Motorola Moto G Power 5G (2024) review: Should you buy it?

Before 5G ever made its way to the best affordable Android phones, Motorola used the Moto G Power to set the tone for its budget-friendly lineup. It was the first to feature a higher-resolution 48MP primary camera and slightly faster 15W wired charging, leading siblings like the Moto G Play and Moto G Stylus into a wide-open segment. These days, however, the affordable Android race is incredibly competitive, with solid options from Samsung, OnePlus, and more. Not to be outdone, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) is back with a spec sheet littered with updates and new (to Motorola) features, but are they enough to outweigh its low-priced limitations?

In terms of design, there’s no question that the Moto G Power 5G (2024) can keep up with its competition. It pulls heavily from the premium Motorola Edge series but retains some individual character with a back panel that’s split between plastic and vegan leather (which is still plastic but has a nice texture to it). The soft-touch material is a step above the often-glossy, fingerprint-loving plastic we usually see on affordable Android devices, adding enough grip that you don’t feel like the Moto G Power 5G (2024) will slip from your hand. It’s largely smudge-resistant, too, unless you touch the camera bump or batwing logo that breaks up the back panel.

The frame surrounding the vegan leather back panel is also plastic, but it’s dotted with features that have largely disappeared from flagship Android devices. There’s a headphone jack tucked on the bottom edge next to the USB-C 2.0 port, a SIM tray with microSD storage on the left, and a capacitive fingerprint reader doubling as the Moto G Power 5G’s power button. It’s a solid fingerprint reader for speed and accuracy, though it sits too high for smaller hands, making the volume buttons hard to reach. Also, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) supports eSIM in addition to its physical nanoSIM. It supports NFC, too, which is a nice (if long overdue) fix to one of the most annoying Moto G problems.

There are, however, a few shortcomings with the Moto G Power 5G’s updated design. The first is that the display once again sits on top of the frame, creating a dust-grabbing crease on all four sides. Motorola’s top and bottom bezels are relatively thick, too, making the phone just a bit taller than it probably needs to be. Also, while the Moto G Power 5G (2024) boasts a water-repellent design, it doesn’t have an official IP rating for water or dust. It should be alright on a rainy day, but I wouldn’t recommend it for a trip to the beach.

Flipping over to the display, it’s another story of a few steps forward and a few steps back. Motorola bumped its 6.7-inch LCD panel of Gorilla Glass 3 to a 120Hz refresh rate and a crisp-for-the-money Full HD+ resolution (2,400 x 1,080). Still, it introduced an unexpected problem: the viewing angles on the Moto G Power 5G (2024) are downright awful. I found it almost impossible to see what’s on the display unless viewed straight-on, which is great for privacy but inconvenient if you’re trying to use the Moto G Power 5G as a companion in the kitchen. The display isn’t bright enough for use on a sunny day, either — I tried to use the camera while on a day trip to Annapolis but kept having to take my sunglasses off and cup a hand over the display just to line up a photo. Thankfully, I was just trying to capture statues and buildings, but any fast-moving subject would have been gone by the time I could see the display.

On the brighter side (pun intended), Motorola’s updated refresh rate should be the standard for its entire Moto G series. The 120Hz panel isn’t adaptive, but you can toggle to 60Hz to save battery life or let it run at full speed. I chose to keep it at 120Hz, simply looking for the smoothest experience, and I didn’t notice any stuttering in my day-to-day usage — with one key exception.

That one laggy, stuttery exception brings us to the 2024 Moto G Power 5G’s new Achilles’ heel: its software. Despite the largely enjoyable hardware experience, the latest version of My UX leaves a lot to be desired. Sure, it’s still one of the lighter Android skins on the market, holding onto several stock Android apps and widgets from when Google owned Motorola, but it’s become bogged down by apps and bloatware worse than we usually see in the US. The setup process pushes you to download a selection of folder-like hubs and additional apps, many of which are just ads in disguise.

We’ve been ragging on Motorola’s shopping, entertainment, and gaming hubs for about a year at this point, but, as they say, the beatings will continue until morale improves. The hubs look like convenient organizational folders, but they’re designed to serve up a preselected checklist of apps to download to your phone, many of which you won’t ever use. Worse, if you exit the hub via the “Done” button rather than by swiping, it will take that as permission to download whichever apps were selected, chewing right through your 128GB of onboard storage.

