Motorola g8 Power Lite packs a 5000mAh battery

Motorola g8 Power Lite
8.3
Good

The Motorola g8 Power Lite is part of the enormously popular g8 series that are ultra-safe buys for business fleet and people that remember the iconic Razr flip phone of old. We have already reviewed the g8 (here $329, 4.6/5 rating) and g8 PLUS (here $399 and 5/5) so this is a quick review of $249 g8 Power Lite. Don’t worry, we still put it through the full suite of tests and rate it accordingly.

The g8 Power Lite, however, is very different to its siblings. So much so that it raises the industry-wide issue of #metoo series naming when there are different engines, RAM/storage, cameras and batteries. It is not a case of good, better, best, but what is missing from the g8 or g8 PLUS to bring it in at this price.

Gone (in comparison to the g8) is

  • The Qualcomm SD665 replaced with a MediaTek Helio P35
  • It has a 5000mAh battery, but a 5V/2A micro-USB charger takes quite a while to fill it
  • The rear tri-camera loses wide-angle lens. It is 16MP PDAF+2MP Depth+2MP Macro
  • It has Android 9 instead of 10

Do these basic differences justify the $80 price hike to the g8? Read on to find out.

Details: Motorola g8 Power Lite Model XT2055-4

  • Australian website here
  • Price: $249
  • Elevator pitch: Up to 3 full days on a single charge with a massive 5000 mAh battery.
  • Warranty: 12-months ACL
  • Country of manufacture: China
  • Lenovo (Est 1984) is a multinational technology company with its main operational headquarters in Beijing and Morrisville, North Carolina. It is the world’s largest PC maker. It purchased Motorola Mobility from Google in 2014. Most of Lenovo’s smartphone business is now under the Motorola Brand.

Warning about grey market and parallel importers

We have named and shamed the major grey market and parallel importers here. Do not buy as you will not get Motorola warranty; Australian over the air OS and firmware updates; and you cannot make a 000 call without a sim. In fact, as these generally do not support LTE Band 28 used by Telstra and Optus, so all you will get is 3G. Specifically, do not buy if it has any other number than -4 at the end or if it is called Blackjack.

First impression

It’s a glass slab, centre tear-drop camera screen, familiar Motorola Bat Wing logo in the rear fingerprint sensor (right where it should be) and a 3.5mm combo audio jack (buds supplied). The only downside is the micro-USB connector that loses points on two counts. First, the 5000mAh battery takes a long time to charge and second – micro-USB is so yesterday even on a lower-cost phone.

The UI is pure Android 9 (Motorola has announced Android 10 update is coming) with a few Motorola apps thrown in.

Screen: 6.5” 1600×720, 269ppi, 20:9, IPS TFT LCD – PASS++

It is quite bright at 478nits (max), 1500:1 contrast, and colour temperature adjustment from warm to cold. It has a glossy finish reducing daylight readability a little. The g8 and g8 Plus have 500+ nits.

Processor: MediaTek Helio P35 – PASS

The Helio P35 12nm, 4×2.3Ghz+4×1.8Ghz, is roughly equivalent to the Qualcomm SD615, so it is a good step down from the G8/PLUS and their SD665. You will find it in LG K51/61, OPPO A5/A7/A8/A11/A31, vivo Y3/Y17/Y30 – in fact over 50 sub-$299 phones. It is a lower power device. It has 4GB LPDDR3 and 64GB (42GB free) eMMC storage and a shared micro-SD/SIM 2 slot for up to 256GB. Geekbench 5 single/multi-core is 171/904. It would not run the Geekbench compute test – typical of MediaTek processors.

CPU Throttle test – EXCEED

It started with 102,039 GIPS. Averaged 97,753 (91%) and its lowest was 88,773GIPS. It shows good thermal management.

Comms: PASS

  • Wi-Fi N 2.4Ghz only – -41dBm (strong) and 65Mbps (good)
  • BT 4.2 SBC codec
  • GPS: A-GPS single band – a little slow for turn-by-turn navigation
  • FM Radio (required earbuds as an antenna)
  • Micro-USB 2.0 480Mbps
  • NFC: No
  • 6-axis accelerometer, Gyroscope, ambient light

You can’t expect Wi-Fi AC dual-band and NFC at this price.

