Specs. I've read every Moto Z3 Play review to date and most of them focus on how the phone, at $499, lacks a compelling value proposition against a clearly superior phone like the OnePlus 6. That's certainly one way to look at it, but the other, better way to view the Moto Z3 Play is on its own terms. It's a flexible, extensible, and utterly convincing representation of modular computing in 2018, and one that I continue to turn to, day after day, despite the presence of more powerful, better-looking products — namely the OnePlus 6. But the Moto Z3 Play isn't for everyone. Like many other Motorola smartphones today, it's finding its place on Amazon, not carrier shelves, and for a good reason — Verizon isn't selling it this time around. If you're on Sprint or US Cellular, its U.S. carrier partners, you can do better. VPN Deals: Lifetime license for $16, monthly plans at $1 & more But if you're looking for an unlocked phone under $500, the Moto Z3 Play, despite its flaws, is your best bet right now. Moto Z3 Play Price: $449 (Amazon / $499 (Motorola Bottom line: The Moto Z3 Play is a very good mid-range smartphone that works on every U.S. carrier. But a mediocre camera and early software bugs keep it from getting my unreserved recommendation. Pros: Impressive build quality Awesome battery life Excellent, fluid software Moto Display makes any phone better Moto Mods support makes up for some hardware limitations Cons: Mediocre camera quality Some software bugs Power button placement is objectively bad See at Amazon $230 at Walmart Moto Z3 Play What I like Spec Moto Z3 Play Specs Operating system Android 8.1 Moto Display, Voice, Actions Processor Qualcomm Snapdragon 636 processor Octa-core Kryo 260 @ 1.8GHz GHz 14nm process Screen 6.01-inch Full HD (2160x1080) AMOLED RAM 4GB Storage 32GB / 64GB Rear camera 12MP, Dual Autofocus Pixel phase-detect, laser autofocus 1.4-micron pixels f/1.7 lens dual-LED flash Rear camera 2 5MP Front camera 8MP 1.12-micron pixels f/2.0 wide-angle lens Battery 3000mAh Colors Deep Indigo Dimensions 76.5 x 156.5 x 6.75 mm Weight 156g There's plenty to like about the Moto Z3 Play: its impeccable build quality, framed with Series 6 aluminum and covered with Gorilla Glass 3 on either side. Its bright 18:9 AMOLED display is quite good, and touch response is second-to-none in this price range. It's like using a Pixel. The Snapdragon 636 processor is really quite powerful — certainly enough to crank through everything you're going to throw at this thing. The reality is that Motorola is at the whim of Qualcomm's confusing marketing — the S636 is an underclocked but otherwise-identical Snapdragon 660, which in its place would have alleviated much of the derision at the phone's performance. In reality, I've yet to notice a major difference in day-to-day workload between the Moto Z3 Play and something like the Pixel 2. Where the disadvantages crop up is in imaging, which I'll get to in the next section. My unit shipped with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, but the one you'll buy on Amazon comes with 4/64, which should be enough for most people. Of course, when comparing this to the OnePlus 6, which comes with 6/64 for just $30 more, along with a much more powerful Snapdragon 845 processor, the Z3 Play will appear lackluster in comparison, but you're not getting the whole story when you just compare things on paper. The Moto Z3 Play isn't a better phone than the OnePlus 6, but there are still reasons to like it more. For my money, the Moto Z3 Play has a few distinct advantages not just over the OnePlus 6 but over every other phone on the market. For starters, Moto Display is still the best ambient display you'll find on any phone, and its value is incalculable when used dozens or hundreds of times a day. It works by surfacing your last three notifications as little bubbles on your lock screen. You can quickly glance at them without turning on the phone, or action them by swiping up or down depending on what you're doing. The feature debuted on the 2013 Moto X and has been updated pretty regularly since then, but what hasn't changed is its simple efficiency. Couple that with Moto Mods support and you have yourself a well-rounded Android phone. Most Mods, like the battery in the box, are "stick and forget" options. Given that the Z3 Play is a hair under 7mm thick, adding a battery Mod doesn't add a lot of bulk, and it's not difficult to use the phone with one attached for most of the day — especially when you get the battery life that such a combination provides. In my testing, the phone's default 3,000mAh battery and the included 2220mAh battery Mod combined for a whopping nine hours of Screen On Time, and roughly 36 hours of mixed use without recharging the phone at all. Most of the time, though, I had the wireless charging Mod attached to the back. It's a single-purpose product, about 1.5mm thick with a textured back. With it