Google-owned Motorola is definitely upping its game. Just weeks after it unveiled powerful new Android smartphones in the form of its latest flagship Moto X and the up-and-coming Nexus 6, manufactured for Google, the once-dying smartphone maker has once again taken the wraps off its third and most powerful phone in a few months.
Meet the Droid Turbo, a souped up version of Motorola's second-generation Moto X. While this new phone has all the bells and whistles a top-of-the-line smartphone can offer, Motorola decided to tackle one major problem most smartphones fail to address: battery life.
The company claims the Droid Turbo, which is exclusive only to Verizon Wireless customers, can run up to two full days of heavy use on a whopping 3,900 mAh battery. That means 48 straight hours of heavy use, including watching streaming videos, playing graphics-heavy games and browsing the Internet.
In contrast, the iPhone 6 Plus, which has a significantly smaller 2,200 mAh battery, claims up to 12 hours of continuous Internet browsing. The Droid Turbo also comes with Motorola's lightning-fast Turbo Charger, which can give the phone a 15-minute quick battery boost that can last up to eight hours.
Of course, Motorola had to make a few compromises to make way for a bigger battery, just as Apple did when it came out with a thinner-than-ever iPhone 6. Motorola, however, targets power users as it clearly believes it is worth sacrificing a slim profile for better battery life.
At its thickest point, the Droid Turbo is nearly half an inch thick, or 0.44 inch to be exact, though it tapers off slightly to 0.33 inch at the edge. The iPhone 6, the slimmest smartphone on the market, is only 0.28 inch thick.
Moreover, it's only available to Verizon customers, effectively cutting off subscribers loyal to other networks. Motorola's Droid smartphones is an exclusive franchise owned and conceived by Verizon, which frequently gives the devices top billing in its retail stores right next to the iPhone displays. Although the Droid line's popularity has waned in recent years as smartphone giants Apple and Samsung took over the market, the Droid franchise remains strong amid smartphone flops such as Amazon's embarrassing Fire Phone.
Lest users think the Droid Turbo is nothing but a big battery, the new phone touts a line of specs that are more than impressive. It runs on Qualcomm's high-end Snapdragon 805 processor, with a 2.75GHz quad-core CPU and Adreno 420 GPU, and 3GB of RAM for fast, butter-smooth performance.
The 4.8-inch screen also carries a Quad HD display with 2560 x 1440p resolution or a whopping 565 pixels per inch. On the camera side, the Droid Turbo has a 21 MP rear camera, albeit without optical image stabilization, that can shoot 4K video content and a 2 MP front-facing shooter.
Out of the box, it runs on Android KitKat, but with Motorola being owned by Google, it won't be surprising if users can quickly update to Android Lollipop when the new platform rolls out next month.
The Droid Turbo comes in metallic black and metallic red and black Kevlar fiber for the 32GB version and black ballistic nylon for the 64GB version. The 32GB model will be available starting Oct. 30 for $200 with a two-year contract, while customers can add $50 more to get the 64GB model.