Further, Motorola’s partnership with 1Weather results in one of the worst default weather apps I’ve ever had to use. The app is laden with ads, stories, and short videos from other weather sites, which causes it to struggle under its own weight. As soon as you try to scroll past the initial forecast, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) begins to jump, skip, and hop its way to the bottom of the app — and not in a helpful way. I regularly swung above and below the section I wanted to check. Thankfully, if you uninstall 1Weather, the Moto G Power 5G jumps back to the AccuWeather forecast interface that previous generations have used.

The Motorola Moto G Power 5G (2024) also ships with Android 14 right out of the box, which means it’s up to date with the latest version of Android — at least for now. Our unit also picked up the March 1, 2024 security patch shortly after its arrival, which is a good start. That said, the shelf life of the Moto G Power 5G (2024) is painfully short. It’s only slated for a single Android version update with two years of security patches, so it will begin to fall behind just about as soon as Android 15 launches later this year. That’s severely behind update policies for budget phones from Samsung and Google.

And now, to talk about the Moto G Power 5G’s, well, power. It does — or rather, doesn’t do — something that I’ve never seen before. The Moto G Power 5G (2024) is the first phone I’ve encountered without full Vulkan API support. Motorola clarified to us that it does support some components of the Vulkan API, but the Dimensity 7020 chipset doesn’t support certain extensions like those required for our gaming benchmarks. While you probably won’t be running the same 3DMark stress tests that we do, we also found that many games that demand even a little bit of grunt from the GPU tend to struggle.

So, if you’re hoping for a budget-friendly gaming device, look elsewhere. You might be able to knock out a daily crossword or handle some Candy Crush, but I loaded up PUBG: New State, and it was pretty much a non-starter. I was able to drop into a game, but the scenery and weapons wouldn’t render, turning me into a sitting duck. GRID Autosport was equally rough; the basic mechanics worked, but most details and environments fell behind.

Outside of the graphical gaffes, though, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) is the most performant of Motorola’s budget models. Its MediaTek Dimensity 7020 chipset keeps it comfortably ahead of both the 4G-only Moto G Play (2024) and Moto G 5G (2024) in our usual battery of tests, as well as neck and neck with Samsung’s Galaxy A25 5G that uses a slightly more efficient Exynos 1280 chipset.

As expected, performance outside of the lab is also solid (unless you’re focused on gaming). The Moto G Power 5G (2024) is just a little bit quicker and a little bit smoother than its Moto G counterparts, thanks to a few extra gigs of RAM and the aforementioned Dimensity 7020 chipset. I had no problems trusting it with my daily navigation needs, social media doomscrolling, or streaming Maggie Rogers’ new album ahead of a summer concert.

The Moto G Power 5G (2024) does, at least, set a new standard for Motorola’s budget camera setup. It pairs the same 50MP primary sensor we saw on the Moto G Play (2024) with an 8MP ultrawide sensor that finally replaces the low-resolution dedicated macro option from previous generations. Now, the Moto G Power 5G’s macro support is software-based and has four times the resolution to work with. Both updated sensors are more than welcome and take steps toward the Moto G Power 5G (2024) competing with the best budget camera phones, though it still has room to improve.

The 50MP primary sensor has a wide maximum aperture of f/1.8, which is capable of some decently shallow depth of field in portrait mode. It should (in theory) allow extra light to reach the sensor in low-light scenarios. Motorola’s quad-pixel branding is on full display, too, dropping to manageable 12.5MP images by default, though you can use the full resolution as needed. Either way, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) captures decent detail and colors in bright lighting scenarios, as seen below. It was a reliable companion for a sunny day at the Naval Academy, nailing the colors in the goat statue, the cherry tree, and the bricks running up the side of the chapel. There is, however, a bit of halation in the cloud next to the chapel, and the background leaves and cherry blossoms get a bit soft when you zoom in on them.

Zoom capability remains a weak point for the Moto G Power 5G (2024). Swapping the macro sensor for an ultrawide option means you punch out to 0.5x zoom just fine, but zooming in is pretty rough. It’s fine at 1x or 2x zoom, as seen in the first two images below, but it falls off quickly after that. The 4x zoom shot of the crypt is grainy and more than a bit muddled, with the 8x zoom image pretty much unusable.

