Motorola’s foldable phone may not be the best, but the price is very low. As you guys know, this time the Razr 40 has once again set a record for the lowest price of a foldable phone. In China, its lowest price is only about $560, which is about the same price as a normal sub-flagship phone. I’m sure there are already some people who are excited to click into this video to see if the Razr 40 Standard Edition is worth buying, right? This video will give you the answer.
Unboxing
While there is a big difference in price, the accessories they have are almost the same. They both have 33W chargers. The manual, warranty card, and SIM pin. The only difference is that the Ultra version has a free case, while the standard version does not.
Design
Good design is very important for a foldable phone, and Moto understands this very well. Although the Razr 40 is cheap, it didn’t take a step back in terms of design. All three colors are made of vegan leather with a frosted metal frame. It looks better than the black 40 Ultra. When they are folded, the outer screen on the Ultra version doesn’t look as good as the standard version if it’s not lit up.
There is one thing that the standard version does better than the Ultra, the SIM slot can finally hold two SIM cards instead of eSIM. but there is one thing that they both don’t do well, it’s USB 2.0 on both phones. They all support standing at any angle, and there is no difference in functionality. whatever the Ultra version can do, the standard version can do as well. Just from the design point of view, I think the standard version does a very good job, even better than the Ultra version.
Display
Compared to the Razr 40 Ultra, the external screen on the standard version is really small, like those old foldable phones released two or three years ago. This small 1.5-inch screen can only display the most basic information, so there’s no way to reply to messages like the Ultra, let alone open some apps.
The internal screen of these two phones has a much smaller gap in user experience compared to the external screen. The screen panel on both phones is actually the same, both are 6.9-inch FHD+ OLED screens, and both support DC dimming as well, maximum brightness is 1,400 nits. But It’s clear that Motorola wants the Ultra to be a step up over the standard version because the refresh rate is higher on the Ultra and the bezels are narrower. So the 40 Ultra will look better in theory, but the difference is so small that you can’t tell who’s better in everyday use.
So my recommendation is, If you’re the type of person who uses your phone less frequently, the Ultra version should suit you better because you can do a lot of things with the outer screen. But if you tend to use it unfolded like me, the standard version should be about the same experience as the Ultra.
Performance & Gaming
Besides the external screen being downgraded, the performance of the Razr 40 isn’t that powerful either. The Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 in the Razr 40 can hardly be called a good processor, and is just as notorious as the Snapdragon 888 and 8 Gen 1. The peak performance looks good but the long-term performance output is poor because it tends to heat up. The scores on many benchmarks are really bad compared to the 8+ Gen 1 on the Ultra.
That’s probably the main reason why a lot of people don’t want to buy the standard version. I can understand that, but is the Razr 40 Ultra really much better than the standard version in gaming?
So looking at the frame rate graph or the thermal imaging photos, the difference between them in the Genshin Impact isn’t as big as the scores. Their frame rates are all locked at 30fps due to heat control. As a result, the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 didn’t really do it more favors than the 7 Gen 1. What a waste of this chipset… Apart from the fact that the standard version fluctuates a little bit more during battles, it’s hard to believe that the gaming performance of these two phones is actually about the same.
So you might ask, how come that the two processors are so different, while the gaming performance is so similar? As you can see from the stress test and the thermal image, the Ultra’s performance is clearly being limited intentionally to keep the body temperatures lower. These two phones have completely blown out my mind. I don’t know if I should be happy for the standard version users or sad for the Ultra users.
Camera
It’s not just the games, even the camera on the standard version is better than I expected. I mean, it takes about the same level of photos as the Razr 40 Ultra with a less competitive sensor. Without the watermark, you shouldn’t be able to tell which photo was taken by the Standard Edition. Most of the time the photos taken are very similar, both in a more colorful style.
Of course, if you were to zoom in to get a closer look, they’re still a little different. It’s hard to tell, but it’s true that the Ultra’s dynamic range is a little better. The Ultra Wide Angle camera on the standard version has a bit wider field of view. However, there is more sharpening on the Standard version and the fur looks more natural on the Ultra. Due to the higher amount of pixels, the standard version can get sharper photos when shooting far away, but the Ultra has less noise in darker areas thanks to its larger sensor.
Overall, they have their merits, but the difference is not huge. In my point of view, they are in a class of their own, both are pretty good.
Video recording on the standard version is much worse than it on the Ultra. The main camera, apart from not supporting 4K 60fps, has a clearly inferior stabilization algorithm than the Ultra. This should be a result of limited processor performance, we get the same result even switching to the Ultra Wide Angle Camera. And this camera performs even worse, sometimes it would go in and out of focus, and that just ruins the footage.
For video samples, you guys can watch the video at the beginning of the article.
Battery & Charging
The Razr 40 has a larger battery than the Ultra version. However, due to the poor performance of the 7 Gen 1, the battery life is actually not as good as the Ultra version. This is one of the reasons why the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 is the favorite of many people.
The wired charging power is the same 30w for both of them, and the charging speed is of course about the same. The time required for a full charge is around an hour. Both support 8w wireless charging as well, and I’m glad that even on the standard version this feature is still there.
Conclusion
When I finished the script for this review video, I realized that the Razr 40 Standard isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It’s on par with the Ultra version in terms of photography, hinge, internal screen, charging, and design. Even if you spend the extra money to get the Ultra version, there isn’t much of an improvement in performance. The size of the external screen really doesn’t matter much to me, so I certainly prefer the standard version over the 40 Ultra.
I wouldn’t make it my main phone though because the gaming experience on both phones is so bad, but I would recommend it to those people who are obsessed with foldable phones and don’t play large 3D games. Finally, there is a cheap option for you.
