Motorola Razr V3: The iPhone of Yesteryear

The phones of the early 2000s have been retroactively dismissed as “dumb” phones, but a more accurate description would be “dedicated phones.” As the world transitioned toward smartphones, these less capable devices were known as “feature phones” for their ability to take photos, play games, and access tailored websites. While they lacked the power of modern smartphones, they prioritized compact dimensions and long battery life.

Most of old cell phones had one problem: they were thick and ugly, often looking like a pear cut in the middle. In contrast, the Motorola Razr V3 was the supermodel of phones: it was slim, gorgeous, and being called “dumb” didn’t make it any less popular.

Before smartphones became mainstream, the Motorola Razr was the spiritual predecessor to the iPhone, transforming phones from a necessity into an object of desire.

Too thin to be seen

Motorola invented cell phones in the 1970s, commercialized them in the 1980s, and popularized them in the 1990s with the Star Trek-inspired StarTAC. However, the company later became infamous for its conservative approval process, which essentially prevented it from bringing anything new to the market, losing market dominance to Nokia.

When veteran engineer Roger Jellicoe saw a concept model for an ultra-thin clamshell phone created by a Motorola design team, he realized it could actually be made – but only if he could keep it a secret. He assembled a team that worked evenings and weekends on a project codenamed “Razor.”

The Razr V3 and what was considered a flip phone 15 years before.

Image credit: CNET (above), Taminator (below)

Jellicoe found an ally in Geoffrey Frost, Motorola’s VP of marketing, who recognized that people didn’t even need to buy the phone – just seeing it would be enough to completely change their perception of the company. But what made it so special, anyway?

Two decades ago, a jeans pocket wasn’t an ideal place for a phone due to pocket dialing. Unlike today’s capacitive touchscreens, which can only be activated by conductive materials, physical buttons could be triggered by any kind of pressure. These accidental button presses would often dial numbers from your speed-dial or recent calls list, who might expect another call from you.

The clamshell form factor was a solution, but it also made phones bulkier and less pocket-friendly. The “Razor” project aimed to revolutionize clamshell designs the way the Apple iPod transformed portable music players.

The phone was ready by 2004. At less than 14mm thick, it was slimmer than most candybar phones even when folded, and when unfolded, it appeared paper-thin. But how did they achieve this level of thinness?

First, the Razr dropped the headphone jack as well as the power connector (some 12 years before the iPhone 7), opting for Mini-USB for both. Most of the backlit keys were placed on a single metal sheet, with bent rubber strips enabling blind typing. The antenna was housed in the phone’s non-foldable chin.

The tiny external display was covered with glass instead of the usual plastic to prevent the phone from bending. The rest of the case wasn’t plastic either; it was made of aluminum, which was uncommon at the time.

A phone for every pocket

After Frost decided to drop the “O” from its name, the Motorola Razr V3 was released in November 2004 for $500 – the equivalent of a modern $800 flagship before adjusting for inflation. People were more than just impressed – they wanted it.

No one cared that internally, the phone was essentially the same as Motorola’s previous clamshell models. It could play music and video, but with just 5.5MB of non-expandable storage, that capability was severely underutilized. Thanks to its shape, the single 0.3MP camera could even be used for selfies.

As production ramped up, the phone became available for as little as $99 with a two-year contract. Within months, it became the best-selling phone in the U.S., seen in the hands of celebrities like David Beckham and Reese Witherspoon, and featured in countless movies and TV shows.

The Razr V3x, released in early 2005, was essentially a “Pro” version, offering 3G, a dedicated selfie camera, higher specifications all around, and a microSD slot. However, it was much thicker and heavier, resembling a more traditional clamshell phone.

Later that same year, the Razr V3i arrived as a direct successor to the V3, retaining the same sleek design while upgrading to a 1.2MP camera and a replaceable microSD card. Some carrier versions of the V3i were among the few Motorola phones to ship with iTunes, which was quickly becoming the most popular way to buy music – after all, this was the heyday of the iPod era.

However, iTunes on Motorola phones was limited to storing 50 or 100 songs (depending on the region), as Apple realized that a phone with full iTunes functionality could spell the end of dedicated music players.

By 2006, the Motorola Razr was outselling the iPod, reaching 50 million lifetime sales in July.

A reflective legacy

Motorola seemingly returned to its old ways after the Razr’s success. The Razr V3xx looked like a combination of the existing V3x and V3i. The Razr2 series, released in 2007, added a 2-inch external touchscreen, but by then it was considered too expensive for a phone without a full keyboard (physical or virtual) – the short-lived Blackberry era – and people continued buying the discounted V3 models instead.

After 12 consecutive quarters as the best-selling phone in the U.S., the Razr V3 series was overtaken by the iPhone 3G in 2008. The Razr was discontinued months later, having sold an estimated 130 million units.

The next phone to use the Razr brand name was the Android-based Motorola Droid Razr, released in 2011.

At 7.1mm thick, it was the thinnest smartphone of its time. However, competitors like the iPhone 4S and Samsung Galaxy SII were already thin enough for most users, and the Razr didn’t do enough to save the company this time.

Motorola’s phone division was purchased by Google in 2012, primarily for its patent portfolio, and sold to Lenovo two years later. The Motorola Razr, one of the first foldable smartphones released in 2020, was named and designed after the V3.

The Razr V3 was a significant stepping stone between the bulky plastic phones of the early 2000s and today’s sleek, expensive smartphones.

It moved phones from handbags into pockets and popularized the use of premium materials. Devices once praised for their performance may be ridiculed years later, but great design is always remembered fondly.