The UI of the Moto One Power is clean with minimal distraction, fluid operations and a seamless, smooth experience. The smartphone comes with a massive 5000mAh battery to suit the needs of power users.
The Moto One Power launched today in India. It marks the debut of the Lenovo-owned brand's stock Android series. The line-up was announced at IFA 2018 in Berlin where Moto launched two phones — Moto One and Moto One Power. The latter, and more powerful of the two, is exclusively for the Indian market. With beefed up mid-range hardware and ticking off all the ongoing design trends, the Moto One Power is a clear attempt at filling a gaping hole left by the Moto G6 Plus, a mid-range phone priced at Rs 22,000. With Xiaomi, Honor, Asus and others claiming large shares of the mid-range market, Moto went back to square one. Both the Moto One and Moto One Power are certified under Google's Android One program. The interface is vanilla Android 8.1 Oreo with the latest security patch, and a promise of regular updates for the next two years.
If you trace back the popularity of pure, stock Android among users, the buck could very well stop at Motorola, the G series to be precise. The first generation Moto G that the company launched under the tutelage of Google introduced the world to the simplicity of stock Android. The Nexus phones were there of course, but stock Android on a budget? The credit should go to Moto G. From then to the present day, no frills stock Android has been ubiquitous with Motorola.
As a result, if you flick through the Moto One Power's UI, it won't be much different from any other Moto phones. It's clean with minimal distraction, fluid operations and a seamless, smooth experience. What changed? Over the years, ever since Moto came under the ownership of Lenovo, it wasn't so regular with pushing out updates. The Android Oreo update to the Moto G5 is incidentally rolling out today, more than a year after it's launch. Being Android One certified addresses that problem in the Moto One Power. At least it assures users of regular updates for two years. Furthermore, being under Google's supervision through the programme, adequate firepower under the hood to handle the daily requirements is more or less assured.
The Moto One Power is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 636 platform. It was introduced back in the beginning of the year by Xiaomi in the Redmi Note 5 Pro. Asus also used it to power their mid-range stock Android phone, the Zenfone Max Pro M1. Both smartphones have been consistent with regular updates and are quite popular among users. The chipset is a step below the Snapdragon 660 that powers the Android One-certified Xiaomi Mi A2, but more than capable of handling the usual smartphone tasks. The Moto One Power is also equipped with a 5,000mAh battery that the company claims provides two days worth of usage. It also supports Moto's proprietary TurboPower fast charging standards.
The big battery also makes the phone quite hefty at 205 grams. The Moto One Power has a smooth metal finish and looks a lot like other Xiaomi and Asus devices in that range. It's perhaps more functional to arrange the dual cameras vertically in the top left corner, but they all look the same now. The fingerprint sensor is a dimple on the body with the Moto Batwing logo etched on it. That's one way to set it apart from the rest. The phone is also splash proof.
Up front, the Moto One Power houses a 6.2-inch IPS LCD display. It's a FullHD+ panel with 19.5:9 aspect ratio, thanks to a notch on top. The notch houses the front camera, earpiece and the proximity sensor and is quite wide, unlike the one on the Nokia 6.1 Plus. At the launch event, Motorola did not shy away from stating that the Moto One Power can stream Netflix in HD, unlike most Xiaomi phones.
On the back is a dual camera unit — A 16MP primary sensor with f/1.8 aperture and 1.12um pixel pitch, and a secondary 5MP sensor with f/2.2 aperture to capture depth information. The LED flash unit paired with the camera houses a colour correction sensor like the Moto G6. Up front is a 12MP sensor with f/2.0 for selfies that can also take portrait shots. The camera is also infused with Google Lens that provides additional information about objects in the viewfinder. The camera also has a manual mode, colour filters and HDR.
The stock Android interface is laced with Moto's proprietary features called Moto Actions. It enables an always-on display along with other gesture-based actions like Chop to turn on the flashlight, twist to launch camera, and the likes.
The Moto One Power surely shapes up to be a device capable of taking a shot at the giants like Xiaomi in the mid-range segment. We're testing the smartphone for an in-depth review, slated for later this week. Stay tuned!
Follow Us
Subhrojit Mallick
Eats smartphones for breakfast. View Full Profile
