Motorola Edge+ brings S865, 5G and 108MP camera, Edge joins in with S765
Motorola is jumping head first into the 5G market with two new “edge” phones – named after what the company calls “Endless Edge”, its interpretation of the waterfall screen. Both phones share this design, as well as 5G connectivity and a capable triple camera.
Motorola Edge+
The Motorola Edge+ is Moto’s first proper flagship in a while and it makes up for lost time by marking several “firsts” for the brand.
Motorola Edge+
For starters, this 6.7” HDR10+ AMOLED panel is the first Motorola with a 90Hz refresh rate. The 1080p+ resolution isn’t quite “premium”, but looking at it positively, it uses less energy. A 25MP selfie camera sits in the punch hole in the upper left corner and there is an in-display fingerprint reader hiding behind the display.
The US version of the Edge+ supports mmWave 5G, which promises up to 4Gbps download speeds working on Verizon’s network, the launch partner in the US. This is Moto’s first proper 5G phone (not counting any MotoMod experiments). Global units will get sub-5GHz 5G, mind you.
Another first is the 108MP sensor on the main camera. It sits behind an f/1.8 lens and is optically stabilized. Like the Xiaomi phones (and unlike the Galaxy S20 Ultra), this sensor does 4-in-1 pixel binning to produce 27MP photos.
It is joined by an 8MP telephoto camera that has a 3x optical zoom lens (and OIS too). Rounding off the triple camera setup are the 16MP ultrawide-angle cam (117°), which can also snap macro photos, and a ToF cam. The phone can record 6K videos, which is a bit strange given that the chipset is capable of 8K (the camera should be too).
The Snapdragon 865 is practically a prerequisite for a 2020 flagship and on the Motorola Edge+ it comes paired with 12GB of fast LPDDR5 RAM as well as 256GB UFS 3.0 storage.
The phone is powered by a fairly large 5,000mAh battery with 18W fast charging over USB-C. Motorola claims that the battery is big enough for 2 days of use. Wireless charging is supported in both directions – the phone can soak up energy at 15W and then share it with other Qi compatible gadgets at 5W.
Some will also appreciate the presence of a 3.5mm audio jack on the both the Motorola Edge+ and the Edge.
The Motorola Edge+ will arrive in Smokey Sangria, Thunder Grey and cost $1,000. Or you can sign up for $41.67 a month installments for two years with Verizon. Sadly the phone will be exclusive to Big Red so those are your only options.
Motorola Edge
The Motorola Edge is very similar to its sibling, but the specs are not dialed up to “plus” levels. You still get a 6.7″ 90Hz screen with extra curves on the side, but no HDR10+ support.
Motorola Edge
However, the chipset is a Snapdragon 765G and while it supports both flavors of 5G, here it is configured only for sub-6GHz networks. Also, the RAM capacity is a more restrained 6GB in the global version and 4GB in North America. Storage is 128GB and you get a microSD for expanding that – something that the plus version lacks.
The triple camera on the back has a similar makeup, but switches to a 64MP main sensor. It is joined by an ultrawide and a telephoto camera, plus a ToF module. The 25MP selfie cam is the same.
The battery on the Motorola Edge is somewhat smaller (but still quite big) at 4,500mAh and retains the 18W wired charging speeds. Wireless charging is a no-go, however.
Both Edge phones boast powerful stereo speakers. They will run Android 10 at launch (naturally) and the company is promising to update them to at least version 11.
The vanilla Motorola Edge is coming to Europe, Latin America and the Asia Pacific initially followed by the US later on. Color options are be Solar Black, Midnight Magenta.
Developing…
