I spent a week with Motorola’s Edge 70, an absolutely thin smartphone that is too hard to ignore 

You might wonder if I am exaggerating, but I am not. I later laughed it off, but it made me curious about why companies are making super-thin and lightweight smartphones.

This year, I have used the Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge and the Apple iPhone Air: both ultra-thin and lightweight smartphones, and now Motorola has joined the brigade. However, Motorola is bringing a razor-thin smartphone at a mainstream price point, along with a bigger battery than what we saw in the Galaxy S25 Edge and the iPhone Air.

The Motorola Edge 70 may look like any other regular smartphone, but it prioritises thinness and lightness above all else. But is it a complete smartphone, and does it have flaws that are hard to overlook?

The Motorola Edge 70 (left) next to the iPhone Air (Image: The Indian Express/ Anuj Bhatia)

I lived with the Edge 70 for a week, and here’s my perspective on the device, the market for sleek and ultra-thin smartphones, and whether this trend will continue or fade over time.

What: Motorola Edge 70 | Price: Rs 29,999

Almost invisible in the pocket 

As someone who often carries two phones in his pockets, the Edge 70 feels almost like nothing. My Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold looks like a tank next to the Edge 70. As I mentioned earlier, you can easily forget it’s in your pocket, and when you do take it out, its lightness is immediately apparent.

The phone is just 5.99mm thick and weighs only 159 grams, making it one of the lightest phones on the market. In comparison, the iPhone Air measures 5.64mm and weighs 164 grams. So while the Edge 70 is slightly thicker, it is actually lighter than the iPhone Air, and you can feel the difference. No doubt, both phones are impossibly thin and incredibly solid, with virtually no hint of flexing. I even intentionally put the Edge 70 in my jeans’ back pocket to test its durability. It passed the test successfully – not once, but multiple times.

The Edge 70 is very thin at 5.99mm. (Image: The Indian Express/ Anuj Bhatia)

The Edge 70 may not look as polished or sophisticated as the iPhone Air, and that’s fine by me. The device has a quintessential Motorola-esque design that feels instantly familiar. I especially liked the unique, textured silicone back, rather than the glass backs most phones use these days. The bold, Pantone-inspired colour choices that Motorola has been leaning into lately are impressive, reminding me of the good old days of the iPod, which was available in a splash of fun colours.

That said, the Edge 70 does look premium, but not in the way you might expect. It features an aluminium frame along the sides. The power and volume buttons are on the right, while the left side houses a dedicated button to activate Moto AI. The USB-C port sits at the bottom alongside the speaker grille and SIM tray, which supports a nano-SIM and an eSIM. The iPhone Air, in comparison, is an e-SIM-only smartphone. Unfortunately, the Edge 70’s internal storage is fixed, and there is no support for a microSD card.

It’s a tough phone, as I mentioned earlier. It meets MIL-STD-810H, a military-grade standard for withstanding harsh environmental conditions, and also boasts both IP68 and IP69 ratings. This means it can handle submersion in up to 1.5 metres of water.

Its light 159grams weight makes it feel even thinner and photos don’t do it justice.(Image: The Indian Express/ Anuj Bhatia)

I used the Edge 70 without a case, as I believe a case kills the best part of this phone: how thin and light it is. There’s no real learning curve to handling and using the Edge 70, at least based on my week of primary use. Sure, it took a day or two to get used to an extremely thin phone, but as I spent more time with the device, it became muscle memory, and I began to appreciate its ultra-slender profile. At the end of the day, a device like the Edge 70 isn’t a deviation from the phone form factor we are used to; it’s simply a reimagined phone.

Its screen size is almost the same as most regular smartphones on the market today: 6.7 inches. So it isn’t a compact phone like the iPhone mini, nor does it feel like a giant slab such as the iPhone 17 Pro Max or the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Still, I would argue that the Edge 70 feels compact; a better way to put it is that it’s compact in its dimensions while still being large enough.

It uses a pOLED panel, which translates to rich colours and deep blacks. Motorola claims the Edge 70 can reach a peak brightness of 4,500 nits, surpassing both the iPhone Air (3,000 nits) and the Galaxy S25 Edge (2,600 nits). Real-world outdoor visibility is good but not particularly impressive.

The speakers get very loud and, surprisingly, offer stereo separation, sounding good overall. The iPhone Air, by comparison, has only a single speaker built into the earpiece, which means it doesn’t get very loud.

