Motorola announces Android Go edition of the E5 Play

By Steven Winkelman and Eric Brackett Published July 16, 2018

Motorola is making huge waves in the budget phone market this summer. After releasing the incredible Moto G6 Play, the smartphone giant followed up with the equally impressive (and less expensive) series of E5 handsets. Well, it looks like Motorola is mixing things up even more this summer with a new Android Go edition of the Moto E5 Play.

The Android Go edition of the Moto E5 Play will launch in Europe and Latin America at the end of July. It will sell for 127 euros which comes out to about $109. And for its budget price, the E5 Play offers some pretty impressive specs.

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Motorola’s lightweight budget handset will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 processor along with 2GB of RAM. There is a paltry 16GB of storage on board, however, you should get a little extra space thanks to the lightweight Android Go UI. There is also a 5.3-inch HD screen with an 18:9 aspect ratio, along with an 8-megapixel camera on the back and a 5-megapixel selfie cam.

The Go version of E5 Play comes just weeks after Motorola released a U.S. version of the handset running Android 8.0 Oreo. While the U.S. version runs well with Oreo, international users will likely be in for a pleasant surprise. Android Go will deliver a smoother experience for the budget chip, and the pre-installed suite of “Light” apps should launch more quickly than their heavyweight counterparts and require less overall storage.

Unfortunately, U.S. consumers may be out of luck on this one. The press release specifically mentions that this device will “only be available in various countries in Europe and Latin America.” You will, however, be able to purchase the Moto E5 Play running Android 8.0 Oreo in the states from a number of carriers including Cricket, Boost Mobile, and Xfinity Mobile.

While we may not be able to get our hands on the Android Go edition of the Moto E5 Play, there is no shortage of awesome budget phones for 2018. In fact, there are so many that we had to create a list to keep track of them all. With options ranging from “flagship-killers” to sub-$150, you can definitely find the perfect phone at just about any price.

Steven Winkelman

Former Staff Writer, Mobile

Steven writes about technology, social practice, and books. At Digital Trends, he focuses primarily on mobile and wearables…

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