We can’t award the 2025 Phone of the Year Award because no phones reviewed met the criteria. Nothing is a play on words, as Nothing 3 came closest to our criteria.
The 2024 phone of the year was the $999 Motorola Edge 50 Pro – an excellent upper-mid-range smartphone, and it is on run-out special at Harvey Norman for a ludicrous $599. Run, don’t walk, as this really is a special phone meeting, all our 15 criteria which we expect can only be reached by a premium phone. These include:
- Current and reasonably powerful AI-capable processor. We have favoured Qualcomm Snapdragon SD7 and SD8 SoCs, but MediaTek is catching up.
- 10-bit/1.07 billion colour AMOLED screen, low PWM-sensitivity.
- 12 or 16GB RAM.
- 256 or more storage.
- USB-C 3.1 or 3.2 Gen 1 (5Gbps) or 2 (10Gbps) with Alt DP (audio/video screen mirror) and external mountable storage.
- All-day battery and fast charge (no charger supplied).
- Fast Wi-Fi 6E or 7.
- City, Suburbs, regional and rural phone reception strength.
- eSIM and SIM, DSDA (dual active).
- Decent range of Bluetooth Codecs (some aptX and LDAC).
- Rear camera with wide, ultra-wide/macro and telephoto.
- Build quality, reliability and repairability.
- Android 16, value-added UI, and decent warranty, OS upgrade and security patch policies
- Simple English, benign privacy policy and terms of use (not several nested policies that mortgage your firstborn).
- Price: Nominally from $1000 to the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra.
If we had to pick the most important, it is:
- Screen (so many people get headaches if the screen has high PWM, and 10-bit colour is essential) for video streaming.
- Phone signal strength (rural use guarantees good city use)
- Day-long battery and fast charge
- USB-C (mountable external drives are mandatory for vloggers and videographers)
- Camera (we don’t need the best, but it needs to be in the top ten).
What does not matter as much is shown in new research from OPPO
- 4% of Australians consider AI necessary. Our reader research goes one step further. Most readers are shunning AI phones, especially those that are likely to have a subscription to use certain features. In reality, every premium Android has AI, but buyers don’t see the value.
- 3% care about sustainable practices, so all this recycled ‘guff’ means little in the purchasing space.
- 2% felt a so-called free gift for pre-order was meaningful. Readers felt this was just smoke and mirrors to keep the price high.
2025 Phone of the Year
So it is with great sadness that we say there was not one outstanding, must-have phone in 2025. One came very close.
Runner up – Nothing 3 – its definition of a flagship phone
- Beautiful 10-bit screen and good for PWM susceptible people.
- Lacks USB-C 3.x instead using USB-C 2.0. That means no external mountable storage or screen mirror. Its only real flaw.
- Finds all four towers in our phone signal strength tests, although not as strong as some.
- Has a Qualcomm SD 8s Gen 4 SoC. Not as powerful as the SD8 Elite in the Galaxy, but no heat throttle issues either. Enough power for Google Gemini and AI if you want it.
- 2+5+7 years warranty/OS upgrades/security patches
- Nothing Essentials AI on phone. These are personal, practical tools.
- Superb 50+50+50MP rear camera and 50MP selfie
- $1509 12/256GB and $1689 216/512GB
This is an exceptional phone, only needing a fully implemented USB-C 3.x to win. Its original design and added value make it a superior choice.
With apologies to Samsung, Google Pixel and Apple (although we don’t cover it), they fail on the screen (Samsung sourced AMOLED is 8-bit and high PWM, no Dolby Vision), lack full implementation of USB-C 3.x.
Why not the Motorola Edge 60 Pro
It was logical to expect the successor to the Motorola Edge 50 Pro, the Edge 60 Pro, would have been a shoo-in. It is an excellent city and suburb phone, but most of Motorola’s phones this year are using MediaTek SoCs.
Regional and Rural phones
While MediaTek processors and modems are getting better, they are still not suitable for regional and rural use.
We called out Telstra for its bald-faced lies on Blue Tick for the Google Pixel 10 series. Telstra Blue Tick Part V: More bloody lies from the expert. Great phones, but definitely for city and suburbs only.
Samsung S25, S25+ and S25 Ultra have good regional and rural phone reception. S25 Edge, Fold7, and Flip 7 are city and suburbs only.
And to 2026
The trend to using MediaTek processors means that when their modems get better, then there will be serious contenders from OPPO, Motorola and newcomer Xiaomi (Redmi).
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