It’s running Android Pie, but don’t go thinking an update to Android 10 will have any positive effects on performance – and with no confirmed release date, you could be waiting a while. A discrete single camera and flash sits in the top left, while a circular fingerprint reader with Motorola’s ‘M’ logo sits slightly indented near the top. All mobile phones are designed and manufactured by Motorola Mobility LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lenovo. Up front, the skinny 18:9 aspect ratio display makes it feel modern enough, although the chunky bezels around all four sides give the game away that this is a cheap phone. I found that an hour of Netflix streaming, with the screen cranked right up to full brightness, drained 21% of the battery.

Low to moderately lit restaurants yield murky, blurry, poorly focused food and dining partner shots, while out in the dark of a British winter’s night the noise is overwhelming. With a Snapdragon 655 processor, you can actually game on this thing, and thanks to a generous 64GB storage, the same as found on the starting capacity iPhone 11 and Google Pixel 4, combined with microSD expansion up to 512GB, there’s plenty of room out of the box, and even more if you need it down the line. That means it’s slightly weaker than the E6 Plus’ 13-megapixel camera, that not only has an aperture of f/2. We use industry standard tests to compare features properly and we use the phone as our main device over the review period. This new phone is an updated version ,with a much improved keyboard that is easier to use with my thick fingers.PayPal Credit and PayPal Pay in 3 are trading names of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH. It’s just not pleasant to use, and the culprit is obvious from the get-go – all fingers point at the weak MediaTek MT6739 processor.

Phone must not be barred; PIN/Account locked, be of UK specification; and not be reported lost or stolen. Out goes the latter’s notched display, which served to push the screen-to-body ratio more in favour of the screen. Low-light shots are even worse, with a real lack of clarity and sharpness as it struggles to find a focus point, and increases the shutter speed to a point that camera shake all but guarantees a blurry image.MicroSD cards, like our Toshiba Exceria Pro M501, are read with normal speed, but the internal memory is accessed much slower than in other, similarly expensive smartphones. Motorola’s crisp Camera UI can help to mitigate some of the exposure issues: just touch and swipe up or down to take direct control. Given that this is a phone that will likely be bought a lot for kids, it seems smart to keep the screen size well under 5. Onto the latest midrange onslaught, and starting with the E6 Play, it launches off the back of the E6 Plus, with the same combination of a fingerprint scanner and face unlocking on a budget phone. With this smaller size, the Moto E6 Play display wears its HD+ (1440 x 720) resolution a little better than the Plus.

But if you’re intent on doing that then we’d politely suggest that you may have either bought the wrong phone or set your expectations too high. The normally-standard Motorola app isn’t even compatible with the E6 Play, meaning no peek display for checking notifications without waking the phone, gesture controls or option for swapping from onscreen keys to swipe navigation. Especially the integrated graphics solution PowerVR GE8100 doesn't come close to the comparable devices in our benchmarks.

Look at the red brickwork on the wall here – it just turns into a smooth mess, even compared to the Alcatel 1X’s poor camera. If you need extra space, you can always add up to 256 GB** more using the dedicated microSD card slot. More gratifying, the Moto G8 Plus has adopted the Moto One Action’s ultra-wide camera, which means you can hold your phone in portrait orientation, and record a landscape video. It features a 48MP main camera, similar to that found on flagships like the OnePlus 7T Pro, and there are Dolby-tuned stereo speakers, too - one on the bottom, one on the front.

While a 3000mAh battery might sound respectable rather than outstanding, it has to be considered within the context of the Moto E6 Play’s other specs.In those that are, visual settings default to their lowest levels, and even then frame rates can tank to slideshow-like levels depending on what’s happening onscreen. Which is fine in my book: it doesn’t look like a budget phone, as such, though those that know what to look for will spot the thicker bezels as a marker that you’re not rocking the latest flagship. It doesn’t have the most extensive feature list, with no NFC for contactless payments, a microUSB port instead of the newer USB-C, and no water-resistance to speak of. If your product is reported as faulty after this period we will provide a 'like for like’ replacement.