What you need to know about the latest affordable smartphone

The Moto G5 Plus, the latest update to Motorola’s line of affordable smartphones, felt sleek, easy to handle and comfortable.

It’s an Android device but was just as easy to set up as my iPhone from Apple, but one downside that some steps had to be done twice.

It was simple to access different applications and follow prompts, most which felt user-friendly. And the phone had one particularly good option – the use of the owner’s fingerprint to lock and unlock the phone. If you have a fear of having your phone stolen, this would be a great security option to use.

The Moto G5 Plus, which was launched at the end of April, along with a standard Moto G5, comes with 3GB of memory and up to 32GB of storage.

It also came with a fold-up leaflet labelled ‘Read Me’, but this only gave me information on:

• At-a-glance different icons
• Microphone
• On and off etc
• Put in the SIM card
• Charge up and power on
• Control with one touch
• Home screen and settings
• Discover your Moto app
• Photos
• Help and more
• Battery safety
• Arbitration and opt out
• User Guides and more, go to website

Whatever happened to those awesome little booklets that you used to to refer to all the time until you got the hang of a new phone?

Lots of different processes required logging in with email address, which I skipped because I was reviewing the Moto G5 Plus on loan (I bought a $30 SIM card to use in  the review phone because I didn’t want to transfer data from my current smartphone). And a lot of different steps required inputting your location, which is something I’m not comfortable doing because I don’t agree with it, but I worked out how to change the steps so that no location requirement came up.

Setting Wi-Fi was a tricky issue –  the phone kept coming up with ‘authentication problem’ but did not take me anywhere to find out what the problem was, so to activate the Wi-Fi I had to cancel and start all over again, but then it worked fine.

The great function, as I mentioned, was the fingerprint security – if this had been my personal phone, I’d definitely turn it on. Once you entered your name, the phone asked for your fingerprint. I did not take up the fingerprint option because the phone was in my care for only a short period, and failing to do so meant the phone warned me that ‘device protection features will not be activated. You won’t be able to prevent others from using this phone if it’s lost, stole or wiped’.  I think this is an awesome feature because if the phone is stolen or lost, it’s useless to someone else as there’s no access without the fingerprint. Plus, you don’t need to remember a PIN or password. 

I did turn the fingerprint option off, but every time the phone locked itself, it was difficult to get access again until I’d found the right icon on the screen.

Here’s the functions I tried:

Date: It was fun changing this. Although I’d selected English as my language, the phone kept reverting to US-style dates i.e. 5/2/17 instead of the 2/5/17. It took some time to change it to the date style I wanted.

The screen icons were clear and easy to identify and it was easy to move the icons for your favourite functions to the top of the page.

Moto Icon: This was for actions, gestures and display, and was easy to set up.

Calendar: This had to be synchronised with the device but because it involved having to log in or create an account, I didn’t use it.

Play Store: This is where you can buy apps, so to use this you had to enter an email or phone number or create a new account so I didn’t use it.

Download Applications: Again, this involved setting up an account so I didn’t use it.

Camera: It took me some time to manoeuvre this option but once I’d worked it out, I found the photos to be very clear.  The only thing it did not automatically provide you with was a noise or clicking sound to indicate the photo had been taken. Once a photo had been taken, the image would then move to the right-hand side of the screen, and zooming in and using the lighting aspect was very easy. You can also back up all your photos at no cost.

Phone Calls: It was easy to call numbers.  The first time the phone rang, though, I had difficulty answering the call as it had a picture of a phone in the middle of the screen but you must swipe it to the right to answer or to the left to not answer.  Your call log showed the numbers in different colours, and within two days of use there were five different colours showing but it wasn’t clear what they indicated.

Messenger/Text messages: Because I hadn’t logged in to Facebook, text messages and Messenger messages were lumped in together.

Device Help: This was very user-friendly, and it was simple to find what I wanted.

FM Radio: I’ve never used headphones to listen to a radio on a phone before but found it very relaxing to use while typing this review. I loved this option – I just went straight to the icon and quickly found a great station, so it’s a really good function.

The Moto G5 Plus also boasts having rapid charging (promising to give you six hours of battery life with just 15 minutes of charging) and a battery life that will last all day. It has a 13.2 centimetre (5.2 inch) high-definition screen and a polished aluminium casing that comes in ‘lunar gray’ or ‘fine gold’ colours.

The camera comes with a ‘beautification mode’ that lets you smooth your skin in your selfies to get rid of blemishes or wrinkles! It also has a ‘best shot’ feature that takes multiple shots before and after the screen is touched, then looking at them for things like blurred objects or closed eyes, and then recommending to you which one to keep.

The Moto G5 Plus with 3GB Ram/16GB Rom and the Moto G5 Plus with 4GB Ram/32GB Rom is sold at  JB Hi Fi, Harvey Norman, The Good Guys Stores, Officeworks and motorola.com.au for $399 and $449. The Moto G5, which has less memory and a smaller screen than the G5 Plus, costs $299.