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Motorola launches super-value Moto E smartphone for £89

We’re at Motorola’s big London launch for the unveiling of the insanely-priced 4.3-inch Moto E, the much-anticipated follow-up to the great-value Moto G mobile, rocking smart performance, great battery life and tons of interesting features for just £89.

Last year’s Motorola Moto G packed some incredible specs, including an impressively sharp screen and quad-core processor, for just £135. No wonder it’s the best-selling smartphone in Motorola’s history, and has just been updated with a 4G version. Well, this year’s Moto E trims back the specs a little, but the result is a still a very impressive handset that costs just £89, which would make a great backup phone or be suited to younger or older users.

Check out our full Motorla Moto E hands-on review

Motorola Moto E launches at £89 in UK

Motorola Moto E: specs

The new Moto E is a 4.3-incher, just a tad smaller than the 4.5-inch Moto G, but it’s also a wee bit chunkier. According to Motorola the phone has been ‘built to last’, able to tolerate more than a few knocks on the move. The curved back is sculpted to fit perfectly in the hand, and comes in a huge variety of colours, so you’re bound to find a design that fits.

That display is the ‘sharpest in its class’ with a 960 x 540 pixel resolution (256ppi), and Motorola compared those specs to Samsung’s Galaxy Fame, which has a 3.5-inch display with a 640 x 480 resoltuion (165ppi). The Moto E’s screen is by comparison 23% larger and 55% sharper.

Into that slim body, Motorola has packed a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, unlike the Moto G’s quad-core chip. However, the Moto E should still comfortably handle the basics, such as messing around online and keeping up-to-date with social media – in fact, Motorola reckons the Moto E is faster than the Samsung Galaxy S4 in many respects, including faster in placing a call, loading the browser and loading the camera.

Motorola also claims that the dual-core chip is smarter when it comes to battery usage, so hopefully we’ll get some good battery life – especially with a 1,980mAh battery packed inside the slim frame. Once again the Samsung Galaxy Fame took a kicking, as Motorola claimed the Moto E has twice the talk time.

Motorola Moto E launches at £89 in UK

The Moto E once again boasts a 5-megapixel rear camera, with an emphasis on ease-of-use. However, this time the front-facing camera has been omitted entirely, to shave off some pennies. Selfie fans will have to do that awkward rear cam thing instead.

Motorola has addressed one of the Moto G’s key concerns too, namely the lack of storage. The Moto E comes with a microSD memory card slot, so now you can expand and carry around tons of apps, games and media wherever you roam – no more relying on good ol’ Google Drive to host all your files.

Motorola Moto E: software

Android 4.4 KitKat comes pre-installed, and Motorola has packed in a couple of interesting new features too.

Motorola Alert, for instance, is designed to put loved ones at ease and let them track your activitiies, useful for older and younger relations. There’s location tracking that alerts friends and family to your exact whereabouts, and an emergency mode that can be quickly and easily activated if you’re in distress, immediately messaging your chosen contacts.

Motorola Moto E: UK price and release date

You can pick up your very own Motorola Moto E from later this week, for just £89. Check out our full Moto E hands-on review for our thoughts so far…

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