As a phone by itself, Motorola"s new Moto Z3 isn"t that exciting, as it"s a sort of hybrid of the Moto Z3 Play and last year"s Moto Z2 Force. Announced at an event last week in Chicago, I"ve been using the handset since then.
There"s really nothing new here. It contains the same Snapdragon 835 chipset and dual 12-megapixel camera sensors that the Z2 Play had, and it has the same body and 1080p 18:9 Super AMOLED screen as the Z3 Play. But what makes the Moto Z3 exciting is that it"s the first phone that you"ll be able to upgrade to 5G, adding download speeds of up to 5Gbps to the device.
And that"s where the specs of the Z3 come into play (pun intended). Using last year"s chipset and making some other sacrifices allows the device to come in at just $480. That means that if the Mod comes out next year at a price of $200, then you have a 5G handset for just $680.
Of course, the 5G Moto Mod will eventually work with older Moto Z devices, as long as it"s the Verizon model. Sadly, unlocked devices like the Moto Z3 Play won"t work, even if they"re being used on Verizon. Backward compatibility is coming later on though, which is what makes the Moto Z3 the first 5G upgradeable device.
Check out our first impressions video below:
Make sure to subscribe to Neowin on YouTube! It"s the best channel in the universe!