Motorola Moto G5S Motorola’s phone makes some good calls

Third time lucky?

If at first you don’t succeed, as the saying goes, keep launching different versions of the same phone. Motorola’s Moto G5 (see our review, Issue 500) was a disappointing successor to the excellent G4. The G5 Plus (see Issue 501) was better but more expensive; and now the G5S tries again to hit the happy medium. At the official £219 it’s only just good enough, but if you can find it discounted to £200 or less, this model is well worth considering.

Instead of the G5’s plastic chassis and aluminium back, the G5S is a proper aluminium unibody and feels much more upmarket, with the same slightly larger 5.2in screen size as the Plus. The screen itself is better, with high brightness and contrast levels, although colour accuracy is still a bit off. Below it is a very fast fingerprint reader, with an NFC chip for contactless payment, and on the back is a higherresolution camera, which gave us startlingly good results for a budget phone – only letting us down in low light. The front selfie camera is just OK.

Android 7.1.1 is installed, with a free upgrade to 8.0 ‘Oreo’ coming soon, but performance is still average for the price. Despite a larger battery, the G5S lasted only a few minutes over 12 hours in our video-playback test, beating the Vodafone Smart V8 but well short of the Samsung Galaxy J5. Still, it will be enough for most people, and all round the G5S is not a bad deal at all.

VERDICT: The G5S feels like a very decent phone for 200 quid, with no major flaws. It does, however, have a lot of competition in this price bracket ★★★★☆

ALTERNATIVE: Huawei Honor 6X £200 This slightly larger phone is more plasticky but has similar specs and a good dual rear camera

SPECIFICATIONS

5.2in 1920x1080-pixel screen

• 16-megapixel rear camera

• 5-megapixel front camera

• 32GB flash storage

• Microsd card slot

• 802.11ac Wi-fi

• Bluetooth 4.2

• 3G/4G

• 150x73.5x9.5mm (HXWXD)

• 157g

• One-year warranty www.snipca.com/26160