The Moto G isn't much like the high-end handsets we spend most of our time with, but in many ways it's more interesting than Another 5-inch 1080p Android Flagship. It looks and feels a lot like a Moto X. It performs a lot like a high-end phone from a couple of years ago. But it costs only $179 off-contract, where most similar phones go for at least $400 unlocked.

This handset obviously isn't meant to compete with $600-and-up flagships, but it's trying to redefine a part of the market that's now served by years-old phones and barely-usable garbage. Look at the phones that an MVNO like Straight Talk Wireless offers for less than $400, and you'll see just how under-served this market is. With the Moto G, Google and Motorola have attempted to put together a basic smartphone that doesn't throw quality under the bus in the name of cheapness.

In giving this phone the review treatment, we'll hit all of the same stuff we usually test—benchmarks, battery life, and so on. However, we'll also spend quite a bit of time answering the biggest questions about the Moto G: where does this phone feel like it costs $179, and who is it for?

Where it's better than $179

A quick demo of the Moto G's rear shells and flip covers. Music courtesy of Musopen.

Specs at a glance: Google/Motorola Moto G Screen 1280×720 4.5-inch IPS (329 PPI) OS Android 4.3 CPU 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 (quad-core Cortex A7) RAM 1GB GPU Qualcomm Adreno 305 Storage 8 or 16 GB NAND flash Networking 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0. GSM model supports GSM 800 / 900 / 1800 / 1900MHz and UMTS 850 / 900 / 1700 / 1900 / 2100MHz; CDMA model supports 850 / 1900MHz Ports Micro-USB, headphones Camera 5MP rear camera, 1.3MP front camera Size 5.11" × 2.59" × 0.24-0.46" (129.9 × 65.9 × 6.0-11.6 mm) Weight 5.04 oz. (143 g) Battery 2070mAh Starting price $179 off-contract

Build quality

Like the Moto X, the Moto G is made of a solid, reassuring plastic that uses a glossy finish around the sides and a nice matte finish on the back. The G is actually subtly larger and heavier than the Moto X, but the two phones feel pretty much the same in your hands. Plastic doesn't have to be a bad thing, and like the 2013 Nexus 7, the Nexus 5, the iPhone 5C, and most of Nokia's plastic Lumia phones, the Moto G gets it right.

The phone doesn't have any harsh angles or chintzy faux-silver trim, and the design doesn't make any bold statements. Its curved back feels good in the hand, and while it's a little on the heavy side it's perfectly comfortable to use for extended periods (it weighs just over five ounces, making it heavier than the likes of the smaller iPhone 5C or 5S and even the 5-inch Nexus 5).

Google doesn't offer the Moto Maker customization service for the Moto G, but the phone's black rear shell can be pried off and replaced with one of six colorful replacement backs or six shells with integrated flip covers. The standard shells run $15 a pop, and while the removable back may contribute somewhat to the phone's extra thickness we're sure people will appreciate the personalization options. Different colored shells may feel subtly different—the default black shell has a Nexus-esque soft-touch feel to it, while the turquoise shell that came with our review unit feels more like plain matte plastic (and the flip cover is made of a harder material with a rough texture). Neither is unpleasant, but you can tell the difference.

As others have noted, the Moto G's shell takes quite a bit of force to remove, but you probably won't be taking it off very frequently. That's because the G lacks some of the niceties that people have come to expect from phones with removable backs—the micro SIM tray is under there, but there's no micro SD expansion slot and the battery is emphatically non-removable (seriously, there's a sticker and everything).

The build quality is excellent for the price, but objectively it's not perfect. The turquoise rear shell Google sent over had a little creakiness to it that the black shell didn't have. While the flip cover feels a little thicker and more ruggedized, the magnets that hold the cover itself to the front of the phone aren't quite strong enough, and the cover makes the phone less comfortable to hold. Finally, the power and volume buttons are loose enough that you can actually hear them jiggling around as you shake the phone (they were a little jiggly on the Moto X too, but not audibly so). All of that aside, this is still the best-feeling phone you'll be able to find for this price.

The screen

Cheap gadgets and terrible displays go hand-in-hand most of the time, but the Moto G's 4.5-inch 1280×720 display punches well above its price class. Brightness and viewing angles are very good, and it's got better contrast and brighter colors than the screen on the Nexus 4. Because we're looking at a conventional LCD screen here and not an AMOLED panel like in the Moto X, contrast on the Moto G isn't quite as good, but colors also lack the glaring over-saturation they sometimes have on AMOLED phones.

If you've got the Moto X and G next to each other, you'll notice that the G has thicker bezels—the phones are roughly the same size, but the G's screen is smaller. It's not a big deal since the phone is still nice enough to hold, but it's a place where some space might have been saved. One surprising commonality between the two different phones is that they both use Corning's Gorilla Glass 3, so both screens feel good to touch and should be reasonably scratch-resistant.

The one thing to complain about on our Motorola-supplied review unit was some pretty noticeable backlight bleeding all the way across the top of the screen (it's made more noticeable by Android's all-black status bar). It's not too distracting most of the time and it may not even affect all Moto Gs, but the bleed is a little more noticeable if you're watching a movie or playing a game with a dark background.

The software

The Moto G runs a version of Android 4.3 that, if anything, is even nearer to Nexus-style stock Android than we saw on the Moto X. Buying the phone unlocked clears away the carrier bloat, leaving only a bare handful of Motorola apps. One, Assist, offers to silence your phone if you're driving, sleeping, or in a meeting. Another, Migrate, will copy some of your data over from your old phone if you've got one. Other than an FM radio app and most of Google's standard software, that's basically it. The Wireless Display feature appears to be absent (I have yet to see it show up on a device without dual-band Wi-Fi support, which probably explains its absence), but otherwise you're looking at the same software you'd get on a Nexus phone.

If you've used a Nexus phone or the Moto X before, this interface will be very familiar to you, since it's essentially unchanged from the standard AOSP launcher (the new Nexus 5-only Google Experience launcher runs great if you have an up-to-date Google Search app and grab the enabler app from somewhere, too). As we'll examine a little more in the performance section, the phone isn't completely without stuttering or lag and it doesn't feel as smooth as a higher-end phone like the Moto X or the Nexus 5, but it's better than older phones like the Galaxy Nexus (just to cherry pick another handset with similar software).

More interesting than the software the Moto G runs now is the software it will be running soon. Google has promised an Android 4.4 update for the phone before the end of January, which isn't Nexus-fast but is nonetheless considerably better than what you'll get from the likes of Samsung, LG, and anyone else making Android phones (especially budget-friendly Android phones). Google and Motorola were surprisingly quick to update the Moto X to KitKat when it came out, and giving the Moto G the same treatment is an encouraging sign that this is the new "normal" for the Moto phones going forward (the Droid series of phones, despite sharing similar software and underlying hardware, continues to exist in a sort-of-limbo in which updates have been promised but are clearly not being prioritized).

It's tempting to think of the Moto G as some kind of "Nexus Jr.," a cheaper way to buy into the clean UI and quick software updates that Google's reference phones have always received. However, Google is making no promises about versions of Android beyond version 4.4, and speculating about whether Android 4.5 or 5.0 or whatever will roll out to the Moto phones as quickly as KitKat is a pointless exercise. At this point Google is releasing about two new Android versions per year (4.1 and 4.2 in 2012, 4.3 and 4.4 in 2013), so by this time next year we'll probably know if we can rely on quick updates for this line just as we can for Nexuses.

Listing image by Andrew Cunningham