Motorola G62 review: Mild upgrades for early 5G adopters

With the 5G spectrum auction done in India, smartphone companies have announced a slew of 5G phones in affordable range. And one of the newest players in the market is the Moto G62 5G. Motorola introduced the handset in the sub-20K segment. The phone has arrived with the same old boring look that we have already seen on a number of Moto G series phones like the Moto G52 and Moto G42. However, the Moto G62 has missed out on some key features like the AMOLED display and 30W fast charging in favor of incorporating 5G as compared. But the question is “can we compromise on the things that Moto G62 missed just to get a 5G-enabled phone at a budget price?” To know this you have to read the detailed review here.

Moto G62 5G Design and Display

The Moto G62 features the same old design that we have already seen on other G series phones of the past. There’s nothing new and nothing exciting. It seems like Motorola has just rebranded the Moto G52 on the design front just to bring a budget 5G phone ASAP. While I find it boring, for most of you, it looks decent, especially with its sultry matte finish over a polycarbonate back. Motorola’s branding is embossed in the middle, while you will get the triple-camera setup arranged vertically inside an elliptical camera module on the back. The phone weighs just 184g and is thick at 8.6mm. On the front, it packs a FHD+, LCD display with a 120Hz refresh rate. Although it’s a minor downgrade over the G52’s AMOLED screen, the higher refresh rate of 120Hz makes everything appear smooth. Moreover, the display offers nice viewing angles, bright colors and 600 nits of brightness levels, all of which boasts a good enough media consumption experience.

On top of this, the device comes with WideVine L1 certification for HD OTT streaming. However, it doesn’t support HDR media from Netflix and this can really disappoint many.

Moto G62 5G Performance

Coming to the performance, the Moto G62 is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 695 SoC. Unsurprisingly, the phone comfortably juggles a handful of apps including web browsers and other social media apps.

The phone also managed to maintain most of its peak performance even while playing heavy-duty gaming like Free Fire Max. Although I’m not a gaming fan, I played the game for around 40-45 minutes and it didn’t heat up. The phone is equipped with up to 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM and 128GB uMCP storage. For most buyers, this set of specifications should do the trick.

In terms of audio performance, Moto G62 5G features a stereo speaker that offers crisp audio with good clarity and minimal distortion, even at high volume levels. The device comes with Dolby Atmos support and features a 3.5mm headphone jack which is great.

Now, moving to the highlight of this handset – 5G compatibility, the handset supports 12 5G bands on the device which is pretty great. Although 5G has not been rolled out in India yet, it is likely to get fully functional in the coming months and most of you should not have issues latching on to the domestic 5G networks.

For software, I must say Motorola has been doing great. Motorola’s amalgamation of its take on stock Android – MyUX skin, is highly impressive, especially with the cleanest interface that even premium phones from Vivo, Oppo and others lack. You won’t find any bloatware apps or unnecessary push notifications — just the ones that you need. On top of all, the handset arrives with up to three years of security updates and two years of Android OS updates.

Moto G62 5G Camera

If you’re looking for a camera phone, then the Moto G62 is definitely not for you. On paper, the camera specs look good as it ships with a 50MP quad-pixel primary sensor alongside a standard 8MP ultra-wide sensor and a 2MP macro shooter. However, it isn’t that impressive actually. The daylight HDR shots in well-lit environments get you decent images but the skin tone looks washed out. But when it comes to clicking pictures in low-light, images appear over-processed. Making matters worse, the smartphone’s dedicated Night mode feature is of little to no use — I found the standard mode to work better in tricky conditions. Furthermore, the camera doesn’t even focus on the subject while clicking closeups.

Finally, the device features a 16MP selfie camera which again is a disappointment as it completely changes the skin tone. Check out the camera sample here.

Moto G62 5G Battery

The Moto G62 is backed by a powerful 5,000mAh capacity battery which lasts for a day and a half on a single charge. But the 20W charging is a major bummer as it takes over two hours to juice up completely.

Verdict

Starting at Rs. 16,999 in India, the Moto G62 5G seems reasonable given the specs on hand with a few misses. Motorola could have managed to squeeze a high refresh rate OLED panel as well as a faster-charging support with better camera performance. However, the Moto G62’s excellent software along with a decent battery backup, great performance and ample 5G bands support makes it a worthwhile choice in the affordable segment for most people. Compared to phones such as the Redmi Note 11S and a bunch of phones from Realme and Samsung, the Moto G62 5G will pamper you with its sorted out software experience and reliably strong raw performance.