At CES 2026, among the AI humanoids, flashy concepts and next-gen foldables, was a Motorola phone that could be the flagship device fans have been waiting for. While the Motorola Razr Fold was the talk of the town (after all, it is the company’s first-ever book-style foldable), there’s a premium smartphone with top specs and a sophisticated design: the Motorola Signature.
Recent high-end Motorola phones have had good-looking hardware but have fallen short in one or more areas, including display, performance, cameras, software or battery. The Motorola Signature is the first flagship phone from the company that looks confident enough to take on heavyweights like the Galaxy S26 Plus and iPhone 17, without faltering on either hardware or software. It appears to be a phone with no major downsides, at least on paper. The biggest one could be availability: It won’t be coming to the US but will be launching internationally.
I went hands-on with the Motorola Signature, and I found it to be a breath of fresh air. I can admit I’m finally excited about a Motorola phone that’s not a Razr.
Motorola Signature is lightweight, slim and rugged
The Motorola Signature has a 6.8-inch AMOLED display with a 1,264×2,780-pixel resolution and supports a 165Hz refresh rate. It’s an LTPO panel, so it can be set to 1Hz for an always-on display, thereby saving battery life. The screen is rated to deliver 6,200 nits of peak brightness for supported HDR content. Its resolution might not be as sharp as the Galaxy S25 Ultra, but it’s a promising screen for gaming and content consumption.
On the back, you get three cameras: a 50-megapixel main camera with OIS, paired with a 50-megapixel telephoto camera with a 3x zoom lens and OIS, and a 50-megapixel ultrawide camera. These are the same cameras you’ll find on the upcoming Razr Fold. Sony is behind all of the optics, which I expect will help these Motorola cameras be a significant upgrade over the current-generation phones.
The Signature features a 5,200-mAh silicon-carbon battery, supporting 90-watt wired charging and 50-watt wireless charging. Should those speeds hold up, that battery might fill up quickly using either method.
Motorola’s new phone won’t be as powerful as the OnePlus 15, but it should hold its place in the flagship category. It’s powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 chipset (which sits below the 8 Elite Gen 5) and is paired with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. Although it’s not the highest-end chip available, this one will likely still pack plenty of power, putting it in the range of last year’s high-end phones, such as the OnePlus 13 and Galaxy S25 Ultra.
The best part? All of this is housed in a slim and lightweight design. The Motorola Signature is 6.99mm thick and weighs just 186 grams. For context, the Galaxy S25 Plus, with a smaller battery, measures 7.3mm thick and weighs 190 grams, while most recent big phones weigh 200 grams or more.
I had a good experience holding the Signature for the first time. I didn’t expect it to be so light. In my short hands-on demo, I liked how it felt in my hand. I love the linen-inspired finish on the back, which sets it apart from the competition. The phone didn’t feel slippery and was also more comfortable to hold than most flat-sided flagship phones.
Like its Edge siblings, the Signature is rated IP68 and IP69 for dust and water resistance.
Joining the ranks of Samsung and Google
The Motorola Signature will ship with Android 16 and will get seven years of Android OS and security updates. This is on par with Google Pixel and Samsung Galaxy phones and better than what OnePlus offers. This new software update policy should instill confidence in people considering the brand for their next smartphone.
Motorola will sell the Signature in two color options: Pantone Martini Olive and Pantone Carbon colors (I like the Olive better). It is priced at €999 (approximately $1,170) and is set to launch in select European countries, with launches in the Middle East, Africa, Latin America and Asia-Pacific scheduled for the coming months.
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