Lenovo-owned Motorola recently launched its Moto Z and Moto Z Play smartphones in the country. Having been launched as part of the flagship ’Z’ line-up ( along side the existing X series) , the Moto Z duo isn’t just about raw hardware specifications.
Of these two, the Moto Z is more powerful and hence, pricier. The Moto Z’s ’modular’ approach can be definitely considered to be a gamble, especially considering the less-than-stellar market response towards the LG G5 and the now-shelved Project Ara from Google.
Now, Moto Z definitely appears to be a pretty solid smartphone.I spent a couple of days, both with the Moto Z and its much-touted companion Mods, and here are our findings.
Design and display
With the Moto Z, Motorola seems to have taken the word ’thin’ a bit too seriously. A mere 5.2mm thick, the smartphone has a really impressive design and a stainless steel frame that looks equally good. Compared to the competition, the Moto Z is also quite lightweight. The design is a bit ’boxy, ’ and despite the large display, the smartphone is comfortable to use with one hand.
The right edge is home to the power button and volume keys, while the SIM tray is located up top. Don’t try to find that 3.5mm jack, as it’s not there. Instead, you’ll have to either use USB Type-C headphones or use the adapter that comes in the box to use your existing earphones. Obviously, this means you won’t be able to charge the Moto Z and listen to music at the same time ( Unless, a ’port-splitter’ accessory or something like that comes to the market to solve the problem) .
Flip to the back, and you’ll see the protruding 13MP rear camera module with dual LED flash. There’s also a ’moto’ branding right in the centre. But what’s truly interesting about the Moto Z’s rear panel are the magnetic pins at the bottom. These are used for interfacing the device with the ’Moto Mods, ’ which we’ll talk about a bit later.
The stainless steel frame can be a bit rough from the back, but turns smooth as soon as you snap on the style shell. The company is offering one for free with the Moto Z. It’s made of a faux-wood material and feels amazing in the hand. The ’wooden’ finish of the shell not only imparts the phone a good grip, but also adds to the look. However, if you go for a full shell case, chances are quite high you won’t be able to stick the mods and shells to the device.
Removing the 3.5mm audio jack has helped Motorola make the Moto Z reportedly the thinnest smartphone in the world, with the phone being just 5.2mm thick. In our opinion, it does give the Moto Z a really good in-hand feel.
Let’s get to the display side of things. Moto Z has a 5.5-inch Quad HD display of 1440x2560 pixel resolution. Thanks to Amoled panel, Blacks are darker, colours are more vivid and sunlight legibility is really nice. The Black pixels are powered off when not being used, such as when notifications are being displayed via the ’Moto Display’ feature. This is quite helpful in saving battery life.
The display also has a brightness override mode. Available only with ’Adaptive brightness’ setting enabled, it brings the brightness from 370nits to 506nits. During our testing, we found the display to be really good in direct sunlight. Viewing angles and colour reproduction are quite solid.