Motorola Edge 50 and Edge 50 Neo hands-on review

Camera samples

The camera hardware is indentical between the Edge 50 and the Neo and it's also shared with the high-flying Edge 50 Pro. This is obviously putting the Neo in the best light of the family as it's not only the chepeast of the three, but also the most compact.

We are looking at a 50 MP with f/1.8 aperture and OIS, a 3x telephoto camera with a 10 MP sensor and f/2.0 aprture and a 13 MP ultrawide shooter is 13MP with an f/2.2 lens. The fixed-focus selfie camera has a 32 MP sensor and an f/2.4 lens.

We had the chance to take a bunch of samples with the Motorola Edge 50 Neo, but given the shared hardware we can reasonably expect the Edge 50 to offer very similar, if not identical image quality. Slight differences due to the processing from the two different chipsets may still be present, so we'll reserve final judgement for when we're down with the full reviews.

Main camera samples

Just like the Edge 50 proper, the Neo supports the AI-powered camera features like adaptive stabilization, 30X Super Zoom, Long Exposure and uses AI-powered image processing.

3x telephoto camera samples

The ultrawide camera unit supports close-distance focusing for nice macro.

Ultrawide camera samples

Ultrawide macro samples

Here are some selfies too.

Selfies

We found the camera app to be fast and responsive, while the switch between cameras while recording 4K videos is smooth and without any hiccups. However, if you start recording with the ultrawide camera, you can't change the camera while recording and vice versa.

Early verdict

Motorola's Edge lineup has a strong presence in key markets around the world and offering a wide variety of phones with diverse feature sets is a big part of the reason why. This year's Edge 50 lineup is quite numerous, but the Neo seems like it has every chance of becoming the star of the family.

It's the most compact, the second most affordable and yet it doesn't sacrifice virtually anything in terms of camera capabilities or screen quality. The IP68 certification and wireless charging are also still here, leaving the chipset as the only potential weak point.

But without running our full sets of tests, it's too early to tell if the Neo and the vanilla are worth recommending. Still, we remain very optimistic about their prospects as we part ways and we hope to be able to share more about them in the coming weeks.