Motorola today announced updates to its Moto X and Moto G product lines, in what the company’s president Rick Osterloh described as “the biggest launch of Moto products ever”, highlighting the price differentials to the flagship products of its rivals.

“All of these phones reflect our obsessive focus on the features that matter. They all offer meaningful software experiences, each has the best camera for the price, they allow you to express your personality with Moto Maker, have all day power, and they offer amazing value,” he said.

The three new devices unveiled were Moto X Style, which was touted as $200-$300 less than flagship devices from Apple and Samsung; Moto X Play, at $300 to $400 less; and Moto G, which offers savings of $400 to $500 over the flagships (although it is unlikely many Moto G buyers switched to the device from a Galaxy S or iPhone).

The company made bold claims about the camera capabilities of the device, one of the key perceived areas of weakness for its previous products. Jim Wicks, Motorola’s design chief, said: “We’ve completely revamped our approach to imaging, we’ve found the latest, most advanced camera technologies available, and rebuilt our image quality testing procedures from the top down.”

As with previous Motorola smartphones, a number of customisation options are available across the board, via its Moto Maker online order portal.

Moto X Style
Moto X Style is the highest-spec in the line-up. It has a 5.7-inch quad-HD display (2560×1440 pixels), with Motorola trumpeting a higher screen-to-body ratio to its Apple and Samsung rivals at 76 per cent (Huawei claims a little over 78 per cent for its P8, with 1080p HD resolution). It also features a 21 megapixel rear and 5MP front-facing cameras.

The company highlighted the fact that a “Pure Edition” will be available for the US market, unlocked, with LTE support across all of the big-four operators.

The device is powered by a 1.8GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 hexacore processor, following LG’s line in opting not to use the troubled Snapdragon 810 chip. It has 3GB of RAM and with 32GB or 64GB of storage, expandable via microSD slot.

Moto X Style will be available in Europe, Latin America and North America from September. Motorola said that “pricing will be shared later on”.

Moto_X_Play_White_Front_BackMoto X Play (pictured above) sits beneath Moto X Style, with key differentiators including its 5.5-inch HD display. It also has a different processor (1.7GHz quadcore Qualcomm Snapdragon 615), 2GB of RAM, and 16GB or 32GB of onboard memory (again with microSD slot).

Moto X Play will be available “in various countries across Europe, Latin America and Canada” starting next month, although the company also noted that it will not be available in the US. The company has given guide UK pricing starting at £299.

Moto G
Finally, the new Moto G is the third in the line, following the launch of the first device in 2013, and has consistently proved a tough challenger in the budget smartphone sector. Osterloh said that the device is the company’s “best-selling smartphone ever”.

Key features include IPX7 water resistance, and the addition of a 13MP rear camera – which Motorola said uses the same sensor as Nexus 6. The device can also be customised using Motorola’s Moto Maker tool for the first time.

But some areas remain unchanged, including the use of a 5-inch 720 pixel HD screen (rather than full-HD) and use of a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400-series quadcore processor (1.4GHz Snapdragon 410, rather than 1.2GHz Snapdragon 400). It will be available in 8GB and 16GB versions (with microSD slot).

In terms of availability, Motorola said this will be “our biggest Moto G launch yet”, with availability in more than 60 countries throughout North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific, from today. UK pricing for the 8GB version is £179, rising to £209 for 16GB.