Moto phones hold a special place in the hearts of Indian consumers. Since Motorola, now a Lenovo-owned brand, re-entered the country in 2014, India phone users have almost always loved the Moto phones. And for right reasons. These are dependable phones. They are almost always more than the sum of their parts. But even among all Moto phones, the one series that has turned out to be really special is the Moto G series. Lenovo, as it launched the Moto G5 Plus in India on Wednesday, said that so far the company has sold 6 million Moto G phones in India.
Although the success of the Moto G is stupendous in India, it is clearly not enough. So for the first time in years, Lenovo is giving it a makeover with the Moto G5 Plus. This is company's most premium Moto G phone yet. It is also the most ambitious. It comes with a metal body. It also has a few special components like that much-talked about camera. Here at India Today Tech we even said that the Moto G5 Plus camera could be as good as that of the Galaxy S7, considering the hardware specifications for both these cameras are similar.
Overall, Lenovo is pitching the Moto G5 Plus as a phone without compromises. After spending over a week with the device, I tend to agree with Lenovo, although not unequivocally. There are no perfect phones. The Moto G5 Plus, mostly good and occasionally great, too falls short of being perfect. But for its price, this is a mighty good phone.
Plastic out, aluminium in
The new Moto G5 Plus is the most radical makeover to the Moto G series since the first Moto G phone was launched a few years ago. The Moto G4 Plus too was different from the earlier Motos. But this time around the design changes are not subtle. They are complete. Thorough. In your face. They are also for good, mostly. The Moto G5 Plus has an aluminium body. This is not a phone with unibody design, similar to HTC 10 or iPhone 7 but then no mainstream phone is. But the way Moto G5 Plus has been put together, with finesse, it looks like a phone with the unibody shell. The only plastic parts are small inserts on the top and bottom of the back cover. These are needed to ensure good signal performance and all budget phones use them, although in case of the Moto G5 Plus, these are really small and blend very well with the metal body.
The Moto G5 Plus is also the curviest Moto G we have seen so far. This is a big change from the Moto G4 Plus, which was boxier. Combined with the fact that the Moto G5 Plus sports a smaller 5.2-inch screen compared to the 5.5-inch one in the Moto G4 Plus, this is a phone easier to carry and easier to use. In terms of ergonomics, it feels closer to the excellent Moto G3, although unlike the G3 it has a flat back cover. In terms of looks, it looks better than the G3, or for that matter the G4. The metal body gives the G5 Plus a premium finish. The fingerprint sensor, which is fast and accurate, too has a rounded shape unlike the ugly square one in the G4 plus. Some style also comes from the large round glass cover over the rear camera and the Batman-style metal Moto logo that is etched on the back cover.
Overall, the Moto G5 Plus has a design that seems more wholesome. It is all due to the curves, and that rounded fingerprint sensor. Although, talking of that fingerprint sensor, I do have one niggle with it. It is strictly a fingerprint sensor. You can't press it. It doesn't act like a home button (though it can act as a touchpad). That button, along with back and menu buttons, is on the screen. So initially, until your brain retrains your muscle memory, you may end up trying to press the fingerprint sensor and then wonder why your screen is not moving to the "home".
In many ways, the new Moto G5 Plus is the most radical makeover to the Moto G series since the first Moto G phone was launched a few years ago
Did I mention, touchpad? Okay, there is a new feature that the Moto G5 Plus has for its fingerprint sensor. You can go into the Moto app, which allows some customisation of interface, and opt for one-button navigation. This turns the fingerprint sensor into a touchpad on which you can swipe up, down, left and right to navigate. For most people, the regular three-button mode works better but if you are feeling adventurous give one-button mode a try. You may like it.
The Moto G5 Plus is available in two colours: grey and gold. The gold one is shinier but I find the grey one classier.
Rest of the Moto G5 Plus is a standard affair. It is quite sleek with thickness of 7.7mm, and is fairly lightweight at 155 grams for a phone with metal body. Just like other phones in this price range, it comes with USB 2.0 port and, unlike the iPhone, it still loves headphone jack to retain it. One interesting bit with the G5 Plus is that it comes with a dedicated slot for the microSD card. No hybrid slot here. This dedicated slot is still inside the removable SIM tray, but Lenovo has used some design mumbo-jumbo to ensure that it fits the dedicated slot for two SIM cards as well as the microSD card. Good job, Lenovo.
Pure Android, pure performance
Lenovo highlights a number of features in the Moto G5 Plus. But the one feature that I absolutely love about this phone, and have always loved in a Moto G phone, is the unadulterated Android. Sure, Lenovo does tweak the Android under the hood, but the user interface that the Moto G5 Plus has with its Android Nougat is the same one that you get in Google Nexus or Google Pixel phones. The Android Nougat with its pure user interface makes using the Moto G5 a joy to use.
