Cell Phones / Expert Reviews

Back in April when we caught the first look of the HTC Sensation 4G, we were thrilled by its design and complete feature set. It was obvious that HTC had put a massive effort into developing it.
It is December 2011 now and we’re talking HTC Vivid. The phone has practically the same specs and functionality,... More

As we’ve seen, they perform very similarly in a variety of key areas, but they have their own specialty refinements that make them stand out. If we had to base it on looks alone and nothing else, there’s no arguing that the Motorola DROID RAZR is the ubiquitous winner, since it’s literally... More

As we’ve seen, they perform very similarly in a variety of key areas, but they have their own specialty refinements that make them stand out. If we had to base it on looks alone and nothing else, there’s no arguing that the Motorola DROID RAZR is the ubiquitous winner, since it’s literally... More

The LG Nitro HD comes very close to earning a "very good" rating from me, but will have to settle for "good." The reason is mostly due to the exceedingly poor voice performance. Even though we use our smartphones more for data-centric tasks, the phone has to be at least serviceable as a telephone. The... More

The Samsung Captivate Glide is going to appeal to a particular user - the one that wants a physical keyboard but also wants a reasonably modern device that has at least some high-end features. Thankfully, the Captivate Glide impresses on most fronts, and has only a few weaknesses. Those who want a high-powered... More

The Galaxy Nexus is the best Android device available, hands-down. For power, comfort and flexibility it’s outstanding, and it will be the standard for performance and UI going forward. Unfortunately, critical flaws keep it from being the best Android phone, at least right now. Poor signal and... More

With thunderstorms of anticipation surrounding this device and a stack of specifications that didn’t seem to be all that much of a jump from the current top tier of smartphone devices in the market already, I was skeptical that this Nexus would impress my day to day mobile life the way the Nexus... More

The Huawei Honor, while not the best phone on the planet by a long shot, has the potential to be a very good midranger. There are several red flags though when it comes to aspects of the camera and call quality, and I didn't feel I was able to accurately test data speeds at all. Still, 720p video capture... More

Simply put, the Galaxy Nexus is the best phone from Google yet. If you can deal with a few of the gripes like sketchy battery life and poor app selection, you're going to love it

Undeniably, Verizon Wireless customers are surely lucky because the Samsung Galaxy Nexus managed to make its landing this year – as opposed to being delayed to next year. Who cares that the carrier missed out with a Galaxy S II model of its own, well, customers have consolation knowing that the... More

Throughout the course of my testing, I kept finding myself thinking, why isn't this phone free? The Illusion has the makings of an excellent entry-level smartphone, the kind you get for free with a two-year contract. While it's a solid starter device, there are too many other good options on Verizon... More

There were few surprises in our assessment of the Stratosphere, if any. It's meant to be a budget offering on Verizon's LTE lineup, and certainly includes specs indicative of that fact. However, we still couldn't shake the idea that this is little more than an LTE-enhanced version of a device from the... More

Despite the many minor flaws in Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, most Android users will be happy with the upgraded appearance and overall functionality of the software. The integration across Google's (growing) services is spectacular. Most of the issues I've pointed out in the controls in this review... More

As I said when I reviewed the GSM version of the Galaxy Nexus — this is one of the best smartphones ever made. The addition of Verizon's killer 4G service makes it almost undeniably awesome, though those improved data speeds obviously come with a price. Namely, battery life. There are also other... More

Say what you will about Samsung, we’ve had our gripes in the past, but you can’t dispute the fact that the company puts out fantastic hardware. Verizon’s Galaxy Nexus is no exception. The second thing you’ll notice is the device’s beautiful design. We can’t stress... More

We already knew more-or-less what we were getting with the Verizon rendition of the Galaxy Nexus, and ultimately it delivers. Yes, battery life predictably takes a hit compared to the HSPA+ when you enable LTE, and it's safe to say this version of the phone has a bit more to love than the earlier release,... More

The Samsung Captivate Glide is aiming for the interest of a special group of people – the messaging and social network junkies, which abound here in the United States. We believe that, especially for those who are already fond of Android, the device will be a welcome upgrade. It also has plenty... More

If you can’t wrap your mind (or fingers) around the idea of relying solely a on-screen keyboard, you should absolutely buy the Captivate Glide. In effect, the phone is a slightly smaller, much thicker Galaxy S II — a very good phone — with a QWERTY keyboard underneath. The keyboard... More

We still have issues with the operating system itself—for instance, shoving Bing in front of your face, which we found often came up with inferior results for those on mobile phones. For instance, if we look for videos on Android or iOS, the results are primarily from YouTube, which has mobile-compatible... More

The best Android phone to date, hands down. Improvements in Ice Cream Sandwich make it much easier to use. Super AMOLED screen is bright and crisp. Cool features like Face Unlock and NFC-powered Beam take phone-based parlor tricks to a new level. Data Usage tool provides granular graphs for us OCD types... More