovo jump into the U.S. market. Given how committed Lenovo has been to serving all the segments of the computer market, don't be surprised to see it put forth a similar effort in the coming years. After all, who wouldn't want a ThinkPad phone?

Check out all our coverage on Lenovo phones from CES 2014:

• Lenovo's S650 Smartphone Hands-on
• Lenovo's A859 'Tweener' Smartphone Hands-on
• Lenovo's Massive 6-inch Phone: Hands-on the S930

Follow Marcus Yam @MarcusYam. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Motorola's Project Ara continues to progress at a steady pace. This week brings reports that the prototype phone is almost ready. Speaking during a Google Hangout, Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside confirmed that an Ara prototype is 'pretty close' to completion. Though we're still a long way from seeing the modular smartphone in stores, Woodside said the phone may eventually be available through Moto Maker.

For the moment, MotoMaker is only used for customizing Moto X devices (customers can choose colours for the front and back of the device as well as accents, storage, and wallpaper. You can also pre-configure your Google account. If Project Ara was available through MotoMaker, the options for customizations would no doubt be far more abundance. Ara allows you to select different components for your phone based on your preferences. For example, folks that want their phone to last all day can choose a larger battery but a smaller camera module. 

Project Ara was announced back in October and hopes to increase the life of smartphones via upgradable and swappable modules. These modules would cover everything from the keyboard to the display and the battery, to more unique models like the pulse oximeter. The company partnered with Phonebloks creator Dave Hakkens. Hakkens first talked about his concept for a modular, open source phone in mid-September.

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Late last week, the unlocked Moto G finally went on sale in the United States via Motorola. Already on sale in Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Peru, UK, Germany, France, and Canada, Motorola last week revealed that the GSM version of the device is now available to American shoppers. The CDMA model will arrive in January. However, the device is now also available through Amazon.

The Moto G was announced last month in Brazil and wasn't supposed to launch in the USA until January. Amazon and Motorola are now both selling the GSM version. The 8 GB model is going for $179 while the 16 GB model is priced at $199. Amazon currently has the device down to ship on December 4, which is a couple of days later than Motorola's December 2 ship date, but the pricing is identical.

The Moto G packs a 4.5 inch screen with a 1280 x 720 resolution and a 326 ppi pixel density. This screen is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 3 and backed by a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chip clocked at 1.2 GHz, 1 GB of RAM, and 8 GB or 16 GB of internal storage (no microSD card slot). There's a 1.3MP camera on the front and a 5MP camera on the back. Other features include an FM radio, an accelerometer, a proximity sensor, a compass, Wireless N and Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity, a microUSB 2.0 port, GPS and more. All of this is powered by a 2070 mAh battery promising up to 24 hours of talk time. The whole show is running on Google's Android 4.3 "Jelly Bean," but Motorola promises an upgrade to Android 4.4 "KitKat" in the beginning of 2014.

The new Moto G will be in more than 30 countries with 60 partners by early 2014.

Check out all our Moto G coverage, video and hands on below:

For more:

Motorola Announces the $179 Moto G

Moto G Video Hands-on

Nexus 5, Nexus 4, Moto G: Off-contract Android Heaven.

Follow Jane McEntegart @JaneMcEntegart. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Amazon's Moto X is the company's flagship device. Though its younger brother, the Moto G, is an extremely good value, it can be hard to ignore the draw of a flagship phone with top-of-the-line specs. Especially when that phone is the Moto X and can be customized to fit your personality. Unfortunately, the price of such devices can be a little hard to swallow.

The good news is that the Moto X is on sale on Amazon right now for just a penny. If you were holding out on getting the device because you couldn't justify the price, then now's your chance to save some dough. Of course, you still have to commit to Verizon for a full two years, because this is not an off-contract or unlocked device. Still, you're saving $100 over buying it directly from Verizon.

