Motorola One Action review

Introduction

Motorola One everything - there's the regular Motorola One, there's the Power and the Vision, plus a Zoom is reportedly in the works. The particular flavor we have today is the Motorola One Action - the brand new entry in the Moto lineup.

The Action's unique twist is that it has an ultra wide angle camera, but not just any ultra wide angle camera like them other non-action phones - instead, this one's installed at a 90-degree angle, so it captures landscape videos when you're holding the phone in portrait.

In terms of the fundamentals, the One Action is a lot like the One Vision - it's got the same 6.3-inch LCD, the same Exynos 9609 ticks inside, and there's the same 3,500mAh battery to power things.

But a few differences can be spotted, and they're again in the camera department. For one, the primary shooter of the One Action is a classic 12MP affair as opposed to the Vision's 48MP QuadBayer solution. And then another 12MP cam replaces the Vision's 25MP snapper on the front - the one on the Action can record 4K video, unlike the Vision's.

Here's the rest of the key specs summed up before we move on.

Motorola One Action specs

• Body: 161.1x71.2x9.2mm, 176g; plastic frame; Denim Blue and Pearl White color schemes.
• Display: 6.3" LTPS IPS LCD, 2,520x1,080px resolution, 21:9 aspect ratio, 432ppi.
• Rear camera: Primary: 12MP, f/1.8 aperture, 1.25µm pixel size, PDAF. Ultra wide: 16MP, f/2.2, 117-degree coverage (13mm eq. focal length), 1.0µm. Depth: 5MP. 2160p@30fps video recording.
• Front camera: 12MP, f/2.0 aperture, 1.25µm pixel size. 2160p/30fps video recording.
• OS: Android 9 Pie; Android One.
• Chipset: Samsung Exynos 9609: Octa-core CPU (4x2.2GHz Cortex-A73 + 4x1.6GHz Cortex-A53), Mali-G72 MP3 GPU.
• Memory: 4GB of RAM; 128GB storage; hybrid microSD slot.
• Battery: 3,500mAh Li-Po (sealed).
• Connectivity: Single/Dual-SIM; LTE; USB 2.0 Type-C; Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac; GPS + GLONASS + Galileo; Bluetooth 5.0; NFC.
• Misc: Rear-mounted fingerprint reader; single down-firing speaker.

Motorola One Action unboxing

The One Action comes in the same purple box as the One Vision, but with slightly different contents. For starters, the bundled AC adapter is a downgrade - this one's rated at 10W, while the Vision had a TurboPower branded 15W one. There's also no headset, which we did get with our One Vision review unit - however, that was likely a Brazil-exclusive, and the One Action may or may not have one depending on region.

There is a soft silicone bumper case and we believe that's standard equipment across all regions. Same with the USB-A-to-C cable.