The Moto G Power is a phone battery behemoth that costs only $250

Android

The Moto G Power is a phone battery behemoth that costs only $250

Micheline Lykke

April 16, 2020

The Moto G Power ($250 at Motorola) is without doubt one of the latest members of the Motorola G price range telephone household. It follows in the identical steps as final 12 months’s Moto G7 Power with each a wallet-friendly worth and a big battery. At its core, the $250 Moto G Power is just like the dearer Moto G Stylus ($300 at Motorola). (It’s offered because the Moto G8 Power within the UK for £220. It’s not out there in Australia.) Both come at a time when sheltering-in-place means many people depend upon our telephones to remain linked with buddies, household or work. At the identical time, thousands and thousands of individuals are in monetary misery and might’t afford a brand new telephone or to interchange a damaged one, particularly when new telephones can value upwards of a thousand {dollars}.

LikeLong battery life thus farHeadphone jackLow PriceMacro digicam is a lot enjoyable

Don’t LikeVideo recording is roughPhotos endure from noise

And that is the place Motorola stands out from the rising crowd of price range telephones by providing each an inexpensive worth and premium options. That’s to not say that the Moto G Power is not with out compromises. It would not have an IP score for mud and water resistance and it lacks wi-fi charging and NFC. But Motorola sensibly traded away such options to maintain the worth low. Apple adopted an analogous system with its new iPhone SE, introduced Wednesday, which omits options present in its higher-end telephones such because the iPhone 11 ($699 at Apple) and 11 Pro so as to hit a $399 worth. That’s inexpensive for an iPhone, however it’s nonetheless $149 greater than the Moto G Power.

And that brings me to timing. Unless you want a brand new telephone simply this second, I’d wait per week or two to purchase one. The new iPhone SE goes on presale Friday. There are a handful of latest Samsung Galaxy price range telephones on the way in which and there are rumors of a follow-up to final 12 months’s Google Pixel 3A ($300 at Walmart). But if you happen to’re on a price range and searching for a telephone with a completely mind-blowing battery life, the Moto G Power deserves your consideration. Its 5,000-mAh battery is similar measurement because the one within the $800 LG V60 and the $1,400 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra. To use a unique metric: You might purchase 5 Moto G Power telephones for the worth of a single Galaxy S20 Ultra and use the cash left over to take a cherished one out to dinner. Moto G Power vs. Moto G Stylus: Key variations Moto G Power prices $250; the Moto G Stylus prices $300.Moto G Stylus has a 4,000-mAh battery; the Moto G Power has a 5,000-mAh battery.Moto G Power has 64GB of storage; the Moto G Stylus has 128GB of storage.Aside from the macro digicam, the Moto G Power and Moto G Stylus have completely different rear cameras.Moto G Stylus has a built-in stylus.Moto G Power is available in Smoke Black; the Moto G Stylus in Mystic Indigo.
Moto G Power has a hole-punch show The Moto G Power has a 6.4-inch full HD show with a hole-punch that homes the selfie digicam. The aesthetic is sweet and offers the telephone a premium look. It’s paying homage to Samsung Galaxy telephones and their hole-punch show.

It has a USB-C port for charging and a improbable headphone jack. On the again is a fingerprint reader that doubles because the Motorola emblem. It lacks wi-fi charging and would not have an IP score for mud or water resistance. It does have a “splash-proof” coating, nonetheless, that withstood being in standing puddles of water for a number of minutes after I was filming footage for a comparability video. But do not take that as an endorsement to submerge the telephone. The Moto G Power comes with 64GB of storage and helps expandable storage as much as 512GB. The telephone is available in Smoke Black, which seems to be wonderful, although the end collects extra fingerprints than an investigator on CSI. But none of that issues if you happen to’re planning on placing it in a case. The display screen is surrounded by thick bezels which are really thinner than these on the iPhone 11. The brow and chin are a bit chunky however at the very least Motorola removed the title on the underside of the telephone, which we noticed on final 12 months’s Moto G7. Moto G Power efficiency and battery The Moto G Power has a Snapdragon 665 processor, 4GB of RAM and runs Android 10 with quite a lot of largely useful touches from Motorola. In our efficiency assessments, it fared higher than final 12 months’s Moto G7, however nonetheless fell behind final 12 months’s Google Pixel 3A and Samsung Galaxy A50 ($227 at Amazon). Geekbench v.4.0 single-core

