Motorola Razr 50 review: Flipping into contention

Foldable telephones are prohibitively costly. That’s what all of us thought till the Motorola Razr 40 arrived in 2023, shaving lots of off the worth of the equal Samsung Galaxy Z Flip due to some usually well-judged compromises.

As one other 12 months goes by with neither a worth lower nor a major improve on the Galaxy Z Flip 6, it falls on the Motorola Edge 50 to signify the worth for cash choose. The Nubia Flip 5G is even cheaper, however there are vital compromises there.

It doesn’t have the innovative options of the flagship Motorola Edge 50 Extremely, which we reckon is the perfect foldable for most individuals proper now, nevertheless it units out to supply a broadly equal expertise for method cheaper. Is that also sufficient in 2024?

It’s value noting for our US readers that the Motorola Razr 40 and the Motorola Razr 2024 are one and the identical. We’ll be referring to the telephone by the previous, as its internationally adopted identify, however every part we are saying in regards to the Razr 50 additionally applies to the Razr 2024. There’s one noteworthy distinction, however we’ll level that out on the applicable second.

Design & Construct

• Vegan leather-based again is available in three colors
• Expanded cowl display
• Now IPX8 rated

Motorola produced an interesting clamshell foldable design within the Razr 40, and it’s caught with a lot the identical blueprint for the Razr 50. It is a a lot softer, hotter gadget than the chilly and industrial Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6.

The aluminium body is rounder, and it melds into the sides of the Corning Gorilla Glass Victus-coated cowl show. In the meantime, the rear panel and a small strip of the alternative half are coated in vegan leather-based.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

This materials is actually manufactured from plastic, nevertheless it includes a grippy texture that approximates that of actual leather-based. Moreover a particular appear and feel, it makes the Razr 50 really feel extra stable within the hand, which is a welcome feeling whenever you’re continuously prying it open through a tightly sprung hinge.

Speaking of which, I discovered the Razr 50 hinge to be simpler to control than the Galaxy Z Flip 6, although it’ll solely maintain place from across the quarter-open level.

It additionally made me really feel way more comfy sitting the Razr 50 down on a flat public floor, corresponding to a wall, to utilize the intelligent distant selfie characteristic that we’ll go on to debate. With the Flip 6, I used to be at all times fearful that I’d scratch the glass again in such a state of affairs.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

That strip of vegan leather-based on the highest half of the telephone is method smaller than earlier than (albeit nonetheless larger than the all-screen Razr 50 Extremely), as a result of Motorola has massively elevated the scale of the quilt show. We’ll go into the main points extra within the subsequent part, however suffice to say that the Razr 50 not seems like an clearly compromised foldable like its predecessor.

The Razr 50 isn’t as skinny because the Flip 6, although 7.25mm when open is nothing to be sniffed at. It’s when it’s closed up that it feels a bit of extra substantial, though a thickness of 15.9mm is offset by these rounded edges and a small, sq. footprint. It’s not very heavy, both, at 188g.

Motorola has bolstered the water resistance score to IPX8, that means I felt far safer dealing with it close to water. The weak level continues to be the non-existent official mud resistance, however then even Samsung has been unable to completely shut up all these hinge gaps. Finish consequence: you continue to received’t really feel comfy taking the Razr 50 to the seashore, particularly not with the identical tender plastic inside show.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Particular shout out to Motorola for my mannequin’s Spritz Orange color, which mixes a shiny terracotta vegan leather-based with a deeper burnt orange for the metallic rim. The opposite choices, Koala Gray and Seaside Sand, provide extra sober tones in case you want.

There’s a responsive fingerprint sensor below the flat energy button on the precise edge, the usage of which reveals off the telephone’s respectable – if not high class – haptic suggestions. It’s not very simple to make use of when the telephone is out of hand, although, corresponding to whenever you’re attempting to place the digital camera for a surroundings or group shot.

Display & Audio system

• Creaseless 6.9-inch inner show
• 3.4in cowl show now truly helpful
• Inside display refresh fee now 120Hz

The primary story with the Razr 50 isn’t its 6.9-inch inner AMOLED show, however relatively its new cowl display. Final 12 months’s Razr 40 provided a weedy 1.5in instance that felt considerably dated. This 12 months’s model is significantly expanded to three.6in, with a 1056 x 1066 decision and a 90Hz refresh fee.

