Motorola One first impressions: Design not software has everyone talking

Android One-based Motorola One is perhaps the best looking Motorola phone in the recent years. We take a closer look at Motorola’s latest mid-range smartphone.

Motorola One Power will be launched in India in October. (Motorola)

Lenovo-owned Motorola already offers phone with near-stock Android experience. Their recent phones have bare minimum software customisation. But perhaps that is not enough for Motorola. At the IFA 2018 technology conference in Berlin, Motorola unveiled two new phones, Motorola One and Motorola One Power. Both the devices are based on Google's Android One platform. This means the phone will run stock Android and guaranteed to receive future software updates and security patches.

The software is of course the biggest highlight of the new Motorola One. But the phone has everyone talking about a different aspect of the phone altogether - design. Sporting glossy and premium-like glass back panel, the phone has two vertical cameras on the left top corners. The two camera lenses are separate and has a lens in between - a pretty unique camera set up. But does that help in photography? We will find out that in our detailed review.

At the moment, what we can say that the camera UI is pretty simple and easy to get familiar with. The camera specifications are 13-megapixel with f/2.0 aperture and 2-megapixel with smaller f/2.4 aperture. It has an 8-megapixel selfie camera. During our brief usage, the camera quickly processed images.

Coming back to the design bit, the glass finish and unique camera module does make the phone look more attractive than any other Motorola phones. The subtle Motorola brand engraving in the back panel also looks good. But the problem with Motorola One and any other glass finish back panel phones are that they are fingerprint magnets.

Motorola Android One smartphones are a fingerprint magnet with visible smudges. (Motorola)

Motorola Android One smartphones are a fingerprint magnet with visible smudges. (Motorola)

During our usage, the panel quickly attracted a lot of smudge, making us wipe the phone after short intervals. The front dons the notch which appears to be a lot wider than you will expect. Fortunately, it gels with the overall form factor. And anyway, we have grown accustomed to notch screens in last couple of months. Sadly, just like many other Android phones, the Motorola One does look like iPhone X from the front but doesn't have any of Apple's advanced sensors to make most of it.

Good thing is that Motorola One is quite compact and very light. The volume and power buttons are well within the reach. It comes with a 5.9-inch 19:9 HD+ display. The screen quality seemed pretty decent. Under the harsh demo zone lighting, the legibility was pretty decent. On the software front the phone run on stock Android. Under the hood runs Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 processor coupled with 4GB of RAM - a decent combination for the phone if launches under ₹20,000 in India. It has 64GB built-in storage and microSD slot for expandable storage.

Motorola One has launched in Europe for a price starting at EUR 299, which is roughly ₹24,000. We are expecting the phone to launch in India with a lesser price tag. Nonetheless, Motorola One faces a strong competition from phones like Nokia 6.1 Plus and Xiaomi's latest Poco F1, which is also the cheapest Android phone to offer Qualcomm's top-end Snapdragon 845 processor. Stay tuned for our detailed review.