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Moto G17 and Moto G17 Power: Meet Motorola's latest ultra-affordable battery life heavyweights

If you're on a tight budget and live in Europe, you should probably consider these new budget-friendly Android mid-rangers.

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By Adrian Diaconescu

Published: Jan 30, 2026, 3:13 AM

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Motorola Android

Everybody knows that Motorola makes great (albeit often confusing) low-cost devices with sleek designs, respectable (at the very least) specifications, and a clear focus on exceptional battery life, and starting this week, yet another two such phones are available across the old continent.

And no, we're not talking about the extremely similar-looking Moto G67 and Moto G77, although the newly unveiled Moto G17 and Moto G17 Power also happen to share a lot of things in common.

These are all the ways in which the G17 and G17 Power are identical

6.72-inch LCD screen with 2400 x 1080 pixel resolution;
MediaTek Helio G81 Extreme processor;
8GB RAM;
Android 15;
165.67mm height;
75.98mm width;
IP64 water and dust resistance;
Corning Gorilla Glass 3 screen protection;
50MP primary rear-facing camera with Sony Lytia 600 sensor;
5MP ultra-wide-angle secondary camera with f/2.2 aperture;
32MP front-facing camera with f/2.2 aperture;
Stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos;
Bluetooth 5.4;
NFC;
3.5mm headphone jack;
USB Type-C port;
microSD support;
Side-mounted fingerprint sensor;
4G LTE connectivity;
Vegan leather finish;
Pantone Alaskan Blue and Pantone Evening Blue color options.

That may seem like a complete spec sheet, but it's (technically) not. Pretty close, but not quite. Yes, the design is (almost) 100 percent identical, from the stylish finish and those two decidedly eye-catching paint jobs to the reasonably thin screen bezels (for such dirt-cheap handsets), the love-them-or-hate-them stove-style camera modules, and the identical height and width measurements.

Under the hood, meanwhile, the Moto G17 and G17 Power share a chipset not only between them, but with the Moto G15 and Moto G15 Power as well, which is both disappointing and very hard to justify. Although I can definitely understand that Motorola had to cut some corners to keep the price points of its latest low-to-mid-end devices down in 2026, the upgrades over these two's predecessors are minimal at best and completely nonexistent at worst.

Will you consider buying the Moto G17 or G17 Power?

The front-facing camera is however improved in a big way, jumping from 8 to 32 megapixels, and incredibly enough, matching the resolution of the best Moto G-series devices around right now. And the rear-facing snapper uses a first-of-a-kind sensor "for a Moto G in this segment", promising "crisp detail and vibrant color" that you may not obtain very easily from ultra-affordable phones made by Samsung or other rival brands.

And this is what sets the Moto G17 Power apart from the Moto G17

6,000mAh battery vs. 5,200mAh;
30W TurboPower charging technology vs. 18W;
256GB internal storage space vs. 128GB;
8.8mm thickness vs. 8.17mm;
No Pantone Bordeaux color.

If you think these might be the best budget phones for you today but don't know which one you should pick, your decision will be made pretty easy by that short list of crucial distinctions.

Clearly, the Moto G17 Power is the better overall handset, packing a bigger battery, supporting faster charging, offering more internal storage space, and naturally, costing more money. Specifically, €229 in Europe compared to €199 for the slightly humbler, thinner, presumably lighter, and in a Pantone Bordeaux hue, undeniably more elegant Moto G17.

Curiously enough, Motorola seems to be keeping the two new phones' weight under wraps (which is not exactly a good sign) while advertising a battery life of 55.8 hours for the "regular" Moto G17 and 64.3 hours for the G17 Power. Those are... very specific numbers, and although we all know they will only be achieved in very specific conditions (if any), they're clearly well above many of the competition in the sub-€250 European price bracket.

So should you go for them?

I think you should at least take them into consideration... if you can actually buy them, which is obviously not the case (and will never be) in markets like the US.

In countries like France or Italy, meanwhile, I can't think of many devices capable of offering similar battery endurance figures, camera performance, and even screen quality at around the same prices. Yes, these are not just battery life champions (especially the Moto G17 Power), but value-for-money heavyweights as well, looking set to further boost Motorola's reputation on the old continent despite looking objectively boring at first glance.

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Adrian, a mobile technology enthusiast since the Nokia 3310 era, has been a dynamic presence in the tech journalism field, contributing to Android Authority, Digital Trends, and Pocketnow before joining PhoneArena in 2018. His expertise spans across various platforms, with a particular fondness for the diversity of the Android ecosystem. Despite the challenges of balancing full-time parenthood with his work, Adrian's passion for tech trends, running, and movies keeps him energized. His commitment to mid-range smartphones has led to an eclectic collection of devices, saved from personal bankruptcy by his preference for 'adequate' over 'overpriced'.

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