Zero Signal

25 de marzo de 2026

Can almost pass for a flagship phone

My old Galaxy, which I managed to keep alive for 6+ years, finally got to the point where it could no longer be upgraded and was becoming incompatible with the apps that I use every day. It's been a great phone-- durable, very reliable, and just enough phone for someone like me.My needs are pretty modest. I don't game, film videos, or do anything very processor-intensive so I don't need a flagship phone. The only things I didn't like about my Galaxy was the modest amount of internal memory (only 64Gb), and the amount of Samsung bloatware that I couldn't shut off or get rid of.I didn't want to spend $800 on a phone, but I wanted to keep a lot of the features of my old Galaxy. Probably most important to me was an IP68 rating, because I've managed to dunk a few phones in my past and I still remember the days when that was a death sentence for them. I also wanted an SD card slot because I have a large collection of audiobooks and prefer to keep them on external storage. Aside from that, I wanted more internal storage than the measly 64Gb that my old Galaxy had. I use a lot of different apps, and I was always bumping up against the storage limit of my old phone.Finally, I really, REALLY wanted a 3.5mm audio jack. I have Bluetooth earbuds but I greatly prefer my $8 wired earbuds. They're inexpensive, they never need to be recharged, I won't lose a night of sleep if I lose or damage them, they fit my ears better than the wireless earbuds, and they're inexpensive enough that I can keep a spare pair in my bag in case I forget my daily-use set.A few phones fit the bill but the Moto line of phones had the best reviews, a very reasonable price, and up-to-date hardware and software. I settled on the Moto G Stylus as it had the best combination of features for my needs.Now that almost all our information is stored in the cloud (for better or for worse), switching to a new phone is very easy. After I switched my SIM card over, I was instructed to scan a QR code with my old phone. This initiated a transfer of all my info-- call logs, text history, etc. The process took a few minutes but was absolutely seamless.Over the next few days, I continued to set my phone up-- logging into apps, playing with different settings, etc. Just a few days into my ownership, I was prompted to upgrade to Android 16, which I did. The process went off without a hitch. From what I've read, I can expect longer battery life, something that I will evaluate in the next few days.Aside from that, the phone has been excellent so far. The screen is nicer than my ancient Galaxy, it runs all the apps that I use flawlessly, and it hasn't lagged or slowed down at all for me once I got everything set up and updated. I'm not exactly a power user, but I do use my phone a lot for many different tasks and so far everything is working well.Some people have complained about the camera quality. I've only snapped a few pics (and no video) but the quality has been pretty good, at least to my eye. I've examined the images on a computer screen and they are crisp and the colors are vibrant. The image quality is better on this phone than on some other more expensive phones that I've looked at in the past.I'm still trying to decide if I'll use the stylus or not. I don't take a lot of hand-written notes but that may change if the apps are intuitive and easy to use. Time will tell on that one.The phone has some included apps that I will probably never use, but nowhere near the bloat that Samsung was cramming into its phones even 6 years ago. I am NOT sorry to see the Bixby button and app gone for good. For those that have never owned a Samsung phone, Bixby is the name of the virtual assistant that is/was loaded onto each phone. On my old Galaxy, you'd summon Bixby using an extra button on the side of the phone. I never once used it but I'd accidentally hit that cursed button all the time, which would open up the Bixby screen while I was trying to do something else. Motorola doesn't do that so good riddance to Bixby.I was dreading the day I'd have to get a new phone because I'd have to start all over again with something that might not be as good as my old Samsung. That thing was an absolute soldier and worked well for a long time so the bar was pretty high. While the verdict is out on the Moto G until I put some more miles on it, it's off to a great start.Ver más

23 personas la encontraron útil

C. Pilot

10 de mayo de 2025

Best Phone I've Had (and I've owned a lot of Moto's) -- Definitely the Current Bargain!

