Motorola Moto G6, analysis and opinion

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We have tested the Motorola Moto G6 and this is our opinion. It is a mid-range mobile with many of the essential features to succeed in 2018. Is it worth buying? We reveal it to you next.

Motorola - now owned by Lenovo - is one of the most important brands on the international scene, although like others it faces a quite moving 2018. The arrival of Xiaomi threatens a good part of its market share, especially in the basic and middle ranges.

For this reason, the company has made great efforts with one of its new terminals. It is the Motorola Moto G6, whose analysis we elaborate to explain what it has to offer and how is this mobile.

It is a very affordable phone, with a launch price of 249 euros and characteristics that a priori are very competitive. In this review we will review all its keys, features and successes, but also the errors.

Is it worth buying the Motorola Moto G6? Is it good mobile for the price? We answer these and more questions.

Crystal body, the controversial fashion of 2018
This year is the year of the crystal, and all the brands seem to get on the bandwagon of a material that brings a premium touch to the design, but which is undoubtedly fragile. It is one of the problems that we have found in this analysis of the Moto G6 and that we will find in many more soon.

Aesthetically, glass is spectacular, but at the level of solidity it is a step backwards. Therefore, it is something that you must bear in mind before buying a mobile phone. In this case, the entire back cover and the front area are made of glass, while the frames and sides are made of metal. Motorola has called it 3D Crystal because of the [CENSORED]ture it has on both sides and that makes it easier to grip.

Beyond the material, Motorola reaffirms its commitment to a camera immense in size, characteristic of smartphones of the brand for some time. As usual, it stands out a lot with respect to the body of the mobile.

The design conveys a clear feeling: it cries out for a cover, which will also serve to protect the rear area from traces, a real magnet for dirt and very susceptible to scratches. The back surface slips a lot if you tend to sweat hands.

As a personal positive note of who signs this is the presence of the headphone jack -yes, it has, less badly- in the lower area. Others have placed it on the upper edge, something that makes it difficult to put and remove the mobile phone while listening to music.

It is also curious that the main speaker is next to the selfies camera, something unusual. It is both the call and the general, so if you play music you will hear it here.

The fingerprint reader is located in the front area, where the Home button would be. Although at first glance it may seem very small, you should not worry because it works perfectly. It is fast and accurate, although as we will see later it is not the only way to unlock this phone.

Finally in terms of design, one of the first things we noticed in the Moto G6 review is that it weighs little. Glass is a lightweight material, although not all take advantage when it comes to lightening weight. In this case they are only 167 grams.

How could it be otherwise, the Moto G6 has 18: 9 format screen, but not exactly without frames. We explain: obviously the aspect ratio exploits a little more the body of the phone, it takes more advantage, although it does not have a screen-body ratio as good as other phones.

That makes the feeling is not really that of a mobile without frames, something that much less the user experience. This occurs due to the shape of the phone itself, the presence of the home button with fingerprint reader and the loudspeaker at the top. There are many elements that surround the screen and that makes it not seem so elongated, although it has 5.7 inches.

Having said that, there are sensations that we have had throughout this analysis of the Moto G6, opinions that depend a lot on the user, although fully justified. What is really objective is that the resolution and quality of the panel are up to the competition: Full HD + on IPS LCD panel and with 424 dots per inch, which is not bad.

 

The viewing quality is good, with decent viewing angles and good outdoor brightness. Maybe it will be a bit tiled if you see the screen from the side, but it is common to all mobile phones with these screens.

In short: does this Motorola have a good screen? Without a doubt this is so, because if we add the Full HD + to the 18: 9 format, it is a very good mobile to watch series, movies and videos in general, although it could be brighter.

One detail is that you can choose the color profile you want to display in the Settings. If you like the screen with more vivid and intense colors, you can modify it manually. Interestingly, to activate the night screen you have to go to the Moto app, where you can also configure it to be activated when you receive notifications

Before proceeding with the evaluation of the Moto G6 software, one thing must be clarified: it is not an Android One mobile. The decision of Xiaomi with the Mi A1 and Android One has marked the rest of the industry, and is that the user asks "clean" mobiles, with or without this version of the operating system.

In this case, the G6 equipped Android 8.0 Oreo with the manufacturer's customization layer, quite light indeed. It is not a smartphone with Android One but the difference is barely perceptible. There are not many pre-installed applications - although there are some, such as Outlook - nor too many superfluous tools.

Instead of creating their own apps, Motorola has preferred to use those of Google. That's why, for example, it does not have a gallery, but it uses Google Photos directly to visualize the images, a good decision.

In addition, that Oreo is the version that comes installed has two advantages: you can benefit from all the features of this version of Android, such as autocomplete with passwords saved in Chrome, and leaves the Moto G6 very well placed to receive the update to Android P when the time comes.