This makes it bigger, sharper, and extra fluid than the Galaxy Z Flip 6 equal. It additionally envelops the dual digital camera modules, relatively than reducing them off at a clumsy angle just like the Flip. It’s value mentioning that the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 is a considerably costlier telephone, too.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

All of which means the Razr 50 cowl show can boast the identical performance because the Razr 50 Extremely, regardless of being a bit of smaller. You’ll be able to run sure full apps on this display, although it’s nonetheless higher suited to heads-up widgets like these of the Galaxy Z Flip collection.

Even so, the additional display house and determination means the Razr 50’s cowl display is rather more nice to work together with than the Galaxy Z Flip 6’s. I discovered the Climate and Calendar widgets to be essentially the most helpful right here, each providing an interactive rundown of the day’s forecast. The YouTube Music widget is one other useful one, letting you skip and pause with out having to open the telephone.

The inside display remains to be the place most of your interplay will probably be performed, although. It’s a big 6.9-inch LTPO AMOLED with a 120Hz refresh fee. The latter truly represents a drop from the Razr 40’s 144Hz, nevertheless it’s a sensible compromise. This at all times felt like overkill, particularly when battery life financial savings are so vital.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

This foremost display can reportedly hit a peak brightness of 3000 nits, although this can be a localised determine with HDR content material. With auto brightness switched off, I recorded a full-screen brightness of 492 nits, which is respectable, if not up there with the perfect non-foldable flagships.

It’s nonetheless a really tall display, which requires a second hand to be introduced into play for nearly any interplay. However with the expanded cowl show now capable of deal with single-handed interactions, that’s much less of a difficulty than earlier than.

Additionally, credit score to Motorola’s designers for getting very near the creaseless ideally suited for a flip telephone. You’ll be able to nonetheless see and really feel that kink half method up the display when it’s open, nevertheless it’s not massively obvious.

That show is flanked by a pair of stereo audio system, however they actually aren’t all that good. The sound output is skinny and reedy, definitely in comparison with flagship non-foldables obtainable for round this form of cash.

Specs & Efficiency

• Mediatek Dimensity 7300X not an amazing performer
• 8GB RAM
• 256GB storage

Motorola has evidently made some financial savings by switching away from the mid-range Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chip of the Razr 40 and adopting the Mediatek Dimensity 7300X.

It’s a roughly equal mid-range processor, that means it ends in very comparable CPU and GPU efficiency. The shortage of progress here’s a little bit of a disgrace, particularly because the Razr 40 was hardly thought-about a high performer on the time of its launch.

My time with the Razr 50 wasn’t with out its situations of lag and stutter in common and pretty low-intensity conditions. It doesn’t unlock with the snap for a real flagship, for instance, whereas I skilled the odd micro-pause throughout navigation, or when leaping between open apps.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

It doesn’t really feel sluggish, precisely. It simply felt like I used to be catching it on the hop on occasion. The supply of 8GB of RAM is a bit of on the low facet, however needs to be greater than sufficient to run everyday duties fluidly. There’s a 12GB variant of the Razr 50 on the market, however not within the UK or the US.

In gaming phrases, Genshin Influence defaults to the bottom graphical settings, and stays playable – if removed from silky-smooth – on Medium settings. When you’re anticipating a gaming powerhouse at this worth, search for one thing with out a hinge.

No less than this solitary mannequin gives a good 256GB of storage. There’s no Micro-SD slot to develop that capability, nevertheless it shouldn’t be an issue for the overwhelming majority of individuals.

Motorola Razr 50 benchmarks

Cameras

• 50Mp foremost digital camera
• 13Mp ultrawide
• 32Mp entrance, however foremost digital camera is method higher at selfies

Fairly impressively, the Razr 50 shares its foremost digital camera with the pricier Razr 50 Extremely. It’s the identical 1/1.95″ 50Mp f/1.7 sensor with PDAF and OIS.

