Motorola Moto G 4G review: Going fast

Average 5MP camera with auto-focus

The Moto G 4G comes with a modest 5MP auto-focus camera. It takes images in a maximum resolution of 2592x1944 pixels. It has a built-in HDR mode, which can even be set to activate automatically in certain shooting conditions.

The camera does have the same minimalist interface as on the Moto X and E, which includes just two on screen buttons on the right-hand side for video recording and front-facing camera. Taking an image is done simply by tapping the screen.

The available advanced settings include HDR, touch capture, panorama, geo-tagging, widescreen mode, and shutter sound.

The camera interface

Unfortunately, the Moto G 4G 5MP camera is no better than the Moto G camera. It produces images with an inspiring amount of detail. Colors are undersaturated and there is very little noise, but that's due to the overly aggressive noise reduction, which eradicates a fair amount of the fine detail - an watercolor painting effect is visible whenever you shoot grass, foliage or similar textures.

Moto G 4G camera samples

Turning on HDR does a good job of extending the dynamic range, and somewhat surprisingly it also improves the contrast issues slightly. However colors tend to get a bit overblown in this mode, which takes away some of the realistic look of the images. It's ultimately a matter of personal preference as to which type of image you prefer, but keep in mind that both modes have their drawbacks.

HDR off • HDR on • HDR off • HDR on

The Auto-HDR is a bit unreliable so we'd recommend manually choosing whichever mode you prefer so as to get more consistent results.

Moto G 4G supports shooting 180-degree panoramic pictures. The resolution is quite low though - 2000x500px for the landscape and 1600x600px for the portrait shots. The resolved detail and contrast in those pano images are quite poor though.

Moto G 4G panorama

Photo quality comparison

The Moto G 4G enters our Photo quality comparison tool to face off against other 5MP shooters. You can also pit it against other cameras from within the tools' page.

The Motorola Moto G 4G in our photo compare test

720p video recording at 30 fps

The camcorder UI shares the same viewfinder with the still camera, with the top right button being used to toggle video recording. The Moto G 4G records 720p videos at 30fps. The bitrate averages about 10Mbps, which can partly explain the poor resolved detail. Audio is recorded at 128 Kbps in stereo mode with a sampling rate of 48 kHz.

Videos by the Moto G 4G are far from stellar, with the low level of detail being the most noticeable issue. There are similar problems with poor dynamic range like on the still camera, and the contrast is still on the low side.

Another thing we notice is the significant frame rate drop in low-light scenes - once we reduced the lightning for our video compare test, the Moto G 4G fps dropped down to 22.

This is a short video sample, which we've uploaded on YouTube.

And this is an untouched 720p video sample taken straight from the Motorola Moto G 4G.

The Motorola Moto G 4G is capable of slow-mo 720p videos, but they are quite poor at 15 fps.

Here is a sample slow-mo video we've uploaded on YouTube.

You can also snap pictures while recoding a video, but they are frame grabs from the actual video and not that good in quality.

Pictures taken while shooting a video

Video quality comparison

The Motorola Moto G 4G enters our video quality comparison tool to be pitted against other 720p camcorders. You can choose which devices to compare against from within the tools' page.

The Motorola Moto G 4G in our Video quality comparison tool