Razr Ultra remains the best-looking phone on the market
▼ Summary
– The 2026 Motorola Razr Ultra has a new main camera sensor, a slightly larger 5,000mAh battery, and a higher price of $1,499, up from $1,299.
– The phone retains the same Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset and 512GB/16GB RAM storage as the 2025 model, with the price increase likely due to a memory shortage.
– New design options include a wood-finish back panel and a suede-like Alcantara finish in orient blue, praised for being visually appealing and tactile.
– Camera updates include a new 50-megapixel sensor with LOFIC technology for improved high dynamic range, and a camcorder mode that allows zoom by tilting the device.
– A new Frame Match mode lets users take a reference photo to overlay framing for someone else taking a picture, ensuring correct composition.
Look, if you’re hoping for a radical overhaul on the 2026 Motorola Razr Ultra, you’ll be disappointed. The upgrades are modest: a new main camera sensor, a slightly larger battery, and a price hike to $1,499, up from $1,299. But what hasn’t changed is that this remains one of the most striking phones you can buy.
The wood-finish back panel makes a return, and it’s now joined by a suede-like Alcantara option in orient blue. To everyone who has told me over the past year that “phones are boring now” , and that’s a lot of Verge readers , just look at these devices. They are anything but boring. They feel premium, they look distinctive, and they are incredibly photogenic.
That’s the good news. The bad news is, well, it’s 2026. For $1,499, you get the same 512GB storage and 16GB RAM configuration that cost $200 less last year. The chipset is also unchanged, still the Snapdragon 8 Elite. The battery has grown to a 5,000mAh silicon-carbon cell from last year’s 4,700mAh, and the main camera now uses a larger 50-megapixel sensor with a new technology called LOFIC for better high dynamic range performance. These are nice improvements, but the price increase likely reflects the ongoing memory shortage.
There are a few other tweaks. The inner display now hits 5,000 nits of peak brightness, up from 4,500 nits on the 2025 model. The outer screen is protected by Gorilla Glass Ceramic 3, which promises better drop resistance than its predecessor.
Along with the other two Razr models, the Ultra introduces some new camera features. When shooting video in camcorder mode with the phone bent at 90 degrees, you can tilt the whole device left or right to zoom in and out. The movement is not visible in the final clip, as the phone uses its gyro sensor and image stabilization to correct it in post-processing, keeping the horizon steady.
There’s also a mode called Frame Match, designed for those awkward moments when you need to hand your phone to a stranger. You take a reference photo with the desired framing, then step in front of the camera. Whoever you hand the phone to will see that reference overlaid, so they can match the composition. The goal is to prevent someone from accidentally cropping out the background you wanted. Personally, I’m too anxious to explain this to a stranger taking my family’s photo, but it worked well enough when I tested it.
Like the rest of the 2026 Razr lineup, the Ultra will be available for preorder on May 14th and launches on May 21st.
(Source: The Verge)
