Motorola Edge 2026 for $600: I surprisingly enjoyed my month with the new Motorola Edge. It’s amazingly lightweight at just 160 grams, and the 6.3-inch screen size feels fairly compact. If you hate big, heavy phones and have longed for the days of smaller handsets, the Edge is worth a look; it’s not as small, but it feels great to use one-handed. Performance is more than capable, though you will feel some sluggishness here and there. The cameras are reliable—there’s even a 3X optical zoom telephoto alongside the 50-MP ultrawide and 50-MP primary—but it’s not going to knock your socks off. It will only get two Android OS upgrades and three years of security updates, which is not really acceptable for a $600 phone. Get it on sale!
Motorola Razr+ 2026 for $1,100: The Razr+ is the awkward middle child of the Razr lineup. I’ve never liked it. It doesn’t have all the bells and whistles or top-notch specs of the Ultra, but still costs more than $1,000. You can get very nearly the same experience with the cheaper Razr and save hundreds. Even battery life is the least impressive of the lot, because it has the smallest capacity. The cover glass isn’t the ceramic glass mixture as on the Razr Ultra, and I found out the hard way. I dropped the phone once, roughly a four-foot drop onto asphalt, and the front screen shattered. Get a screen protector!
Moto G 5G 2026 for $299: The Moto G 2026 is nearly identical to the Moto G Play 2026 below, except it has double the storage (expandable via microSD), supports slightly faster wired charging, and the front and rear cameras pack more megapixels. It’s a $50 difference, so if you’re eyeing either one, you really should go for the Moto G 5G 2026. Performance is similarly sluggish, though perfectly usable day to day (if you’re patient). Even with more megapixels, don’t expect much from the cameras; they can take passable photos in good lighting, but struggle to do so in low light. I was able to hit nearly two days of battery life with average use, and I like that this phone still has the headphone jack. However, keep in mind that it will receive only two Android OS updates and three years of security updates. I think you’re better off buying the Moto G Power 2026 on sale. It’s worth noting that Motorola suddenly jacked up the prices of this device and the Moto G Play.
Moto G Play 5G 2026 for $250: Motorola’s cheapest phone always sits in an awkward spot. It was originally under $200, but Motorola increased the price to $250. I don’t think it’s worth it at that price, but for under $200, it’s a serviceable handset that now features 5G connectivity. You get two-day battery life, a headphone jack, expandable storage, and a pretty nice design. But the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 chip with 4 GB of RAM is very sluggish—get ready to wait a second or two, sometimes more, for an app to launch or a webpage to load. Photo quality is passable; most of my images have lackluster colors. I took several calls, and the people on the other end generally complained about my audio quality, which isn’t great. It’s nice that this ultra-budget phone will get two Android OS updates, but I’d wait for the Moto G Power 2026 to eventually dip to $250 during major sale events.
What Motorola Phones to Avoid
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Motorola phones diminish in value fairly quickly. You should avoid buying Moto G phones from 2025 or earlier. They likely won’t get any more Android version updates, and the prices aren’t drastically different from the latest models. Last year’s Motorola Edge 2025 or the Razr (2025) series are the oldest I’d go, assuming prices are a good deal lower than the latest models, so don’t consider anything else.
