Pixel too pricey? This is the mid-range smartphone deal I recommend instead
The Motorola Edge 50 Fusion is down to its lowest price ever in Amazon’s Prime Day sale, offering unbeatable value for money
The beauty of deals events like Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days is that, usually, there’s a decent range of discounts on offer, meaning that you can always find a smartphone deal that fits your budget.
I’ve already recommended the Google Pixel 8a as both my favourite mid-range phone and what is likely to be one of the most enticing offers in Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days sale. But even at its sale price, the Pixel 8a costs at least £399, which may still be a little on the high side for some bargain-hunters.
Enter the Motorola Edge 50 Fusion. I had already proclaimed this handset the best mid-range phone under £400 at its original retail price but now it’s been massively discounted, I’ll need to amend that to best under £300. If you want an excellent Android phone in the vein of a Pixel but can’t push to the £400 mark, you need look no further than the Edge 50 Fusion.
Motorola Edge 50 Fusion: What’s the deal?
The Motorola Edge 50 Fusion joined the market at £350 earlier this year and has since averaged around £337 in price. I already found that to be an outstanding price for all the quality that the phone offered (more on that below) and rated it a full five stars in my review, with our Best Buy award as the cherry on top. In no uncertain terms, I stated that this is the best phone you can get with a hard budget of £400.
Now, the value for money is even more tempting, with this Prime Day deal bringing the price down to a record-low of just £250. That’s over £80 off the average price and a cool £100 down from the original cost, making this one tempting bargain.
Motorola Edge 50 Fusion: What’s so good about it?
Let’s start with the design. Like the rest of the Edge series, the 50 Fusion is fronted by a stylish curved display, with LED notification lights all along the sides (hence the “Edge” moniker). It’s nice and slim at 7.9mm and weighs an airy 175g, so is very comfortable to use one-handed.
The only thing I’d say about the design is that the rear panel overlaps the edges ever so slightly, so you can feel tiny ridges when holding the phone. I quickly got used to this but it’s worth bearing in mind for anyone who is particularly sensitive to sensory issues.
What’s most impressive about the design is just how durable it is: the phone is rated IP68 for dust and water resistance (the same classification you see on most £1,000+ flagship phones) and a layer of Gorilla Glass 5 sits over the display for scratch protection. Both of these are far more robust than you typically see from phones under £500 – let alone for £250.
That curved display is another big selling point, with a ridiculously smooth 144Hz refresh rate, terrific peak brightness and excellent colour accuracy. It’s a 6.7in AMOLED panel, so black and contrast levels are as close to perfect as you can get, and the 2,400 x 1,080 resolution is decently sharp for this price.
Performance is plenty fast, with the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 chipset keeping pace with similarly priced rivals in the CPU testing and delivering reasonable (albeit not exceptional) framerates in the GPU portion of our benchmarks. Battery life is much more impressive, however, with the Edge 50 Fusion lasting for a fantastic 27 hours in our looping video test, landing it on our best phone battery life roundup.
Even once depleted, the stamina continues to impress, thanks to the Edge 50 Fusion’s support for speedy 68W charging. In my testing, this brought the battery from empty to 50% in around 15 minutes, and to 100% in under 40 minutes. That’s outstanding for this price and better still, you get a compatible 68W charger bundled in the box.
I was also very impressed with the main camera during testing. Images are excellently lit with vibrant colours and strong contrast and even after dark, the shots are crisp and detailed, with great colouring and minimal visual noise.
Motorola Edge 50 Fusion: Any drawbacks?
It once again speaks to just how ridiculously good this phone is for the price that my only complaints feel more like nitpicks than actual dealbreakers. First of all, there’s no 3.5mm headphone jack or microSD card slot. These quality of life features are more and more rare on most phones but you can still get them on cheaper Motorolas, so it’s worth mentioning here.
Software is overall a positive on the Edge 50 Fusion, with Motorola’s instalment of Android 14 being one of the closest to a stock launcher that you can get outside of Pixel phones. The Edge 50 Fusion is promised three years of software updates and four of security patches, which is still good (especially for this deal price) but it unfortunately sits in the shadow of the seven years apiece offered by the Google Pixel 8a.
The only other issue I had in testing was that the ultrawide camera didn’t impress me as much as the main lens did. It’s a perfectly fine shooter, with reasonable colouring and exposure balance but the detail leaves something to be desired, especially towards the edges of the shot.
Motorola Edge 50 Fusion: Should you take the deal?
For clarity’s sake, I’ll reiterate that anyone looking to score a bargain on the best mid-range phone this Prime Day should still consider the Google Pixel 8a. The cameras are better, software support is more extensive and you get a sprinkling of AI features, all for the rock-bottom price of just £399.
If that is out of your price range, however, the Motorola Edge 50 Fusion is too good to even call a consolation prize. The display is exquisite, the build is robust and sleek, the main camera is terrific, battery life is some of the best you can get at this price and charging is nice and nippy, too. This was an outstanding phone at its original price but for just £250? The Motorola Edge 50 Fusion might be the biggest bargain out there right now.
