Motorola Razr review

The legendary Moto brand gets reborn in an Android skin

Motorola Razr review
The definitive Motorola Razr review

Why you can trust TechRadar We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.

Motorola razr review

Contacts

The contacts system on the Motorola Razr isn't much different to most other Android phones on the market, with the ability to join and separate accounts to a single person available.

Like the Samsung range, it's not the easiest thing in the world to link up your buddies - you have to press the menu key once inside their profile and select 'Join' to choose from a list of social networking accounts that they could belong to. It's a world away from the ease with which HTC manages it with HTC Sense.

Motorola razr review

If there's already a lot of information in the contact card, then sometimes you'll have to dig even deeper to find the 'Join' functionality, which can be irritating if you have hundreds of people on your phone... you lucky, popular thing, you.

Motorola razr review

However, there is a fairly nifty widget on the home screen that lets you select your favourite friends and have them arranged in a grid formation to look at whenever you like, which makes it a lot easier to stay in touch.

Calling

We're getting a little bored of saying call quality is 'fine' on today's smartphones, and usually all we can comment on is the volume of the speakerphone.

However, there's a definite issue with the earphone on the Motorola Razr, as making a call means you can hear a definite 'chirrup', almost like a very slight echo, whenever sound comes into your ear, which is a little annoying and ruins the premium feel of the phone.

Motorola razr review

That aside, we can't really fault the Razr for calling ability though, as it was above average at maintaining signal, even in areas where we've previously struggled to get it going.

There's also smart dialling too, so when you fire up the easy to use dialler, simply tap out the corresponding letters to the persons' name on the phone and the Razr will work out the possible matches, making it very easy to search for people you want to chat to.

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.