Bottom line: Motorola was expected to announce a refreshed version of its folding Razr smartphone at a launch event last week. At the 11th hour, however, Motorola canned the event without any explanation. Now more than a week later, the smartphone maker has finally unveiled the iconic clamshell and some will no doubt be disappointed by its lack of availability.
Let's go ahead and get the bad news out of the way up front. Motorola is only launching the Razr 2022 in China, at least for now. With any luck, they'll reconsider and bring it to more markets but we'll have to wait and see how that plays out.
The new Razr features a 6.7-inch foldable P-OLED FHD+ panel with a 144Hz refresh rate and support for HDR10+ as well as a 2.7-inch P-OLED cover display that can be used as a viewfinder for the rear cameras or to check messages and alerts. The outer screen is accompanied by dual cameras - a 13-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a 50-megapixel OIS-enabled shooter. A hole-punch camera on the main display relies on a 32-megapixel sensor.
Under the proverbial hood is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC that can be paired with up to 12GB of RAM and 512GB of UFS 3.1 storage. It'll ship running Android 12 with Motorola's UI on top, and packs a 3,500mAh battery with support for a 33W fast charger. Other amenities include dual SIM support, 5G, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC and a USB-C port.
The Motorola Razr 2022 is set to launch in China on August 15. Pricing starts at 5999 Yuan (about $890) for a model with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of onboard storage and scales up to 7299 ($1,082) for the 12GB / 512GB variant.
If you're in the market for a foldable clamshell and don't want to wait around to see if Motorola brings the Razr 2022 to other markets, there are some other options to consider. Samsung's new Galaxy Z Flip 4 was announced yesterday and goes on sale August 26 starting at $999. The Razr 5G from 2020 is still available at retail as well, but its mid-range hardware and poor camera make it somewhat difficult to recommend at this point.