Motorola Signature 27 is finally coming to the US, and I think your patience is about to pay off

Motorola Signature 27 is coming to the US this November as a Galaxy S26 Ultra rival, and when we asked you how it sounded before the reveal, most of you held off on a verdict. Looking back, that was the smart call, since even the 200MP camera that excited so many of you turned out to be something other than what we expected.

Most of you said the Signature 27 was still a mystery

A day before Motorola's Snapdragon Summit reveal on September 22, we asked you how the Signature 27 sounded based on Motorola's teasers. The most popular answer, picked by 37.62% of you, was that it was still too mysterious to tell.

Excitement wasn't far behind, though. Another 34.65% of you called it impressively powerful, and 20.3% said the 200MP camera alone was making you drool, so roughly 55% of you were leaning positive.

Only 2.97% of you weren't impressed, and 4.46% said you don't care about Moto phones in general.

The Signature 27's 200MP camera turned out to be the zoom

When Motorola finally showed the phone, the Signature 27 turned out to be the first phone announced with Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6, which is a different chip name from the "Gen 6 Pro" we had guessed at. The bigger twist is the camera, since we (like most coverage of the teaser) read it as a 200MP main camera, and Motorola confirmed it's a 200MP periscope telephoto instead, sitting next to a 50MP Sony LYTIA 910 main camera.

So why put the biggest sensor behind the zoom lens? The 200MP chip is Sony's LYTIA 901, which Sony built to crop into its own pixels for up to 4x "in-sensor" zoom, with a processing circuit inside the sensor that rebuilds fine details like text and patterns. Paired with a periscope lens, that should let the Signature 27 reach far-off subjects without the mushy look of regular digital zoom, before Motorola's AI-assisted Super Zoom Pro takes over all the way to 100x.

This setup is close to the opposite of the Galaxy S26 Ultra, which keeps its 200MP sensor on the main camera and pairs it with a 50MP 5x periscope and a 10MP 3x zoom.

The Pixel 11 Pro XL, meanwhile, sticks with a 48MP 5x telephoto and stretches Pro Res Zoom to 120x (our Pixel 11 Pro XL review found its zoom a bit better in our camera benchmark), while Apple lists 8x optical-quality zoom and 40x digital for the iPhone 18 Pro Max. If you own any of these, the Signature 27 doesn't make your phone feel old yet, since Motorola hasn't shared a single sample photo, but zoom fans should keep an eye on it.

What the Signature 27 means for US buyers

For anyone in the US, availability is the biggest change. The original Signature never launched here, but Motorola's US page now says the Signature 27 is coming this November, and you can already sign up for updates there.

Price, the full spec sheet and the other two rear cameras are still a secret, though, so those of you who wanted more information before deciding haven't missed much.

Motorola has earned a little patience

I think the way you voted says something nice about Motorola, since fewer than 8% of you were negative about a phone you could barely see.

Still, goodwill only goes so far once a price tag shows up. I'm hoping Motorola keeps it close to the first Signature's €999 launch price, and I'd personally love to see a few sample photos from that 200MP zoom before November rolls around.

More on the Motorola Signature 27:

• Why the Signature 27 shows Motorola learned from its past mistakes
• Read our original Motorola Signature review
• Motorola Signature 27

• Follow me on X and Threads

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