Motorola’s ultrawide camera and Macro Vision pull a few points back in the Moto G Power 5G’s favor, as does the 16MP selfie camera that bins down to 4MP by default. The 118-degree field of view came in handy a few times while walking around the Naval Academy, and the extra resolution offers significantly better detail in macro shots than the previous 2MP sensor (which can still be found on the Moto G 5G (2024), come on, Motorola).

You can also check out full-resolution versions of the images above and several more at this Google Drive link.

Despite its overall imaging upgrades, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) doesn’t support 4K video recording, so it probably won’t be your first pick for capturing moving memories. This is a disappointing omission, given that Samsung offers 4K at 30fps on its identically priced Galaxy A25 5G, though neither supports 1080p at 60fps, which would be the ideal middle ground.

Ending on a high note, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) is a good example of what battery life and charging should be on a budget phone. Its 5,000mAh cell matches its Moto G siblings, and I’ve reliably pushed it for a day and a half or two days of usage. My usage is mixed, with plenty of time split between the camera app, social media, and streaming through Spotify. Our standardized battery drain test also put the Moto G Power 5G (2024) ahead of its closest non-Motorola rival, the Samsung Galaxy A25 5G, in Zoom and web browsing performance. Samsung, however, came out ahead in the camera and 4K playback sections, nearly doubling the entire Moto G series on the latter. Interestingly, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) comes up short of both Moto G siblings across the board, suggesting that its better benchmarking numbers come at a pretty steep cost.

Though it may not have the battery longevity of its siblings, the Moto G Power 5G (2024) runs circles around Motorola’s other budget phones when it comes to charging. It offers both wired and wireless options to choose from for the first time. Yes, seriously, Motorola finally brought wireless charging to its Moto G series in a rare move that sees a feature added without years of us begging for it. The 30W wired speeds (via Power Delivery support) will get you back on the go fastest, but the 15W wireless charging is no slouch. It’s the same rate at which Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S24 series charges and adds a wrinkle that affordable Android phones often forgo. Just keep in mind that Motorola no longer includes a full-speed charger in the box, so you’ll have to supply your own if you want to hit 30W speeds.

If there’s one Motorola Moto G device worth buying, it’s the Moto G Power 5G (2024) — but it’s still an “if.” Motorola’s latest bite at the apple makes a few meaningful improvements, including NFC support, improved charging, and a camera setup that makes at least a bit more sense. It feels better in the hand than its glossy plastic rivals, and the headphone jack and expandable storage are always welcome throwbacks. And yet, its single Android update means the clock is rapidly ticking on the phone’s future prospects, and the Moto G Power 5G’s gaming performance woes heavily limit it as an affordable gaming option — not a great look when power is in the name.

If you aren’t sold on the Motorola Moto G Power 5G (2024), the good news is that there are plenty of other affordable Android devices worth considering. Here are just a few from Samsung, OnePlus, and even Motorola itself:

• Samsung Galaxy A25 5G ($299.99 at Amazon): As mentioned, Samsung’s Galaxy A25 5G is the Moto G Power 5G’s closest rival, and, taken as a whole, is the better choice for most people. It adds one more rear camera to the mix and a vastly superior update commitment, though Motorola’s vegan leather is much more comfortable to hold than Samsung’s slick plastic.
• Nothing Phone 2a (£319.99 at Amazon): It’s tough to recommend the Nothing Phone 2a for US-based buyers, but it’s still an impressive budget phone if you can live with the compatibility woes. The Pixar-esque style is eye-catching, and Nothing’s speedy wireless charging runs circles around Samsung and Motorola. Just keep in mind that you’ll struggle for official carrier support stateside.
• OnePlus Nord N30 ($299 at Amazon): The OnePlus Nord N30 is on pretty equal footing with Motorola’s Moto G Power 5G (2024), offering a very similar display and slightly faster wired charging with a charger (albeit a USB-A one) in the box. Unfortunately, it also suffers from a similarly underwhelming software commitment.
• Motorola Moto G 5G (2024)(on the product’s website): If you’re still interested in a Motorola device, the Moto G 5G (2024) slots in just below the Moto G Power. It has an identical update commitment and primary camera, but the sage-colored vegan leather back looks even better than the Power’s all-black option.