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The Washington Post

Hello, it’s your flip phone from 2004 calling. Remember when phones fit into a shirt pocket? And closed up with a thunk?
In December, Motorola is planning a comeback of its oh-so-thin flip phone, the Razr. But this reboot is an Android smartphone with a large touch screen that folds in half and a price that might make you flip out: US$1,500.
At a Motorola event in Los Angeles, I spent a little time with the new Razr ahead of its launch. I came away impressed with the seamless, bendable-screen tech – first seen on Samsung’s Galaxy Fold – that’s enabling a return to smaller phones. But this particular design trades heavily on a retro appeal that doesn’t quite deliver in the era of 2019’s ultra expensive smartphones.
Holding it with one hand, I couldn’t even get this Razr to flip closed with that satisfying snap. Motorola has never recaptured the household name status it had in the 2000s when the Razr was the bestselling flip phone. After being bought and then sold by Google, now it’s owned by Chinese hardware maker Lenovo. Today its smartphones have a small share of the US market.

But bringing back the flip phone isn’t only a desperate plea to cash in on our affection for a dearly departed brand. The original Razr became popular, in part because it was small – one of the first phones you could slide into your pocket.
Well, 15 years later, some people are struggling with giant phones. Now they’re not fat, but tall and wide. The latest Samsung Note 10 Plus has a whopping 6.8-inch screen. There used to be smaller smartphones, like Apple’s iPhone SE, but they got dropped because consumers keep choosing the functionality of more screen over comfort and ergonomics.

The new Razr has a screen that measures 6.2 inches on the diagonal – about the same as an iPhone 11. But it shuts to be about half as tall. Closed up, it easily slipped into any of my pockets.
Although it’s wider than the original, the new Razr is, impressively, just as thin. And opened up, it also still has a thicker “chin” at the bottom to grab on to. That’s where Motorola stuck the fingerprint reader, speakers and antennas. All this is possible because the pixels are super-super tiny, and covered in a kind of plastic rather than glass. Samsung used its own version in its US$2,000 Fold phone, which arrived in September with some embarrassing durability problems.
Motorola is confident its screen and hinge will last at least two years of regular use. (Unlike Samsung’s Fold, there’s no gap when you close up the Razr, which should help protect the screen from detritus.) We won’t really know how well this one stands up until people try storing it in grubby, linty, sandy pockets and bags. Motorola says it will repair broken parts within the first year in the US, and screen replacements after that will cost US$300.

In the era of screen addiction, I enjoy the idea of closing up a smartphone. Shutting the Razr means you can go about doing something other than looking at your phone. The new Razr also has a small 2.7-inch touch screen on the front, which displays the time, shows calls, music controls and other basic functions. The 16-megapixel camera also sits right underneath it.
But the ergonomics of the new Razr are just different enough from the original to be a letdown. In your hand it feels more clunky because of the wideness. After an hour of practice, I still couldn’t get my one-handed close to produce a satisfactory snap. The hinge that protects the screen doesn’t have the spring-loaded feel of the original and requires more pressure. It’s possible I’m out of practice – a Motorola employee showed me he could make it snap with one hand.
Perhaps it’s ludicrous to judge a US$1,500 gadget on how much it echoes the tactile feel of its 15-year-old predecessor. But aside from the screen, the new Razr’s appeal is more nostalgia than cutting-edge tech. Other phones that cost more than US$1,000 now have at least three camera lenses – Razr has just the one. (And in my early preview, it seemed sluggish.)

Other premium flagship phones have made inroads in battery life. The Razr’s new battery (which had to be split into two different pieces) is rated at 2510 mAh, a third less than the competition from Samsung and others. And the Razr runs Android 9.0, which was released in 2018.
Then there’s that price tag. The original Razr cost US$600, or about US$800 in today’s money. The new Razr is twice that – and more than twice the US$700 price of an iPhone 11. That takes the Razr out of contention as a practical phone. It’s a status symbol. Even the trip back to 2004 makes it hard to justify.
The new Razr is a sign that we’re re-entering an era of weird phones. Like the mid-2000s, we’re going to see lots of new technologies give rise to new shapes and functions. It’s a welcome relief from the seas of me-too iPhone clones. I hope this one is popular enough that folding screen tech gets cheaper and makes it into phones with more attainable prices.


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Smartphones

Motorola revives its 2000s flip phone, the Razr, but its price may make you flip

Motorola is bringing back the Razr flip phone 15 years after it debuted, rebooting it as a foldable smartphone. Photo: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg

Modeled after the popular 2000s flip phone, the new Motorola Razr uses folding technology to open up to a 6.2-inch screen. MUST CREDIT: Photo courtesy of Motorola

An attendee photographs the Lenovo Group Ltd. Motorola Razr smartphone during an event in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2019. Motorola is bringing back the Razr flip phone 15 years after it first debuted, rebooting it as a foldable smartphone as part of a return to the premium segment that would once again pit the company against Apple and Samsung. Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg

An attendee demonstrates the Lenovo Group Ltd. Motorola Razr smartphone during an event in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2019. Motorola is bringing back the Razr flip phone 15 years after it first debuted, rebooting it as a foldable smartphone as part of a return to the premium segment that would once again pit the company against Apple and Samsung. Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg

LG G8X ThinQ Dual Screen full review: all the versatility of two screens for a third of the cost of Samsung Galaxy Fold

The LG G8X ThinQ Dual Screen. Photo: Ben Sin

LG’s software allows the second screen of the G8X to display a keyboard or digital controller in full, improving typing and gaming experience.

In low light conditions, the LG G8X produces solid images but this lags behind what a new Apple or Huawei phone could do. Shutter speed is also a bit slow hence some motion blur.

LG’s software allows certain apps to be able to spread across both screens, including Google Chrome. The Samsung Galaxy Fold (right), however, obviously does a better job of this because it is a single screen instead of two screens connected by a hinge.

A shot taken with the LG G8X’s wide-angle camera. Colour accuracy is good and the image doesn’t suffer from much barrel distortion.

With the LG G8X ThinQ Dual Screen, the hinge rotates 360-degrees so the second screen can be folded all the way back for better one-hand use

The LG G8X ThinQ Dual Screen comes in handy when travelling. One screen shows the map app, the other shows a messaging app. Photo: Ben Sin

Huawei prices its Mate X 5G foldable phone at US$2,400 for China and limited supplies may make it hard to get

An employee demonstrates a Mate X foldable 5G mobile device at the Huawei Technologies pavilion on the opening day of the MWC Barcelona in Barcelona, Spain, on Monday, Feb. 25, 2019. Photo: Bloomberg

Lifestyle

Gadgets


The popular 2000s flip phone returns as a smartphone with a foldable screen
Apart from the screen, the rest of the US$1,500 phone is pretty ordinary



The popular 2000s flip phone returns as a smartphone with a foldable screen. Apart from the screen, the rest of the US$1,500 phone is pretty ordinary.


Motorola revives its 2000s flip phone, the Razr, but its price may make you flip

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;} The popular 2000s flip phone returns as a smartphone with a foldable screen Apart from the screen, the rest of the US$1,500 phone is pretty ordinary

The popular 2000s flip phone returns as a smartphone with a foldable screen

Apart from the screen, the rest of the US$1,500 phone is pretty ordinary