Motorola Edge 70 Pro Review: Mid-Range Battery Champion

The Motorola Edge 70 Pro is one of those phones that I find increasingly difficult to complain about. It doesn’t have one single headline feature or a specific gimmick; it’s just a very well put-together smartphone where almost everything just works the way you would want to.

Our 12GB/512GB model costs AED 2,999 and comes with a 6.78” AMOLED display, the MediaTek Dimensity 8500 Extreme processor, three 50MP rear cameras and a massive 6,500mAh battery with 90W charging. It reads like a fairly standard upper-midrange spec sheet, but in day-to-day use it feels cohesive and refined to an almost flagship level.

It is slim, lightweight and lovely to hold, the display is gorgeous, performance has been consistently smooth, and Motorola’s Android experience remains clean and easy to live with. Even the AI features mostly stay out of the way unless you actually want to use them. There are a few annoyances, particularly the curved screen, but so far I haven’t encountered anything that seriously takes away from what is otherwise a very easy phone to like.

Specifications

Design, Display and Features

Motorola seems to have settled on a particular design language over the past couple of generations, and honestly, I don’t mind them sticking with it. The Edge 70 Pro looks unmistakably like a recent Motorola phone, with soft curves, subdued colours and a camera housing that blends neatly into the rear rather than looking like an enormous puck bolted onto it.

Our Pantone Titan model comes in a deep navy blue colour that looks fantastic. The rear has a cloth-like texture to it, although it is actually a synthetic silicone-polymer material rather than fabric. It feels smooth when you run your fingers across it, but there is enough roughness to give you some grip. Combined with the restrained colour and relatively simple camera arrangement, the Edge 70 Pro looks sophisticated without trying too hard.

The frame is plastic, which is one place where Motorola has clearly saved some money. At AED 2,999, I would have preferred an aluminium frame for some additional durability and a slightly more premium feel. But importantly, the phone doesn’t actually feel plastic or cheap. The construction feels solid in the hand, there are no creaks or flex, and the lightweight body doesn’t come across as hollow or flimsy.

At just 7.2mm thick and around 183g, the Edge 70 Pro is also quite slim and light for a large 6.78” phone. It isn’t quite in the absurdly thin category of devices designed specifically around that idea, but it is among the slimmer conventional phones I have used recently. More impressive is that Motorola has somehow managed to fit a 6,500mAh battery inside without turning it into a brick. The balance is excellent, and the phone just feels nice to pick up and use.

Durability is reassuring as well. The Edge 70 Pro carries IP68 and IP69 protection against dust, immersion and high-pressure water jets, alongside MIL-STD-810H compliance. The screen is protected by Gorilla Glass 7i, which isn’t Corning’s highest-end glass, but should offer reasonable protection against everyday scratches and drops.

My bigger concern is the shape of the display itself. The glass curves aggressively into the sides of the phone, leaving very little flat area to comfortably rest your fingers. Motorola’s palm rejection works most of the time, but not always. Every now and then, a finger resting on the edge registers as an input and interferes with scrolling or typing. It doesn’t happen constantly, but it happens often enough to become annoying. Just make a flat display, Moto. Let’s get over this fad.

Thankfully, Motorola includes a transparent magnetic case in the box, and that largely fixes the problem. The raised sides give your fingers somewhere to rest without touching the display, while the phone still remains reasonably slim with it attached. The case itself is nothing fancy and the magnetic ring is clearly visible through the transparent plastic, but the magnets are strong enough for compatible accessories and it’s a useful inclusion. Personally, I would rather use the phone naked because the rear feels so nice in the hand, but between the accidental touches and the exposed curved glass, the case gives me some peace of mind.

Curves aside, the display itself is excellent. The 6.78” AMOLED panel runs at 1272×2772 resolution with a refresh rate of up to 144Hz, and it looks every bit as good as I have come to expect from Motorola’s recent phones. Colours are vibrant and punchy, blacks are deep, everything looks sharp, and the screen gets bright enough that outdoor visibility hasn’t been a problem. Whether watching videos, browsing photos or simply scrolling through the interface, it looks fantastic.

The optical fingerprint reader underneath the display has also been flawless so far. It unlocks quickly and consistently, and even worked without issue when my fingers were slightly damp.

The stereo speakers are considerably less exciting, but they get the job done. They are fine for Instagram Reels, YouTube videos, voice notes and some casual music listening, although there isn’t anything particularly special about their sound. The haptics are similarly average and probably one of the weaker aspects of the hardware; vibrations feel slightly grainy rather than tight and precise.

There is also a dedicated Moto AI button on the left side of the phone. A regular press launches Moto AI, while double-press and long-press actions can be configured to trigger individual AI features. It is a sensible implementation because Motorola isn’t forcing you to use any of it if you don’t want to.

Camera Performance

The Edge 70 Pro comes equipped with an all-50MP camera setup on the back, led by a 50MP main sensor with OIS, a 50MP 3.5x periscope telephoto lens with OIS, and a 50MP ultrawide camera. There is also a 50MP selfie camera up front.

On paper, it is a pretty complete setup for the price, with proper optical zoom, stabilisation on the two most important lenses, and enough resolution across the board to give Motorola plenty to work with in post-processing.

In daylight, the Edge 70 Pro is a great snapper. The pictures are very well balanced, with vibrant colours and sharp details. It takes great shots even at 7x zoom, giving plenty of room to get the right angle, but it does come at a slight loss in quality. Otherwise, I have no complaints.

