Motorola Edge 2026 for $600: Surprisingly I enjoyed my month with the new Motorola Edge. It’s incredibly lightweight, at just 160 grams, and the 6.3-inch screen size seems quite compact. If you hate big, heavy phones and long for the days of smaller phones, the Edge is worth a look; which is not as Small, but feels great to use with one hand. Performance is more than capable, although you will feel some sluggishness here and there. The cameras are reliable (there’s even a 3X optical zoom telephoto lens alongside the 50MP ultra-wide and 50MP primary), but they won’t blow you away. You’ll only get two Android OS updates and three years of security updates, which isn’t 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 line. I have never liked it. It doesn’t have all the bells and whistles of the Ultra, but it still costs more than $1,000. You can get almost the same experience with the cheaper Razr and save hundreds. Even the battery life is the least impressive of all, because it has the smallest capacity. The glass cover is not a ceramic glass mix like on the Razr Ultra, and I found that out the hard way. I dropped the phone once, from about four feet onto the asphalt, and the front screen shattered. Get a screen protector!

Moto G 5G

Photography: Julian Chokkattu

Moto G 5G 2026 for $299: The Moto G 2026 is almost identical to the Moto G Play 2026 below, except it has twice the storage (expandable via microSD), supports slightly faster wired charging, and the front and rear cameras have more megapixels. It’s a $50 difference, so if you’re considering either, you should opt for the Moto G 5G 2026. Performance is similarly slow, though perfectly usable on a day-to-day basis (if you’re patient). Even with more megapixels, don’t expect much from the cameras; They can take acceptable photos in good lighting, but struggle in low light. I was able to achieve almost two days of battery life with average use and I like that this phone still has the headphone jack. However, keep in mind that you will receive only two Android operating system updates and three years of security updates. I think you’d better buy the Moto G Power 2026 on sale. It’s worth noting that Motorola suddenly raised the prices of this device and the Moto G Play.

Moto G Play 2026

Photography: Julian Chokkattu

Moto G Play 5G 2026 for $250: Motorola’s cheapest phone is always in an awkward spot. It originally cost less than $200, but Motorola increased the price to $250. I don’t think it’s worth it at that price, but at under $200, it’s a useful phone that now features 5G connectivity. You get two days of battery life, a headphone jack, expandable storage, and a pretty nice design. But the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 chip with 4GB of RAM is very slow: be prepared to wait a second or two, sometimes longer, for an app to launch or a web page to load. The photo quality is passable; most of my images have mediocre colors. I received several calls and the people on the other end of the line generally complained about my audio quality, which is not very good. It’s nice that this ultra-cheap phone is getting two Android OS updates, but I’d wait for the Moto G Power 2026 to finally drop to $250 during major sales events.

Which Motorola phones to avoid

Motorola Moto G 2025

Photography: Julian Chokkattu

Motorola phones lose value pretty quickly. You should avoid buying Moto G phones from 2025 or earlier. They likely won’t receive any more Android version updates, and prices aren’t drastically different from the latest models. The Motorola Edge 2025 or last year’s Razr (2025) series are the older ones I’d go for, assuming prices are much lower than the latest models, so don’t consider anything else.