Moto G or Moto E: Which one should you choose?

Motorola's Moto G has set the benchmark for budget smartphones with its exceptional performance, good build quality and affordable price. Not only has the phone received critical acclaim, it brought Motorola back in the limelight and, in a way, resurrected it. However, with the recent launch of Moto E, the company's economy smartphone that ticks most of the right check boxes, it is difficult for consumers to choose between the two phones. Should you buy Moto G, or go for Moto E to save some money? A major factor that you need to consider is the amount of money you're willing to shell out while buying a phone and whether the features missing in Moto E are critical to you. The price factor The 8GB variant of Moto G is priced at Rs 12,499 while Moto E can be purchased for as little as Rs 6,999. You would end up saving almost Rs 5,500 if you choose Moto E. Not everyone wants a front facing camera or plays graphics-intensive games. There are users who hardly use the phone's camera leave alone taking advantage of the LED flash for shooting photos in the dark. If you're fine with the tradeoffs that the phone makes and would rather save some money, Moto E is great bargain. There's no doubt that both the phones are well-built and durable (and resistant to minor splashes and scratches). So you're not compromising on build quality even if you're going for Moto E. On second thoughts, for some people buying a phone is a long term investment. If you're going to use your smartphone even for an year, why not spend a little more and get a feature complete phone? The performance card It may not be its key strength, but Moto E offers decent performance for an economy smartphone. You'd notice minor delays while launching and switching between apps if you compare it with Moto G. While we don't endorse benchmarks, Moto G performed significantly better in some of the popular tests scoring almost 1.5 times more than its younger sibling. However, Moto E still performs better than the current crop of economy smartphones. You can even play graphics-rich games such as Asphalt 8 and Dead Trigger albeit with minor frame drops and stutters. It's also pretty decent at multitasking. Of course, Moto G also comes with a snappier processor and you would notice the difference while playing games and multitasking. One area where Moto E outshines Moto G is support for expandable storage. Moto E comes with just 4GB internal storage (out of which just 2.2GB is available to the end user) but you can transfer pictures, multimedia and even some apps or app data to a microSD card. You do have to invest in a memory card though. Moto G, on the other hand, comes with 8GB storage (with about 5GB available to user) and there's no way you can expand it. Both the phones offer great battery life and would easily last you a day even with heavy use. The two phones offer equally good network reception and call quality. Another interesting bit that we noticed is that Moto E's speaker outlet is located in the front and the phone offers louder sound output. This makes it useful for people who use the speakerphone for calls. Moto G's speaker outlet is at the back and sound tends to get muffled when the phone lies on its back. To sum up, if you only use your phone for making and receiving calls, staying connected via messaging and social networking apps and playing casual games, then Moto E is the best smartphone you can buy without burning a hole in your pocket. If you like playing games like Asphalt 8, Dead Trigger or Real Racing, and want apps to open at the blink of your eye then we'd recommend Moto G. Are you a shutterbug? One reason why Moto E may not become as popular among teenagers and the hipster junta is the lack of a front-facing camera. If you take a selfie every now and then, go buy Moto G. If you're not a selfie person and don't even use your phone for video chats then definitely save some money and get Moto E. One of the major shortcomings of Moto E is the lack of autofocus and LED flash. While you can set the exposure, the lack of autofocus makes taking close-up shots a difficult task. The lack of a flash makes it impossible to capture images in the dark. Moto E is capable of shooting up to 480p video while Moto G can shoot 720p videos as well. If camera is a critical feature for you then you should not look at Moto E. However, all said and done, the camera of Moto G is no great shakes either. Other factors Moto G offers a great experience with its bigger, brighter display that offers better viewing angles and packs in more pixels than Moto E. Moto E's display comes with a slight tint so whites are not as white as they appear on Moto G. Even with its shortcomings, Moto E offers the best display in its class. So is the case with Moto G, but everything comes at a price. Both Moto G and Moto E come with Android 4.4 KitKat, the latest iteration of the OS and Motorola has promised that the phones will receive at least one more software update. Being free of unnecessary bloatware, the phones offer one of the best software experience.   TOI