Motorola first announced the Moto G smartphone in 2013 and it very quickly became the budget king. The range has come a long way in the decade it’s been around though and while it has continued to reign in the budget smartphones field, there isn’t just one humble model anymore.

For 2023, Lenovo-owned Motorola released four new models that join an existing four models, including the top-of-the-range Moto G73 that is one of two new 5G models. The other is the Moto G53, but here we are concentrating on the Moto G73, what it offers and our first impressions are.

Design

• 161.4 x 73.8 x 8.3mm, 181g
• Water-resistant design
• Lucent White, Midnight Blue

The Motorola Moto G73 has a simple and sophisticated design. It’s no thrills, but for its price, it’s a great looking device all things considered.

On the rear – which has a matte plastic finish that is soft to the touch – there is a dual camera in the top left corner within a rectangular housing. It’s a design we’ve seen on many smartphones over the years so it’s not something to write home about as such, but it’s clean and fuss-free, which we like.

Available in two colour options of Lucent White and Midnight Blue, the darker colour does love a fingerprint and did begin to look a little greasy as we played around with it. That’s not unusual though, with most smartphones suffering this issue.

There’s a water-resistant design here and while there is no official IP rating, you’re still getting some protection. Just don’t go dropping it down the toilet or take it in the shower. The plastic finish on the rear and the plastic frame – which is curved for the most part with a flat section in the centre – also makes for a refreshingly light device to hold. It’s also narrow and tall, allowing for easy one-handed access and there’s a 3.5mm headphone jack too, which has become less and less common over the years.

On the front, there’s a centralised punch hole camera at the top of the display and a relatively slim bezel surrounding the screen. There’s a slightly larger lip at the bottom of the display but overall, there’s a lovely design here.

There’s nothing striking about it necessarily, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes simple and subtle is best and that’s true in the Moto G73’s case, making it perfect for the area it occupies.

Display

• 6.5-inch, IPS, LCD
• 2400 x 1080, 405ppi
• 120Hz refresh rate

The Motorola Moto G73 has a 6.5-inch display so it’s a decent size and it has come a long way from the original Moto G that featured a 4.5-inch screen. It’s not the largest display of the current Moto G family – the Moto G82 has a 6.6-inch display – but it is certainly up there in terms of size.

The Moto G73 has an IPS LCD screen with a resolution of 2400 x 1080 pixels that delivers a pixel density of 405ppi and from what we have seen so far, it offers a decent viewing experience overall.

You don’t get the same vibrancy and punch you would get from an OLED panel but LCD is kinder on battery life and there are still good viewing angles and plenty of detail. You also get a 120Hz refresh rate, which although has become more standard across mid-range devices, it’s still not a guaranteed feature so it’s good to see it at this level.

You may find you might not notice the increased refresh rate unless you have a device with a lower refresh rate alongside it, but given the flagship Apple iPhone 14 doesn’t offer a 120Hz refresh rate, we aren’t complaining that it’s on board here.

The display also appears to offer ample brightness from what we could tell, though we will be testing all the Moto G73’s display aspects properly when we come to review it in full.

Hardware and specs

• MediaTek 930 chipset
• 8GB RAM, 128GB/256GB storage, microSD
• 5000mAh battery

Under the hood, the Motorola Moto G73 runs the MediaTek 930 platform that uses a 6nm process. There’s support from 8GB of RAM and a choice of 128GB or 256GB of storage, both of which offer microSD support for storage expansion via the SIM slot.

Elsewhere, the Moto G73 has a 5000mAh battery, which should deliver plenty of juice. There’s no wireless charging on board, but there is support for 30W wired charging, which although isn’t the fastest out there compared to the likes of Realme, Oppo and OnePlus, it is faster than what Samsung offers on its Galaxy S23 for example.

Charging takes place via USB-C, which will come as no surprise to most. There’s also support for Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac and Bluetooth 5.3 too so most boxes are ticked based on what you would expect at this level.

In terms of software, the Moto G73 runs on Android 13 and as is standard for Motorola smartphones, it’s pretty close to stock Android. You therefore get a lovely clean experience with very little bloatware. There is a Moto app that offers some customisation and extra features like gestures, but if you don’t want to use them, they are easy to ignore as it’s just one app and there’s no skin either.

We of course couldn’t test the performance of the Moto G73 during our brief amount of time with it, but from what we have experienced so far, we don’t have any concerns for its ability to cope with day-to-day tasks.

Cameras

• Dual rear (50MP + 8MP)
• 16MP front camera
• 1080p 60fps video recording

On the rear of the Motorola Moto G73, there is a 50-megapixel main camera with an f/1.8 aperture and 1.0µm pixels. It has phase detection auto focus (PDAF) on board but no optical image stabilisation (OIS).

The main camera is joined by an 8-megapixel ultra-wide angle sensor that has an aperture of f/2.2, 1.12µm pixels and a 118-degree field of view. On the front, there’s a 16-megapixel front facing camera that offers an f/2.4 aperture with 1.0µm pixels.

The rear camera is capable of video recording at 1080p at 60fps, while the front camera offers 1080p at 30fps.

As with performance, the camera capabilities of the Moto G73 weren’t something we could test properly during our time with it, though the specifications look good for this end of the market. We will be sure to test it out properly when we come to review it though as many megapixels doesn’t automatically translate to decent results so that is something to consider.

First impressions

The Motorola Moto G73 is a great looking phone for all intents and purposes. You get a simple and sophisticated design, a dual rear camera, a lovely big display and some solid hardware features under the hood, such as the huge battery.

We can’t comment on its performance as yet, nor the camera capabilities, but based on our initial experience, Motorola is doing a great job of making sure the Moto G retains its crown as king of the budget smartphones. We will bring you a full review of the Moto G73 as soon as we have it in properly.