Moto Z Play Release Date, News and Updates: Smartphone Bringing Modularity for Mid-Range Price; Specs and Features
Will the Moto Z Play Live Up to the Standards of Its Predecessors?
Motorola Mobility recently overhauled its entire design language after being acquired by Lenovo. They launched the Moto Z and Moto Z Force last June, bringing modularity into the Motorola smartphone line-up. Now with tons of leaks surfacing online, the company will be releasing the new Moto Z Play next month.
Design
The new range of Moto Z smartphones highlight modularity as one of its main features. This innovation was first introduced by the LG G5, but drew a lot of flak due to somewhat poor execution and quality control issues. The two previously released Moto Z devices, however, offered a more premium smartphone with easier access to their modularity.
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The Moto Z Play would most likely share a similar fate. Several leaks point to the upcoming device to have a similar design with its older siblings, making it compatible to already existing Moto Mods. For cost-cutting though, the device may be made of plastic material instead of a metallic finish. It will also come with a thinner body, meaning that the camera bump will protrude a tad more.
Hardware
As with the previously released Moto phones, the Moto Z Play will be coming with a 5.5-inch AMOLED display. The main difference here would be the downgrade from Quad-HD to Full HD resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels.
To power the midrange device is the relatively new Qualcomm Snapdragon 625, with an octa-core processor clocked at 2.0GHz, alongside the Adreno 506 for graphics.
RAM would be at 3GB, with varying internal storage options of 32GB or 64GB. Both the top-tier Moto Z and Moto Z Force are equipped with Snapdragon 820 and 4GB of RAM. The Moto Z Play will also the pin connectors at the back that all for the connection of the Moto Mods.
The rear-facing camera would be at around 16-megapixels, which lies between the Moto Z's 13-megapixels and the Moto Z Force's 21-megapixels. The selfie shooter would then be at 5-megapixels. Also, the 3.5mm audio jack will make a return to the Moto Z Play, after being strangely omitted from its high-end predecessors.
The battery would sit somewhere between 3300 mAh and 3600 mAh, a huge upgrade over the Moto Z's 2600 mAh. This stays true to the Play line-up tradition of having mostly midrange specs with huge battery packs. The device will come with quick charging capabilities.
Software
Unsurprisingly, the device will run Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow out of the box. However, Android 7.0 Nougat is sure to shortly come after its official release. The new Moto Z line-up is well loved by the tech community for delivering close to vanilla Android experience, resulting in to a snappier experience.
Price and Release Date
Various leaks put the price range of the new Moto Z Play at around $400 to $500 unlocked, cheaper than the $600 to $700 price point of its precursor devices. For the release date, most rumors point to a September 6 launch.
