The Razer Edge is fantastic, but who is it for?

After just under an hour of play, Razer’s new Android-powered gaming hardware easily impresses – but I don’t feel much closer to knowing who’s going to buy one.

The Edge is a small, rectangular device with a 6.8-inch touchscreen, powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon chip and running Android – but don’t call it a phone, or at least not where a Razer rep might hear.

Razer is adamant that the Edge isn’t just a smartphone (or tablet, for that matter), but a full-fledged games console. It even comes with its own controller, but really it’s just a detachable gamepad attachment – an upgraded version of the long-running Razer Kishi accessory (which is normally used with it – you know). guessed – a phone).

I got to try Edge for myself at Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Summit, a year after the two companies made waves by collaborating on dev kit hardware for the Snapdragon G3x Gen 1, the chip found now in Edge.

Razer’s Will Powers is quickly moving the Edge – and indeed Razer itself – away from this early hardware. He says Qualcomm handled the industrial design of the dev kit and goes so far as to say he was “very pissed off” to even have the Razer name attached.

There wasn’t much wrong with this dev kit as a proof of concept, but it’s fair to say that Razer went in a different direction with Edge.

The biggest change is the move to a low-profile device with a detachable gamepad. You can’t buy the Kishi V2 Pro anywhere else – just yet – but the form factor is familiar enough, with a split gamepad that attaches to either side of the screen using a rear pillar stretch.

The good news is that when fully assembled, the Edge feels surprisingly sturdy – you’ll quickly forget it’s technically split into two parts – and there’s a smooth, fluid hand-feel with satisfying clicky controls on the pad V2 Pro.

The square edges and black design suggest a clear heritage of the two Razer phones the company launched a few years ago, although in fact the textured plastic finish and slightly curved rear remind me most of the Google tablet. Much older Nexus 7 – a dated design, but by no means a bad one.

With the tablet/phone element alone weighing 243g (with an additional 140g on top for the controller), it’s surprisingly heavy – more than a Switch but lighter than the Steam Deck – but that helps keep it premium. Gorilla Glass on the screen will help protect against scratches, although Razer couldn’t say which version of the protective glass it uses.

The benefit of the split design is that the Edge breaks down to be more compact when you want to store it for travel, and also gives you a more natural form factor when you want to use the Edge to play regular Android games. or (whisper it) just launch some standard phone apps.

This is because Edge only runs Android. From a gaming perspective, this gives you access to all the usual Play Store apps, plenty of emulator options, and of course cloud gaming via Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and GeForce Now. Razer even goes to the trouble of pre-installing the Epic Games Store app, which is no longer available through the Play Store.

It’s easy to access various installed games or streaming services via Razer’s personalized Nexus Dashboard, which you can access at any time with the press of a button. With big tiles for every game, it has more in common with the Switch’s software than your phones, and there’s a clear focus on ease of use.

More unique features include adjustable haptic intensity and remappable button inputs, as well as the ability to define which games (or other apps) appear in the Nexus interface.

Take a peek behind the curtain and you’ll find the older Android 12 though (notably not the newest Android 13 – and Razer is also silent on its long-term software support). That means the Edge can act as a compact tablet or secondary phone, with nothing stopping you from installing everything from Instagram to WhatsApp here.

Of course, that raises the specter of the biggest challenge facing the Edge: why should anyone buy this rather than just grab a Kishi controller for their existing phone?

Razer’s argument for Edge is threefold. First, the Edge contains its own battery. The company remains coy about exactly how long this 5,000mAh cell should keep you gaming, but it’s about the same size as a typical flagship phone, if not a bit larger, which should give you an idea. .

More importantly, it means you can play Edge without eating into your phone’s battery – so instead of carrying a portable power bank around with you, you can just lug an extra handheld instead.

Second, the company argues that by removing outside some of the features associated with a phone help keep the Edge both focused and affordable.

With no fingerprint sensor, just 128GB of onboard storage (though you can expand it via microSD), and a single 5Mp selfie camera, Razer has managed to keep the Wi-Fi version of the Edge down to just $400, half the price of a premium handset.

Of course, that’s a moot point considering you probably already own a phone. And anyway, you need it no matter what – so if you’re on a fixed budget, you’ll get a better return on a flagship phone and a Bluetooth controller than on a cheap phone and an Edge.

So it all comes down to argument number three: the Edge is simply better for gaming.

The main bottlenecks here are networking (for cloud gaming) and processing power and cooling (for local elements).

The standard $400 version of the Edge is Wi-Fi only, but supports the nippy Wi-Fi 6E standard. A 5G version is also on the way, but it will be a Verizon exclusive in the US, and there are no signs of either version launching anywhere else so far.

To be fair, this one’s a loss for Edge: your phone also has Wi-Fi, it probably has 5G, and if you bought it last year, it probably even supports those same 6E speeds over Wi-Fi. In fact, you could get a cheap 5G phone for less than the $400 price of Wi-Fi Edge, and arguably have a better setup for cloud gaming right off the bat.

Then there are local games. The Edge is the first device to launch powered by the Snapdragon G3x Gen 1, a Qualcomm chip specifically designed for gaming hardware. It’s significantly more powerful than the base Snapdragon 720G found in its closest direct rival. close, the Logitech G Cloud, which has absolutely no 5G option.

The G3x here should be on par with flagship phones, although since it launched over a year ago based on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 phone chip architecture, it’s unclear yet. how it will stand up to the newer Gen 2. Again, there’s every chance the latest phones will have the edge.

Where Razer will be victory is on cooling. Unlike most phones, the Edge includes an active cooling system, with six vents on the back of the body. In my time with the hardware – around 45 minutes, a mix of gaming and browsing the OS – it certainly never ran hot, and I suspect even most gaming phones would struggle to keep pace.

That means the Edge should be able to play the most demanding Android games smoothly and for longer, and for some titles it’ll no doubt get the most out of its 144Hz refresh rate display.

So, who is the Edge for? Even after trying it myself, I’m still not sure. If the pitch is cloud gaming on the go, then there’s nothing it doesn’t that your phone doesn’t do as well – grab a good gamepad instead and save a few hundred.

If the focus is more on playing the latest and greatest Android games at full performance, it fare better, and I suspect it could pick up steam among committed mobile gamers who can’t stop playing. resort to using a bulky, garish gaming phone 24/7.

What It Isn’t is a Steam Deck-style subversion, unlocking all-new ways to play. It does nothing to free itself from the software limitations of Android or the hardware limitations of the smartphone form factor.

Razer is right: the Edge is not a phone. But that more reflects all the phone stuff it can’t do than all the gaming extras it can.