The Motorola Moto G Stylus 5G, as you may have pieced together, is a phone with a built-in stylus and 5G. It’s a slightly upgraded version of the 4G-only, 2021-edition Moto G Stylus (I’m sorry, that’s really how these phones are named).
The Stylus 5G includes a few more hardware upgrades in addition to 5G connectivity, including a bigger battery, more storage and RAM (256GB and 6GB on the version I tested, respectively), and a newer Snapdragon 480 processor. There’s a new stylus-friendly GIF creator mode, which is fun. Fun is good! But it more or less feels like the same phone: the rear camera array is identical with the exception of a different macro sensor, its 6.8-inch screen is the same, and overall dimensions are similar.
This puts the G Stylus 5G in a kind of awkward spot. At $399, it sits between the $279 G Stylus and the $1,000 Galaxy Note 20 (the next step up if you want a stylus with your phone), but it doesn’t go far enough to clearly offer more than the budget-friendlier version. Performance and battery life are a bit better, but these aren’t really weak spots for the 4G version.
