Motorola Moto G Turbo Edition launched: Here’s our first impressions of the smartphone

The Moto G Turbo Edition is the more rugged version of the earlier Moto G (2015 edition) that was launched in India and packs a faster Snapdragon 615 octa-core processor and 2GB RAM unlike the Snapdragon 410 processor in the earlier smartphone.

Moto G Turbo comes with IP67 certification which means it can be submerged into static water of up to 1 metre for half an hour without any worry of damage and is also dust-resistant. The Moto G (3rd gen) comes with IPX7, which means it has not been tested against dust resistance.

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Once again, don’t assume that water-resistance means that you can take the phone for a swim in the sea, it won’t work and the salty sea water will probably ruin the device.

Motorola has kept the design of this smartphone as the same as the Moto G3.

It also comes with a fast charging feature or what Motorola calls Turbo Charge, that we’ve seen with the Moto Turbo phones and the new Moto X series.

So what’s really different about the Moto G Turbo edition? Here’s our first impression of the phone based on our usage the last couple of days.

Design, Screen: Honestly, when you look at the new Moto G smartphone, there’s not much to differentiate it from the Moto G 3rd gen. The matte-finish removable back cover has the familiar design that we’ve seen in the Moto G. The camera is bang in the centre of the rear cover with the dual-LED flash below and the Motorola M logo.

Moto G Turbo is all about fast-charging.

The two SIM slots are on the rear of the phone, and there’s a MicroSD slot as well. The smartphone accepts Micro-SIMs.

Moto G Turbo Edition has 5-inch HD screen with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 for protection. The screen gets covered in fingerprints quite easily, although I’ve not noticed any scratches and am using this without a screen guard. It is disappointing that Motorola didn’t go for a full HD display, since that would have been a strong differentiating factor between the regular Moto G and this one.

The Moto G Turbo edition’s screen, however, is sharp and vivid, even when you bring down the brightness to zero and thanks to the higher GPU Adreno 405, graphics heavy games like Beach Buggy or Asphalt look pretty good.

Performance, OS: The higher processor means that the Moto G Turbo Edition can handle games, multi-tasking quite easily. We’ve not faced any app crashes so far with this one and the phone’s clean UI and interface will appeal to the Android fans.

Sample shot from Moto G Turbo Edition.

At present, the Moto G Turbo Edition runs Android 5.1.1 Lollipop and we’re hoping that the Android 6 update will roll out soon for this one as well.

Sample shot from Moto G Turbo.

Camera: Motorola Moto G Turbo Edition’s got the same 13 mp rear camera and 5 mp camera as the Moto G 3rd gen. Motorola says the camera has zero shutter lag  and there’s a video stabilisation  feature as well.

Moto G Turbo does have a pretty fast clicker, although it faces some issues with focus, especially in low-light. You can tinker with the exposure and focus in the settings. However if you’re in a room with proper lighting, you can just start taking pictures and you will get some pretty good results.

Battery: The Moto G Turbo edition has the same battery 2470 mAh as the Moto G3, but Motorola has added the Turbo charging feature which offers six hours of battery life with just 15 minutes of charge.

The phone took less than 40 minutes to get to a full charge for us and even with notifications buzzing on the phone, the battery level has not dropped below 60 per cent. Based on our early impressions, we would say the battery on this phone is pretty reliable and will last you more than a day with moderate to heavy usage.

Conclusion

The Moto G Turbo is a slightly higher-specs version of the Moto G3 with dust resistance and fast charging added in for good measure. The biggest positive is the faster processor and the battery life right now. If you don’t wish to spend more than Rs 15,000 on a phone, and think the Moto X Play is too expensive, then the Moto G Turbo makes much more sense.