Motorola’s likely going to announce its next Razr phone lineup in the coming weeks, continuing the foldable Android phone line. There are already a number of rumors pertaining to it. We expect to see a base Razr, a Razr Plus and Razr Ultra, as Motorola continues to refine its take on the flip-style phone.

While the company hasn’t yet teased any of these, we do know that any new flip-style phones will join Motorola’s book-style Razr Fold, which is set to go on sale this summer. 

Until Motorola does provide a look into its next line of flip phones, here’s what we heard around the internet regarding the rumored phones’ new designs, improved cameras and beefier specs.

Release date and price

We haven’t heard of an official release date for the 2026 Motorola Razr just yet, but since last year’s Motorola Razr launched in early to mid-May, we’re expecting the same for this year too. As for price, we’re guessing they’ll either stay the same (the 2025 Razr starts at $700) or be more expensive due to the global RAM shortage and other world events.

Motorola has raised the price of some phones in its lower-cost Moto G line over their prior models, and it is possible the Razr line might follow suit.

Motorola’s UK website has begun preorders for the Razr Fold with an £1,800 price for a model with 16GB of memory and 512GB of storage. Those preorders will be shipping in that country on May 6. However, pricing and availability will likely be different for the US market, which has yet to announce those details. For comparison, Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 7 costs £1,799 for a 256GB model, and starts at $2,000 in the US.

When it comes to the Razr Plus and Razr Ultra, if last year’s prices are any indication, they’ll probably be around the $1,000 ballpark or higher. 

Design and display

According to recent rumors, the design of the 2026 Razr will likely be similar to its predecessor. It’ll have the famous clamshell design and the smaller Quick View display on the cover.

Color-wise, Moto is expected to introduce new colors to the Razr lineup. Some rumors say they’ll be called hematite, sparkling green and pink, while others say they could be hematite, sporting green and violet ice. All of these colors are from Motorola’s Pantone collaboration. Leaker Evan Blass recently posted some rendered images of what could be the Razr’s base colors. The Razr Ultra, according to Android Headlines, is expected to ship in an Orient blue alcantara, a Pantone cocoa wood and an African violet. 

Another particularly interesting rumor is that the new Razrs won’t just come in new colors but new textures as well. We’re hearing that they’ll come in a fabric-like texture, a carbon-fiber-like texture and one additional finish that’s yet to be identified. Apparently, the Sparkling Green will have the carbon-fiber texture while the Hematite will have the fiber texture. 

Unfortunately for those who prefer slender handhelds, there’s some speculation that the 2026 Razr Ultra will actually be bulkier than its predecessor. Leaker OnLeaks says that the phone will be 3.46 by 2.92 by 0.62 inches when folded and 6.74 by 2.92 by 0.3 inches when unfolded. That makes it just 0.02 inches thicker in its unfolded state when compared to the 2025 Razr. (The 2025 Razr, by comparison, is 0.28 inches thick unfolded and 0.62 inches thick folded.) While 0.02 inches is only a smidge thicker, it’s not great if you were hoping for the Razr to become a slimmer handset. 

Display-wise, the new Razr is said to have similar specs to the 2025 version. It’s expected to have a 6.9-inch OLED display when unfolded and a 3.63-inch OLED panel to use while folded.

Camera upgrades

Recent rumors seem to indicate that the base 2026 Motorola Razr could have a camera upgrade. The 2025 version has a 50-megapixel rear camera plus a 13-megapixel ultrawide. New speculation, however, brings those specs up to the Razr Plus level.

Android Authority has heard that it could have a 50-megapixel main rear camera along with a 50-megapixel telephoto lens with 3x zoom. We haven’t heard too much about the specs for the 2026 Razr Plus and Ultra, however.

Rumored specs and performance

Eagle-eyed folks on the internet recently spotted the Motorola Razr 2026 listing on TENAA, which is China’s Telecommunication Equipment Certification Center. The listing revealed some key specs. According to Phone Arena, the new Moto Razr could come with massive amounts of RAM — 8, 12, 16 or 18GB RAM. 

