Overall, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is a complete flagship smartphone. That too, at just Rs 54,999. Apart from the good display, performance, software, and camera, we are also getting all the premium features like IP68, Corning Gorilla Glass Victus, wireless charging, and more. The smartphone also scores well in our AI tests and comes with enough AI features to keep up with the trend.
So last two generations of Motorola’s Edge series of smartphones have made quite a mark in the smartphone space. The Edge 40 series from last year, and the Moto Edge 50 series of this year, both have been critically acclaimed across the consumer tech landscape. Since I didn’t get a chance to review or experience any of the Moto Edge 40 smartphones last year, I thought I’ll see what the hype is about with the Moto Edge 50 Ultra.
So Moto skipped the ‘Ultra’ variant in last year’s Moto Edge 40 series. We only got the Moto Edge 40 and the Moto Edge 40 Neo last year. This year, Motorola went back to its 2022 naming strategy and we got the Moto Edge 50 Fusion and the Moto Edge 50 Ultra both this year, along with the Moto Edge 50 Pro, which was launched first. So the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is the top-spec device in the Edge 50 series and Motorola has set the bar high, in terms of what to expect from the smartphone. Let’s take a look if the Moto Edge 50 Ultra was able to fare well:
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Design
Right off the bat, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra looks superb from the moment I set my eyes on the smartphone. Despite Moto’s new Edge 50 series being super pretty in itself, Motorola has gone a step ahead and put a wooden back panel on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra. Now, this is not actual wood, but the material is made of recycled parts of wood. Now, I am not sure how much wood is there in the whole composition, but the back panel feels wooden to the touch.
Not only this, Motorola has made sure that the experience of opening their new Moto Edge 50 Ultra is exquisite. The brand has also added a scent to the box and the back panel of the Moto Edge 50 Ultra so that when users open and start using their new phone, it should smell good. Great touch! The Moto Edge 50 Ultra also has a nice woody scent on the back panel. The smell enhances if you rub the back panel. This is probably one of the most creative ways I have seen any brand enhance the unboxing experience for users, and it works really well. How long the scent lasts on the back panel is yet to be seen.
Apart from the wooden back, the camera module merges into the back panel nicely, just the three cameras aren’t placed symmetrically. We are also getting a metal frame, along with the subtle “Dolby Atmos” branding on top of the frame. Up front, there is a curved screen with a hole-punch display. The charging port and SIM tray are placed on the bottom, along with the speaker grille. The power button and volume rockers are placed at the right side of the frame, and up top also, we are getting a speaker outlet.
Furthermore, we are getting IP68 dust and water resistance along with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus protection, so the device is also rugged. The Moto Edge 50 Ultra isn’t as slim as the Edge 50 Pro or the Fusion, but at 8.6mm, I’ll still consider it slim.
In terms of design, there is nothing that goes against the Moto Edge 50 Ultra, except for the camera placement maybe, but that isn’t something that will influence any buying decisions. So yes, the design is very good. It is slim and light, it has all the protections and ratings in place, and it looks extremely good. I have seen many people buying these wooden texture skins for their smartphones, so Motorola giving that out of the box is very good. Add to that, the scent and this makes for a very pleasing device in terms of design and feel.
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Display
The display of the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is a 6.7-inch AMOLED display with a 1.5K resolution and up to 144Hz refresh rate. On paper, this is a brilliant display. It is also a 10-bit display so there is enough range in terms of the colours as well. This is also a Pantone-validated display, which means that it is capable of rendering the full range of Pantone colors accurately.
This is a good display. At 144Hz, it is extremely responsive and smooth. Scrolling through menus and apps is a pleasant experience and you will never feel like the display is slow or unresponsive. It is also extremely bright. The display is claimed to come with a peak brightness of 2,500 nits. But how much is it actually? I used the Lux Meter for testing the brightness on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra and under bright sunlight, the smartphone showcased a good luminance of 1962 nits. So yes, the sunlight visibility is not an issue and even in the scorching Delhi sun, this display doesn’t let you down.
Coming to colour accuracy, I ran the Calman ColorChecker analysis on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra. Here also, the smartphone showcased exceptional colour accuracy. The smartphone was able to achieve a DeltaE of about 1.5, which is great since a DeltaE of under 3 is considered good for smartphones, so this is great in that sense.
The Moto Edge 50 Ultra also supports HDR10+ and Dolby Vision so watching content on platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, or YouTube is a pleasing experience and you can watch your movies and TV shows in high dynamic range.
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Performance
Coming to performance, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is using the much popular Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chipset paired with up to 12GB of RAM and up to 512GB of internal storage. The performance is right up there with other smartphones in this category, and smartphones that have been launched with the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chipset. Be it in terms of how the smartphone performs in the day-to-day, or how the smartphone performs in synthetic benchmarks.
Let’s first get the numbers out of the way. The Moto Edge 50 Ultra is right up there in the flagship territory. The smartphone showcased similar scores to its latest competitors – the Realme GT6 and the Xiaomi 14 CIVI. The Moto Edge 50 Ultra also beats the OnePlus 12R in CPU-based benchmarks like AnTuTu and Geekbench 6.
