The Best Smartphones You Can Buy Right Now

The best phone should be a jack of all trades, and the OnePlus 15 proves that OnePlus knows what it’s doing for another year in a row. You won’t get the best cameras, or the best performance, or the best software support, but you will get very good versions of all three. Just about every other aspect of the device delivers too without coming up lacking like other phones competing with the OnePlus 15 tend to.

Let’s start with the hardware. The OnePlus 15 is built well. It has a sturdy construction that can hold up to some abuse. The IP69 protection for hot water jets is a step above what you’ll find from most phones. It packs in a gorgeous display that’s big, bright, and smooth. It offers a 165Hz refresh rate that goes faster than most mainstream phones for even more fluid visuals, though there’s really diminishing returns at this point.

You’ll get a competent triple-camera system on the rear of the OnePlus 15 that can give Pixels and iPhones solid competition. The camera system isn’t a big upgrade over the OnePlus 13, and I wouldn’t recommend anyone actually upgrade from that or the OnePlus 12 to this one, as those two should still be very competitive in just about every regard except one: performance.

The OnePlus 15’s performance is a cut above. When I tested it, the only phone that it didn’t beat out in just about every single benchmark was the RedMagic 11 Pro — an extreme gaming phone with active air and liquid cooling. The OnePlus 15’s performance comes by way of the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip inside, which is a stunner. Even when more Android phones with that chip start cropping up on the market, I don’t expect most to squeeze any more out of it than OnePlus has.

On top of all its packing, the OnePlus 15 squeezes in a huge battery that delivered multi-day battery life in my testing, letting me go four full days of regular use before needing to charge it back up.

OnePlus brings all of this at a competitive starting $899 price that may be more expensive than a base-tier iPhone, Pixel, or Galaxy S model, but delivers up an experience that’s more in line with upper-tier configurations and Pro models. The OnePlus 15 comes with four years of OS updates and six years of security patches, which is a bit shy of what those competitors offer. But if you’re chasing the latest and greatest performance and capabilities, you’ll probably want to upgrade your phone again before that support expires anyway.

The Google Pixel 9 Pro is a brilliant phone when it comes to photography. It offers a triple-camera system on the rear that provides a ton of flexibility, and each sensor in the stack snaps quality photos, whether you want to punch in on a distant subject or zoom way out to capture a landscape. Even the selfie camera snaps vibrant, sharp photos.

The phone itself is no less pretty than the photos it takes. Google has refined the design of its Pixel line again, and the Pixel 9 Pro benefits greatly. It’s still somewhat tame with aluminum and glass, not opting for the titanium of Apple’s and Samsung’s flagships. But it comes together elegantly.

Thin bezels wrap around a modest 6.3-inch display, which is a bit of a star. It’s reasonably sized without making the Pixel 9 Pro an unwieldy behemoth like the iPhone 17 Pro Max or Galaxy S25 Ultra, though you can go that route by upgrading to the Pixel 9 Pro XL. The display is also excellent, with a super-bright OLED panel, smooth refresh rate, and poppy color.

The Pixel 9 Pro may not be the fastest phone on the market, as its Tensor G4 chip lags well behind recent Apple and Qualcomm flagship chips, but it’s plenty peppy for everyday use and works quickly with AI applications. And it still runs lighter games reasonably well too. Google is also backing the phone up with longer-term software support than you’ll find on a lot of Android devices.

Apple’s base-tier iPhone is a hit this year. The iPhone 17 brought more upgrades all around than it has in previous years, and that makes for a base tier that comes closer to the Pro models than typical. Perhaps one of the most exciting upgrades is that the iPhone 17 finally brings a 120Hz display to the base tier, delivering on the fluid visuals that had previously been limited to Pro models. Combine that with the brilliance of its OLED panel and the anti-glare finish on the display, and you’ve got a big leap in display quality over previous models.

The iPhone 17 also runs on a new A19 chip with ample memory and a bumped up base storage of 256GB. The storage is great for storing more photos, video, and apps. Those apps can include games, as the iPhone 17 is a worthy gaming device that handles most games in the App Store, with only heavyweights like Assassin’s Creed Mirage making it stutter at their highest graphical presets in our testing.

You may not get the powerful camera system of the Pro tier with the iPhone 17, but you still get a capable set of cameras that are happy to snap photos in most settings, record high-quality video (even from the front and back at the same time), and provide flexible selfie shooting with automatic switching between portrait and landscape without the need to adjust the phone’s position.