That said, I mostly use a pair of earbuds rather than the phone’s speakers for music or video playback.

Mid-range chip and long battery life 

The Edge 70 is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 4 SoC, paired with 8GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage. This isn’t a flagship-grade processor, so don’t expect the same level of performance you would get from a high-end smartphone. That said, the Edge 70 meets my expectations and performs reasonably well. I was able to open all my must-have apps, such as WhatsApp, LinkedIn, and Gmail, without any issues. It’s a fast phone, and you won’t face problems with everyday apps or regular web browsing. However, running graphics-intensive games can be a bit tricky.

What impressed me the most, something I wasn’t expecting at all, was the Edge 70’s battery life. I have used both the Galaxy S25 Edge and the iPhone Air, and I wasn’t particularly impressed with the battery life on either phone. However, the Edge 70’s 5,000 mAh battery lasted a whole day in my testing (though not beyond that). For a relatively light phone, getting battery life that stretches to 9 pm—assuming the day starts at 8 am—is fantastic, in my opinion. The supplied 68W wired charger takes approximately 45 minutes to recharge the phone from 20 to 100 per cent.

The large high-quality 6.7-inch pOLED screen is bright, crisp and smooth. (Image credit: Anuj Bhatia/Indian Express)

Motorola’s version of Android 16, called Hello UI, works well and offers plenty of customisation options. However, I was a bit taken aback by the presence of bloatware on the Edge 70, which I wasn’t expecting from a company that had previously largely stayed away from preloading third-party apps and ads on the home screen. In terms of software support, Motorola has committed to four years of OS updates and six years of security patches. That’s acceptable, but it doesn’t quite match the competition. Mid-range phones from Google and Samsung now receive up to seven years of software support.

The phone is also loaded with AI features as part of Moto AI. There’s no new AI feature I want to single out here (you can read my earlier reviews for more depth on Moto AI), but I do want to point out a shift in my opinion. Motorola’s approach has become increasingly convoluted when it comes to packing AI features into its devices.

Moto AI relies on Perplexity integration for its AI virtual assistant, and uses Copilot Live for real-time conversations. Both work well, but one also gets access to Gemini and Gemini Live with a long press of

the home button. It’s a lot to take in, and it can easily become overwhelming for users.

The camera dilemma 

The most significant trade-off for me is the camera system on the Edge 70. I’m not saying it’s bad (don’t get me wrong), but there are better smartphones in this price range when it comes to camera performance. The Edge 70 has two rear cameras but lacks a telephoto sensor. It features a 50MP f/1.8 primary rear camera and a 50MP f/2.0 ultra-wide camera with a 120-degree field of view.

The Edge 70 is incredibly solid with virtually no hint of flexing. (Image: The Indian Express/ Anuj Bhatia)

I spent most of my time shooting with the primary camera, and I have no major complaints. Clearly, this phone isn’t trying to replace a professional camera, and Motorola isn’t positioning it that way either. The camera is good enough for taking decent shots across a range of conditions and is aimed at users who want to capture moments and don’t obsess over vibrancy or fine detail. If you let go of expectations around top-tier image quality, the Edge 70’s camera largely lives up to expectations.

That said, I wouldn’t feel comfortable taking the Edge 70 to a major product launch event and relying entirely on its camera. I still choose my Pixel 10 Pro XL over the Edge 70 any day. I didn’t have high expectations for this camera system, and the Edge didn’t exceed them.

Motorola Edge 70 camera samples. Image resized for web

Motorola Edge 70 camera samples. Image resized for web

Motorola Edge 70 camera samples. Image resized for web

Motorola Edge 70 camera sample. Image resized for web.

Who is the Motorola Edge 70 for

The Edge 70 is for those who want style and a lightweight smartphone that still looks modern while retaining a familiar form factor. Motorola has clearly succeeded in creating a thin and light smartphone at an accessible price point, especially at a time when smartphone prices are going through the roof.

That said, the Edge 70 remains a niche device, joining the likes of the iPhone Air and the Galaxy S25 Edge. Battery life and camera performance rank high on most people’s priority lists when choosing a smartphone. Still, I think the Edge 70 is a compelling experiment to gauge appetite for an ultra-slim, lightweight phone.

From an engineering perspective, it’s hard to pull off a phone this thin that still delivers a full day of battery life, and Motorola has done so. The bigger question is whether we are ready for light and thin smartphones, or if this trend will eventually fade. That, for now, remains unclear.