attached, the phone feels neither bulky nor slippery; without a Mod, the phone feels a bit vulnerable to scratches and unfortunate drops. Motorola also managed to increase the size of its screen without compromising Mods support, which is an impressive feat for a nascent ecosystem. Previous Moto Z phones had 5.5-inch displays with that now-outdated 16:9 aspect ratio, along with fingerprint sensors below the screen. It's odd how quickly tastes change, but that first-generation Moto Z looks practically ancient to my eyes. But elongating the screen without doing the same with the body meant figuring out what the heck to do with that fingerprint sensor, so Motorola punted it to the right side, below the volume buttons and across from the power button (more on that quizzical decision in a moment). The fingerprint sensor is best-in-class. I love this fingerprint sensor: it's extremely fast to pick up even the edge of my thumb, and its placement feels natural. Like my friend Kellen at Droid-life, I agree that more companies, if they want to continue with capacitive sensors, should move them to the side of the phone. The Z3 Play also employs a version of face unlock that's surprisingly fast and extremely insecure, negating the need for the fingerprint sensor entirely if you find it cumbersome. Let's also talk about the phone's software experience in general. The Z3 Play ships with Android 8.1, and aside from the single Moto app there's nothing you wouldn't find on a Pixel device. It's that clean. On the other hand, the Amazon Prime Exclusive version, which I suggest buying for its $50 discount, is full of Amazon apps, none of which can be deleted, though all can be disabled. If that bothers you, spend $50 more and get it directly from Motorola — nice and simple. The good news is that, like all of Motorola's phones, the device sounds incredible while making calls, and the single front-facing speaker does an awesome job projecting sound towards the ears. As all phones should. One of my favorite features about Motorola phones is also its most subtle: it just feels like a complete package. And better yet, the Z3 Play, even if you can't buy it at Verizon, works on Verizon — and Sprint, and T-Mobile, and AT&T. It's one of Motorola's ever-present virtues, that its phones are certified for nearly every carrier in the world. Better yet, the Z3 Play just works — not just on networks, but in general. Aside from the software bugs (mentioned in the next section), the phone adds up to far more than the sum of its parts. I really like using Motorola phones because, like Google's Pixel line, they are holistically well-rounded. They don't do anything best but do everything well, and when you're old like me (I'm 33) and no longer chasing the speeds and feeds of furious spec sheets, a phone like the Moto Z3 Play, with support for a vast line of Mods that are helpful but not essential. Moto Z3 Play What I don't like The Moto Z3 Play's camera isn't great. Like last year's Z2 Play it's not bad, but it's not a device I'd want to bring with me to a wedding — or even a fancy party. That's mainly because it uses the same 12 megapixel main sensor as its predecessor, benefiting only slightly by improvements to the image processing through the Snapdragon 636. That results in images slightly more color-accurate and less prone to motion blur, but similarly deficient in low light. I did get some great shots from the Z3 Play, and the twist-to-capture gesture (another holdover from the original Moto X) is incredibly useful, but the OnePlus 6 takes far better photos. If camera quality is your main priority, and you don't want to invest in the $200 Hasselblad True Zoom Camera Mod, avoid the Z3 Play. And the less I say about the secondary camera, the better. Motorola's software is just bad at building portrait photos, and I'd have much preferred the company to focus on improving its primary camera than augmenting it with a crappy sidekick. Still, there are things to like about the camera experience: the Cinemagraph mode is tons of fun, and I used it liberally. And the camera app itself combines powerful manual controls with a simple, elegant user experience that more phone makers should emulate. I'd also be remiss not to talk about the terrible power button placement. Did Motorola not get the memo that power buttons shouldn't be on the left side of the phone? Sure, perhaps it would have been awkward to put it above the fingerprint sensor, but — no, that wouldn't have been awkward at all. It would have been objectively better. The volume buttons should be on the left and the power button on the right. There's no excuse for this. Also troubling is that number of software bugs I came across, mainly pertaining to notifications. Remember how I told you Moto Display is great? Well, it is. But it relies on Android's notification system, and on this particular device, notifications would either take hours to show up — I