I've been a rather loyal Motorola phone user. First of all, my first cellular phone (way back in the day) was Motorola, but I've also owned Moto/Motorola branded smartphones since the Nexus 6 (which was branded Google but was actually made by Motorola). After that phone's internal storage failed on me ( watch -- this will become a pattern), I bought a Moto G5S Plus. Then after 2 years when it's internal storage failed on me (told you -- pattern!), I bought first model Moto G Stylus. Then my first Stylus started showing the now familiar signs of failing internal storage (again after 2 years), I bought the Moto G Stylus 5G 2022. I admit that I probably could've continued using the original Moto G Stylus for a while longer (maybe?), but I also really wanted 5G capability, so when the original Stylus first started slowing down, I just went ahead and bought the then current 5G Stylus model. That was 3 years ago, and just recently (much to my surprise), my Moto G Stylus 5G 2022 started showing signs of a failing battery. Yes, I could've just replaced the battery, but the phone was already 3 years old and I had been watching it carefully for the past year for any sign of the familiar internal storage failure. I just didn't think it was worth the time/trouble to replace the battery only for the internal storage to likely fail sometime soon. So, I decided to move on to the Moto G Stylus 2025.The Positives:And...WOW. Very significant, obvious upgrade! I think everything on the phone is a big improvement over the Stylus 2022 model. The phone is much faster with the newer higher end processor, the cameras are much better quality (as is the improved Moto Camera app, which...sorry...has previously just been useless), the stylus features/apps are much nicer, love the fingerprint sensor being in the screen rather than on the power button, the screen seems much brighter with better refresh (even though I think its technically the same), love the faster wifi with Wifi6, love the newer Bluetooth, and I really like that Moto has kept the headphone jack and expandable storage. The rest of the improvements are mostly due to the OS upgrade, but you can't really disregard those when the older Stylus isn't receiving anymore OS upgrades.The new cameras are just superb in comparison to the Stylus 2022, and I really liked the Stylus 2022 cameras. I've always used GCam ports (specifically BSG MGC) with my Stylus 2022, which is why I always got the great photos that I did. The Moto Camera 3 app was actually just lousy. It used to take a decent enough photo, but then the post processing would pixelize and blotch up the image. The new Moto Camera 5 app actually works a lot like the Google Camera (GCam) and actually enhances the photo in post processing rather than ruining it. I still installed GCam port and sometimes use it, but for most photos I just use the Moto Camera 5 app.So far the battery life has been great, but so was all my Moto cameras, so there's no real surprise there.I was a little disappointed in the lack of color choices of the Moto G Stylus 2025, and I especially miss the seafoam green of my Moto G Stylus 5G 2022 (which I wasn't tired of at all), but I've actually really come to like the purple-ish blue color of "Surf the Net" (whatever that's supposed to mean), and I've put it in a clear case like I did my Stylus 2022 to show off the color.More a matter of market timing than anything else, but it's also nice that this time around I actually found that 1TB microSD cards are now reasonably priced, about as much as the 512GB ones were back when I bought the Stylus 2022. So, now I have a phone with 1,256GB of storage for around $460 total. You're definitely not going to be able to find a Samsung or Apple phone model with that much storage (and all these features) for that low of a price. Moto is definitely the best thing going in bargains.The Negatives:Most of these aren't true negatives, and are actually more like situational issues for me, personally. First of all, I don't like the new Gemini AI. I was able to easily avoid it when Google offered it as a software upgrade in my last phone, but it's built-in to this one's ROM. It took several tries, but I think I've finally turned it off in most areas of my phone and I'm almost entirely back on the good ol' reliable Google Assistant. I'm sure eventually I will only be offered Gemini.Another personal negative is that apparently this phone is now entirely 64-bit so I ended up losing several of my favorite 32-bit apps. One of them is PicSay Pro photo editor, which is hands-down the best Android photo editor available even though it hasn't had an update or even supported for over a decade. It was removed from Chromebook when it was finally removed from the Google Play Store as unsupported, but it wasn't removed from my phone until I tried to upgrade to this phone and migrate all data and apps. Even so, I tried the backup/restore method to move an old app and it didn't work, citing that the app is not compatible with my phone. The problem is that there is no other photo editor that even comes close to this decade old unsupported app, which is truly pathetic. Fortunately, the latest version of Google Photos that came with the new OS on this new phone, at least has most of PicSay Pro's features, but still not all of them. And no, Snapseed doesn't have it all either. Oh, well.There are other little issues, too, like for whatever reason Moto decided to copy Apple and have the usual power button changed into a multi-function button that does everything except power on/off the phone. That's pretty annoying considering the main reason I'm sticking with Moto is because it's not typically going the way of Apple, Samsung, and Google.Summary:Definitely the best phone I've ever owned, and even though I've liked all my Moto phones, I thought that was never going to happen again after the Nexus 6. The positives far outweigh any negatives (if there are any legit negatives that would matter to anyone except me), and Moto has definitely brought the Stylus way into the realm of a flagship more than a mid-class phone. With how Samsung and Google went completely Apple-esque with having no expandable memory, no headphone jack, and a ridiculous high pricetag, the market for me has now ceased to be a question of Android vs. iOS, and it's now Moto vs everything else. For now, I'm very happy sticking with Moto.