Night time is where the camera impresses less. It takes in way too much light, creating an unnaturally brighter picture than one may have intended it to be. It also starts to lose significant quality and introduces image smoothing as you climb up the zoom ladder. But on the plus side, it still manages to retain a lot of detail and colours, and doesn’t introduce any banding, compression artefacts or blurring.

Benchmarks and OS Performance

The Motorola Edge 70 Pro is powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 8500 Extreme, paired with 12GB of RAM and fast UFS 4.1 storage on our 512GB model. It is firmly an upper-midrange chipset, but in everyday use, I honestly couldn’t ask for much more performance than this.

Our benchmark results were as follows:

More importantly, the phone feels excellent to use. Apps launch quickly, scrolling remains smooth, jumping between multiple applications doesn’t cause any noticeable slowdown, and I didn’t encounter aggressive app reloading despite constantly moving between them. The 144Hz display complements that responsiveness nicely, giving the entire phone a nice fluidity.

Where the Dimensity 8500 Extreme struggles is sustained performance. In the 20-minute 3DMark Wild Life Extreme Stress Test, the Edge 70 Pro started with a best loop score of 4,380 before eventually dropping as low as 2,016, resulting in a stability score of just 46%. Performance fell sharply around the sixth loop and remained close to the 2,000-point mark for much of the test, aside from a brief recovery later on.

Temps climbed from 36°C to 45°C during the run, while the battery dropped from 100% to 93%. It’s clear that the slim chassis has its thermal limits and the phone throttles aggressively once subjected to prolonged GPU loads. Unless you plan on hammering it with demanding games for extended periods, however, none of this manifests during normal use. I certainly never noticed it.

The software experience is similarly fuss-free. The Edge 70 Pro ships with Android 16 and Motorola’s Hello UI, which continues to stay close to stock Android while adding a handful of useful features without changing how everything fundamentally works. There are a few pre-installed apps, but nothing excessive, and anything unwanted can be removed easily.

Moto AI makes another appearance with essentially the same feature set found across Motorola’s recent phones. Catch Me Up summarises missed notifications, Pay Attention can record, transcribe and summarise conversations, while Remember This lets you save screenshots or photos with additional context so they can be searched for later. There are also generative tools such as Magic Canvas, alongside integrations with services such as Perplexity and Copilot.

They all work well enough but more importantly, Moto AI remains relatively unobtrusive; you can use whichever features appeal to you and largely ignore the rest.

The disappointing part is software longevity. Motorola promises three major Android upgrades and around five years of security support for the Edge 70 Pro. That’s beginning to look rather stingy.

Battery Life

Battery life might be the Edge 70 Pro’s most impressive achievement. Motorola has somehow squeezed a massive 6,500mAh silicon-carbon battery into a phone that’s only 7.2mm thick, and the endurance I have been getting out of it is borderline ridiculous.

With normal everyday use, I am fairly confident I could take this phone from 100% to 0% across three days. I haven’t deliberately run it all the way down to verify that exact number, so take that as an estimate rather than a hard fact, but two full days feel almost effortless. Messaging, social media, browsing, watching videos, taking photos and generally using the phone as I normally would barely seems to bother it.

I genuinely can’t remember the last smartphone I used that gave me this much confidence away from a charger. Even if you are a heavier user, getting through a full day should require almost no thought whatsoever, while lighter use can comfortably push well beyond that.

Charging is equally well covered. The Edge 70 Pro supports 90W wired charging, with the charger thankfully included in the box. A full charge takes roughly an hour, which is pretty good — especially given how long that charge then lasts.

Should You Buy the Motorola Edge 70 Pro?

There really isn’t much about the Motorola Edge 70 Pro that I dislike. It is slim, lightweight and lovely to use, with a gorgeous display, consistently smooth performance, capable cameras and some of the best battery life I have experienced on a smartphone. Motorola’s software remains clean and unobtrusive, while useful extras such as the included 90W charger and magnetic case only sweeten the package.

There are a few rough edges (no pun intended). The curved display can interfere with everyday use, the haptics feel mediocre, sustained performance takes a sizeable hit under heavy load, and the cameras lose some of their shine at night. Motorola’s software update commitment could be better too. But none of these issues significantly affected how much I enjoyed using the phone. At AED 2,999, the Edge 70 Pro is an excellent all-rounder that gets almost everything that matters right.

Buy It If

• You want class-leading battery life — the 6,500mAh cell comfortably clears two days.
• You want a big-screen phone that’s still slim, light and lovely to hold.
• You prefer clean, near-stock Android with AI that stays out of your way.
• You value the in-box extras — a 90W charger and a magnetic case included.

Don’t Buy It If

• You can’t stand curved displays — the aggressive curve causes the odd accidental touch.
• You want long-term software support — three OS upgrades feels stingy at this price.
• You’re a heavy gamer — sustained performance throttles hard under prolonged load.
• You expect premium materials — the plastic frame is a visible saving at AED 2,999.

FAQ

How is the battery life on the Motorola Edge 70 Pro?

Excellent. The 6,500mAh battery comfortably lasts two days of normal use, and 90W charging refills it in around an hour.

How much does the Motorola Edge 70 Pro cost in the UAE?

AED 2,999 for the 12GB/512GB model reviewed here.

Is the Motorola Edge 70 Pro waterproof?

Yes. It carries IP68 and IP69 ratings against dust and water, alongside MIL-STD-810H compliance.

Does the Motorola Edge 70 Pro come with a charger?

Yes. A 90W charger and a transparent magnetic case are both included in the box.