Note:
Longer bars point out higher efficiency

Geekbench v.4.0 multicore

Note:
Longer bars point out higher efficiency

In on a regular basis use, I had no downside browsing the online or watching YouTube movies. I performed PUBG with graphics set to “smooth” and the body price at medium and I had no issues. But after I performed Alto’s Odyssey, generally animations stuttered. I’m nonetheless operating battery assessments on the Moto G Power, which takes some time. Motorola promised that the telephone would last as long as three days of standard use on a single cost. During my time with the telephone it lasted simply 4 days between fees. I ought to level out that final 12 months’s Moto G7 Power, which additionally had a 5,000-mAh battery, lasted longer in our battery check than each different telephone we reviewed in 2019. I’ll replace this piece with remaining outcomes and rankings once we end operating our video assessments for battery life. Moto G Power’s triple rear cameras On the entrance is a 16-megapixel selfie digicam which takes first rate images and video. It’s the identical one discovered on the Moto G Stylus. The dynamic vary is not the best, and the colours in video aren’t as correct as they may very well be. A selfie picture taken with the Moto G Power.
Patrick Holland/CNET
And then there are the rear cameras, which… can we acknowledge how cool it’s to see a $250 telephone with three rear cameras?! The Moto G Power has a 16-megapixel important wide-angle digicam, an 8-megapixel ultrawide-angle digicam and a macro digicam all of which can be utilized for images and movies. The $250 Moto G energy has a triple-rear digicam
Patrick Holland/CNET
In good mild, images are first rate, however footage taken indoors or in low mild are mushy and noisy. The HDR mode works effectively to assist the Moto G Power’s important digicam punch above its weight and really yielded just a few first rate snaps. A shot from my yard with HDR turned on.
Patrick Holland/CNET
There are just a few of those flowers alongside the facet of my home. The Moto G Power’s HDR captured the luxurious colour of the scene.
Patrick Holland/CNET
Videos from the telephone endure from a restricted dynamic vary and have the distinction cranked up too excessive. The macro digicam, which lets you take ridiculously close-up images and movies, is considered one of my favourite options on the telephone. I’m astonished on the macro images the Moto G Power was in a position to get. Here is similar flower as above taken with the macro digicam.
Patrick Holland/CNET
But I need to handle your expectations: The digicam system on the Moto G Power is ok for the worth. But you will get the Google Pixel 3A, usually $399 for $300 proper now. That’s simply $50 greater than the Moto G Power. The Power’s a greater all-around telephone, however if you happen to’re into taking images in your telephone, the Pixel 3A deserves your consideration. Motorola Moto G Power specs in comparison with Moto G Stylus, Moto G7 Power, Moto G7

Motorola Moto G Power

Motorola Moto G Stylus

Motorola Moto G7 Power

Motorola Moto G7

Display measurement, decision

6.4-inch LCD; 2,300×1,080 pixels

6.2-inch LCD; 1,520×720 pixels

6.2-inch LCD; 2,270×1,080 pixels

Pixel density

399ppi

271ppi

403ppi

Dimensions (Inches)

6.29×2.98×0.38 in

6.24×2.98×0.36 in

6.28×2.99×0.37 in

6.18×2.96×0.31 in

Dimensions (Millimeters)

159.85×75.8×9.63 mm

158.55×75.8×9.2 mm

159.43x76x9.3 mm

157×75.3×8 mm

Weight (Ounces, Grams)

7.01 oz; 199 g

6.77 oz; 192 g

6.98 oz.; 198 g

6.07 oz.; 172 g

Mobile software program

Android 10

Android 9.0

Camera

16-megapixel wide-angle, 2-megapixel macro, 8-megapixel ultra-wide angle

48-megapixel wide-angle, 2-megapixel macro, 16-megapixel ultra-wide angle

12-megapixel

12-megapixel, 5-megapixel

Front-facing digicam

16-megapixel

8-megapixel

Video seize

1,080p

Processor

Snapdragon 665

1.8GHz octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 632

Storage

64GB

128GB

32GB

64GB

RAM

4GB

3GB

4GB

Expandable storage

Up to 512GB

Battery

5,000 mAh

4,000 mAh

5,000 mAh

3,000 mAh

Fingerprint sensor

Back

Connector

USB-C

Headphone jack

Yes

Special options

Stylus, Action Cam

Water repellent with P2i nano-coating; TurboPower charging

Price off-contract (USD)

$250

$300

$249

$299