The iPhone 17 may not be the top-tier iPhone but it brings plenty to the table, and with its considerably lower starting price, it’ll be the best option for most users.

The Pixel 8 might not be the best of the best or a new model in 2025, but it’s still got a lot to offer. The Tensor G3 chip inside improved on the G2 not only with increased performance but, critically, with better thermals. Since heat is the enemy of most phone components, being able to avoid it will help the longevity of the device.

The other big get for the Pixel 8 is that Google promised seven years of OS, security, and feature updates when it launched. That means it still has a long life ahead of it. Thanks to its age, the price of the phone has dropped considerably though. So you can often snag the Pixel 8 for a mid-range price of $500. While many people may think the Pixel 8a is the smart mid-range option, the full-fat Pixel 8 at just $100 more is a smart pick thanks to the superior design, which includes Gorilla Glass Victus on the front and back, improved water resistance, and better cameras.

On the note of cameras, the Pixel 8 boasts an excellent 50MP main camera that snaps great shots in light or dark settings. The ultra-wide sensor is solid in daylight, but struggles in the dark. And the selfie camera is nice and sharp with a wide field of view. The Pixel 8 may not offer the best cameras out here, but it’s great for the price.

Ultimately, the Pixel 8 remains a great option for mid-range shoppers. But it’s worth remembering how pivotal price is in its ranking here. The newer Pixel 9 or Pixel 10 may generally cost more, but they can see discounts as well. If either of them is available for below $600, they provide enough extra value to be worth grabbing instead.

It used to be that you couldn’t expect too much from a budget smartphone. But these days, that feels like it’s hardly the case. You may not get the most capable cameras or absolutely top-tier performance, but there’s still a lot you can get. The Poco X7 Pro is a perfect example of this.

At $299, the Poco X7 Pro is less than half the price of most flagship phones, but it doesn’t wind up feeling like it’s half the quality. The star of the show has to be the display. The Poco X7 Pro fits a wonderful 6.67-inch AMOLED display that’s colorful, poignant, and smooth with a 120Hz refresh rate. It’s the kind of display that should have made everyone wonder why Apple was still putting 60Hz displays on any of its recent phones.

That display is fitted into a stylish enough chassis that may not be all metal and glass, but still gets some durability bonafides with an IP68 protection rating to handle submersion as well as flagship phones. The Poco X7 Pro even includes a 3.5mm headphone jack for use with wired headphones, something more expensive phones have seen fit to exclude.

Now you might expect that performance is lacking, since Poco had to cut corners somewhere. But the Poco X7 Pro actually proves quite competent. The MediaTek Dimensity 8400-Ultra may not be the most potent, but it comes shockingly close to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3’s performance and can even come close to the iPhone 16’s graphical performance. It may not be able to max out every game’s graphical settings, but it should comfortably run just about any Android game you throw at it.

The phone even runs on a sizable, 6,000mAh battery that’s more than enough for a full day (or two) of regular use. You may miss out on long-term software support and top-tier networking speeds, but the Poco X7 Pro proves a very competent phone that punches well above what its price tag would have you expect.

If you’re a gamer, the RedMagic 11 Pro is where it’s at. This new model takes all the lessons that made the RedMagic 10 Pro such an exceptional model and dials it up to 11 (pun intended). In my testing, the RedMagic 11 Pro managed to lead the way in almost every single benchmark, setting plenty of new records along the way. That performance translates to exceptional gaming performance with the phone hardly breaking a sweat in any game I threw at it.

Part of that excellence stems from the phone’s unique features: active air cooling and water cooling. This not only lets the phone see leading performance levels but also sustain them better than the competition. While it could still get plenty hot during benchmarks, it held up better than rival gaming phones and never saw such high temperatures when playing actual games.

The performance is put on display with a wonderful screen. It’s a sharp and large AMOLED panel that doesn’t even let its selfie camera get in the way. The screen hides the camera completely, doesn’t round off the corners much, and has thin bezels, giving you a big and clear view of your games.

The design may not be to everyone’s taste, but the RedMagic 11 Pro is stylish in an industrial way that doesn’t go overboard with gamer aesthetics. It’s also robust, feeling plenty sturdy in the hand and actually offering waterproofing in spite of the open air duct that provides its active cooling.

