Motorola Edge 40 Neo smartphone review – The US$550 phone with high-end features

The Motorola Edge 40 Neo gets its main camera from the much more expensive Edge 40 Pro: A 50-megapixel Omnivision OV50A acts as the sensor, which also features optical image stabilization. Only our phone’s video capabilities are a little stripped back.

You can actually take quite detailed photos in daylight using the Edge 40 Neo’s main camera and they only differ in small amounts from the pictures taken on the high-end phone: Images aren’t brightened as much and some details are lost on the cheaper smartphone. Our test device’s main camera also managed well when taking the picture in low light and with high levels of contrast — the flame isn’t overexposed and at the same time, details remain visible within the darker areas.

The Edge 40 Neo can record video in a maximum of 4K and at 30 fps, which is pretty good for this price range. The resulting videos are sharp in good lighting conditions, the autofocus works quickly and the exposure adjustment does a good job.

A 13-megapixel lens acts as the phone’s wide-angle camera. It takes decent images but when zoomed in, they are lacking quite a bit in detail. 

Its front-facing camera features 32 megapixels on paper, however, it adds 4 pixels together to create one pixel — as a result, the lighting is better and you can take 8-MP images. Selfies look decent in good lighting, but even without zooming in, you can begin to see some unclean edges.