Even in GPU-based benchmarks, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra came at-par with the competition, being just ahead of the Xiaomi 14 CIVI in GFXBench benchmark.
Now talking about the usage, here also the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is as good as any flagship smartphone. I felt no lags or slowdowns while using the smartphone. App opening speeds are as good as any flagship out there, there are no lags or slowdowns, and best of all, the software is stable and very clean. I played games, used social media, watched content, tried out some other features from Motorola like the Smart Connect feature which lets you connect your Motorola smartphone to a Windows laptop seamlessly.
I also tried out some AI features of the Moto Edge 50 Ultra. These include create AI Magic Canvas which allows users to generate their own wallpapers with just text prompts. There is also Style Sync, which will let you click a photo of yourself and based on that photo, create a wallpaper for you that matches your style. Many AI features are also limited to the camera. For example the AI action shot, intelligent auto focus tracking, and the likes.
And while we are at AI, this is my first review that also includes Digit’s latest AI-Q scoring. We ran our AI tests and looked at the features on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra and the smartphone fared very well in our AI score. The Moto Edge 50 Ultra scored a total of 38.33 points out of 100.
Throughout, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra didn’t give me much issues. While gaming, the smartphone did heat up a bit. It also throttles a lot. Upon noticing heating, I ran the CPU Throttling test on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra and the smartphone throttled to 57 percent of its performance, which isn’t really good for our gamer friends out there. Other than that, the performance is pretty good and this feels as slick as any flagship out there.
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Battery and charging
The battery on the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is a rather small 4,500mAh unit. However, the backup is decent. While I was only able to get about 6 hours of on-screen time on heavy usage without inserting my SIM in the smartphone, in battery tests this smartphone did fairly well.
In a 15 minute Call of Duty: Mobile gaming session, the smartphone lost 4 percent of the battery. Watching YouTube for 30 minutes on the highest resolution made the smartphone lose only 3 percent of the battery, and it lasted a fairly decent 802 minutes which is more than 13 hours in the video loop test. For a 4,500mAh battery, this is good output. However, I have my doubts about using the smartphone more extensively and the battery still giving similar backup in the longer run.
The charging, however, is absolutely bonkers. The Moto Edge 50 Ultra comes with 125W fast charging, making it one of the fastest charging phones in the market right now. It also has a much smaller 4,500mAh battery as compared to other devices in the range. Combine this and the Moto Edge 50 Ultra charged from 0 to 100 percent in just about 20 minutes! This is probably the fastest I have seen any smartphone charge from nothing to full.
So yes, even if the battery backup doesn’t remain good in the longer run, the overall experience is sorted since this is one of the fastest charging that I have personally ever seen on any smartphone so far. Only maybe the OnePlus 10R and Realme GT Neo3 from a couple of years back gave a similar charging experience.
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Camera
We get a triple rear camera setup with the Moto Edge 50 Ultra. This includes a 50-megapixel primary shooter, a 50-megapixel ultrawide angle shooter, and a 64-megapixel periscope telephoto shooter. Up front, we get a 50MP selfie shooter. I will start with the main point – I like the front camera on this more than the rear camera.
Now, while getting good images isn’t very difficult with this setup, the Moto Edge 50 Ultra isn’t the best camera smartphone out there. Things are very simple here. There aren’t many things going on and Motorola’s tuning also looks to be quite basic, with a hint of vibrancy which is a safe approach.
I love having a telephoto shooter in any camera setup that I use and this is no exception. It is limited to 6x, but the optical zoom is pretty good. The details remain intact, and we get enough range to play around with different perspectives.
In extreme low light, this camera really struggles. Even with the night mode on, you can’t see a lot of details. However, things aren’t as bad in slightly less extreme situations.
Portraits are also decent, the edge detection is just fine and the subject is cut out properly. There is also very minimal to no smoothening of the skin so that is good.
Overall, this is just an average camera so those who want a decent camera but aren’t much of photographers would definitely like this.
Moto Edge 50 Ultra review: Verdict
So the Moto Edge 50 Ultra is a phone that does pretty much everything good. It has a nice and different design and comes with a very good display. We also get enough power and might with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 3, and the camera is also decent.
Yes, there are issues. It throttles quite a bit and the battery might give up in the longer run. However, we can argue that this is not a gaming phone and the super fast charging more than makes up for a time when the battery possibly degrades.
Best of all, the software is super clean. While 3 years of updates for a smartphone that costs Rs 55,000 is still quite less, it is something Motorola claims to be working on so we may see further improvement in the update cycles.
Overall, however, it is a complete flagship smartphone. That too, at just Rs 54,999. Apart from the good display, performance, software, and camera, we are also getting all the premium features like IP68, Corning Gorilla Glass Victus, wireless charging, and more. The smartphone also scores well in our AI tests and comes with enough AI features to keep up with the trend.
Motorola Edge 50 Ultra 5G Key Specs, Price and Launch Date
| Release Date: | 26 Jun, 2024 |
| Market Status: | Launched |
Key Specifications
Storage
512 GB
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Battery capacity (mAh)
4500
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Rear Camera Megapixel
50+ 64 + 50
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Screen size (in inches)
6.7
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