6.5 / 10

Score

Moto G Play (2026)

Pros

• Google Circle to Search at a low price
• 5G and NFC set an important standard for cheaper phones
• Long-lasting battery

Cons

• Camera is quite compromised
• Little onboard storage and memory
• Noticeably sluggish without RAM Boost

Motorola's $180 Moto G Play for 2026 is getting some special attention this year. Despite being $20 cheaper than the latest version of the Moto G, it matches many of its specs, such as 5G connectivity, NFC for wireless payments, the same MediaTek Dimensity 6300 processor, and a 5,200-mAh battery.

But trust me, this phone certainly cuts corners. It's one of the few new handsets releasing in 2025 with just 64GB of onboard storage, and that's going to fill up fast if you download music, videos and games onto your personal phone. It also has just 4GB of onboard memory, which made setting up the phone a challenge -- simple tasks like logging into apps and syncing my WhatsApp message history proved onerous. 

Motorola does offer simple solutions for both of those problems. You can install a microSD card to expand storage and use the RAM Boost setting to convert a portion of your slim storage into 8GB of additional virtual memory, which assists with loading apps as well as multitasking.

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But it then prompts the question -- if you're going to spend more money to expand the storage, maybe you should consider spending the extra $20 for the new Moto G that starts at 128GB. That price difference is also now rather nominal, as Motorola originally announced a $170 price for the Moto G Play but upped it to $180 when it went on sale Thursday. 

There are people who will find the $180 Moto G Play a good fit. It's just capable enough if you have simple needs from your device and plan to use it primarily for texting, voice calls and video chats ... or to play a couple games. But, even though this device meets the essentials, it has a low ceiling of capability, so buyers should keep their expectations in check.

Moto G Play (2026) design, battery, software

The Moto G Play comes in a single color called Pantone Tapestry, which is a blueish-green hue with a textured vegan leather backing. I like this shade as it adds a splash of personality to this lower-cost phone and certainly dresses it up more than the plastic designs in boring black that we tend to see in this price range from other phone companies.

Along with the aforementioned microSD card slot, the Moto G Play comes with a headphone jack and dual stereo speakers -- the latter of which I found made my music and YouTube watching sound quite good.

The phone's 6.7-inch display, on the other hand, is an area where you'll feel the phone's lower price. It does run at a 120Hz refresh rate, but that smoothness is hard to notice because its lower HD (1,604 by 720 pixels) resolution leads to a grainy feeling, whether I'm scrolling through the home screen or reading websites. The display's 1,000-nit peak brightness is on the lower side, but still high enough for me to find the screen usable in outdoor settings.

The phone runs on Android 16 and features Motorola's customizations, including its signature gestures such as twisting to open your camera and a chopping motion for turning on the flashlight. Having access to Google's Circle to Search in such a low-cost phone is also great, and I found it to work just as well on this phone as it does on more expensive phones. The phone gets two years of major software updates and three years of security updates, which is on the lower side compared to the six years of support Samsung provides its Galaxy A phones. However, this support level is comparable to similarly priced phones from TCL.

Also very nice are the inclusion of 5G connectivity and NFC, both first-time inclusions on the lower-cost Moto G Play series. While TCL and other companies have these features on other sub-$200 phones that were tied to specific carriers, it's great to see Motorola now provide them on an unlocked device. With 5G cellular networks now prevalent and NFC used everywhere, from transit systems to supermarkets for purchases, it's good that these technologies are worth including in phones of all price ranges.

The 5,200-mAh battery is also appreciated, as it easily gets through two days of medium use. This might be because the Moto G Play is a less powerful device, but if you're indeed a light phone user, having a large-capacity battery that lightly drains away during casual use will go a long way. Its 18-watt maximum charging speed isn't particularly fast -- in CNET's 30-minute wired charging test, it slowly climbed from 0% to 35% -- but with a battery of its size, it'll likely get enough charge for the day by plugging it in for an hour while getting ready.

