Wednesday, September 1, 2021

Motorola Moto G50 5G w/ Dimensity 700 Review

Motorola has come a long way as a phone brand. It’s one of the biggest manufacturers out there alongside Nokia. It also had its share of challenges especially with the rise of smartphones and aggressive competition from China. But it’s still here and has made its presence more known in the mid-range market, especially when it launched the Moto G 5G Plus last year, a competitively priced 5G smartphone. Now, it’s back with the Moto G50 5G. Another 5G smartphone, but more affordable this time. Read our review below.

Design and Construction

The Moto G50 5G is a pretty tall device, chunky and quite hefty given the large screen and big battery. The body is entirely made of plastic with a glossy back panel that attracts fingerprints, so better use the protective case included in the package. It also has a water-repellent design—meaning it can handle accidental spills, splashes, or some light rain.

The unit we have is in Meteorite Grey color that produces a bluish glow and light effects depending on the angle and is also available in Green colorway.

Flipping to the front, there’s a large 6.5-inch display, and its bezels are noticeable, especially the thick chin. Then there’s also a notch at the top for the selfie camera. Found above it is the earpiece, which also doubles as a secondary loudspeaker for stereo sound.

Found on the right is the dedicated button for Google Assistant, the volume rockers, and the power/wake button that also doubles as a fingerprint scanner. The buttons are made of plastic but tactile, firm, and quiet. The buttons are easily reachable, but the Smart Assistant button can be quite a reach.

The card tray is placed on the left side for two nano-sized SIM cards and a microSD card in a hybrid setup.

Up top, we have the secondary microphone, while at the bottom is the 3.5mm audio jack, main microphone, USB-C port, and loudspeaker.

Overall, the design has a good build with a bonus water-repellent design, plus it sits comfortably in the hands, thanks to its flat sides.

Display and Multimedia

The Moto G50 5G is equipped with a 6.5-inch Max Vision screen and features an HD+ resolution, equating to 269 PPI. It’s not hi-res, but it’s enough for most tasks, including watching videos or playing games. Colors and viewing angles, on the other hand, are decent. However, the pixels are noticeable if you really look up close. It’s not a big downer for most users, though, especially at this price range.

One of the things that users will like about the Moto G50 5G’s display is the 90Hz refresh rate, meaning you’ll get smooth animations and transitions.

When it comes to audio, the Moto G50 5G has just one speaker, and it screams budget. While it gets loud enough for voice calls, you’re better off using headphones if you want a more immersive audio experience.

Camera

The Moto G50 5G has a total of four cameras — a triple setup at the rear consisting of a 48MP main, 2MP macro, and 2MP depth. For selfies, a 13MP shooter. Sadly, there’s no ultra-wide lens here, and take note that the app is also pretty slow.

The camera UI is unique as its modes are arranged in a customizable carousel formation, with the hamburger menu holds a couple of other shooting modes. In addition, there’s a Pro mode, cutout, spot color, and night vision.

When it comes to quality, results are distinctly OK. The dynamic range is good, details are pretty present, and colors can be bright in some shots or muted. Using the sensor’s full resolution helps get more details but doesn’t provide drastic improvements.

For macro, surprisingly, images are sharp and detailed. Color reproduction is also good and vibrant. The Portrait mode works okay too, it has good background separation, and you can adjust its bokeh depending on your preference. However, when it comes to low light, photos come out soft. It lacks sharpness, so make sure to turn the Night mode on for a better result.

For selfies, it has a decent amount of detail in perfect lighting, and taking a photo is kinda annoying because it takes around 3 to 5 seconds to snap, depending on the lighting. There’s also a beautification slider to make your skin look smoother in selfies.

For videos, it can only shoot up to 1080p, and there’s no way to change the video recording resolution. Also, take note that files are set to H.265/HEVC encoding by default.

OS, UI, and Apps

The Moto G50 5G runs on Android 11, the latest version of Google’s mobile operating system. It’s a very clean UI that feels almost stock, and dark mode is available if you’re looking for that. Pre-installed apps are kept and YouTube.

All of the settings can be accessed through the general settings menu like what we used to, but Motorola has its app, called Moto, which is pretty easy to use. You can choose custom fonts, colors, wallpapers, toggle on/off gestures, set your display performance, audio effects, media controls, and many more in the app.

Storage-wise, we’re getting 128GB of storage space, and if that’s not enough, you can expand it up to 1TB via a microSD card.

Performance and Benchmarks

The phone is powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 700 5G with a Mali-G57 MC2 GPU, 4GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage. The experience is great as it can handle all the basic tasks we throw at it. Playing high graphic intensive games like Genshin Impact and Asphalt 9 won’t give you any headaches as these load pretty responsibly. But keep in mind that you’re better off playing these games at default or even the lowest graphic settings possible to ensure a stutter-free experience.

Check out the benchmark scores we got below:

AnTuTu v9.1.1 – 296,657
3D Mark – 1,103 (Wild Life)
PC Mark – 7,809 (Work 3.0)
Geekbench 5 – 546 (Single-Core), 1,650 (Multi-Core)
AndroBench – 945.22 MB/s (Seq. Read), 486.37 MB/s (Seq. Write)

There is a side-mounted fingerprint sensor and face recognition for biometrics, and both are incredibly fast and accurate.

Connectivity and Battery Life

The Motorola Moto G50 5G has modern connectivity features such as dual SIM support, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC, and 5G, of course.

The Moto G50 has a 5,000mAh battery capacity. Battery life is quite strong, and you can survive throughout the day. However, charging speed is what you would get at this price at 15W, but the charger itself can pump out 20W if your device supports a higher voltage.

In our standard video loop test (1080p movie on loop, 50% brightness, 0% volume, airplane mode on), the device lasted 24 hours and 15 minutes.

Conclusion

So, all in all, the Motorola Moto G50 5G isn’t a bad phone. At PHP 10,495, there are a lot of better phones at this price range from its competitors, but if you are looking for a smartphone that can perform well to your basic day-to-day needs, has a 5G connectivity, good battery life, 90Hz screen, and a lean Android build, you’ll be fairly happy with this phone.

Motorola Moto G50 5G specs:
6.5-inch Max Vision HD+ (1600 x720) display, 269ppi
90Hz refresh rate
MediaTek Dimensity 700 5G SoC
Mali-G57 MC2
4GB RAM
128GB storage
microSD up to 1TB (hybrid slot)
Triple rear cameras:
• 48MP F1.7 (main)
• 2MP F2.4 (macro)
• 2MP F2.4 (depth)
13MP F2.2 front camera
Dual-SIM (nano)
5G, 4G LTE
Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
Bluetooth 5.0
NFC
GPS, A-GPS, LTEPP
USB Type-C
3.5mm headphone jack
Fingerprint scanner (side)
Android 11
5,000mAh battery w/ 15W charging
167 x 76.4 x 9.26 mm
206g
Meteorite Grey, Green