Motorola Moto G5 review

The G5 steps away from the standard design choices of its predecessors by adding touches of metal. The back panel is aluminum. But it isn’t a unibody design. In fact, plastic makes up the rest of the phone’s body.

Still, the added heft of the aluminum provides what reviewers consider an excellent feel and premium appearance. With that said, most admit that compared to other phones, the G5’s design “isn’t likely to turn heads…”

The G5’s greatest strength is its 5-inch IPS LCD screen. With its 1080-by-1920 resolution, it offers a pixel density of 441ppi. This means it’s just as sharp as the Google Pixel and iPhone 7 Plus.

Still, the screen has limitations. Experts noticed the screen didn’t offer quite the same depth of color or contrast as more expensive phones. This wasn’t a deal breaker for most reviewers as they only noticed the differences when comparing it side-by-side with other flagship phones.

So how can the Moto G5 be so affordable if it has a great screen and excellent build quality? The answer lies in the internal specs.

It comes with a 1.4GHz octa-core processor and up to 3GB of RAM. While this might sound impressive, the processor itself is weaker than the G4’s older processor. When critics put the G5 through benchmark tests they found it slower than the G4 on paper.

In actual use, however, they did not experience lag. And while there were some frame rate drops when playing graphic-intensive games, overall it performed admirably. PC Advisor adds, “The G5 never feels like it’s under-performing despite its benchmarks.”

The biggest limitation is internal storage. Of the 16GB included, only 10GB of free storage is available for use. Fortunately, there’s a microSD slot for easy expansion.

As for battery life, the 2800mAh battery provided a full day of charge for most critics even with heavy usage.

For you smartphone photographers, the 13MP camera didn’t wow reviewers. But it also didn’t disappoint.

They could capture good details in well-lit situations. Images showed little noise, vivid and accurate colors and excellent contrast. Many even praised the app itself as it is easy to use, focus and allows advanced controls—such as exposure adjustment.

In lower light situations, noise increased and color fidelity dropped. This did not surprise reviewers. Overall, they consider it a decent camera—especially for the price.

Overall, while many didn’t feel the G5 brings anything incredible to the table, reviewers still consider it an excellent value. Techradar states, “… this is still a great buy…” NDTV adds, “… it won’t disappoint you in daily use…”