If Motorola won’t fix its poor Android updates now, when will it?

Last month’s announcement of the Motorola Razr Ultra took me by surprise, mostly in a good way. As the highest-end Razr foldable we’ve ever seen, the Ultra has quite a lot going for it — including the latest flagship Snapdragon chip, significantly faster charging, a promising camera system, and some ridiculous new colors/finishes (including a wood version that looks incredible).

There is a cost for those high-end specs, however. The Razr Ultra is priced at $1,300, making it not only the most capable Razr phone to date, but also the most expensive.

Is $1,300 too much money for what the Razr Ultra brings to the table? We won’t know for sure until we fully review the phone, but I do know one thing is certain. If Motorola is going to charge this much for a phone, it has to fix its bad update policy. And if Motorola hasn’t done it with the Razr Ultra, I’m worried it may never.

Ranting about Motorola’s lacking Android updates is not a new talking point in 2025. It’s something the company has long struggled with, and, if anything, its policies have only gotten more confusing as time has gone on.

As it stands today, budget Motorola phones typically receive two major Android OS updates and three years of security updates. This includes phones like the Moto G Power (2025) and Moto G Stylus (2025). When you step up to a more expensive phone — such as a Motorola Edge or Razr device — you get boosted to three years of OS upgrades and four years of security updates. It’s better, though still significantly behind what other manufacturers offer.

Late last year, Motorola launched the mid-range Edge 50 Neo in Europe and India. Earlier this year, the company launched the Moto G75 and ThinkPhone 25. While there’s nothing particularly special about the phones’ hardware or specs, they stand out as the first handsets from Motorola with its best update policy yet: five years of Android OS and security updates. It’s the longest update guarantee we’ve ever seen from the company, and it gave me hope that Motorola had finally listened to our repeated complaints.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.

The new Motorola Razr (2025) and Razr Plus (2025) — just like their predecessors — both have the same update guarantee of three years for Android OS upgrades with four years of security updates. That’s frustrating enough for phones that cost $700 and $1,000, respectively, but it’s all the more infuriating that the $1,300 Razr Ultra is slapped with the same paltry update policy.

It shouldn’t be a hot take to say that a $1,300 smartphone deserves to be updated for more than three years. That should also be true of $1,000 and $700 phones, but especially so when we’re talking about one of the most expensive Android phones on the market today.

I’ve heard some arguments that, because the Razr Ultra is a folding phone, three years is enough. Given the lifespan of folding phones and how often people who buy foldables tend to upgrade, there’s an argument that three years is fine.

However, I don’t buy that argument — not for a minute. Whether we’re talking about a folding or non-folding phone, a device of the Razr Ultra’s caliber and price demands software support to match its flagship nature.

Google and Samsung have offered seven years of Android OS updates for a while now, for both their folding and non-folding phones alike. Why? Because that’s what you should expect when you spend this much money on a high-end smartphone. Can you imagine if Samsung only provided three years of updates for the Galaxy Z Flip 6? If Google promised just three years of updates for the Pixel 9 Pro Fold? Each company would be dragged through the coals until they fixed it, and rightfully so.

Motorola’s lackadaisical approach to software updates doesn’t surprise me these days. It’s a point of contention we’ve all had to deal with for years, and at least once a year, I find myself writing something lamenting the situation. But the years keep passing, Motorola keeps releasing expensive flagship smartphones, and nothing really changes.

At this point, I find myself wondering if this will ever change. Motorola has had ample opportunities to improve its Android updates, and if the company doesn’t deem a $1,300 smartphone worthy of more than three years of support, I’m not sure what will finally push Motorola over the edge. A $1,300 slab phone? A $2,000 book-style folding phone? Maybe, nothing at all.

I’m usually not a glass-half-empty type of guy, but I can’t help but feel pessimistic about this whole thing. If the Razr Ultra isn’t the phone that gets Motorola to fix its poor Android updates, I’m worried nothing will.