The Moto Razr is a good small phone.
Can a flip phone be a good substitute for a small phone? I decided to find out, so I bought a Razr Ultra. The Z flip was not an option for several reasons: less functional outer screen, glass back, Samsung skin, and worse battery life. I have a soft spot for Motorola and unique materials since the moto X, which is still my favorite phone and ideal screen size.
Having used a 5.9" screen for the past 3 years I knew that a 6.3" would not meet my expectations of a small phone. 5.9" was already too large in my opinion. I've also used a 3" Jelly 2 which I found too small. The Razr has an almost square 4" outer screen and a super tall 6.9" inner screen. Neither are ideal, but it makes an interesting compromise. The outer screen is actually pretty usable for most apps, and is actually ideal for one handed use. The center of gravity is in your palm and you dont have to balance the phone to reach the whole screen. The camera sometimes in the way, and some apps have a too cluttered UI for the outer screen to work well, but those are far from common. Some apps require turning the screen, which blocks out the cameras giving you a roughly 3" 16:9 screen. This actually works better than you would think. Bottom line, I can honestly say that this is the best option for those who want a no compromise small phone. You can legitimately use it closed with a couple minor exceptions. You get an up to date OS, a nice screen, wireless charging and a high end processor and camera. There are also some unique things that you can do with the foldable form factor, but these might be considered gimmicks. I mainly just use it full folded and it works great for that.
Now there are some arbitrary limitations or pain points, which I hope Motorola addresses. First, to use apps on the outer screen you have to manually enable it for every app. This is needlessly tedious, just give us a toggle for all apps. Second, the outer screen is not able to use a custom launcher or keyboard. Lastly Google has tried to "help" in their usual unhelpful way. Gmail displays an awkward grey area around the cameras to avoid buttons being unaccessible and photos seems to have a special mode where you can't access everything on the outer screen. There should be a way to turn this off.
To sum things up, I think the experiment has gone well, and I will be sticking with the Razr. It's a unique smartphone experience that I can get excited about for the first time in many years.