Motorola Moto X will now be the Moto Z

The Verizon Droid name gets a slight modification to be more in line with the new Moto X and Moto Z naming convention.

by Alexander Fagot/ Allen Ngo, 2016/05/20

Popular leaker @evleaks revealed earlier this month that a couple of Motorola handsets would be on the way codenamed "Vertex" and "Vector Thin". Now, the latest round of rumors will see the Vertex and Vector Thin launch as the Moto Z Play and Moto Z Style, respectively. Both models are expected to be the successor to the popular Moto X series from Lenovo.

The renaming contrasts Sony's plans for its Xperia series of smartphones where instead of streamlining the family under one common name, Lenovo is rebranding its Moto family into an entirely new letter. The flagship models should carry the Moto Z name while middle-class models will still make use of the Moto G moniker. For example, Motorola unveiled the mainstream Moto G4 and G4 Plus devices just a few days ago with Snapdragon 617 and 410 SoCs.

The new Moto names will trickle down to the Verizon Droid family as well, which is also based on the Moto family. Gone are the confusing names like Droid Turbo or Droid Maxx that tend to hide the aforementioned lettering hierarchy. Instead, the smartphones sold by Verizon will simply add "Droid Edition" to the end of the base model name. Proprietary Motorola accessories like case covers and zoom lenses will also be renamed from "Amps" to "MotoMods".

The entire family of Moto smartphones is expected to be unveiled this coming June 9 at the Lenovo Tech World expo.