Meet the Moto E, Motorola’s Affordable Android Phone

Motorola’s big claim to fame lately has been the Moto 360, the hotly anticipated Android Wear smartwatch that we’re hoping to hear more about before its scheduled summer release. But Motorola has been a phone maker for a long, long time, and today details about its upcoming Moto E handset have spilled out across the web. Let’s all have a look, shall we?

A post on BGR snagged the specs that were listed on a Brazilian retail website, Fast Shop, before they were taken down. If they’re to be believed, the Moto E will be packed with a 1.2GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, 1GB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage along with expandable storage via microSD, a 5 MP rear camera, and Android 4.4 KitKat. All of this will run the show underneath a high-definition, 4.3-inch Gorilla Glass display.

Compare those specs to Motorola’s flagship phone, the Moto X, and we’re talking about a modestly outfitted phone. The X features a 1.7 GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU, with twice as much RAM, and four times as much onboard internal storage. Overall, the Moto E sounds like a fully capable smartphone, but with specifications coming in much lower than Motorola’s top handset that was released last August, chances are good that the E will have a modest price to match its tech.

The BGR post says that the E will also be available in three different colors to start, and is likely to be officially announced later this week—along with some other big phones like the newest version of the Moto X.

By all accounts, the X was a pretty great phone, even if it wasn’t great enough to convince Google to hold onto Motorola Mobility, opting instead to offload the handset maker to Lenovo a couple months ago. But with the buzz surrounding the Moto 360, it almost seems like the company’s smartphones might end up being an afterthought.

On the other hand, perhaps Motorola will announce some kind of extra synergy between its line of smartphones and its smartwatch offering—much like Samsung’s Galaxy Gear smartwatch needs to be paired with a Galaxy smartphone. Almost undoubtedly the Android Wear powered smartwatch won’t need a Moto phone to work, but it’s possible that the two working together could offer users some extra bells and whistles. If so, they’ll have my attention.

[Source: BGR]