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Motorola Moto G5 review: Plans | Pricing | Specs

Name: Motorola Moto G5
Brand: Motorola

Alex Kidman

Motorola's Moto G5 isn't a fancy phone, but it's entirely suitable within its price bracket if you want a budget phone with a better-than-expected camera.

5 inches

Display size

1080 x 1920px

16GB

Internal storage

13 MP

Rear camera

2,800 mAh

Battery size

Finder rated as Average vs similar phones

Details

Device features

Rear camera megapixels	13MP
Rear camera aperture size	f/2.0
Video recording	1080p
Front camera megapixels	5MP
Front camera aperture size	f/2.2

Processor	Snapdragon 430
RAM	2GB
Operating system	Android 7
Internal storage	16GB
External storage support	Up to 128GB
Battery capacity	2,800mAh

Launch price (RRP)	$299
Launch date	2017-03

Alex Kidman was the tech and telco editor at Finder and is now a freelance technology writer. He's been a technology writer with experience spanning more than 20 years, writing and editing at Gizmodo, CNET, PC Magazine, Kotaku and many more. Alex has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of New England and a serious passion for retro gaming.

The good

Low asking price
Camera exceeds expectations
NFC built in
Good fingerprint sensor
Removable battery

The bad

Ordinary battery life
Mediocre performance
Very plain look

The Moto G5 is the ute of phones, and that’s a good thing.

If you want excitement in a smartphone, you’re typically looking northwards of $1,000 to get it, because truly premium smartphones attract serious price points. It’s the equivalent of buying a Ferrari or a Lamborghini, in that a good part of the fun is in showing off your shiny new gadget.

The problem is that for many of us, premium smartphones are an aspirational ideal, but they’re not exactly a sensible buy, even if they’re not quite in supercar pricing territory yet. What you might want is a more practically priced, practically featured everyday phone.

If the Samsung Galaxy or Apple iPhone are Ferraris then budget phones are, logically speaking, utes.

Practical, hardworking, maybe not the fastest or the prettiest, but a good option at the right kind of price. In fact, that’s pretty much exactly what the Motorola Moto G5 is, excluding any ability to fit sheep in the back. There's an Android app for that, right?

Design

Simple Motorola design
Good fingerprint sensor

Motorola’s design language tends towards the plain, as we already saw with the Moto G5’s bigger sibling, the Motorola Moto G5 Plus.
The Moto G5 itself follows almost exactly the same design recipe, albeit with a little more plastic and a little less metal. Measuring in at 144.3x73x9.5mm and 144.5g, it’s an inoffensive but ultimately rather bland looking handset that at least fits well in the hand.
There was a time when the inclusion of a fingerprint sensor on a phone was something that you only saw in the top-tier premium space. That was a number of years ago now, but they’re still not common in budget phone devices. The Motorola Moto G5’s fingerprint sensor is fast and accurate for unlocking, which is all you really need out of this kind of device. We’re still fans of front-mounted fingerprint sensors as found on the Moto G5, too.
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Camera

Simple camera that shoots better than you'd expect

The Motorola Moto G5 is priced to sell, and that’s the clear consideration when it comes to every factor of its construction and delivery. It’s also the only sensible way to assess what it’s offering, because buying a phone like this and expecting iPhone-level performance is just setting yourself up for disappointment.
The camera onboard the Motorola Moto G5 is a good example of this. It’s equipped with a 13MP f/2.0 rear camera and 5MP f/2.2 front selfie camera. By themselves that’s nothing to get all that excited about, and even the larger Moto G5 Plus can at least sport dual autofocus pixels to help it on its camera journey.
Still, while we didn’t have huge expectations for the Motorola Moto G5’s camera, it actually managed to impress us with what it could make of what it’s got. Yes, it struggles in low light, or indeed with any kind of brightness balancing if you’re shooting from the hip. However, if you’ve got time to tap to focus, it’s entirely feasible to come out with some surprisingly decent shots from the Moto G5’s camera:
Motorola G5 Sample Photos
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Performance

