Flagship 5G Motorola phone images and specs leak, but we're not convinced

The Motorola Z4
The Motorola Z4 (Image credit: Future)

We've heard rumors that Motorola is working on a new flagship phone, possibly called the Motorola Edge Plus, and now a huge specs leak has revealed possible features of the phone, and we've also seen pictures of the device.

This information comes from XDA Developers, which has published a report examining the details of the new Motorola flagship phone. The pictures supposedly come from a trusted source, but the information is from the site's own intel and research.

We say this with every leak, but for this story especially take the information with a pinch of salt – some of the facts don't add up, as we'll get to.

We'll run you through the different components of the leak, as well as if and why we think they're bogus, but it's up to you to decide if you really believe this leak or not.

Motorola flagship phone images

There are three hands-on images of the Motorola phone here, and they show a large device with a curved screen and a punch-hole cut-out in the top left corner, which houses the selfie camera. A speaker grille at the top is also visible in one picture, and generally we can only see the top half of the front of the screen.

The pictures are quite low-quality and fuzzy, but it's worth bearing in mind that XDA Developers edited the pictures to protect their sources, so that's not necessarily an indicator of the pictures being fake.

If this is the correct design of the Motorola flagship though, we'd be surprised, as it's far more premium-looking than the company's other phones, and it doesn't look very 'Motorola'. Instead, it looks like a generic Chinese company Android phone that we've started to see quite a few of in 2020.

There are a few other things that ring alarm bells for us – firstly, the Motorola logo on the screen of one image looks big and stretched, as though it's not a start-up screen but an image being shown on the phone.

In addition, the third and final picture showing the speaker grille and top of the screen looks like it has a display curve at a different angle to the other pictures, as though it's a different phone.

(Image credit: XDA Developers)

Motorola flagship phone names

According to XDA Developers there are two Motorola flagship phones, which could explain why one of the images looks different, although the site states that they have the same screen, so they should look similar. It's worth pointing out that the site only refers to their leaked names as 'possible' marketing names.

One is, supposedly, the Motorola One 5G 2020, the other the Motorola One 2020 or Motorola Edge Plus. 

It's curious that the phone without 5G in the name is, according to the specs, the top-end phone, but presumably this means all the handsets are 5G-compatible.

To make things simpler, XDA Developers refers to the former phone as 'racer' and the latter as 'burton', as these are supposedly their code names, so we'll use these names to refer to the devices.

Motorola flagship phone specs

Apparently both 'racer' and 'burton' have the same design, with 6.67-inch 2340 x 1080 displays which allow a 90Hz refresh rate.

The main difference between the phones is that 'racer' has a Snapdragon 765 chipset, while 'burton' has the top-end Snapdragon 865. Both of these processors have a built-in 5G modem, so it's strange that only one phone is set to have the '5G' suffix.

We don't know the cameras of 'burton', but 'racer' is apparently set to have a 48MP main snapper as well as other sensors and lenses. Likewise we know that phone supposedly has 128GB of storage space, but 'burton' is still a mystery

These specs are a little harder to disprove since there are so many question marks here, but it's worth pointing out that Snapdragon 765 processors and 48MP main cameras aren't exactly flagship features given that they're more common in mid-range devices.

It could be that 'racer' is a more mid-range handset while 'burton' is the true flagship phone, but we don't know for sure right now. According to XDA Developers we'll find out soon though, as the website thinks Motorola is set to show these phones off at MWC 2020 at the end of February.

Tom Bedford
Contributor

Tom Bedford was deputy phones editor on TechRadar until late 2022, having worked his way up from staff writer. Though he specialized in phones and tablets, he also took on other tech like electric scooters, smartwatches, fitness, mobile gaming and more. He is based in London, UK and now works for the entertainment site What To Watch.


He graduated in American Literature and Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia. Prior to working on TechRadar, he freelanced in tech, gaming and entertainment, and also spent many years working as a mixologist. He also currently works in film as a screenwriter, director and producer.