While I didn't experience issues with the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 chip once I activated RAM Boost, it's still worth noting that the processor struggles to handle more complex tasks. In Geekbench 6.0, which stresses the processor, and 3D Wild Life Extreme, which pushes the graphics, the Moto G Play's benchmark scores are quite low but average for a phone in this price range. Again, it's a matter of setting expectations: This is a phone that's great for texting and calling, but it won't be at all ideal for playing games like Fortnite at their medium to high graphics settings.

Moto G Play cameras

The Moto G Play's cameras are the biggest compromise you'll have to deal with on this cheap phone. This shouldn't be a surprise, as often the biggest reason phones cost more is because of more advanced camera systems.

By the standard of a $180 phone, the 32-megapixel main camera and the 8-megapixel front-facing camera are just fine. But by the standard of using a camera to take photos of important life moments, beautiful park settings or your next scrumptious meal -- this is more of a camera that will let you share these in group chats. 

I took the Moto G Play for an evening walk in New York's Central Park, where there was still just enough sunlight to potentially give the cameras plenty of visibility to work with. But most of these photos still look quite muddy, blurry or have image noise.

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This photo, showing autumn leaves along a lake, does give you the oranges and reds, but zooming in even a little quickly reveals pixelation.

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This selfie photo, taken in the same spot, shows the sun fading behind me, with the plants and some of the details of my face visible. However, a quick zoom-in and you can see that the grass behind me is quite fuzzy.

Taking photos indoors did not help. This up-close photo of a beer is absolutely filled with image noise, even though there was plenty of lighting inside the bar.

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While we haven't yet tested the $200 Moto G for 2026, that phone has a 50-megapixel wide camera alongside a 2-megapixel macro camera. While I'd prefer to see it paired with an ultrawide lens, hopefully, the 50-megapixel shooter will do a better job of capturing details.

I should note that I had no complaints using the Moto G Play for video calling. I took several calls over Facebook Messenger, and while I knew I didn't look as good as I would on more expensive phones, I did come through clearly and could easily multitask while taking the call. So, if using the cameras for communication is more important than using them for photos, the Moto G Play can do the job.

Moto G Play: The bottom line

The $180 Moto G Play is as simple a phone as you should go. And as far as bargain phones go, if all you need is a device for phone calls, video chats, texting and light media use, it could be quite viable for those simpler needs.

However, if you try to do anything more advanced than that, you'll quickly reach a point where you should consider a more expensive device. If you need more than 64GB of space (and honestly you probably do), then instead of buying a microSD card you should just take that money and put it towards a $200 phone that comes with 128GB of onboard storage space. If you want a device that takes nicer photos, this isn't it. And if you want a phone that punches above its price, look elsewhere, as the Moto G Play meets expectations for a $180 handset.

On the bright side, by including features like 5G connectivity, NFC and Google's Circle to Search, the Moto G Play sets a standard for what all phones should have, regardless of their starting price. Just don't try to race even further to the bottom, because I don't think you can make any more trade-offs than the Moto G Play does and have a functional device.

How we test phones

Every phone tested by CNET's reviews team was actually used in the real world. We test a phone's features, play games and take photos. We examine the display to see if it's bright, sharp and vibrant. We analyze the design and build to see how it is to hold and whether it has an IP-rating for water resistance. We push the processor's performance to the extremes using standardized benchmark tools like GeekBench and 3DMark, along with our own anecdotal observations navigating the interface, recording high-resolution videos and playing graphically intense games at high refresh rates.

All the cameras are tested in a variety of conditions, from bright sunlight to dark indoor scenes. We try out special features like night mode and portrait mode and compare our findings against similarly priced competing phones. We also check out the battery life by using it daily, as well as running a series of battery drain tests.

We take into account additional features like support for 5G, satellite connectivity, fingerprint and face sensors, stylus support, fast charging speeds and foldable displays, among others, that can be useful. We balance all of this against the price to give you the verdict on whether that phone, whatever price it is, actually represents good value. While these tests may not always be reflected in CNET's initial review, we conduct follow-up and long-term testing in most circumstances.