Motorola Moto Z3 hands-on review

Moto Z3 hardware tour

Motorola pretty much locked-in the overall profile of its Moto Z lineup with the unveiling of the Moto mods and the consequent promise for cross-generation compatibility for the accessories. This has made for rather physically identical phones over the last few years, but even so, Motorola managed to successfully switch things up and make the jump to a trendy new 18:9 screen aspect ratio. That design change, however, is only new compared to last year's Moto Z2 Force. Compared to the Moto Z3 Play, from earlier this year, the new vanilla Z3 is practically unchanged on the outside.

The phone is very thin, with flat Gorilla Glass 3 pieces shielding its screen and back. A thin frame made of Series 6000 aluminum glue the said glasses together - and that's pretty much it. It should come as no surprise that the flat back, in particular, is a major fingerprint magnet. To be fair, though, Motorola clearly intended it to be used with some kind of attachment installed, pretty much all the time. Even if it's just a Moto style sheet, with no added functionality. Those don't really hold on any firmer to the Moto Z3 than any other Moto Z device, so you can expect to find them sliding about if you frequently let the Moto Z3 slide about inside a backpack or handbag. Still, they look great.

We have to say, personally, we also appreciate the move away from the Shatterproof glass finish on the front of the Moto Z2 Force. The Moto Z3 uses a much less shatter-resistant, but noticeably more scratch resistant Gorilla Glass 3. This might have necessitated the loss of the "Force" moniker and a potentially desirable extra feature for some buyers, but it should also mean a lot less general wear and tear on the display. And this was a major issue on the Z2 Force.

Moto Z3 front

Speaking of which, you really don't want to cover that gorgeous 6.01-icnh, Super AMOLED panel, courtesy of Samsung. It's of the new tall kind with 18:9 aspect ratio, which means the resolution is now 1,080 x 2,160 px. The extra 240 rows of pixels didn't increase the Z3 footprint (which is limited by the Mods), Motorola just trimmed the bezels.

Sure, the resolution is a downgrade over the QHD panel on the Moto Z2 Force. But, even subjectively, the contrast levels and colors looks a lot better on the Samsung panel than they did on the older P-OLED one. Sill, we will reserve final judgment for the proper review, after the full set of display tests. Plus, there are now fewer pixels for the Andreno 540 GPU to push, so we can definitely expect on-screen framerate improvements, compared to the Z2 Force.

While a thin bottom chin definitely looks good, it also meant no front-facing fingerprint reader/home button combo on the Moto Z3. Again, not a big surprise, since the Z3 Play is in the same boat. The Moto Z3 relies on a single virtual key for complete Android navigation, while the fingerprint sensor has been placed in the only place they could fit it on - the right-hand side. Sony has a long history of putting the sensors there and we liked how those worked on those Xperia phones, and we found it pretty neat on the Moto Z3, too.

Anyway, back to the control scheme, from our brief time with it, the fingerprint seems pretty snappy and very accurate. Just like the one on the Z3 Play.

It's also quite conveniently placed. We can't exactly say the same about the tiny and rather crammed volume buttons. The fingerprint reader does a great job of unlocking the phone but it can't really lock it back up, since it's not actually a button and does not double as a power button.

There is a separate control for that on the left-hand side of the device. Frankly, it feels really odd to unlock your phone on one side and then lock it back by using a button on the opposite side. We would probably opt for an Android lock screen app shortcut on the desktop instead if we had to do this every day.

Finishing off the I/O tour of the device - the SIM card tray is on the top frame, along with the secondary noise-canceling microphone. Since, for now, at least, the Moto Z3 is a Verizon exclusive, it can only take a single Nano-SIM card. We are pretty confident that once a wider release takes place, a dual-SIM version will also pop-up.

On the bottom - a single USB Type-C port. No 3.5mm audio jack. But, once again, the Moto Z3 Play already prepared us for this development. Plus the Moto Z2 Force lacks the standard audio jack as well. You get a dongle for that in the box.

Moto Z3 internals

Since the Moto Z3 Play and the Moto Z3 are pretty much identical externally, even down to the display panel and resolution, it's going to be the internals that potentially push a buyer in one direction or the other. Motorola upgraded the chipset, but didn't go all out, opting for a last-gen Snapdragon 835. 4x2.35 GHz Kryo & 4x1.9 GHz Kryo are definitely an improvement over the Snapdragon 636 and its eight 1.8 GHz Kryo 260 cores.

Not to mention, the GPU has gotten a significant boost as well. The Adreno 540 is, again, not the best money can buy, but quite potent and capable to handle pretty much any modern game load. Plus, there is also the matter of the phone's lower FullHD resolution, which will definitely help with on-screen fps.

Speaking of lower, we are mostly taking the Moto Z2 Force as a reference point here. While the vanilla Z3 clearly borrows its exterior from the Z3 Play, the internals seem to be almost directly transplanted from the Moto Z2 Force. The chipset is identical, so is the memory base memory configuration - 64 GB, 4 GB RAM. The latter might be subject to change once the phone leaves the Verizon exclusivity club, considering the Z3 Play recently got a 128GB, 6GB version of its own.

Before we get to the camera department, though, there are a few other upgrades in the Z3, compared to its predecessor. Most notably, the battery pack has gotten a bump up to 3,000 mAh. Same as in the Z3 Play. Bluetooth has also been upgraded, or rather updated to the v.5.0 protocol stack. Last and probably least important, there is an FM radio receiver - a feature you rarely see on flagship phones.

Moto Z3 camera

The main camera on the Moro Z3 appears to be directly lifted from the Moto Z2 Force. It is a dual setup, consisting of a main 12 MP, f/2.0, 1.25µm, PDAF & laser AF snapper and a secondary 12 MP B/W, PDAF & laser AF one.

Now, depending on your preference, this could either be considered an improvement or not so much, compared to the cheaper Moto Z3 Play and its brighter f/1.7 main camera. No doubt, having a secondary black and white unit is potentially more functional than a simple 5MP depth sensor, but the jury is still out on whether the extra data from the black and white camera can make up for the f/2.0 main one.

That can only be properly answered once we get the phone in for review and test it out. If the Z2 Force is any indication for camera performance, we were, indeed, quite impressed with the level of resolved detail on it, as well as the low noise. However, color capture and reproduction was unreliable and the dynamic range left more to be desired on that phone.

Perhaps a year's worth of camera software development might have helped improve on those problem areas. If nothing else, the camera on the Moto Z3 does have a few new shooting modes to play around with, like cinemagraph and a background cutout feature.

While on the subject of software, as a side note, the Motorola experience is still a very clean, nearly AOSP one. So, no change there.

As for selfies, you get the same 8 MP, f/2.0, 24mm, 1.12µm from the Z3 Play, which is an overall upgrade, compared to the Z2 Force. Except for the dedicated LED selfie flash, which is now gone and has been replaced by a screen-flash solution.

Here are some camera samples. They all look really good so far. Our initial impressions are strong for this camera despite having the same hardware as the Z2.

Sample photos

HDR: Off • On • Off • On

HDR samples looked excellent. Exposures were balanced very well and not exaggerated.

Black and white samples

Portrait samples

The portrait mode looks pretty solid on the Moto Z3, but the bokeh outline needs some work. All these samples were taken in the most ideal summer lighting. We'll be testing lower light and tougher conditions for the full review.