Review: The Motorola moto g75 — setting new standards for phones under $500?

We recently reviewed Motorola’s entry-level smartphones, and now we have a mid-range phone from Motorola, the Moto G75.

Why do we review so many cheaper phones? Sure, we all love to think the flagships are amazing, and they are, but according to sales data, of the seven million smartphones purchased by Australians in 2024, 54.2% were in the sub-$700 category! That is 80,000 phones per week!

This statistic reflects the amazing value for money you get in this category. The difference between some of these mid-range phones and a $2,000 flagship is not all that much for most folks.

Enter the moto g75. It sits at the upper end of the entry-level or the very beginning of the mid-range smartphone category, with an RRP of $499. When reviewing it, we need to keep the price in mind because you can buy four of these for less than the price of some flagship smartphones.

The moto g75 is no slouch though and arrives sporting a 6.78-inch 120Hz, FHD+ display.  It is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 3 (4 nm) and includes a dual rear camera setup consisting of a 50MP wide camera and an 8MP ultrawide camera.

Design and hardware

The moto g75 is a good looking phone, as most phones are these days.  The sides of the phone consists of a brushed steel band with a thinner polished steel band on each side of that brushed steel band.

The display is a big 6.78-inch display and although not an AMOLED display but instead an IPS LCD display, the colours are still good and it can be seen in the daylight quite well. You will have to pump up the brightness for better reading in daylight though.

The rear of the review phone provides a premium leathery feel and feels really good thanks to its silicone polymer (eco leather).  It has exceptional grip and you don’t have to worry about this one slipping and sliding in your hand.   It may not be a fancy glass backing, but I love the eco leather’s texture and feel and wish more phones had it.  There is also an option for a matte finish on the rear, but go for the eco leather; you can and will thank me later.

The camera island sits on the top left of the rear of the device, and it looks like it holds three or four cameras. However, it houses just two, with the two other ‘cameras’ being the flash and what Motorola calls a flicker sensor.

The moto g75 is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 3 (4 nm) and supported with 8GB of RAM.  This combination is quite good, although a bit sluggish at times.  By sluggish, I just mean that it does not have that super snappy feel to the OS that you see in more expensive phones.  It doesn’t hang up though, just is slower in its transitions from one app to another – but remember speed is relative.

The fingerprint sensor is side-mounted, as Motorola like to do on their more affordable smartphones.  It is a cost-saving measure and I don’t mind it either way.  The sensor is fast and fairly accurate, although there were times that some fingerprints took a few shots to work.  

I feel that with these side-mounted fingerprint sensors you need to be careful saving the fingerprints because if rushed, it won’t register correctly and when going back and re-saving the fingerprint, the issue is often resolved.  That was the case here.

Durability-wise, the moto g75 arrives sporting an IP68 rating and has passed “16 rigorous tests for conditions such as sudden drops up to 1.2 meters, extreme temperature, pressure change, and freezing/thawing.” I can certainly see why it is durable with the build quality being solid, even though the rear does feel like it has a bit of ‘give’ to it.

Camera

The rear camera specs are nothing to write home about but what is there, when combined with the Motorola camera software and their ‘AI’, the results are pretty good.  Photos were good in decent light and even at night they were decent but as with so many phones of this price, the night shots lacked some of the detail and clarity we see in the ultra premium smartphones.

This phone is priced under $500 though and for that price, these photos are really good.

Software

I really like what Motorola do with their Android skin, as minimal as it is.  They basically just have stock Android with a few extra settings for some incredibly handy tweaks and features they have implemented.  For some reason, other manufacturers haven’t copied some of these, but I wish they would, they are that good.

The two main tweaks that I love are the chopping of the phone to turn on the torch/flashlight and the twisting of the wrist/phone to open the camera app. I use these all the time and they work exceptionally well — you do not need to have the phone unlocked for these to work. These gestures also work from all screens, not just the lockscreen but when in any random app or phone locked.

One thing though I did have an issue with on the g75 is with using Wi-Fi hotspot.  For my job I drive from one facility to another using wireless Android Auto to navigate and I also use Wi-Fi hotspot on my phone to provide connectivity to my laptop as it sends x-ray images back to the office.  

The problem with the g75 though, is that for some reason it will not allow you to use both the Wi-Fi hotspot at the same time as Wi-Fi (required for wireless Android Auto).  Instead, I had to keep switching hotspot on and off as required which meant a lot of images had to be resent from out of the failed queue as they hadn’t been sent by the time I had started driving to the next facility.  This whole process was incredibly annoying.

I have seen this before on some Android devices which had heavy skins but that was years ago.  All other manufacturers seem to have fixed this but Motorola has not.  Hopefully they do so soon.  If this is a use case you may encounter then I suggest checking with Motorola that they have fixed this before buying the moto g75 – or check back here as I’ll edit this section if and when it is fixed.

Battery life

Given my use case of smartphones – see above – I really push the hell out of the battery on a smartphone.  The moto g75 had decent battery life but wasn’t up to the level that some other manufacturers have.  My thoughts are that Motorola do not have an overly aggressive task manager, which is how Android is meant to be, and thus have more apps running in the background, using up more battery.

On a normal, non-work day though, the battery lasted a day, which includes at least an hour of Bluetooth music streaming and an hour or two of wireless Android Auto use.  Do not expect exceptional battery life; instead, expect acceptable battery life.

Motorola includes a 33W charger in the box of the moto g75, which is surprising, given it is a $499 smartphone.  At that price they could be forgiven for not including it, but they have.

The 5,000mAh battery supports 30W fast charging and 15W wireless charging.  The wireless charging was a surprise and they have done well to include that at this price point.  Many others in the mid-range do not include wireless charging, so well done Motorola.

Earbud accessories are back!

Yes! You read that right.  Motorola has released a SKU of the moto g75 that arrives with moto buds in the box!

Now, don’t go expecting Sennheiser-quality sound with the moto buds.  The sound is decent although the bass is a bit muddy, lacking the crispness of more expensive earbuds.  The mids and highs are good but still just seem to lack that crisp punch.  I’d place them around the quality of a set of earbuds that are priced around the $100 mark which, in 2025, is still decent quality.

By themselves though, they are decent enough, especially when they are included with a $499 phone!

Final thoughts

The Motorola moto g75 is a phone that barely scrapes out of the entry-level segment and into the mid-range segment. It can comfortably sit in this mid-range category thanks to a stunning design, especially the eco leather backing versions, solid build, exceptional software and capable camera.

The camera is good and in fact better than most other phones in this sub-$500 category although it could do with some improvement. It struggles a bit with low-light photography, lacking the detail of the ultra premium flagships, but then it also lacks the $2,000 price tag.

Add in the included fast charger and the 15W wireless charging and you have a great phone that is surprisingly under $500, especially when you consider that it comes with half-decent earbuds in the box.

For those with only $500 to spend I can recommend the moto g75 for you. It is not the greatest phone around but at RRP $499 offers great value for money.

The moto g75 5G moto buds edition is available in Succulent Green, Charcoal Grey and Aqua Blue at Harvey Norman, OfficeWorks, Big W, The Good Guys, BingLee, MobileCiti, Amazon, JB Hi-Fi (online only) and motorola.com.au for RRP $499. Charcoal Grey is available in a matte material option, while the others feature soft vegan leather.