Motorola's new Razr phones feel like a push back into the big leagues

Summary

Motorola’s new Razr models show it’s serious about leading foldables, particularly the Razr Ultra.
The Razr+ and Razr Ultra beat Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip 6 in some areas — and may even hold an edge against the Z Flip 7.
Motorola may still need to fix its value proposition if it wants to be a dominant force in the foldable market.

This won’t mean much to you if the Lord of the Rings movies came out when you were a toddler, but for a few brief years, the Motorola Razr V3 was the coolest cellphone you could get. It’s not that it was much better than other phones on a practical level — this was, after all, an era when phones were still mostly for calls and texts. No, it was all about style, since the V3 was a stylish, ultra-thin

flip phone
made of aluminum, at a time when many phones were still essentially plastic bricks. The V3 was so popular that I remember seeing giant banners for it hanging in my local movie theater.

We all know that since then, Motorola has become a secondary player in consumer phones, dwarfed by rivals that more quickly embraced smartphone tech, above all Apple and

Samsung
. It’s been staging a slow comeback with a series of Android-based Razr

foldables
, however, and its new

2025 models
seem intended to go toe-to-toe with the big guys. The company could be poised to regain some of its former glory, although that will probably depend on what ships in 2026.

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It might pain some people at Apple, but there’s solid logic to the idea.

The Razr-tipped spearhead

What’s different this time around

Motorola

Without delving too far into specs, the new Razr and Razr+ models are pretty solid. They both have 6.9-inch, 165Hz internal displays, which makes them pleasant to look at, and these are paired with 3.6- and 4-inch external screens, respectively. The phones also share 50-megapixel main cameras and 32-megapixel front sensors. The MediaTek Dimensity 7400X processor in the base Razr is a knock against it, but if you care more about power efficiency than 3D framerates, you should be satisfied. Springing for a Razr+ gets you a Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 chip, 12GB of RAM, and a 50-megapixel telephoto camera, among other upgrades.

I’d give a little more attention to the product that isn’t just another slab of metal and glass.

Where things really get interesting is with the first-ever Razr Ultra. It’s a phone that, on paper at least, absolutely decimates Samsung’s popular Galaxy Z Flip 6. It has a state-of-the-art Snapdragon 8 Elite, instead of the Flip’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 (“for Galaxy,” excuse me). It also sports 16GB of RAM, something you’ll typically only find on laptops and gaming phones, whereas the Flip is capped at 12GB. When it comes to charging, the Ultra supports 30W wireless power and 68W over USB, making the Flip’s 15W and 25W figures seem pathetic. Neither phone has a telephoto lens — a big miss, in my books — but the Ultra has 50-megapixel front and ultra-wide cameras, and the front shooter on the Flip is capped at a measly 10 megapixels. There’s less of a gap with display tech, but a 7-inch 165Hz panel still beats a 6.7-inch 120Hz one.

Motorola

As if that weren’t enough, decorative options for the Ultra include wood and Alacantara versions. While Motorola and others have experimented with alternate materials, it’s rare for them to show up on a flagship product, and they could be a deciding factor for people who prioritize style. I know that if I were in the market for a new phone at the moment, I’d give a little more attention to the product that isn’t just another slab of metal and glass.

Motorola further seems to be all-in on my idea of mixing and matching different AI platforms for different purposes. Aside from its own Moto AI, there are hooks for Google Gemini, Perplexity, Meta Llama, and even Microsoft Copilot. There’s nothing disappointing about Samsung’s integration of Gemini with its own AI features, and I’ll have to see how well everything gels on Motorola’s side, but it’s nice that a company is breaking out of the notion that one or two AI models should handle everything.

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Making a big play

But the real work lies ahead

Motorola

While I’m not sure that the vanilla Razr and the Razr+ will move the needle much, the Ultra is clearly a shot across the bow, meant to put Motorola at the forefront of clamshell-style foldables, at least until the inevitable

Z Flip 7
. Even then, though, rumors suggest that Samsung’s product might still have weaker screen, RAM, storage, and camera specs. That’s kind of shocking — Samsung could be poised to cede some ground, at least in the US.

The revolution isn’t here just yet, however — the main issue is price. When it ships in May, the Ultra will start at $1,300 for a 512GB model, about $80 more than an equivalent Z Flip 6, and a full $200 more than a 256GB Flip. The Ultra will attract people who want the best, but it’s probably not going to be a mass-market success by virtue of targeting a richer demographic, in the middle of a US-instigated trade war no less. To reclaim the throne, Motorola may need to push down the Ultra’s price to make it an unbeatable deal.

The Ultra is clearly a shot across the bow, meant to put Motorola at the forefront of clamshell-style foldables.

Who knows, though — maybe the cheaper Razr models will catch on. The $1,000 Razr Plus also beats the Z Flip 6 in some respects, price among them, which should make it more palatable outside the scope of foldable enthusiasts. And while the base Razr has some weak points, $800 is still reasonable if you insist on having one of the latest foldable devices — that’s as much as a non-folding iPhone 16. Personally, I’d rather spend my money on an iPhone, or maybe a Pixel, but not everyone cares about things like processor specs or

IP ratings
.

Motorola’s prospects for hitting the big time again may hinge (no pun intended) on the lessons it learns this year, and whether it can leverage any modest success into something more. It is, after all, going up against a behemoth in the form of Samsung, and if you consider tablet-style foldables, there’s an ocean of competition out there, particularly from Chinese brands like Oppo and Honor.

One thing Motorola is probably considering itself lucky for, at least, is Apple’s hesitancy about joining the fray. While the first

folding iPhone
could ship in 2026, it’s expected to be one of the most expensive tablet-style foldables ever produced, possibly costing upwards of $2,000. There’s no sign of a clamshell iPhone coming anytime soon — so if Motorola plays its cards right, it could establish itself as a force to beat long before the 800-pound gorilla enters the room.