Motorola said that the low-cost Moto G would be coming to the U.S. in January. Well, it seems like they’ve changed their mind.
The Google-owned smartphone maker, which announced the Moto G earlier this month, has opened the phone up for domestic pre-orders today, and the company says that it plans to start shipping phones on December 2.
The Moto G is the cousin of the Moto X, Motorola Mobility’s first smartphone under Google’s leadership. It features a 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor, along with a 4.5 inch 720p display and a battery that Motorola claims will last up to 24 hours with “mixed usage.” Still, it’s missing a MicroSD card slot and a LTE modem, so the phone seems best for people who want a smartphone that’s good but not amazing.
The low-cost phone seems designed to compete primarily with low-cost offerings from Samsung, which has run away with the lion’s share of the Android smartphone market, and it’s certainly priced to compete. The Moto G costs $179 for the 8GB base model, and $199 for the 16GB model. At present, the only way to get the phone is off contract, direct from Motorola.