LTE – good reception – EXCEED

  • Dual SIM – SIM 2 or micro-SD
  • Single ringtone for both SIMS (only one active at a time)
  • VoLTE. Does not appear to have Voice over Wi-Fi.
  • Signal strength: -79dBm and found next nearest tower at -85 (good)
  • Bands 1/2/3/5/7/8/19/20/26/28/38/40/41 (excellent)

Battery – capacity EXCEED, charge time PASSable

  • T-Rex – 495 minutes and 1415 frames
  • Typical use screen on – 15 hours
  • Video loop – 12 hours (19 hour claim)
  • Discharge: 200mA so should last for 25 days idle, screen off (35 day claim)
  • Battery charge 5V/2A – over three hours (note that you should not use a higher rated charger)
  • Battery Charge 5V/.9A – over seven hours

Motorola claims three days between charges. That would require aggressive battery management, but you could expect at least two days.

Audio – PASSable

  • Maximum volume 75dB (average)
  • 3.5mm combo jack
  • Earpiece (only for phone) and single bottom mic
  • Handsfree is not very loud, but phone audio quality is fine
  • Single rear-ported speaker with no fidelity
  • BT 4.2 SBC codec provides clear sound to our reference Sony WH-1000xM3 headphones

If you use cabled buds or BT then audio quality if fine.

Android 9 – PASS but when Android 10 comes – EXCEED

  • Android to be upgraded
  • Motorola uses pure Android and adds Moto functions
  • The full suite of Google Apps

Build – PASS++

  • Glass front (no protection specified, plastic frame and back
  • 164.94×75.76×9.2 mm x 200g
  • Water repellent (not rated)
  • Rear fingerprint button (reliable and fast) and 2D facial recognition (60% reliable over ten tests)

Camera – social media class – PASS+

The camera app is Google basic meaning not a lot to play with.

Rear Camera

  • 16 MP (f/2.0, 1.0um, 68.6° FOV) PDAF, 1080p@30fps
  • 2 MP (f/2.4, 1.75um) depth
  • 2 MP (f/2.4, 1.75um) macro
  • Single LED flash
  • HDR, Face Beauty, Dual camera bokeh, Timer, Panorama
Motorola g8 Power Lite
Good colour and detail
Motorola g8 Power Lite
Not bad for digital zoom
Motorola g8 Power Lite
Office Light – details good but colours a little off
Motorola g8 Power Lite
Macro – detail is good but colours are a little off
Motorola g8 Power Lite
Not for low light!

We were more than satisfied that it is capable of producing good results in office and daylight but limited in low light. It has a means a fairly narrow FOV – no wide-angle or ultra-wide angle lens.

Front Camera

  • 8 MP (f/2.0, 1.12um, 66.4° FOV) 1080p@30fps
  • HDR, Face beauty, Timer, Bokeh

It produces reasonable selfies, but its narrow FOV means it is not for groups.

GadgetGuy’s take

In the beginning, I asked if the $80 upgrade to the g8 was warranted? The answer is no. Yes, the g8 is better, but in everyday use, you won’t miss its better processor, camera and USB-C. But here is the conundrum. The g8 PLUS is $399, and at $150 more it is vastly better with the Qualcomm SD665, Wi-Fi AC, BT 5.0, fast charge, Dolby stereo sound, vastly better camera and USB-C. It scored 5/5 in our tests. So if all you have is $249 it gets the tick. It lost points for the slower charge time and lack of USB-C.

Competition (prices are from JB and may include carrier-locked devices)

https://youtu.be/LuXXkWPcCSs
Motorola g8 Power Lite
The Motorola g8 Power Lite is a good, all-around phone with more than you can expect for the price.
Features
8
Value for money
8.6
Performance
8
Ease of Use
9
Design
8
Positives
Good battery life
Solid ‘water-resistant’ construction
Good screen
Better than social media class camera day/office light camera
3.5mm jack and earbuds
Negatives
Can be laggy if you don’t close apps
Micro-USB is so yesterday
8.3
Good