Other specs include an Octa-core 2.75 GHz processor, a 4,500-mAh battery and 33W charging capabilities. It could also come in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB and 1TB storage variants. 

Though the storage and RAM options sound impressive, especially with the global RAM shortage, Android Police warns that these upgrades might not be available in the US. The outlet points out that international models of the Razr last year included higher storage and RAM specs than what was available in the US. Motorola does often release higher-end phones in other countries, such as the Motorola Signature. It remains unclear if the specs seen here are only for the Chinese market. 

Motorola Razr vs. Razr Plus vs. Razr Ultra vs. Razr Fold

Aside from the above leaks, we haven’t heard too much about the 2026 Razr Plus. That said, it stands to reason that the Plus will have slightly more premium specs when compared to the base Razr. As for the Ultra, it looks like it could have the same processor as last year. According to Android Headlines, the Razr Ultra looks to have the Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. However, Android Headlines also says that it could ship with a bigger battery — a 5,000-mAh battery, to be exact. That’s about a 6% bump over its predecessor. 

That’s why, for many, the most exciting handset in Moto’s upcoming lineup is the book-style Razr Fold.

According to our hands-on earlier this year, the Razr Fold has the following specs: a 6.6-inch external display, an 8.1-inch internal display, a measurement of 4.6mm thick when open and 9.9mm thick when closed, a triple 50-megapixel camera system plus a 32-megapixel selfie camera on the cover and a 20-megapixel selfie on the inside, and a 6,000-mAh battery.

It’s also powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 processor. It comes in Pantone blackened blue (textured back) and Pantone lily white (smooth and matte). 

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle has a fun topic, but get ready to do some serious unscrambling of lengthy answers. If you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story. 

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Not too much.

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: Is it on sale?

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

• VICE, VICES, SHEER, FOLD, FOLDER, FOLDERS, BALD, CHEAP, HEAP

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

• SALE, BUDGET, BARGAIN, INEXPENSIVE, AFFORDABLE

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is ONTHECHEAP. To find it, start with the O that’s three letters to the right on the top row, and wind down.

Toughest Strands puzzles

Here are some of the Strands topics I’ve found to be the toughest.

#1: Dated slang. Maybe you didn’t even use this lingo when it was cool. Toughest word: PHAT.

#2: Thar she blows! I guess marine biologists might ace this one. Toughest word: BALEEN or RIGHT. 

#3: Off the hook. Again, it helps to know a lot about sea creatures. Sorry, Charlie. Toughest word: BIGEYE or SKIPJACK.

As the precursor to today’s iPhones and foldable phones, landlines were once a staple in every home. While they may seem like ancient technology, they still might have a role to play today in your home — especially during a major mobile network outage.

Outages can leave you stranded without one of your most critical lines of access to the world for hours if you’re reliant only on a cellphone. And if your smartphone can’t make phone calls, it’s not much good in an emergency.

You might reconsider the role of this home device, once standard issue but now nearly obsolete. Here’s what to think about when deciding whether to keep (or get) a landline.

Remember the landline?

Landlines are telephones that connect to specialized wiring in our homes. The iconic image is that of a rotary-dial phone — usually rented from the phone company — that either hung on the wall or sat on a counter or table, though push-button and later cordless landlines replaced many of those oldsters in the 1980s. Landline phones connect through a global communication network that was built over more than a century. But as cellphones became broadly available and affordable, many people chose to drop their landlines altogether. 

A 2022 survey by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that only about 29% of US adults lived in a house with a landline phone, down from more than 90% in 2004. The crossover happened over 10 years ago, in 2015, when smartphone sales entered a boom period that reshaped the tech industry and helped turn iPhone-maker Apple into one of the world’s most highly valued companies.