If what you are looking for is a mobile that works well, smoothly and with few or no errors. You will not have problems if you choose the one we have in hand. Luckily at the level of performance the situation has improved a lot in the market in general, and the performance of the Moto G6 is as good as you could wish for a mobile of 249 euros.

However, software is much more than that: it has to do with customization options, with everything you can do or not in a smartphone. There Motorola has always been good, and it still is.

Almost all the actions that are not included in Android by default are in the Moto app. In it you can configure the phone so that the screen stays on when you are watching it or to activate the night screen automatically.

As an extra, there is the possibility to configure the sound with the Dolby Audio equalizer. Already its presence helps you to hear better, but if you are also a handyman and configure the profiles, you can boast of how good your smartphone is heard.

And finally, an important detail: the facial release. This phone has it but watch out! It is not the same Face ID of the iPhone X or the S9, but uses a photo to recognize your face. Normally it works well when you look at the camera in static, but not if you are walking or if you are more than one meter from the selfies camera.

It is a less reliable system than the fingerprint reader, although you can use both simultaneously.

Good performance, but without boasting
This mobile equips a quite usual configuration in 2017 and 2018: Snapdragon 450 processor and 3 GB of RAM. So far this combination has shown that it is capable of providing good performance in general terms.

In this case the exact same thing happens, and that is that the user experience is generally good. You can use applications like WhatsApp, Twitter or YouTube without any problems. You can even change from one to another without lag, although it slows down on some occasions.

During the time that we have tested Moto G6 for its review, we have never had to close all the applications because the mobile phone was slow, although occasionally it is noted that it takes a little longer than expected to open applications. Nothing unbearable in a mobile of this price.

Where you see more shortcomings is in games. In those that are graphically more demanding directly you have to configure them with low graphics if you want to enjoy them in a fairly acceptable way. An example is PUBG Mobile, whose graphics on this smartphone are far from what a mobile offers with another GPU.

Simply Adreno 506 - the GPU that comes with this processor - is good for many things, but not for games with 3D graphics. You can play, but not 100%.

With this we do not mean that it is a slow mobile, much less. It works well until it takes a second more time to open an application, for example.

In addition, it has 32 GB of internal storage. This amount is sufficient for now, although it is advisable to use a microSD. This device allows you to expand your card storage, and you should do so if you are going to record many videos or save multimedia content.

Dual camera on one side, front flash on the other
The dual camera is one of the bets of Motorola in this Moto G6, although in megapixels there is a reduction of 13 to 12 MP in the main with respect to the Moto G5. It is not important, since it also includes an additional sensor - hence the dual camera - of 5 MP. The opening in the main chamber of f / 1.8.

In this case, both cameras make pretty good photos, especially in bright environments. They reproduce the color well and capture all the details and textures well. In the gallery that we attach below you can see some examples.

At night they are also very decent photographs for a mobile that costs just 250 euros, and it surprises the amount of light that is able to capture, although it is necessary to mention some problems, like for example the great amount of grain that is observed as soon as you extend them a bit.

Another problem is the operation of portrait mode. Theoretically it must be one of its strong points, counting on having a dual camera. However, it does not work as well as you would expect. Focuses well on the object in the foreground, but in a limited way. The edges of that same object are already blurred, subtracting the image a lot. It is almost better to take the photo in macro mode if you want the background to be out of focus.

This portrait mode does not work making you selfies. It is something strange and difficult to understand, since theoretically selfies are the second big bet in this Moto G6. That's why it has a frontal flash and panoramic selfies that fit three people without any problem.

At least it has a fairly simple and easy-to-use manual mode, like almost the entire camera application interface. It does not have many modes, beyond HDR, panoramic and portrait mode, but they are enough.

Let's say as a conclusion that if you know how to make good photos and you manage manually with the values, this camera will work for you, although there are better ones to take pictures in automatic mode.

Fast charging and more than enough battery
With 3,000 mAh capacity, it is expected that in this analysis of the Moto G6 we have not suffered to spend a day with a battery cycle. And we have not done it, so we can say that this mobile is placed in normal autonomy parameters.

Playing occasionally and above all using many social networks, you will not have problems to get from morning to night and keep around 20% remaining battery. That yes, extend more than 24 hours autonomy is quite difficult.

You can not say that it is something to highlight but it is acceptable and sufficient, especially because it is what the vast majority of mobile phones available now offer.

On the other hand, it is appreciated that Motorola includes a fast charger in the pack. This smartphone is compatible with Quick Charge 3.0 thanks to its Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, a point in its favor.

It is not the latest standard available, but it is fast. For example you can charge 40% of the battery in only half an hour or 90% in an hour and a half according to the real test we have done for the review of this Motorola Moto G6. These are figures that can save you if you have to leave home in a short time and you are in a hurry to battery.