Motorola Edge: A good phone with a Pixel 8a problem

The Motorola Edge (2024) makes some smart changes versus 2023’s model. It now has a Snapdragon chip, and the price has dropped by $50 to $549.99. It also gets a better camera sensor and a slightly bigger battery. In a different time and place, maybe that would be enough. But Motorola has a Pixel problem if it wants to make a successful phone that skirts just above the budget phone space.

This is a good device that I genuinely enjoyed using, but it’s only a winner in isolation. When you compare it to other recent phones, there’s an obvious barrier to victory: the Pixel 8a. Google’s newest phone is cheaper than the Edge, and it’s better in most ways that matter. That makes it hard for me to give the 2024 Edge a full recommendation, even though I like it quite a bit. Let’s talk about why.

I love a good pocket-sized supercomputer as much as anyone, but I do get tired of these weighty, gargantuan phones that barely fit in said pocket. That’s why the Motorola Edge (2024) is a nice departure from the norm. It’s one of the lightest smartphones you can buy, but it doesn’t sacrifice the essentials. You still get a large 6.6-inch pOLED screen, and the battery lasts all day. When it’s time to recharge, the Edge can hit an impressive 68W with a compatible PPS charger (which it doesn’t come with, naturally — check out some options we like if you need one).

Motorola has been experimenting with materials more after years of making phones with unpleasantly glossy plastic. Like last year’s Edge, the 2024 version has faux leather (silicone polymer) on the back. And before you turn up your nose, it looks much nicer in person than you’d expect. It also feels great — soft and grippy but not flexible. The subtle texture, along with the low weight, makes the phone very cozy in your hand.

It’s nice to see such a large display on a phone that is this thin and light. The 6.6-inch 1080 x 2400 pOLED supports a 144Hz refresh rate (though the default tops out at 120Hz) and has a peak brightness of 1,300 nits. I found that it’s bright enough to be readable in bright outdoor light, but it is quite reflective.

The display curves on the left and right edges, a quirk most OEMs have abandoned. I did encounter occasional accidental touches in this region, but at least Motorola has scaled back on the curve radius from its earlier Edge phones — you could barely look at those devices up without triggering touch events all along the edges. I do have some mild durability concerns, though. When dropped, curved edges can take a real beating, and the Edge uses older Gorilla Glass 3 that isn’t as impact-resistant as newer versions. It is IP68-rated for water and dust resistance, though.

The 2024 Motorola Edge has the same thin aluminum frame as its predecessor. The edges of the frame are rolled slightly so they don’t poke you — something Motorola got wrong on its early Edge models. The buttons on the right side are similarly thin but very stable and tactile.

One of the few visible differences from the Edge (2023) I tested last year is the addition of a shortcut button along the left edge. I appreciate Motorola’s desire to offer more customization, but the phone already has plenty of shortcuts in gesture form, like chop-chop for the flashlight and twist for the camera. The button is useful if there’s an app you need to access frequently, though. It also launches Motorola’s Ready For PC companion app with a double-tap. Ready For works well enough, but it’s not any better than Microsoft’s Phone Link (which works on all Android phones).

Motorola is asking $550 for the Edge, which is reasonable for what you get. However, it’s $50 more than the Google Pixel 8a, and that’s a problem for Motorola. When you compare the specs and features, balanced against the price, the Pixel 8a leaves the Edge in the dust.

Most OEMs don’t have the luxury of putting a flagship Arm chip in a mid-range phone, but Google can. Last year’s Edge had a MediaTek chip, and this year, it’s moved to the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2, a relatively modest chip that uses older A78 and A55 CPU cores. Google’s Tensor G3, which powers the Pixel 8a, might not be the best processor in the world, but it’s much faster than the 7s Gen 2 (not to mention the off- and on-device AI features it enables).

In day-to-day usage and benchmarks, the Edge is fast enough. There are hiccups, but they’re not too frequent. Gaming performance is mediocre, though. Even when other devices throttle from heat, they remain faster than the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2.

Motorola has always had problems with cameras. Even when it uses the best possible hardware, the results don’t match those of Samsung and Google’s camera phones. With a price tag higher than the Pixel 8a, Motorola needs to make the case for the Edge’s camera. But it doesn’t quite get there.

The primary shooter is an upgraded 50MP Sony LYT-700C, which produces binned 12.5MP photos. Motorola’s handling of varied lighting does appear to have gotten better — I can snap photos with bright backgrounds, and the phone does a good job of evening them out. However, performance in less-than-perfect lighting is still a crapshoot. Shots end up blurry, and the capture times become unworkable indoors if you want to photograph something (or someone) in motion.

Even when you do have perfect lighting, the results from the 2024 Edge aren’t in the same league as a Pixel phone. Motorola’s processing tends to over-sharpen edges and obliterate detail, making photos look flat and blurry by comparison. Videos look similar to other phones in this price range, but it tops out at 4K/30fps — no 60fps option.

The 13MP ultrawide is actually a bright spot for this phone. It has autofocus, allowing it to shoot macro photos without another sensor on the phone. The macro shots are good enough you might actually want to take them, and the regular ultrawide photos look nice. The details can suffer in the same way as photos from the primary camera, but the problems are less noticeable with the wider landscape shots you’re going to shoot with an ultrawide. You can check out the full-resolution versions of all these photos, plus a sample from the 32MP selfie shooter, in this Google Drive folder.

Software is usually a strong point for Motorola, and the version of Android 14 on the Edge isn’t bad, but it doesn’t lead the way like it once did. The interface is clean and responsive, and there’s a halfway decent implementation of Material You under the hood. I’m also a big fan of Moto’s shortcut gestures for the flashlight, camera, and more.

I’m much less enthralled with the raft of bloatware Moto has crammed into this phone. This is something we’ve started to see more of on Motorola phones, especially its G series, but it’s gradually begun to seep into its Edge offerings, too. You can remove most of the unwanted software from the Edge, but I must object again to Motorola’s choice of weather service. The version of 1Weather that plugs into the lock screen and widgets is a sluggish mess of ads, and the privacy policy is atrocious. If you remove it, you just don’t get weather on the lock screen or Moto widgets. This same app has been on other devices I’ve tested this year, like the 2024 Moto G Stylus 5G, but it’s harder to ignore when the phone costs $150 more.

Motorola is also phoning it in with update support. Despite the switch to a Snapdragon processor, the Edge is only guaranteed two OS updates and three years of security patches. That’s not enough to compete with the leading update policies.

If you want to buy a mid-range Android phone in the US right now, it should probably be the Pixel 8a. That’s too bad, though, because I like the Motorola Edge; it’s got a big, bright screen, and it’s very lightweight. Right now, I’m not in a rush to take my SIM card out of this phone, but at the same time, I can’t recommend purchasing it when Google’s mid-ranger exists.

If you go down the list of all this phone’s strengths, the Pixel 8a has it beaten, either by a little or a lot. The Pixel is faster, has better software, and will get updates for much longer. When it comes to photography, Pixels remain hard to beat, especially in the budget to mid-range tier, and Motorola is just trying to stay competitive. The Edge’s only clear victory is charging speed, which tops out at 68W to Google’s anemic 18W. You could also argue that having a big screen in a lightweight package is a benefit, but it’s not enough to justify the higher price and all the other drawbacks.

I went right from using the Pixel 8a for several weeks to the Edge. Despite how good the 2024 Edge is in isolation, sometimes a good product has to be equal to or better than its closest competitor to stand a chance. Unfortunately for Motorola, even if they were priced the same, the Pixel 8a would still edge out the Edge.