Motorola Edge 50 Ultra review

Display

The Motorola Edge 50 Ultra features the same display we saw on the Edge 50 Pro - a 6.7-inch P-OLED with a high resolution of 1,220 x 2,712 pixels or 446ppi, up to 144Hz refresh rate and support for 10-bit color depth and HDR10+ standard. It is protected by a slightly curved Gorilla Glass Victus shield.

Motorola Edge 50 Pro (left) next to Edge 50 Ultra (right)

The display features a combination of DC dimming and PWM at a reasonably high 720Hz and has a Flicker Prevention mode for those who are particularly sensitive to the phenomenon.

The specified peak brightness is 2,800nits instead of 2,000nits, and this is the only difference with the Edge 50 Pro panel.

The maximum brightness we achieved manually is 504nits, in line with the most recent OLED-packing phones. The screen can be much brighter in Adaptive Brightness mode - up to 1,473 nits, more than the Edge 50 Pro screen.

The minimum brightness we measured at point white was 2.5 nits.

Refresh rate

The Edge 50 Ultra offers several refresh rate modes with some adaptive behavior in all but the 60Hz one. The Auto mode will go as high as 120Hz, more often to 90Hz, and dials down to 60Hz when idling. The 120Hz uses 120Hz when possible and 60Hz for idle screen, there is no 90Hz drop here.

The 144Hz mode will enable the maximum supported refresh rate, but it too will switch to 60Hz when you don't touch the display.

Games are capped at 60Hz in the Auto mode. You can set a higher refresh rate on a per-game basis or pick one of the higher global settings from the display settings menu before gaming - the Auto mode isn't gaming-friendly.

HDR and streaming

The screen supports HDR10+ and some streaming apps (like YouTube) offer at least Full HD HDR10 streaming. Netflix doesn't allow HDR playback on the Edge 50 Ultra, just like it didn't on the 50 Pro. The Widevine L1 certification does enable FullHD playback.

Battery life

The Motorola Edge 50 Ultra is powered by a 4,500mAh battery, not the largest in this segment. We completed our standardized battery life test, and the results are solid.

The phone scored an Active Use score of 12:56 hours. It aced the call and streaming tests, and did well when it comes to web browsing and gaming.

Charging speed

The Edge 50 Ultra supports 125W fast wired, 50W fast wireless and even 10W reverse wireless charging. It ships with the 125W power adapter and an 8A-rated USB-C cable.

There is a toggle called 'Charging boost', which needs to be enabled to get you the fastest possible charging. It is set to 'off' out-of-the-box, though.

Turning on the Charging boost option improves even more the already impressive speed - 81% in 15 mins and 100% in 21 mins.

Speakers and loudness

The Motorola Edge 50 Ultra features two stereo speakers of excellent balance. There is a speaker at the bottom of the phone and a symmetrical one at the top, which has a second, front-facing outlet for earpiece purposes.

The setup scored a Very Good mark on our loudness test, and it offers excellent audio quality with deep bass, super nice vocals, and well-presented high frequencies.

Use the Playback controls to listen to the phone sample recordings (best use headphones). We measure the average loudness of the speakers in LUFS. A lower absolute value means a louder sound. A look at the frequency response chart will tell you how far off the ideal "0db" flat line is the reproduction of the bass, treble, and mid frequencies. You can add more phones to compare how they differ. The scores and ratings are not comparable with our older loudspeaker test. Learn more about how we test here.