Motorola Razr 2023 1st Impression: I feel Sad

   

     The Motorola Razr 2023 (Razr 40 as it is sometimes called) is available refurbished for under 250 USD. Is this a good buy? Full disclosure, I will not be doing a full seven-day review, as the device will be shipped back after my hands-on, so I can get more content out for you guys. This is a 6.9-inch phone with green faux leather and a tiny cover display. This display is next to useless as it only shows the time, date, and battery percentage, basic camera control, and can be programmed to do things on "double tap" such as take a screenshot, or pause media

    Speaking of battery percentage, the phone is not that good with battery life in my limited, Wi-Fi-only testing. According to AccuBattery it should have about 4 hrs and 30 min of screen-on time with 90% battery... which is not that good in my opinion, especially for phones at this price point which have large batteries and trash chips, so they can last all day. Also the Razr loses out on having a larger cover display which could help you conserve battery. Unfortunately, I did notice some of this drain in my use as well. The cameras are decent for the price point and the application does include a fun photo booth mode which creates a collage-type photo strip for your photos. 

    HOWEVER it does have one neat feature. The phone can double as a USB webcam, no software needed and it can blur the background and track the subject. This works completely offline, no Wifi or extra apps needed, and can use the front or back camera. This becomes especially useful because you can fold the phone negating the need for a holder.

    However, the camera application is laggy and slow, and recording 4K 30fps video really taxes the phone's chip. I noticed the top half of the phone would get warm when I wasn't doing much, so when filming video it would drop frames. The front camera gets plenty of light but is very washed out and does not get the best detail. The hardware of the phone is pretty nice. The screen seems secure after about 2.5 yrs as of writing and while the hinge does make a noise which may leave users feeling uncomfortable, I cannot complain. The phone feels fine and well put together.

    The chip on this phone is good enough. It did launch Riptide faster than my S24 Ultra but it was a step behind in everything else. Slower to load applications, 50 sec slower to write a story about a flying turtle in private AI than my S24 Ultra despite the Razr writing 100 fewer words. However, it is good enough for most tasks. YouTube, IG reels, emails should all be fine on this phone as they would be on any phone, and would be faster than phones of this same offering. For context, the Razr offers double the RAM of the 200 dollar A16 and offers a pretty comparable Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 chip.

    However, if you really pushed the phone with video editing or multitasking it would most likely falter. Poking around the phone or scrolling sometimes feels laggy despite the fact that it has a 144Hz display. The display, of course, folds, but does not get as dark (the blackest blacks) like my Ultra screen does, but most people probably would not notice. Moto's software is fine though the phone is most likely on its last update having launched in 2023 and still coming to me with Android 13 in the year of our Lord 2026. The phone is not as "smart" as its newer 200 dollar counterparts having Google Assistant instead of Moto AI or Gemini. AI is virtually nonexistent on this phone as of my testing, and search is not as good as a polished skin such as One UI. If you want to search for a setting you cannot use the search bar, you MUST go to settings and search for a specific setting.  

    It did have a few cool features such as Ready For on PC which will stream your applications to your PC screen, support for multiple user accounts and Moto family, and an old-fashioned Razr mode which emulates the 2004 Moto Razr meaning you can make calls right from the home screen. Speaking of calls, I did not put my SIM in but I did record audio, and let me tell you the mics are not that good. I was way more muffled than my S24 Ultra. This device does run mostly stock Android which is great for some people and bad for me. It is missing features I would enjoy on One UI or another Android skin.

    This phone made me feel kind of sad, not because it was a bad phone but it just showed me how stagnant tech has become. Even though the S24 Ultra smokes it in processing and cameras (at least in zoom department), Moto is more punchy, and takes "faster" pictures though the broken and laggy camera application kinda mitigates that, and sure it may not have as many portrait options but it felt fine for most people. And that's sad because it means that tech is becoming stagnant. It kinda felt boring to review this phone. More camera and video samples will be uploaded to YouTube. God bless and Tech Talk To You Later