Like clockwork, Motorola launched a new G series smartphone last month to take on the premium budget segment. I'm talking about the Moto G64 5G, which succeeds the Moto G54 from last year. The new smartphone is the world's first to come with the MediaTek Dimensity 7025 SoC, however, it only offers minor improvements over its predecessor with hardly any design changes.
After using the phone thoroughly for about two weeks, here's what I think of the Moto G64 5G. If you're considering it as your next budget phone, then you should definitely read this review.
Moto G64 5G price in India
I'll quickly get the pricing out of the way. The Moto G64 5G is currently being sold in India at Rs. 13,999 for the 8GB + 128GB storage variant and Rs. 15,999 for the 12GB + 256GB variant. Our review unit offers 12GB RAM and 256GB storage.
The Moto G64 5G is available in three colour options – Ice Lilac, Mint Green, and Pearl Blue. I received the Mint Green variant.
The Moto G64 5G also comes with a case in the box
Motorola continues to be environmentally conscious and ships the Moto G64 in a plastic-free box. However, the box does include a plastic/silicone case inside. Apart from the case, the box contains the usual paperwork, a SIM ejector tool, a USB Type-A to Type-C cable, and a 33W fast charging adapter.
Moto G64 5G Review: Design
As I mentioned in the beginning, there aren't any major changes in design with the new Moto G64 5G when compared to the Moto G54 5G. The only difference is that there's no Black colour option this year, with Motorola deciding to go the colourful way. The phone has a plastic frame that houses the power and volume buttons on the right edge, the SIM tray on the left, and a microphone at the top. The bottom frame houses the 3.5mm headphone port, USB Type-C port, a second microphone, and a speaker.
The plastic rear panel has a glossy finish and creates a pattern when light hits it. There's a very familiar rectangular camera module at the back placed in the top left corner. The module protrudes and does cause the phone to wobble when laid flat on its back. On the front, the phone now gets a Gorilla Glass panel to protect the display, which still has thick bezels all around, particularly at the bottom. There's a hole-punch cutout at the top to house the front camera.
The phone offers hybrid dual speakers with Dolby Atmos support
Overall, the Moto G64 5G feels similar to last year's phone. It weighs 192g and is 8.9mm thick, almost exactly the same as the Moto G54. The phone carries an IP52 dust and water resistance rating, but I wouldn't recommend exposing your phone to water or rain.
Moto G64 5G Review: Specifications and software
The Moto G64 5G comes equipped with the world's first MediaTek Dimensity 7025 SoC, which is a small improvement over last year's model. The chipset is paired with the IMG BXM-8-256 GPU, up to 12GB LPDDR4X RAM, and 256GB UFS 2.2 storage, which is expandable via a microSD card.
For connectivity, the Moto G64 supports 14 5G bands with 3 carrier aggregation, dual SIM support with a Hybrid SIM tray, Bluetooth 5.3, dual-band Wi-Fi, GPS, A-GPS, LTEPP, GLONASS, Galileo, QZSS, NFC support, a 3.5mm headphone port, FM Radio, and a USB Type-C (USB 2.0) port.
The Moto G64 5G comes with bloatware, but you can uninstall them
The phone features a side-mounted fingerprint scanner housed within the Power/Wake button. It's a capacitive sensor that worked well during the review period. I faced no issues with it and found it to be fast.
Like last year's Moto G54 5G, the new phone has a 6,000mAh battery and supports 33W fast charging.
Moving over to software, the Moto G64 5G comes with Android 14-based My UX on board. While you do get the latest software, Motorola will only offer the Android 15 update on the phone. You will, however, get 3 years of security updates. In terms of features, the phone comes with Motorola features such as Family Space 2.0, Moto Secure, a Game Mode, and several Moto apps. You also get plenty of bloatware in the form of pre-installed apps, a GamesHub, Entertainment, and Shopping apps. Fortunately, you can uninstall most of the bloatware on the phone.
Moto G64 5G Review: Performance
The Moto G64 5G comes with a slightly better MediaTek Dimensity 7025 SoC compared to the Dimensity 7020 on the older model. Motorola claims that the phone received a 500k+ score on AnTuTu, and in my tests, it did manage a score of 4,94,364 points. On Geekbench, the phone scored 1012 points in the Single-core CPU test and 2403 points in the multi-core test. Overall, the phone performed decently well in daily usage and I hardly faced any lag or stutter while opening apps, system animations, and so on. This is also thanks to the screen.
