Can Motorola win its budget phone crown back?

Motorola is making waves in 2024 with its high-end Razr and Edge devices, but the Lenovo-owned brand hasn’t forgotten about budget phones. 

Its Moto G line has long been a staple of our best budget phones round-up, combining respectable specs and clean software with an impressively low price. 

However, Motorola isn’t currently our top cheap phone choice. Of all the phones released this year, we consider Nothing sub-brand CMF’s Phone 1 (£209/$199) and the Samsung Galaxy A15 5G (£199/$199.99) to offer the best all-round experience you can get at this price. 

But Motorola is fighting back. Judging by price, the company’s new Moto G35 (£149.99/€199) and G55 (£199.99/€249) seem to be decent options in the crowded budget market, albeit not in the US, where they’re not being sold. 

Can they beat Samsung, Nothing and others to regain the top spot? I’ve tried both new budget Motos at the launch event in Belgrade and have plenty of thoughts. 

Grand designs

One of the first things that usually gets sacrificed on budget phones is build quality, but not on the Moto G35 and G55. On both phones, you can choose between matt plastic or vegan leather finishes. 

I tried the latter and was pleasantly surprised by how premium it felt. Not only does vegan leather look great, it also adds lots of grip to the back of the phone and cushions any impact from drops. 

Despite this, the vegan leather models only weigh 182g (G55) and 192g (G35) respectively. Coming from significantly heavier flagships, these phones felt refreshingly lightweight in my hands. 

Then there are the colours. Motorola has become known for its vibrant phone finishes in recent years, and that’s no different on the new budget models. 

I tried out the ‘Vibrant Purple’ model of the G55, which is about as bright and eye-catching as a phone finish gets. Alongside ‘Smoky Green’ and ‘Forest Grey’, it’s nice to see Motorola shift away from the traditional muted colours we see on modern phones. 

The ‘Midnight Black’ version of the G35 I tried is about as safe as it gets, but there are also options for ‘Leaf Green’, ‘Guava Red’ and ‘Sage Green’. 

Display for days

Another thing that impressed me in my short time with these phones were their displays.  

Of course, you’re not going to get flagship-level screens at this price, but Motorola has been smart about where the compromises are made. The 6.49-inch G35 and 6.72-inch G55 both have FHD LCD panels and benefit from 120Hz refresh rates.

Neither phone will wow you with its display, but decent colour accuracy and impressive detail make them a solid choice for everyday use and watching videos. And even in challenging lighting conditions, I found the visibility on both handsets to be good. 

Decent performance

If you’re buying a budget phone, you probably aren’t planning on using it for gaming or other demanding tasks. You just want a device that can handle everyday usage without taking ages or crashing.  

And based on early impressions, that’s just what the new Moto G phones offer. The G35 uses the Unisoc T760, while the G55 steps up to the MediaTek Dimensity 7020. While not the fastest, I found both phones to be relatively slick and responsive, although you may need more than the starting 4GB of RAM. 

Still lots of unknowns

Of course, my few minutes with the devices can only tell you so much. And while the signs are encouraging, there’s still so much we don’t know. 

What are the cameras like in real life? Is battery life any good? How ‘water-repellent’ are the phones without an official IP rating? And are these devices that can realistically be used for their full software support of two years of OS updates and three years of security patches?

For all this and much more, you’ll have to wait for our full reviews. But based on specs and first impressions, the Moto G35 and G55 look like impressive phones for the price. 

Overthrowing Samsung and Nothing to be the budget phone kings again, though? That’ll be very difficult.