The new Moto Z3 will be the very first to work with a 5G Moto Mod, allowing owners to experience super-fast data speeds before anybody else, downloading 4K movies in just about a minute. But where? And when? The nascent state of 5G technology leaves a lot of questions swirling around this exciting new device.
The Motorola Moto Z3 is not exactly a new phone. It’s almost identical to the recently-released Moto Z3 Play, except with a slightly better processor and an evolved dual-lens camera system. But there’s a much more consequential difference lurking beneath its skin: The Moto Z3 will be the “first upgradeable 5G phone” in the world.
That’s possible thanks to Motorola’s Moto Mod program, which lets you snap unique components to the back of the phone. So far we’ve seen more pedestrian mods like a 360-degree camera, or a tiny snap-on projector. The new 5G Moto Mod will up the stakes with exponentially faster data speeds. That means you can perform traditional tasks much faster — downloading a 4K movie, for example, in a minute and a half. Here’s how it all works.
The 5G Moto Mod is a little thick, and it has a unique shape. Like all Moto Mods, it magnetically attaches to the back of the Moto Z3. Four millimeter-wave antennas implanted in the device ensure you consistently get a 5G signal without interference.
Let’s get things straight — you’re not going to access 5G as soon as you slap the mod on. You need to be in somewhere with 5G Verizon service, which means only three cities right now: Sacramento, Los Angeles, and Houston. It will take a long time before 5G is as ubiquitous as 4G LTE.
The Moto Z3 is a Verizon-exclusive device, and so is the 5G Moto Mod. So if you want to access these faster data speeds, you’ll need to be on Verizon. Motorola told Digital Trends it will decide which previous Moto Z devices will be able to support the 5G Moto Mod at a later date (through a software update) — but you’ll need to be on the Verizon network no matter what.
The 5G Mod has its own SIM card inside it, and two modems: Qualcomm’s X24 for 4G, and Qualcomm’s X50 for 5G. In a 5G-supported area, it will be capable of hitting 5Gbps speeds. In 4G areas, the X24 modem should still be able to hit speeds up to 2Gbps speeds — a marked improvement of what you would get from the X16 modem built into the phone.
What will these dramatically faster data speeds enable? Well, it will drastically change the way we use our smartphones. Think about this: It will currently take around a minute and 20 seconds to download 90 songs from Spotify on an iPhone X — that’s with peak download speeds. With the 5G Moto Mod on the Moto Z3, Motorola said you will be able to do the same thing in 10 seconds. Downloading 200 pictures from Google Drive will take 30 seconds; downloading four episode of Game of Thrones will take a minute; downloading one 4K movie from Netflix will take around a minute and a half. Motorola showed us a demo of the Z3 hitting 3Gbps per second, but promised the final unit would achieve the full 5Gbps in areas with 5G coverage.
5G will affect everything from cars to the Internet of Things, but for our purposes here with the 5G Moto Mod, expect your smartphone experience to dramatically improve.
There’s a 2,000mAh battery inside the 5G Moto Mod, and the battery will deplete alongside the phone — so you’ll never end up with a dead Moto Mod first.
The real kicker here is that the 5G Moto Mod won’t be available until early 2019 from Verizon, and we don’t know what it will cost. Even then, while you will be able to access 2Gbps speeds, we’re not sure exactly when you’ll be able to truly access those 5Gbps 5G speeds.
So why didn’t Motorola just build this 5G technology into a new phone? It’s because the technology isn’t really there yet. Motorola said the requirements would severely constrain the design and display of the smartphone — it would look like a “low-tier device.” By putting it all into a Moto Mod first, people can still get a modern smartphone experience, and the benefits of 5G data speeds. The company said doing this also helps it fast-track development on a 5G smartphone.
Why’s the phone and mod restricted to Verizon? Motorola said it believes Big Red is on track to lead in the 5G space, and there has already been a strong partnership between the two companies (such as with the Droid-branded smartphones). Motorola is exploring opportunities with other carriers, though it wouldn’t say much else.
With the Moto Z3 only costing $480, you may be wondering if it’s truly a “flagship phone” that can compete with the likes of the more expensive iPhone X and Galaxy S9. Motorola’s message is that you can still get an edge-to-edge design, an 800-series Snapdragon processor, a solid dual-lens camera, and great battery life for almost half the price of most of these high-end phones. The 5G Moto Mod is icing on the cake, offering speeds you won’t be able to access on any other phone (for now).
The Z3 may seem very similar to the Z3 Play announced a few months ago, but it has a different flash storage system that’s quicker, making it more conducive to 5G downloads. It also has an improved Snapdragon 835 processor (though most 2018 Android phones use the Snapdragon 845 processor), and the dual-lens camera system is different. Instead of the 12-megapixel and 5-megapixel depth-sensing lens system on the Z3 Play, the Moto Z3 has two 12-megapixel sensors on the black. There’s an exclusive black and white mode available as well.
The rest is more or less the same. There’s a 6-inch screen with a Super AMOLED display with a 2,160 x 1,080 pixel resolution, a 3,000mAh battery, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB of storage with support for a MicroSD card slot. The front camera packs 8 megapixels, and the software is Android 8.1 Oreo. We recommend checking out our Moto Z3 Play review, since it’s very similar to the Moto Z3.
We asked Motorola’s President, Sergio Buniac, whether the 5G mod will be the last Moto Mod. When the company announced Moto Mods three years ago, Motorola committed to maintaining the same modular design for three generations. His answer? “No.”
Buniac said Motorola has been able to change the Moto Z3’s design quite a bit while still adhering to Moto Mod design standards, and considering it’s putting one of its biggest technological advancements in a Moto Mod, it doesn’t see it dropping support for them soon.