Not notably powerful
NFC onboard

We’re willing to give the Moto G5 a certain amount of leeway based on the asking price, but the very practical reality here is that you are fairly likely to hit a performance wall at some point. The Moto G5 runs off the very budget-centric 1.4GHz Snapdragon 430 octa-core processor with just 2GB of RAM. That’s not a recipe for great performance, and even the inclusion of Android 7.0 ("Nougat") can’t give the Moto G5 grunt it simply doesn’t have. That’s reflected in both anecdotal use, which was serviceable if a little slow, and in benchmark terms, where against a sea of other budget choices it didn’t do all that much to stand out. Here’s how it compared using Geekbench 4’s CPU test:

Handset	Geekbench 4 CPU Single Core (higher is better)	Geekbench 4 CPU Multi Core (higher is better)
Moto G5 Plus	842	4180
Motorola Moto X Force	1352	3581
Huawei Nova Plus	843	2985
Motorola Moto Z Play	799	2648
Sony Xperia X	1122	2626
Moto G5	630	2605
LG X Power	554	1482
Motorola Moto G Play	522	1334

And here’s its comparative performance running 3DMark’s Ice Storm Unlimited test:

Huawei Nova Plus	13969
Motorola Moto Z Play	13958
Moto G5 Plus	13753
Oppo R9s	13691
Oppo R9	11053
Motorola Moto G4 Plus	9757
Moto G5	9532
LG X Power	4953
Motorola Moto G Play	4475
LG Stylus DAB+	4321
Alcatel Pop 4	3863
Samsung Galaxy J2	3469

Some budget phone makers (why yes, I am looking at you, Oppo) eschew NFC in their handsets, which means you’re cut off from the world of contactless phone payments via Android Pay. NFC is built into the Moto G5, which means that while it won’t cost you much to acquire, you can use it for any number of additional expensive purchases as long as your financial institution supports it.

Battery life

2,800 mAh battery delivers ordinary battery performance

We've seen some budget models with a huge battery focus, such as the LG X Power.

The Moto G5 doesn’t play in those spaces, instead playing it conservative with its 2,800mAh battery. Motorola describes it as an "all day" battery, and for the kinds of users it’s designed for, that’s probably a fair description. Push the Moto G5 and you can send it flat in a day, as we found using Geekbench 3’s older battery test against the handsets of its day:

Handset	Geekbench 3 Battery Test Duration	Geekbench 3 Battery Score
LG X Power	14:50:30	5714
Huawei Nova Plus	13:21:20	8013
Motorola Moto G5 Plus	11:15:40	6756
Samsung Galaxy J2	10:05:20	2689
Motorola Moto X Force	9:46:50	3914
Motorola Moto 4G Plus	9:44:10	3977
Motorola Moto G Play	9:36:00	3840
Alcatel Pop 4	9:20:30	2490
Alcatel Idol 4S	8:14:20	4943
LG Stylus DAB+	8:11:40	3278
Alcatel Go Play	7:21:10	2941
Motorola Moto G5	6:32:50	3833

While it’s acceptable without being outstanding within its price range, we do feel compelled to point out that the Moto G5 Plus performed considerably better in this regard, and would be a better pick if your budget can stretch to it.

One interesting design difference between the Moto G5 and Moto G5 Plus is that the Moto G5 supports a removable battery where the Moto G5 Plus is entirely sealed. There’s a slight design trick here, because the rear of the Moto G5 looks as though it should pop off around the camera lens. Instead, it’s the entire rear of the phone that comes off to pop the 2,800mAh battery into the Moto G5’s body.

Verdict

An older budget handset, and you may be better with something newer

Motorola knows entirely well what it’s selling in the Moto G5, and that’s a cheap phone. It doesn’t try to dress it up in fancy marketing clothes, or for that matter useless software gimmicks. That’s a plus because it leaves you with a mostly blank slate Android device.
Motorola has enjoyed a lot of success with the Moto G line, and it’s not hard to see why. The Moto G5 isn’t a stellar handset in performance terms, and we'd certainly advise seeking a bargain price for it given it's not even Motorola's latest G-series phone.
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Pricing and availability

Motorola Moto G5

Motorola's simple G5

The Motorola Moto G5 is an affordable everyday handset.

The Motorola Moto G5 originally sold in Australia outright for $299.