The phone offers Widevine L1 support
Motorola has included a 6.5-inch IPS LCD display on the G64. The panel offers up to 120Hz refresh rate, full-HD+ resolution, 240Hz sampling rate, and HDR10 support. As for brightness, the display is rated for 560 nits peak brightness, which isn't much. Indoors, the display gets bright enough to not use full brightness, but it's not easy to read outdoors. The display offers Natural and Saturated colour modes, and viewing angles are okay, with colours looking washed out at certain angles.
The Moto G64 5 G has a hybrid dual-speaker setup, with the earpiece acting as the second speaker. The audio quality is good enough, but it lacks bass and isn't very loud. Call quality, on the other hand, is excellent. The phone offers two microphones.
You can play most games, and the phone doesn't heat up much
Can you play graphic-intensive games on the Moto G64 5G? You most definitely can, but not in full settings. I was able to play Asphalt 9 with very high graphics, but the game warned me that the phone doesn't really support this mode. Casual games will not be a problem, though. You can also play BGMI and Call of Duty in medium settings.
In terms of heat management, Motorola has done a good job. The phone didn't get hot while gaming, using apps such as Camera, or even charging.
The phone packs a large 6,000mAh battery that can easily last two days with normal usage. In our HD video loop test, the phone managed about 16 hours of screen-on time. Even with heavy usage, you can expect the Moto G64 5G to last about a day and a half. Charging is slow despite the support for 33W fast charging. It took me about 1 hour and 50 minutes to fully charge the battery from 0 percent.
Moto G64 5G Review: Cameras
Now, let's talk about the cameras. The Moto G64 5G has a dual rear camera setup with a primary 50-megapixel sensor with f/1.8 aperture, quad pixel binning, and optical image stabilisation. You also get an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera with auto-focus, macro mode, and a 118-degree field of view. For selfies, there's a 16-megapixel sensor with f/2.4 aperture. The phone offers an easy-to-use camera app with several modes, including a Pro and Night mode.
The 50-megapixel primary rear camera can take good photos in daylight conditions
Image quality from the main rear camera is good in daylight conditions. Colours are a bit oversaturated and there's a loss in detail when you zoom in. The ultra-wide camera also takes good photos in adequate lighting, but the colours are inconsistent between the main and ultra-wide cameras. You'll also notice fewer details with the shots. The phone offers a 2x digital zoom, which is essentially a crop of the main sensor, and produces good images when the Sun is out. The selfie camera can also take good images in daylight conditions, but it's not the sharpest and can be blurry at times.
In low light conditions, the main camera can take decent photos with Night mode enabled. Without the mode, the photos are washed out with plenty of noise and artefacts. It's the same story with the ultra-wide camera, but even photos taken with Night mode aren't that great. Check out some samples below.
Daylight photos from the main rear camera [Tap to expand]
Main rear camera - lowlight photos. Top without Night mode, bottom with Night mode [Tap to expand]
Ultrawide shots: Top- Daylight; Bottom- Lowlight [Tap to expand]
Video performance in daylight isn't bad, but it's not great either. The colours look oversaturated, and the panning isn't smooth. Stabilisation is also decent. The phone can only shoot at 1080p resolution at a max frame rate of 60fps. Lowlight videos lack detail and have plenty of noise.
Moto G64 5G Review: Verdict
The Moto G64 5G has plenty of competition in its segment. There's the recently launched Realme P1 (Review), which has a more powerful processor but only offers 8GB RAM, no ultra-wide camera, and a smaller 5,000mAh battery. Then you also have the Redmi Note 13, the Vivo T3x, and the Samsung Galaxy A15, which all cost around the same but lack in most areas compared to the Moto G64 5G. The Vivo T3x offers a better processor and a similar sized battery, but once again lacks in other important areas such as cameras and RAM.
If you're looking for a good budget phone with great battery life, a good display, and a decent pair of cameras, then the Moto G64 5G is an excellent choice. Albeit you may not get the best gaming performance out of this phone, it'll still play all your favourite games as long as you dial down the graphics. Although Motorola has only given the Moto G64 5G a small spec bump, it's still an easy phone to recommend.
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