Ann Williams is one of the folks who hasn’t given up on their landlines yet. When asked why she keeps hers around, she describes moving to Huntsville, Alabama, after a tornado outbreak on April 27, 2011, when dozens of twisters killed at least 250 people and knocked out power for days. Although she moved there after the tornadoes, hearing about the event brought home to her the importance of always needing a phone connection.

«The weather here is so unpredictable,» she told me in an interview. But landlines have dedicated power and often work even in an outage. «We remember a day when it was absolutely necessary to have (the landline),» Williams said.

What makes landline phones more reliable

Landline phones operate on a separate infrastructure, built from copper phone lines that are inexpensive to build and rather reliable. They also don’t have the drawbacks of cellular networks, like dropped calls, poor and distorted quality or weak reception.

A key reason people keep landlines around is that they tend to work even during power outages, which is a big plus for folks whose work involves emergency services, business or health care.

Analog fax machines are also built around landline phone systems, which means most hospitals and doctors’ offices, as well as policy and law offices, need to keep a landline connection running.

The downsides of landlines

The US Federal Communications Commission has effectively ended the requirement that phone companies provide traditional analog landlines, and carriers are actively retiring them in favor of newer technologies. As a result, more homes and business offices are being built with Ethernet jacks rather than phone jacks.

Landline phone connections aren’t cheap, either. Standalone home phone plans from big carriers like AT&T can run about $25 to $70 per month, depending on the plan and features. CenturyLink’s home phone service starts around $30 per month, and other providers, such as Spectrum, often charge around $30 or more for basic voice service, with lower promotional rates sometimes available when bundled with internet or TV.

And not all landlines use copper phone lines. Increasingly, companies are piggybacking their phone systems on their internet connections, a service called Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP. AllConnect currently tracks only three service providers offering old-style landlines: CenturyLink, Comcast Xfinity and Cox. 

How to get a new landline service

If you’re ready to get set up with a landline, call your local phone company to learn about phone services. If you live in an apartment building, it’s important for you to find out where the phone junction box is. Typically, the landlord should know, and if not, the local phone company should be able to find it.

Here are some follow-up questions you want to ask, and what to look for in the answers:

• Are the landlines VoIP or are they POTS? Ideally, if you’re looking for security and reliability, POTS is what you want. VoIP can work, but understand that it likely relies on your internet modem and connection. 
• If VoIP, does the company have backup power systems to ensure the voice line remains operational during a power outage? Most companies sell backup batteries that you can buy directly from them. You can use an uninterrupted power supply, perhaps from CyberPower or APC. Do note that these are different from portable power supplies. Portable power supplies do allow you to stay electronically powered on the go, but those aren’t meant to continuously monitor for power outages and then kick in as needed.
• Typically, local calls are free, but dialing out of your area code costs. What’s the rate structure? Companies like AT&T charge extra fees tor nationwide and international long-distance calls. Long-distance calls in particular are usually charged per minute, and companies don’t always publish that information on their websites. Make sure you know what it’ll cost, and if it’s too much, consider using a chat app like Signal, WhatsApp, Google Meet or Apple FaceTime for your long-distance calls instead.

What should you do with a landline phone?

If you have a landline but leave it languishing, just sucking money out of your bank account each month, you aren’t alone. But there are some ways to make it more useful.

Google Voice is a popular option that gives you a new phone number acting as a central hub. When someone calls, Google Voice rings all the phones you’ve connected, whether it’s a home landline, a cellphone, a work phone or anything else.

There are other such services too, including Zoom and RingCentral, if you don’t like working with Google. 

A landline phone can also connect with home security systems and medical alert sensors to help ensure that if you’re in an emergency, help will be there as soon as possible.

What to do if you can’t get a landline connected

If you’re ineligible for a landline or don’t like the service being offered, you do have more options from satellite providers. Companies such as HughesNet and SpaceX can support VoIP over their internet connections.

Phone makers like Apple are also slowly building satellite messaging into their devices. The iPhone has a feature called Emergency SOS, which can connect with a satellite to send location data to your friends or an emergency text to authorities.