With an inferior processor onboard and the shortage of Motorola’s Photograph Enhancement Engine, nonetheless, this doesn’t end in photos of equal high quality. Certainly, the Razr 50 has a good worse behavior of pumping up colors to an unnatural diploma.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Whether or not taking footage of individuals, sushi, or flowers, I discovered snaps to be over-processed. At instances, they had been positively luminous. In shiny situations, there was loads of element, and cheap HDR implementation, however I additionally seen some blown out highlights. In sure different indoors photographs, the place the lighting was reasonable, I used to be capable of get some well-balanced outcomes.

Evening photographs aren’t something to write down house about although, with a barely flat look and a great deal of glare from synthetic mild sources. Once more, it might do a job, however you may count on higher.

Motorola has caught with a extra conventional 13Mp ultra-wide right here, relatively than following the Extremely and switching to a 2x telephoto. I’m not significantly for or in opposition to both strategy, so long as the ensuing photographs are respectable. All I’d say is that 2x cropped photographs utilizing the primary digital camera have come a great distance, and there’s no strategy to satisfyingly take ultra-wide photographs in a similar way.

Both method, the ultra-wide photographs right here lack the readability and sharpness of the primary sensor. They’re ample, however you may hope for higher. One thing just like the Pixel 9 or the Galaxy S24 would definitely get you higher ultra-wide outcomes.

Nearly the one footage that really impress listed below are selfies, and that’s received nothing to do with the devoted 32Mp entrance digital camera. It’s completely ample, however largely relegated to video name obligation due to the Razr 50’s foldable nature.

The duvet show defaults to displaying a digital camera preview, which signifies that you need to use the primary digital camera for selfies. The standard of those in comparison with these from the entrance digital camera is miles higher. Try these two photographs, the left-hand of which makes use of the selfie cam whereas the opposite makes use of the main-camera-and-cover-display combo.

Motorola consists of some nifty little UI options for such selfies too. You’ll be able to have an animated smiley face seem to make your topics smile (which proved very profitable, at the least the primary few instances I deployed it). You too can prop the telephone up on a flat floor, half opened, and maintain your palm to the digital camera to start out a countdown timer earlier than the picture is taken. It really works like a appeal.

Whether or not taking footage of individuals, sushi, or flowers, I discovered snaps to be over-processed

Maintain the telephone half-folded and on its facet with the digital camera app open, and it’ll enter camcorder mode, counting down from three to start out mechanically recording. Mentioned video footage can hit as much as 4K at 30fps, or 1080p at 60fps.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Battery Life & Charging

• 4200mAh battery
• 30W wired charging help
• 15W wi-fi charging

Motorola has gone with the identical 4200mAh battery within the Razr 50 because it did with the Razr 40. This means that it’s actually larger than the 4000mAh Razr 50 Ultra.

Not that this resulted in superior battery life, unfortunately. In our standard PCMark battery test, the Razr 50 managed 10 hours and 41 minutes. That’s about 25 minutes longer than the Razr 40, but more than 2 hours short of the Razr 50 Ultra.

Given that the Ultra has a bigger, more fluid external display to power, I can only conclude that the Ultra’s more impressive and power efficient processor gains it those extra hours.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

This test reflects more intensive conditions. During my own practical use, which I’d describe as fairly moderate, I was routinely able to get through a full day with around 50% battery left. It’s got genuine two-day potential if you’re a lighter user, which is just the audience these compact foldables are intended for.

I was routinely able to get through a full day with around 50% battery left

The wired charging provision is the same unimpressive 30W as before, but you don’t even get a charging brick in the box this time. Using an Asus 30W charger, I was able to get the phone from empty to 63% in half an hour, and to a full charge in a little under an hour.

Wireless charging has taken a small boost from the Razr 40, moving up from 5W to 15W when using an appropriate Qi charger.

Software & Apps

• Android 14
• Clean and quite close to stock
• Three Android versions, four years of security updates

The Razr 50 runs on Android 14, with Motorola’s light embellishments sprinkled over the top.

