Motorola Moto One Power review: Pure Android phone with long-lasting battery

Motorola had released the Moto One Power, an Android One series phone, in India earlier this month. It is available exclusively on Flipkart for Rs 15,999.

Considering the specifications, the Moto One Power comes with cost-effective price-tag. I have reviewed the new Motorola phone and let's check out if it can truly live up to the expectations and give rival brands a tough fight to popular Redmi Note 5 Pro, Zenfone Max Pro M1 and Mi A2 in the highly competitive mid-range.

Display, design and build quality:

Motorola Moto One Power comes with a notch design language similar to the Apple iPhone X (review). It has uni-brow on top of the display, which houses the front camera and other sensors. And on the back, it has vertically aligned dual-camera on the top left corner and to the centre, it has the iconic batwing Motorola logo and I like what the company has done with this space. It has incorporated the fingerprint sensor in the insignia, which has saved a lot of space.

The previous generation Moto series phones used to come with the biometric sensor in the front panel and end up having an unsightly thick chin at the base. Now, the front, except for the notch on top, everything else is a working display on the Moto One Power.

It comes with big full HD+(2460x1080p) Max Vision screen having 19:9 aspect ratio, but sadly there is no option to hide the notch and the only way to watch the video is by changing video format to 16:9. This issue can be resolved with software update similar to how Google plans to do with Pixel 3 XL's notch.

Thanks to the big screen, people can still have fun watching TV series or movies on the Motorola phone.

In terms of screen legibility under the direct sunlight, I had no issues at all. It is bright and did not face stress to my eyes while viewing the contents, be it in text or images or video form.

As far as the build quality is concerned, it comes with the metal shell on the back, which not only offers stability to the phone but also exudes premium feel, when held in the hand. It has plastic-based bands on top and the base but is a necessity for the proper working of network signal connectivity and yes it is sturdy too.

Motorola has done a marvellous paint job on the back, as it almost impossible to differentiate between them. Rest assured Moto One Power can easily survive accidental drops.

Additionally, Motorola has included translucent and a very bulky soft case in the retail box. I also loved that the fact that it comes with a small protrusion on the front-side to partially encapsulate the front panel. So, even if the device falls flat on the display, it protects the screen from cracking unless it falls on a pointed object.

Also, Moto One Power comes with P2i water-repellent coating which means it can survive an accidental water spill or light rain. This brings more value addition to the Motorola phone.

Performance:

Motorola Moto One Power comes with Qualcomm Snapdragon 636 octa-core processor backed by 4GB RAM and 64GB storage, which can be further expanded to 256GB storage.

During the testing period, I had no major issue in terms of opening apps, switching between multiple apps or while playing games for that matter. It worked flawlessly and smoothly.

On AnTuTu performance benchmarking app, it scored an impressive 1,16,585 and on Geekbench 4 series, it got 1,332 and 4,919 points on single-core and multi-core tests, respectively.

I also loved the user interface of the Moto One Power, as it is simple and easy to find features in the settings or in the drop-down shortcuts, unlike other brands, which are tedious to understand in a day. I have to relearn on how to navigate through the phone to find as simple as about phone in some branded phones. But, with Motorola's Android One phone, I had a delightful user experience.

And, Moto One Power comes with zero third-party apps, except for Motorola apps, which by the way are very useful.

But, have to mention that the camera app needs some work as the on-screen shutter button tends to become unresponsive while taking a series of photos. I believe this to be a software issue and can be resolved with a firmware update. This issue is seen in other phones too, so it is not deal breaker and you can go for the Moto One Power without any apprehensions.

Camera:

Motorola Moto One Power comes with a dual 16MP + 5MP camera module with LED flash, full HD video recording, Bokeh effect, Google Lens integration, 4K video recording. It takes pretty good photos in outdoor conditions. One thing I noticed that the phone enhances the colour of the subject, more than it naturally looks. But have to say, the resulting pictures are really pretty and look good on the social media, which the consumer wants. So, this will definitely find traction among youth who are active online particularly on Instagram.

During twilight and also indoors particularly in big malls or airports, the images are decent. As far as the Portrait mode is concerned, the resulting pictures are good too.

In the night, auto-focus speed tends to slow down, but most importantly the image quality is praiseworthy and is on par with similarly priced phones in the market.

On the front, it features a 12MP sensor with 1.25µm pixel size, selfie portrait mode, auto HDR, Beauty mode and Professional mode. Moto One Power takes good selfies that can be posted on social media sites without the need for beautification tools unless the user wants to.

As said before, Motorola needs to release a software update to fix the shutter button freeze issue.

Battery:

In this aspect, Motorola One Power truly lives up to the reputation. During the testing period, it consistently delivered more than one and half days of battery life. During the active hours (5:30 am to 10:30 pm), I binge-watched several episodes of the House M.D. on Amazon Prime Video service, browsed internet for latest news, constantly checked my Facebook and Twitter accounts, watched videos, yet it had more than 40 per cent of battery before I retired to the bed.

If used more conservatively, Moto One Power can easily last two full days.

Final thoughts:

Motorola's new Moto One Power is a well-rounded phone. It has all the right specifications and aggressive price-tag to take on popular Redmi Note 5 Pro and Asus Zenfone Max Pro M1 in the highly competitive mid-range segment in India.

Pros:

• Long-lasting battery life
• Pure Android experience
• Good build quality
• Three dedicated slots—SIM 1+ SIM 2 + micro SD card
• Type-C USB Port

Cons:

• Camera apps need some work as the on-screen shutter button tends to freeze at random times, but this is not a deal breaker, as it can be fixed with a software update. Most importantly, the picture quality is good.

Key specifications of Motorola Moto One Power:

Stay tuned. Follow us @IBTimesIN_Tech on Twitter and on Google News for the latest updates on Motorola.