The long-awaited follow-up to the original Motorola Razr is now available with its clamshell foldable display through Telstra plans or outright purchase.
Outright purchase of the foldable will set you back $2699, while repayments on a plan will cost $112.45 per month on a 24-month contract, or $74.97 per month on a 36-month contract. That’s in addition to normal plan costs – which start at $50 per month for 15GB of data.
If the giant price tag alone isn’t enough to make you think twice, it’s worth noting that Samsung’s second foray into foldables has launched too: the Galaxy Z Flip is also available from Telstra for a lot less than the Razr – $2199 outright, or $91.62 per month on a 24-month contract.
Motorola also doesn’t quite come off as confident about its highly-priced foldable, since they aren’t sending out review units to any Australian tech journalists.
Overseas reviews have been middling at best – Wired says the Razr is a “cheap phone in a foldable body,” pointing out the old processor and substandard camera, while The Verge‘s headline put it succinctly; “Folding Flip Phone Flops”.
The Razr’s spec sheet and price tag might not make sense value-wise, but it isn’t a phone you’d buy for specs alone – it’s more of an emotional purchase. The act of flipping a clamshell phone open to answer a call and snapping it shut has a sort of satisfaction that most of the public hasn’t experienced for close to 15 years.
And that experience is sadly something we won’t be able to translate for you, dear reader.
Our hands-on review is available here, but living with a phone for an extended period of time is another beast entirely. What seems good for a short time – as the Razr certainly did – can quickly become a chore to live with, and an expensive phone with a small battery and middling camera mightn’t sit well for those forking out that much.
I kind of understand this, it’s a niche product at a high price that the people who want to buy it will regardless of reviews (which a good one of likely wouldn’t sway people who weren’t already planning to get it) and with the likely reduced amount of units they plan to produce anyway, it would make sense to not spare any of them for reviews anyway.
You look like a beautiful young lady, Scottelle
Goodbye Moto!
It’s a shame Lenovorola could not manage to do a decent retro Moto phone.
I agree Jeni, I had a look at a Moto Razr display model in JB recently. The display was dull and washed out. I’m tipping it’s going to be the biggest flop of year unfortunately