It’s not totally free from bloat – did we really need the Opera web browser preinstalled alongside Chrome? Spotify, TikTok, and even Facebook are probably justifiable due to their ubiquity, but I would still rather have been given the choice at set-up. There’s never any excuse for LinkedIn, though, especially on this most un-businesslike of phones.

Motorola’s embellishments are usually well received, and nowhere is that more apparent than within the Moto app. This stylish, streamlined app serves as an introduction to everything extra Motorola has to offer.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

You can access all of the available gestures through this app. By default you can do things like double-chop to turn on the torch or double twist to jump into the camera app. But you can also activate lift to unlock, flip for do not disturb, and other handy physical actions.

Much of what’s here is common to any regular Motorola smartphone from the past few years, so let’s turn to the company’s foldable features. We’ve discussed some of the camera benefits in the previous section, which leaves that external display.

The interface is like a shrink-wrapped take on the main UI, together with drop-down control centre and swipe-up-and-hold app switcher menu.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

You can run a number of apps in reduced fashion from the Razr 50’s 3.6-inch cover display, including Google apps like Photos, Gmail, Maps, and Messages. You can also run Google’s Gemini AI assistant here, which is something you can’t do on the Galaxy Z Flip 6.

Even so, the confined nature of the cover display makes it better suited to widgets and simple notifications than full apps. On the widget front, you can add full-screen applets for the likes of Weather, Calendar, and your chosen music player.

The confined nature of the cover display makes it better suited to widgets and simple notifications than full apps

The Motorola Razr 50 comes with the promise of three main Android OS updates and four years of security updates. That’s fine for most people, but not all that hot by modern foldable standards, where the Galaxy Z Flip 6 offers seven years of both.

Price & Availability

In the UK, Motorola Razr 50 is available direct from the Motorola website, as well as via third-party retailers including Amazon, for £799.99.

Within the US, the identical mannequin (referred to as the Motorola Razr 2024) can also be obtainable from the Motorola web site and through Amazon, nevertheless it solely prices $699.99.

On contract, see the perfect choices beneath.

That outright worth is £200/$300 cheaper than the Razr 50 Extremely, and £250/$400 cheaper than the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6.

It’s nonetheless in direction of the costly finish of issues in smartphone phrases, nevertheless it feels downright low-cost for a foldable telephone. The one telephone that undercuts it’s the Nubia Flip 5G, however that telephone makes far more compromises to hit its £499/$499 price ticket.

See extra options in our information to the perfect folding telephones.

Do you have to purchase the Motorola Razr 50?

With the Razr 50, Motorola has introduced its entry-level foldable extra according to the premium Razr 50 Extremely. The easy addition of a bigger, extra useful cowl show has made the Razr 50 right into a viable various.

It could really feel downright low-cost if it weren’t for the US mannequin, referred to as the Razr 2024, which is priced considerably decrease.

It’s good to see the primary digital camera getting some love, with a superior foremost 50Mp sensor that matches the Razr 50 Extremely. Nonetheless, a scarcity of superior processing smarts signifies that the photographs aren’t as superior, which may be a bit of robust to simply accept whenever you’re paying this a lot. The shortage of progress when it come sto efficiency is disappointing, too.

With all that mentioned, the Razr 50 stays essentially the most compelling foldable entry level in the marketplace, undercutting Samsung’s broadly comparable Flip 6 whereas offering a telephone that’s arguably extra satisfying to make use of.

Specs

• Android 14
• 6.9-inch FHD+, OLED, 120Hz, foldable show
• Aspect-mounted fingerprint sensor
• Mediatek Dimensity 7300X
• 8GB RAM
• 256GB storage
• 50Mp, f/1.7 foremost digital camera
• 13Mp f/2.2 ultra-wide digital camera
• As much as 4K @ 30fps rear video
• 32Mp front-facing digital camera
• Stereo audio system
• Twin-SIM
• Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/6e
• Bluetooth 5.4
• 4200mAh battery
• 30W charging
• 73.99 x 171.30 x 7.25 mm (open), 73.99 x 88.08 x 15.85 mm (folded)
• 188g
• Launch colors: Meteorite Grey, Moonlight White, Celestial Blue