Moto Z has quite a winner on its hands with the new Moto Z. Motorola has routinely hit it out of the park with their phones for the last few years and this year’s flagship is no different. Cynical Android fans will point out that the success of the last four years did not prevent Motorola from getting bought by Google and then getting sold quite promptly, to Lenovo. While this is true, the ownership of this once venerable brand by Lenovo hasn’t seem to hurt it at all. Lenovo is the Chinese company that was once most well-known for buying out the PC division of another venerable brand, IBM. Lenovo has cared for and built the valuable ThinkPad brand well over the years that it has owned it and hopefully it will do so with Motorola as well.
There are however rumours that Lenovo plans to kill of Motorola or Moto branding and just use Lenovo branding on all their phones from next year onward. For now however, we have the Moto Z and it is quite brilliant. Actually, it gets even better, because there are 3 phones to choose from if you want to get a Moto Z.
There is the flagship Moto Z, a razor thin phone with great battery life, amazing design and a price that is much lower than any other flagship phone on the market today, with perhaps the exception on the OnePlus 3T. There is also the much cheaper Moto Z Play, an even cheaper midrange phone with even better battery life thanks to a bigger battery and a slower, more power efficient processor. If you are clumsy or have an active lifestyle, the ruggedised Moto Z Force, with its shatter proof plastic screen, is the perfect Moto Z for you since you won’t even need Moto Z cases to protect it.
Moto Z Mods, cases with a difference
Along with the Moto Z series, which consists of the Moto Z, the cheaper and less powerful Moto Z Play and the ruggedised Moto Z Force, Lenovo also introduced a line-up of very interesting Moto Z covers. These Moto Z covers snap on to the backs of the Moto Z series phones, with the help of magnets and thanks to a row of contact pins on the back of the phones, the Moto Z cases interact with the phones in interesting ways. There is a case that adds to the already amazing battery life of the phones, a case that adds a great portable speaker, a case that adds an even better camera with a zoom to the Z and more.
There is also a plain back cover that Moto calls the Style Mod and includes in the box. Though all these Moto Z cases are very functional, there are a couple of drawbacks to them. The most important one is that they add no protection to your phone. For instance if you want some additional protection for the screen of your Moto Z, none of these covers that snap on to the back, offer any protection. For that you have to get one of the many Moto Z Force covers or covers for any of the other Moto Z’s that offer a lip in the front of the case.