The Moto X uses the "Motorola X8 Mobile Computing System," which consists of a software-optimized Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro dual-core SoC clocked at 1.7 GHz, a natural language processor and a contextual computing processor. This is paired with 2 GB of RAM and a 2200 mAh battery promising up to 13 hours talk time and up to 24 hours mixed usage time. The phone also packs a 4.7 inch AMOLED 720p screen, 16 GB (standard) or 32 GB of internal storage, dual-band wireless AC and Bluetooth 4.0 + EDR connectivity, and location services consisting of aGPS (assisted), AGPS (autonomous), sGPS (simultaneous), Standalone GPS, eCompass and GLONASS.

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On Wednesday, Motorola announced the Moto G, a mid-range smartphone with a price that's hard to beat. While the value of the phone is in no way uncertain, the same cannot be said for Motorola's decision to launch plans. The company said on Wednesday that Brazil and 'select parts of Europe' would get the phone right away, while Canada would get it later this month, and the United States would have to wait until January. The good news is that the UK is among the first to get the phone.

According to GSMArena, Phones 4U has the phone up for pre-order online and says they'll have the phone in brick and mortar stores from November 15, which is this coming Friday. Clove and Unlocked Mobiles have also opened up pre-orders. As we've come to expect, the phone isn't quite as cheap in the UK as it is in the United States or Canada, though it is still a fairly good value. The 8 GB model, which costs $179 in the US and Canada, is priced at £135 on Phones 4U. Customers can expect to pay £159 for the 16 GB model. Clove has the phone priced at £156 and £186 for the 8 GB and 16 GB models, respectively, while Unlocked Mobiles is charging £160 for the 8 GB and £177 for the 16 GB.

The Moto G packs Qualcomm's quad-core Snapdragon 400 CPU and 1 GB of RAM as well as a 4.5-inch 720p display (329 ppi), 5-megapixel camera in the back, a 1.3-megapixel lens up front, 2070 mAh battery and Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. Motorola, a Google-owned company, is promising an upgrade to Android 4.4 KitKat in January. 

In line with the Moto X and its customization options, the Moto G is also a highly customizable phone. Motorola is offering numerous snap on covers that customers can use to jazz up their phone. Unlike the Moto X, it seems customers won't have the ability to customize the color of the phone ahead of its manufacture, so the covers are something you'll have to buy separately after you get your phone.

For more:

Motorola Announces the $179 Moto G

Moto G Video Hands-on

Nexus 5, Nexus 4, Moto G: Off-contract Android Heaven

Follow Jane McEntegart @JaneMcEntegart. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

There's been never a better time than now for consumers looking to get a new Android smartphone (that doesn't suck) without being tied to a ball-and-chain sort of contract with one of the big wireless carriers.

Google together with LG shook the pricing model of the high-end smartphone with the introduction of the Nexus 4. Even without (official) support for LTE, the Nexus 4 was a runaway hit thanks to its $299 price point. It was sold out for months in Google's Play Store, and commanded much more than sticker price on the buy-and-sell markets.

The just-released Nexus 5 replaces the Nexus 4 but boosts the entry price to $349, albeit with 16GB in the starting model. Like the Nexus 4, the Nexus 5 boasts the same top-end Snapdragon processor of other smartphones twice its price.

Motorola takes the value proposition of the Nexus line and takes it even a step further with today's Moto G reveal. The Moto G smashes smashes through current pricing models (and expectations) with a starting price of $179 from Motorola, with no contract, carrier unlocked.

Like the Nexus 4 and 5, the Moto G gets to that amazing price point with some compromises. For one, it doesn't have LTE, but given that 4G is still roiling out worldwide (with a whole mess of different bands), it's understandable. Motorola set out to deliver a modern Android experience to those who would otherwise be relegated to years-old models, and chose to spend the money on the 720p display that looked very good in our early impressions and the quad-core Snapdragon 400. Sure, the SoC is a step behind that of the Nexus 4, but in regular tasks it feels just as snappy -- further highlighting the wise choice of sticking closely to stock Android.

