Motorola Moto G55 hands-on review

29 August 2024

This is the newly-announced Motorola Moto G55 and we had some time with it during its announcement, so here go our first impressions.

The Moto G55 is a subtle upgrade over the G54. You get a Dimensity 7025 over the 7020 but other than a slightly clock speed bump there's not much in it - you'll get around 10% to 20% increase in speed. You also get the same up-to-12 GB of RAM.

The display is the same 6.5-inch size, technology (LCD), and refresh rate - 120Hz, and the battery capacity is unchanged at 5,000mAh. The new Moto G55 throws away the useless 2 MP macro camera in favor of an 8 MP ultrawide one with its own macro mode, and doubles the charging speed at 30W.

While the Moto G55 shares a lot of design elements with its predecessor, namely the fun colors and the vegan leather option, its in tune with Motorola's latest efforts with a more flowing design.

The camera is now a subtly rising element of the back panel and no longer the abruptly cut shape of the Moto G54's camera island. There's no blue option this time, replaced by Smoky Green and Twilight Purple.

We love the vegan leather finish as it gives so much texture and the feel of something natural and tactile. Better yet, it makes the phone easier to handle.

The Motorola Moto G55 brings some old-school creature comforts like a 3.5mm audio jack and a microSD card (up to a terabyte!). You get Dolby Atmos-ready stereo speakers, a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, and Android 14 out of the box.

The camera system is better thanks to the addition of an ultrawide camera. The main and selfie cameras have the same 50 MP and 16 MP sensors as their respective predecessors. Also the same is the 1080p video recording - missing 4K in 2024 isn't a good look.

Here's the Moto G55 (on the right) next to its newly announced sibling, the Moto G35. The G35 is slightly bigger thanks to its 6.72-inch display. There's little to distinguish the pair from the back, though, with very similar designs.