First impressions of the Razer Phone

The iPhone X and the Razer phone were two of the most celebrated phones of 2017. Both were billed as revolutionary, albeit in different ways.

Razer boasts that its phone is the ultimate gaming experience, with a screen capable of vibrant HDR colours, a 120Hz display allowing for animation twice as smooth as any other handset, and even Dolby Atmos sound through dual speakers.

Impressive specs. But how is the phone in reality? We took it for a spin to see what the Razer Phone could do.

Knives Out

I’ve been playing Knives Out -- a smartphone clone of the hit PC game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds from NetEase -- for the past few weeks on my iPhone X. Playing the same game on the Razer Phone really highlighted a lot of this phone’s advantages.

The screen was bright and colorful, displaying the island battleground clearly. It helps that it’s physically large too -- making it easier to spot buildings or players in the distance. I was impressed with how well the game ran, which could be down to the Razer Phone’s beefy processor or 8GB of RAM.

The speakers produced great sound, but a bigger advantage had nothing to do with audio. The big bezels on either side of the screen that house the speakers may not make the phone as nice to look at as other modern smartphones, but they’re far more functional -- holding the phone felt natural and was much more comfortable when playing Knives Out. The phone’s physical size may make it less convenient in some ways, but it felt great for gaming.

Arena of Valor

Next up, I tried Tencent’s Arena of Valor -- one of the most popular mobile games in the world, and one of the few properly enhanced for the Razer Phone. It supports the phone’s 120Hz screen, arguably its main selling point as all of its competitors are stuck with 60Hz screens. That means apps, games, even just the general scrolling animation of the phone can be twice as smooth as other handsets.