It may actually be a shame that the Nexus 4 is no longer offered. If it were, even at original prices, then a consumer could pick from a modern-day Android phone at $179, $199, $299, $349, and $399 -- all at no contract, unlocked prices.

This new trend supported by Google (and its subsidiary Motorola Mobility) is a boon to phone users at almost even level. The Nexus 4 and Nexus 5 delivers enthusiasts top-of-the-line mobile processors at prices half of other flagship devices, all while providing what we feel are superior software experiences. The Moto G, on the other hand, will accomplish the very same but for a different segment. Customers with prepaid plans with less than $200 to spend often had to settle for a slow device with already-outdated software. Now the Moto G lets them buy in to the modern Android experience at only a fraction of the cost.

Could this be Google's secret plan to capture the worldwide market? Possibly. Before the release of the latest iPhones, the buzz about the iPhone 5c was that it was going to be Apple's invasion into the low-cost market. The iPhone 5c's unlocked, off contract pricing of $600 isn't going to do that, but the Moto G could very well blaze the trail to Android world domination.

Moto G vs. Nexus 5 vs. Nexus 4

For more:

Motorola Announces the $179 Moto G

Moto G Video Hands-on

Follow Marcus Yam @MarcusYam. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Motorola today announced the Moto G, its latest Moto handset, with hopes it will dominate the mid-range smartphone market. The the Moto G's screen was described as "the hero feature" of the phone, you can't talk about the Moto G without first talking about its incredible price. The Moto G comes in both 8 GB and 16 GB variations and 8 GB model will be available unlocked, SIM-free and off contract for $179. The 16 GB model will cost just $199. Again, that's SIM-free, off contract pricing, and the phone is unlocked when purchased straight from Motorola.

The Moto G packs Qualcomm's quad-core Snapdragon 400 CPU and 1 GB of RAM as well as a 4.5-inch 720p display (329 ppi), 5-megapixel camera in the back, a 1.3-megapixel lens up front, 2700 2070 mAh battery and Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. Motorola, a Google-owned company, is promising an upgrade to Android 4.4 KitKat in January. [UPDATE: due to a miscommunication, the battery capacity of the Moto G is a more down-to-earth 2070 mAh.]

In line with the Moto X and its customization options, the Moto G is also a highly customizable phone. Motorola is offering numerous snap on covers that customers can use to jazz up their phone. Unlike the Moto X, it seems customers won't have the ability to customize the color of the phone ahead of its manufacture, so the covers are something you'll have to buy separately after you get your phone.

The Moto G is launching in Brazil today (Motorola's event was held in Sao Paulo) and in parts of Europe as well. Canada will get it within the month on Telus and its Koodo brand, while the U.S. won't get it until January. 

Check out our hands-on video here of the Moto G.

Follow Jane McEntegart @JaneMcEntegart. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Motorola has yet to officially announced the Moto G, but it seems Amazon UK has already let the cat out of the bag as far as pricing is concerned. Android Authority reports that a listing for the Moto G that appeared on Amazon UK has confirmed pricing and a release date for the new device.

If Amazon's information is correct, Motorola's newest phone, which the company will announce on Wednesday, will be available as soon as Thursday, November 14. What's more, the device will apparently be priced at £159.99. The listing has since been pulled and in its place is a 404 Document Not Found notice. Meanwhile, GSM Arena reports that the Moto G has also appeared on the website of another retailer. Tesco has the phone online (which is where the picture you see to the right came from) and priced at £149.99.

Motorola is hosting an event this Wednesday to unveil the Moto G, which is a mid-range smartphone that is rumored to pack a 4.5-inch 720 x 1280 resolution display, 8 GB of storage, 1 GB of RAM, a 1.2 GHz quad-core CPU, a 5-megapixel camera, Android 4.3, and a 1950 mAh battery.

Follow Jane McEntegart @JaneMcEntegart. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.