Today it is the turn of Motorola Edge 30 Fusion, the third of the autumn Edge mini series of the winged house, which arrives after Edge 30 Ultra and Edge 30 Neo, which we have already talked about in their respective reviews.
As the name suggests, Fusion is a real fusion between the world of the high-end and that of affordable smartphones, therefore proposing elements of different rank, creating a nice mix in which the value for money runs on the edge of a few tens of euros and the fiercest competition is right at home.
DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION QUALITY
This Fusion is very well-kept, but to summarize I could tell you that in the game of “fusion” this is an element of the upper category, not surprisingly both the design and the build quality are taken from the Motorola Edge 30 Ultra. Aluminum on the frame, Gorilla Glass 5 front and back, IP52 certification that guarantees resistance to dust and splashing water.
Without a doubt, the distinctive feature is the thickness reduced to just 7.5 mm, underlined by the tapered shape of the edges, which follows the curvature of the display and the back cover. At the front the frames are well optimized, with only the very small hole in the central part of the screen, which houses the selfie cam.
The ergonomics are good, the dimensions are generous but not exaggerated and the low weight (175 grams) will help you handle the smartphone in common situations. Positive also the availability of a transparent tpu cover in the package.
PACKAGING
About the rich equipment in the package is a must to mention for the very good protective film pre-applied on the display, which is accompanied by the type-c / type-c cable for charging and data exchange, 68 Watt wall power supply and wired in-ear headphones with type C connector.
DISPLAY
The display of the Motorola Edge 30 Fusion is a 6.55-inch P-OLED with FullHD resolution and refresh rate that reaches 144 Hz. This is a screen very close to the panel equipped on Edge 30 Ultra, but with a slightly lower peak brightness. As for the flagship, multimedia content in HDR10 and HDR10+ is supported, the refresh rate is automatically managed within standard values: 60-90-120-144 Hz. Although it is therefore not an LTPO, Motorola has carefully taken care of this aspect.
In the days in the company of the smartphone we realized that in 90% of the conditions of use the refresh rate is set to 90 Hz, rises to 120 Hz during scrolling with some apps, while the 144 Hz are reached only by forcing the homonymous mode in gaming, or “locking” them within the screen settings, which I do not recommend doing.
MULTIMEDIA AND AUDIO
The audio is stereo and is definitely valid, compared to the flagship I perceived a lower presence on the bass, but I do not exclude that the difference is due exclusively to the smaller thickness of the body. There is also the Dolby Atmos suite that works with both wired and wireless headphones, greatly improving sound quality.
As for the display, due to the peak luminance that barely exceeds 1000 nits you do not get an optimal viewing experience. Especially for HDR videos, which are a bit off even at maximum brightness, especially if we are in a well-lit or outdoor environment.
SOFTWARE
As with Edge 30 Ultra, also for the Fusion Motorola promises 3 major updates of Android and 4 years of support for security patches.
The customization of Motorola is always very pleasant and streamlined in everyday use. The base is pure Android, with numerous additions in the field of customization and gestures, with some advanced features such as Moto Display (an advanced ambient display) and Ready For, a desktop environment that is obtained by connecting the smartphone to the PC or a monitor, both wirelessly and via cable, taking advantage of the video output on the Type-C port that Motorola Edge 30 Fusion is equipped with.
All functions can be reached within the Moto app, which is an excellent control center that greatly facilitates the first interactions with the smartphone, guiding the new user to discover all the capabilities of the product.
USER EXPERIENCE
We found ourselves really very well on the fundamentals of this device, all the sensors work without problems, the fingerprint reader is very fast, the haptic feedback is also pleasant, the brightness sensor is well calibrated and there is not an annoying problem that in the past I had noticed on several Motorola: the minimum brightness too high.
As mentioned earlier, in the Motorola Edge 30 Fusion different product categories coexist, on a solid basis we find some particularly valid components. This is the case of the SoC, the heart of a modern smartphone that in this case is nothing less than the Snapdragon 888 +, top of the Qualcomm range for the end of 2021.
The performance is clearly high-level, the smartphone moves smoothly in the system and among the most demanding apps, everything is ok even in games where the refresh rate package, power, fast memories and stereo audio can give a fantastic gaming experience to the user.
TELEPHONE PART AND CONNECTIVITY
The high-end SoC does not only mean high performance but great reliability and completeness on the connectivity front. Here we find the latest generation WiFi 6e, dual frequency GPS and Bluetooth 5.2.
Well signal reception (better than the big brother Ultra) and as always impeccable management of the dual nano SIM, unfortunately there is no support for eSIM.
AUTONOMY AND CHARGING
The battery equipped on Motorola Edge 30 Fusion is 4400 mAh, we are considering the very reduced thickness and is enough to take you to the evening. However, it did not excite us as it did on the top of the range, perhaps because the Snapdragon 888+ is a little less efficient than the new Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1.
For lovers of statistics we are on the 5 hours of active display, neither much, nor little. Benino the charging speech, even if clearly the sacrifices are important compared to Moto Edge 30 Ultra: we find only the charging with 68 Watt cable (50% in 10 min), the wireless one is missing, while I remind you that on the flagship we have 125 Watts wired and 50 wireless.
CAMERAS
We continue in our push and pull between high-end and mid-range and in this paragraph we dive back into the second. The distance from the remarkable capabilities of Edge 30 Ultra is important and this is precisely the sector that most differentiates the two smartphones, not only in the technical data sheet but also in the field test.
On Edge 30 Fusion we have a 50 MP main camera with OmniVision sensor and optical stabilization, flanked by a 13 MP ultra wide angle with AF, the same that we saw on the Edge 30 Neo. Surprisingly, the 32 MP main camera is also equipped with autofocus, a real rarity!