You’ll miss out on a few things, like quality cameras and extra long-term software support, but the phone is overall amazing and actually something of a bargain with its starting price of $749.

With its seventh generation of foldables, Samsung looked to radically change things up. And while the Z Flip 7 doesn't get the same kind of thinness that makes the Galaxy Z Fold 7 such a wonder to behold, that doesn't mean it didn't get the same amount of love.

The biggest change here is the outside display. It's larger now, covering an entire half of the backside of the phone, stretching from edge to edge when folded up. And while, yeah, it looks nicer, the bigger change is in what it can do. Now, you can run full apps on it, so you don't have to settle for the weird half-app widget things you had to use on the (admittedly incredible) Z Flip 6. Though, you will have to fiddle with some experimental settings to enable full apps on the smaller display.

The Flip 7 didn't get the same kind of chassis reduction that the Fold 7 did, but that doesn't mean Samsung just left it alone. While the device has larger screens both on the inside and the outside, Samsung maintained basically the same weight as the last generation, with the Flip 7 weighing in at 188g, compared to last year's 187g. That's basically not even a difference.

Powering the phone is the Exynos 2500, rather than the Snapdragon 8 Elite that powers the Fold 7. This is a pretty massive change, given the Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6 were both powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. It also marks a change of direction, with Samsung essentially positioning the Flip 7 as the device you get when you want long battery life, rather than the raw power offered by the more expensive (and bigger) Fold. In our review, this paid off, with the Flip 7 now lasting all day, which is something the small foldable has struggled with in past generations. Now, keep in mind that due to the size of this device battery life and performance are just something you're trading off for the portability – but at least that trade-off isn't as severe as it's been in past generations.

Samsung overhauled its top foldable this year and it’s proven a worthy change. The new Galaxy Z Fold 7 has shrunk down by 26% compared to the earlier Fold 6. That makes it just over 4mm thick when unfolded and 8.9mm thick when folded. It's plenty close to the thickness of other non-folding smartphones, like the 8.9mm-thick Asus ROG Phone 9, for example.

Even as Samsung managed to trim down the dimensions of the phone, it still kept the battery capacity from the prior model at 4,400mAh. While this doesn’t make it a two-day warrior, our reviewer found the Galaxy Z Fold 7 easily lasted through the day during testing, generally with some charge left the next morning. That's even after playing games for four hours one of the days.

While the Galaxy Z Fold 7 may not be specifically for gaming, it still can hold up. Part of the equation is the new screen sizes. The Z Fold 6 had a very tall outer display that wasn’t ideal for a lot of games that targeted different aspect ratios. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 has a more common 21:9 aspect ratio on the outer display. When combined with the thinness of the phone, it’s easy to use the Galaxy Z Fold 7 just the same as any ordinary smartphone. Of course, when you want to go big, you can unfold the device and use the 8-inch interior display for gaming, media, multitasking, or whatever else you feel like.

Another key aspect of the Galaxy Z Fold 7’s performance is the Snapdragon 8 Elite inside, a potent chip in every device I’ve seen it in so far. The device manages solid bursty speeds, and it has enough horsepower to run games like Honkai Star Rail. One downside of the thin design is that it will heat up considerably during long, sustained workloads like gaming and its performance will sag. You’ll still be better off with a gaming phone or even just something thicker if you’re planning to do a lot of gaming.

The Galaxy Z Fold 7’s $1,999 price tag may be a hard pill to swallow. It’s more than what you’d pay for a OnePlus 15 and Redmagic Astra – an excellent phone and great gaming tablet – combined. But if the convenience of one gadget that does it all is worth it to you, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is a great device that fits the bill and stands out as the best foldable on the market right now.

What About the Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge?

Having wrapped up testing, I've concluded the Galaxy S25 Edge won’t be joining the ranks of the best phones on the market. While it is a surprisingly thin phone, I wouldn’t go so far as to call it impressively thin. Phones have been this thin in the past, and I think there’s a reason they’ve gotten thicker over the years. The S25 Edge makes sacrifices to get that thin. It has a smaller battery than comparable phones. It may offer the same speedy Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset powering other great phones, but it quickly runs into thermal throttling when trying to take full advantage of that chip. And the S25 Edge only gets two rear-facing cameras when it’s priced like a phone that should have three or four quality cameras to offer. All of those trade-offs to shave a couple millimeters from the device just don’t work out in this phone’s favor.