The software on the Moto G5 Plus has clean interface, with all those lively colours in material design that Google loves to use. This is also simple to use, with same app drawer, same notification shade, shade settings app, same Google Now, same keyboard that you will find in a Nexus or Pixel phone. The animations too are same, although Lenovo adds a new app called Moto to the device. This app can be used to set up some specific gesture and interface settings.
The performance is other areas is dependable. Network performance is good enough and so is the call quality on both 4G network and the regular GSM network. And yes, the Moto G5 Plus works well with Jio its VolTE feature out of the box
Android 7 aka Nougat not only looks good and is easy to use, it also works flawlessly on the Moto G5 Plus. The hardware inside is good enough and given that there is no heavy skinning or unnecessary apps like security scanner in the background, the performance of the phone is good. At India Today Tech we got the 4GB/32GB variant for review and never while using the phone I encounter poor or low performance. The Snapdragon 625 processor inside the phone runs well and cool. It handles web browsing, photo editing etc well enough. There is no lag when you switch between the open apps.
When it comes to performance, the Moto G5 Plus doesn't falter in any area. Although, in some it's only good enough. That one area is screen. The 5.2-inch screen in the Moto G5 Plus is bright enough to be usable in direct sunlight. It is also sharp enough with FullHD resolution, and it can show nice colours. But contrast is where it barely makes the cut. It's not bad, but deep colours don't exactly pop out. The viewing angles too are on the average side. If you are used to some higher-end phones you will notice these peculiarities in the Moto G5 Plus screen. The screen of the G5 Plus gets the job done, but it is an area where it could have been better.
The same is true for the front-firing speaker, placed above the screen. It is loud enough for indoor use, but if you are hoping to listen to PM Modi's speech on it while walking through Chandni Chowk, you better use earphones.
Performance is other areas is dependable. The GPS works well and accurately. Network performance is good enough and so is the call quality on both 4G network and the regular GSM network. And yes, the Moto G5 Plus works well with Jio its VolTE feature out of the box.
Now the battery: This is one area where I was pleasantly surprised by the Moto G5 Plus. It packs in a 3000 mAh battery, which is on the smaller side in a market where we have phones coming with 4000 mAh battery. But forget about the capacity and numbers. The Snapdragon 625 is a very efficient processor and it shows in the Moto G5 Plus. When used with a 4G SIM, the phone lasts around 13 to 15 hours. In other words, this is a phone that you will have to charge only once in a day.
The Moto G5 Plus camera clicks nice photos when the light is good
A camera with hint of greatness
This is the part that is most important one in this review. Lenovo has highlighted the Moto G5 Plus rear camera big time. And for right reasons. It seems to have pretty neat hardware inside its body. The rear camera uses a 12-megapixel image sensor, with dual-pixel autofocus feature. This is very similar to the sensor inside the Samsung Galaxy S7, considered one of the best in business. It is a Sony-made sensor and though Motorola hasn't revealed the details, it is either IMX260 or IMX362, which are very similar. This sensor is paired with F1.7 lens, another similarity between the Moto G5 Plus and the Galaxy S7. But similarities in hardware on paper may not mean similar performances because actual performance of camera depends on hardware, lens and software that processes the images. And that is what we see from the Moto G5 Plus camera.
This is a good camera but it also could have been better. In some areas the Moto G5 Plus camera excels. It captures good amount of detail and great colours in good light. It is very good at handling dynamic light. It also captures fantastic macro shots not just because of its good sensor but also because of its wide F1.7 lens, which helps it get nice blurred background. But it is in low light, where the performance takes a hit. The low light photos shot with the Moto G5 Plus are grainy and have lot of colours noise.
The interesting part is that it could have been better. The camera app comes with a manual mode and if you are shooting in low light, go into this mode and tone down ISO. This will give you better results in low light. The Moto G5 Plus can shoot 4K videos. Unless light is really low, the Moto G5 captures good quality video footage.
On the front the Moto G5 Plus has a 5-megapixel camera. In good light, you will get nice sefies from it. the level of detail in these selfies is not great but colours are nice. (For all sorts of image samples, click on thumbnails above).
Should you buy it?
Absolutely. But buy it for the overall experience, and especially for that clean Android Nougat. Although the Moto G5 Plus performs well in all areas and has a nice enough design, its biggest strength remains its overall experience. Once again it is a Moto G, which is bigger than any one single part. Its camera is one of the best we have seen in this price bracket and its performance is fantastic, complete with the clean Android. Its design is attractive, although a curved glass on the screen, could have been the cherry on the cake.
As I noted earlier, no phone is perfect. The Moto G5 Plus too is not. But for its price, you can't wish for more. For its price -- Rs 14,999 for 3GB/16GB and Rs 16,999 for 4GB/32GB -- the Moto G5 Plus offers more than enough to be the best all-rounder under Rs 20,000 price bracket.
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