missed a few very important emails during my time with the phone — or would show up on time and, when tapped, wouldn't actually do anything. I'd open the notification shade, tap on the message, and it would disappear but the accompanying app wouldn't open. This usually happened on Twitter, but it wasn't limited to that most persnickity of social networks. Software updates haven't been a Motorola strongsuit in recent years, so don't expect regular patches. I did reach out to Motorola to ask about these issues, and they're actively working with me to diagnose them — early hardware, early software, etc. — but the issues were pervasive enough to bring up here. Your mileage my vary. Finally, there's Motorola's recent poor history of software updates. The Moto Z2 Play still hasn't received an update to Oreo on its biggest carrier partner, Verizon, despite its more premium counterpart, the Z2 Force, receiving it in January. Seriously, the phone got Oreo more than seven month ago. It's not that Motorola doesn't update its phones — the original Moto Z Play has Oreo, but only in the unlocked stream — but that it's so haphazard and inconsistent. And to owners of Motorola phones that have been burned by promises, that doesn't mean much. I'd expect similarly slow updates for the Moto Z3 Play on Sprint and US Cellular, the phone's only carrier partners. Oh, and there's no headphone jack. Moto Z3 Play The competition This phone exists in a bit of a smartphone Purgatory: there aren't many great devices left in the $500 pseudo-category. That's because in the most lucrative of phone markets, the U.S., there's no need for such a price tier: you either buy a phone through a carrier, which is leased on a monthly financing plan for $30ish a month; or you buy a cheaper phone outright, for presumably much less. Galaxy S9 or Moto G6. From a volume perspective, there isn't much in between.<doc-sep>Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola Motorola has announced the latest in the mid-range Z Play line of phones, the $499 Moto Z3 Play. Motorola is still pushing its "MotoMod" modular system, and for that $499 price, the Z3 will come with an extra battery backpack. Your $500 gets you a glass front and back with aluminum sides. Inside there's a 1.8GHz Snapdragon 636 SoC, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, and a 3000mAh battery. There's a dual-camera setup on the back with one 12MP sensor and a 5MP depth sensor, while the front has an 8MP selfie cam. You get a USB-C port on the bottom, a microSD slot, and no headphone jack. In 2016—the year of the failed modular smartphone—Motorola introduced the Moto Z , the first phone with MotoMod compatibility. Thanks to a giant gold connector on the back, the Moto Z could be outfitted with accessories that covered the entire back of the phone. In our review, we mostly found these accessories to be expensive, gimmicky, and unnecessarily proprietary ("Why not Bluetooth?" was a common refrain), but Motorola stuck with the concept and committed to MotoMod compatibility for the next three years. We're now entering year three of Motorola's MotoMod experiment, and the decision to support the attachments has really limited Motorola's phone design for three generations now. Since the back has to be clear for the clip-on MotoMods, Motorola can't add standard features—like a rear fingerprint reader—to its phones. Similarly, the overall shape of the phone has stayed the same to ensure compatibility, and the large camera bump on the back can't change either. As a result the designs of the Moto Z, Moto Z2 Force, Moto Z Play, and Moto Z2 Play have all been interchangeable. It's been thin phones, thick bezels, and front fingerprint readers. Advertisement The Moto Z3 Play manages to work around the MotoMod design limitations somewhat. Instead of large bezels and a front fingerprint reader, the Z3 Play has a rare side-mounted fingerprint sensor. The side has a flat cutout just below the volume keys, where a quick finger scan can unlock your phone. A side fingerprint reader has the advantage of always being accessible, even if the phone is on a desk, but unlike a front fingerprint reader, it doesn't suck up valuable display real estate. The downside is that you're scanning a smaller area of your finger. With the fingerprint reader finally kicked off the front of the phone, the Z3 Play can catch up to the competition somewhat and slim down the bezels. You get a 6.01-inch 2160×1080 "Super AMOLED" display ("Super AMOLED" is technically meaningless, but it's a Samsung trademark) with an extra-tall 18:9 aspect ratio. The Moto Z3 Play is only launching in Brazil right now, while Motorola says it will "roll out globally starting this month." In the US, the Moto Z Play will only be available on Sprint and US Cellular. You can buy it unlocked from all the usual suspects. While the Z3 Play is not Motorola's flagship phone for 2018—that should be the "Moto Z3" or "Z3 Force"—the Z3 Play probably shares a design with Motorola's high-end device this year. Again, with MotoMods locking everything down, there's just not a lot of variety in Motorola's lineup from device to device or year to year. There's already a rumor out there that the Z3 Play and Z3 photos are interchangeable. The good news is that this is the last year of Motorola's three-year MotoMod plan, so next year, the company might actually be able to design phones again. As for the Z3 Play, $500 for a Snapdragon 636 phone sounds like a tough sell. For $30 more you can get a OnePlus 6, which will get you a top-of-the-line Snapdragon 845, more RAM, more storage, more screen, more battery, and a headphone jack. You won't get MotoMods, though!<doc-sep>
The Moto Z3 Play is focused on solving a few key pain points in the smartphone market. This begins with the display, which is the largest noticeable difference over the Moto Z2 Play. The display is taller, with narrower bezels, thanks to its 18:9 resolution. The taller aspect ratio offers a screen-to-body ratio of 79 percent. The Super AMOLED panel offers FHD+ resolution, alongside the characteristic vibrant colors and deep blacks of AMOLED screens. The Moto Z3 Play is focused on solving a few key pain points in the smartphone market, starting with the display Motorola opted for Gorilla Glass 3 on the front and back over the newer Gorilla Glass 5 standard as the company found little difference in the scratch resistance performance. Between the two panels is a 6000-series aluminum metal shell, which adds a nice feel. This is further compounded by an impressive 6.75mm thickness. It certainly delivers on the premium experience Motorola’s been pushing for. Read Next: Best Moto Z3 Play cases The biggest change with the larger display is the fingerprint sensor, which has now moved to the right of the phone. Unlike other devices with a right fingerprint sensor – like recent Sony devices – the fingerprint sensor doesn’t double up as the power button. Instead, Motorola moved the power button to the left of the Moto Z3 Play. While this may seem annoying, it’s not that big of a deal, especially as you don’t interact with the power button a lot during a day. By keeping them separate, the fingerprint sensor remains lightning fast too. The design and overall footprint of the Moto Z3 Play is almost identical to other Moto Z devices, and it’s compatible with all 14 of the current Moto Mods. The company plans to bundle the Moto Z3 Play with a Moto Mod in the box, because apparently it increases overall adoption of the Mods concept. Unsurprisingly, the Moto Z3 Play also drops the headphone jack, which we’ve come to expect from most smartphones in 2018. The Moto Z3 Play is powered by a Snapdragon 636 processor, which Motorola says offers 30 percent faster performance than the Moto Z2 Play. In the U.S., the Moto Z3 Play comes with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage while globally, there will also be additional variants offering up to 6GB of RAM and up to 128GB of storage. The battery is still 3,000mAh with TurboCharging, and it should offer similar battery life to the Moto Z2 Play. Read: The best mid-range phones you can get right now The Moto Z3 Play also supports Cat 12 LTE, offering 600Mbps download speeds and 24-bit audio. There’s also 4 mics with far-field capability and a 7-core DSP for natural language processing — used for the crystal talk feature, which aims to offer more clarity in calls even when you’re surrounded by loud background noises. The other major change is on the phone’s back, where Moto Z3 Play now sports two cameras. The main camera is a 12MP shooter with an f/1.7 aperture and a 1.4-micron pixel size, while the secondary 5MP sensor is used to capture depth information. The main camera supports dual autofocus pixel and offers zero shutter lag as with previous Moto Z devices. The front facing camera has also received a boost, now using an 8MP sensor with an f/2.0 aperture and a 1.12-micron pixel size. The front and rear cameras both offer portrait mode, although the secondary camera on the rear allows for more features in the rear portrait mode. The big new addition to the camera experience is the cinemagraphs feature, which lets you capture a picture with motion and then pick where the motion is. You could capture a plant swaying in the wind, as well as the shadow, and freeze the motion of the plant while the shadow continues moving. The image is then saved as a GIF, so it’s easy to share on social media or with your friends and family. The feature works rather well and can add a unique touch to otherwise boring scenes. The camera also supports Google Lens natively in the camera app, which brings all the Google Lens features you’d expect. Moto Z3 Play camera samples The Moto Z3 Play runs on Android 8.1 out of the box and Motorola will support two OS upgrades during the life of the phone.