The Motorola One's budget successor just leaked out entirely

Last year, Motorola kicked off an entirely new smartphone series with the launch of the Motorola One (P30 Play), Motorola One Power (P30 Power), and the China-only Motorola P30.

The latter two, as revealed recently, will soon be succeeded by the Motorola One Vision and One Vision Power/Plus. And today, thanks once again to Steve Hemmerstoffer, the successor to the original Motorola One has been revealed.

Following in the footsteps of its predecessor, the smartphone – which should be known as the Motorola P40 Play in China – has been equipped with a 19:9 display up front and a dual-camera setup on the rear. 

The device’s display is, once again, paired with a notch, although this time around the wide implementation found on the Motorola One has been replaced with a waterdrop-like solution. Another key difference comes with the size of the bezels – they are now slightly thicker. Despite this, Motorola has seemingly removed its branding from the chin.

On one final note about the smartphone’s front, it’s worth pointing out that the Motorola P40 Play sports a 5.6-inch display whereas its predecessor featured a somewhat larger 5.9-inch panel.

On the original Motorola One, the Chicago-based brand employed a premium-looking glass build which helped justify the smartphone’s relatively high launch price of $399 a little. But with this device, the company is ditching its glass build in favor of a cheaper plastic construction.

As mentioned earlier, the Motorola P40 Play sports a dual-camera setup on the rear. This is aligned vertically in the corner of the device and includes a primary 13-megapixel camera which could be the same sensor found on the Motorola One. In addition to this, there is a much smaller sensor that sits directly below in a separate camera module. Details about this haven’t yet been provided, but it could be the 2-megapixel depth sensor that is also found on the P40 Play’s predecessor. Unsurprisingly, the smartphone’s rear also features an LED flash and a Motorola logo which doubles as the fingerprint scanner. 

Other external details include a 3.5mm headphone jack on top of the device and a rear-firing speaker. Also, Motorola has replaced the One’s USB-C port with a micro-USB connector on the P40 Play.

From the look of things, the Motorola One’s successor will cease to be a midrange smartphone and will instead compete in the budget segment – our guess is that it’ll be priced between $200 and $250.

Earlier this year, Motorola revamped its strategy slightly with the release of the Moto G7 series. Compared to previous generations, the actual prices remain largely unchanged, but this time around the smartphones offer much more value for money. In fact, they are some of the best budget devices around.

Ultimately, the original Motorola One was an overpriced phone which had little going for it other than stock Android straight out of the box. These days, that isn’t enough to sell millions of devices, hence why it would make sense for Motorola to lower its prices.

In terms of specifications, the Moto G7 series comes powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 632. But in order to keep its prices down and avoid competing directly with the Moto G7 lineup, there’s a strong possibility this smartphone may be a repackaged Motorola One.

If this turns out to be true, the Motorola One’s replacement could arrive powered by the same Snapdragon 625 chipset. This may then be paired with 64GB of internal storage and 4GB of RAM, although these could be downgraded to 32GB and 3GB respectively. 

Like Motorola’s other One-branded devices, consumers can expect stock Android 9 Pie straight out of the box. In regards to the battery, a 3,000mAh cell seems likely.

The smartphone’s release date remains a total mystery at the moment, but an announcement should take place sometime this quarter.