2018 has not been kind to Lenovo-owned Motorola. The company laid off half of their Chicago-based employees, canceled the Moto X5, and announced the Verizon-exclusive Moto Z3 along with a 5G Moto Mod that wasn’t available at launch. The Moto Z3 isn’t a bad phone, but it launched with last year’s Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 and has little to offer when compared to the many devices launched last month. Although Motorola has no plans to launch a new Moto Z device later this year, we’ve learned that the company is working on a new flagship with the latest Qualcomm chipset. The device, code-named “Odin,” will feature the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8150 chipset and 5G Moto Mod support. We don’t know the device’s marketing name, but we’re leaning towards this device being the Motorola Moto Z4.
“Odin” – Code-name for the possible Motorola Moto Z4
According to our source, who provided details on the phone that we were able to verify, the upcoming Motorola flagship is based on the upcoming Snapdragon 8150 platform. The initial device configuration features 4GB RAM and 32GB of storage, though the phone is still in early development so there could be higher RAM and storage models. The device is running Android 9 Pie and Motorola is developing the phone with Moto Mod support in mind. We don’t know if the device will support existing Moto Mods, however. Motorola has previously committed to “three generations” of support on the Moto Z lineup, and this device will be a fourth generation model.
What we do know is that “Odin” will support Motorola’s upcoming 5G Moto Mod. This will likely be made possible thanks to Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X50 modem, which Verizon has used to complete its first 5G data transmission using the Moto Z3 with the unreleased 5G Moto Mod. Verizon’s commercial 5G network is set to go live in 2019. Speaking of which, “Odin” is being developed for North America. There are mentions of a Verizon model, which could mean this device will be a Verizon exclusive like the Moto Z3. However, there could also be an unlocked model this time around.
Lastly, our source can confirm that Motorola is working on software to handle an in-display fingerprint scanner, but they could not confirm if “Odin” will itself have an in-display fingerprint scanner. “Odin” is still in the early stages of development, so it’s possible that support for an in-display fingerprint scanner will appear in the future. We do not know of any other upcoming Motorola flagships, and we highly doubt that the company would bring an in-display fingerprint scanner to their upcoming mid-range smartphones. Thus, the work that’s being done on an in-display fingerprint sensor is most likely for “Odin.”
The new Qualcomm Snapdragon 8150
The Snapdragon 8150 is the rumored successor to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845. The chipset is rumored to feature a dedicated NPU and be manufactured on a 7nm process. The chipset is expected to feature 4 “Silver” and 4 “Gold” cores as well as a tri-cluster CPU configuration. Our source has been able to provide us with a few more details about the new platform. First, the tri-cluster platform consists of 4 “little,” 3 “big,” and 1 “prime” CPUs. The possible benefit of having a single “Gold” core in this “prime” cluster would be that this isolated core could be run at a higher frequency than the “big” cluster since frequencies are synchronous across CPUs in each cluster. Thus, the single “prime” cluster would handle routine housekeeping, saving on battery. Lastly, there’s evidence that Qualcomm’s new aptX Adaptive Encoder should be included in the DSP of the Snapdragon 8150, though there wasn’t much doubt about this news.
That’s all the information we have now on “Odin,” Motorola’s next flagship smartphone. In summary, we believe “Odin” is likely the Motorola Moto Z4 based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8150 platform. It’s running Android 9 Pie and supports Moto Mods (most importantly, the 5G Moto Mod). It may have an in-display fingerprint scanner, but we’re not 100% sure yet. The phone is currently for the North American market, specifically on Verizon Wireless, but we don’t know every market the device will be sold in.
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