The Motorola Moto X was a big hit when it was released in the United States late last year, thanks to its clever voice controls and sensors. Of course, a near-stock version of Android, powerful hardware in a slim shell and all-American construction didn’t hurt either. Now the Moto X is coming to Europe – and to Mobile Fun, sim-free and unlocked!
The Moto X is first and foremost a smart phone. One part is something Motorola call “Touchless Controls.” Basically, it means that you can set up the phone to always listen for your commands, even when the screen is off or you’re in an app. Your phone learns your voice, then you can use a litany of commands to do almost anything on your phone. You can make notes, send texts, begin a phone call or just search Google. It works really well, and the fact that you don’t need to touch your phone to begin – as you do with Siri or Google Now – makes it a whole lot more convenient.
The Moto X also has a bunch of extra sensors, which are used in something called “Motorola Assist”. That means your phone can automatically tell when you’re at the office or at home, walking, taking public transit or driving – and adjust its settings accordingly. You can silence your phone during meeting times (gleaned from your calendar), automatically engage hands-free when you enter your car, or any number of other automatic actions. While you can set up these contexts yourself, the examples included out of the box are incredibly impressive by themselves.
Active notifications are the other major software component Motorola have added. It’s a replacement lock screen that shows new notifications on a small portion of the screen, while keeping the rest of the AMOLED screen unlit. That means less blinding lights at night, and less power use too. Notifications can be tapped for a preview, then opened by swiping up. This means that you don’t need to unlock your phone for every notification – instead, you can check to see if it’s important with the preview, then only open it if you need to. It looks cool, and it’s a big time-saver as well.
The rest of the Moto X is almost tame in comparison – although still impressive compared to other phones on the market! You’ll get a 4.7-inch 720p display, a dual-core 1.7 GHz processor, 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB of on-board storage. Android 4.2 is the software of choice, although the phone can be updated to the latest version of Android, 4.4.
The Moto X is a cool, clever phone that you’ll quickly love. For more information on the phone, check out our sim-free Motorola Moto X product page or check out The Verge’s favourable review. We’ll have the phone – and a whole host of Moto X accessories – soon, so if you’re interested you can pre-order today!