Motorola is staging a comeback in the flagship segment with its new Motorola Edge+ along with an affordable Motorola Edge. Both phones were slated to be unveiled during the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2020 but due to the Coronavirus outbreak in various parts of the world, the conference, along with all major events now stand delayed or completely scrapped. However, many smartphone companies have taken to host virtual launch events in the wake of COVID-19 crisis. Recently, OnePlus launched its OnePlus 8 series of phones followed by the launch of the Apple iPhone SE 2020.
Motorola also announced its Edge series in a similar virtual event with the Edge+ taking the spotlight as the company’s next flagship phone. It comes packed with the latest processor, a versatile camera setup, high refresh rate display and stock Android 10 to boot.
Let’s take a brief look at the specifications, features and pricing of Motorola Edge+ and the regular Edge.
Motorola Edge+ is a flagship phone that borrows a lot of the elements from the current crop of premium smartphones. The body is made from a combination of metal and glass with a vivid display that wraps around the edges (and hence the name) just like what we’ve seen other smartphone manufacturers try in the past.
The phone measures 9.6mm at its thickest point and weigh 203 grams. It doesn’t come with a certified water-resistant rating but the company has faith in its protective design. The phone features a 6.67-inch display that uses an AMOLED panel with a Full HD+ (2340 x 1080 pixels) resolution and 90Hz refresh rate. The screen has a punch-hole cutout on the top-left corner that lends it a 21:9 aspect ratio and is also certified for HDR10+ playback. There’s also an in-display fingerprint sensor for unlocking the phone quickly.
The display edges can use customized to light up in case of notification alerts or incoming calls. The edges are also customizable for gaming and users can deploy two on-screen shoulder buttons when playing games like PUBG Mobile or Call of Duty Mobile.
Motorola Edge+ is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 chipset with built-in 5G support that ensures the phone is 5G-ready. The octa-core processor is clocked at upto 2.84GHz paired with Adreno 650 GPU. The Snapdragon 865 chip offers a 25% increase in performance over Snapdragon 855 with fifth-generation Qualcomm AI Engine support. The Edge+ is being offered in a single variant with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. There’s an option to increase the storage by upto 1TB using a microSD card. The phone runs on stock Android 10 out-of-the-box as expected with some added Moto customizations that are common with all its phones.
The Edge+ comes with a triple camera setup that consists of a primary 108MP camera along with an 8MP telephoto camera with upto 3x optical zoom and a 16MP ultra-wide-angle lens with a 117-degree field-of-view. The main camera uses pixel binning technique to create pictures with an f/1.7 aperture and can record in up to 6K UHD supported by OIS. The telephoto lens also supports OIS and lets you capture far-out with its 3x optical zoom. On the front, there’s a 25MP selfie camera with an f/2.0 aperture.
The phone has a 5,000mAh battery that supports 15W fast charging, both wired and wireless. Motorola claims that the phone can power through two days worth of battery life on a single charge, but we won’t be too sure of it till we get to test it ourselves.
Motorola Edge, the younger sibling features a similar build and uses the same display as the Edge+. Though, the regular Edge is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 765 chipset with an octa-core CPU clocked at upto 2.4GHz with Adreno 620 GPU. The phone comes with 6GB RAM and 128GB storage with an option to increase the storage by using the hybrid microSD slot.
The camera setup on the Motorola Edge is also slightly different as it uses a 64MP primary camera instead. The main camera has an f/1.9 aperture and is paired with the same telephoto lens but with 2x optical zoom, ultra-wide and selfie cameras as on the Edge+. Additionally, there’s a depth sensor on the Edge that will be assisting the camera system in creating portrait pictures.
Moreover, the Edge has a slightly smaller battery rated at 4,500mAh with 15W fast charging support that’s said to offer a day’s worth of battery and then some.
Motorola Edge+ is priced at $999 in the US while the Motorola Edge will go on sale at a later date. The company hasn’t announced additional availability details in various regions yet.
Whether the Motorola Edge series lands up in India isn’t known at the moment, however, we’re keeping an eye out on a possible launch in India post-lockdown.