Best Phones of 2026
Ranked by our critic's grades, best first.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro MaxApple's best all rounder yet, with the longest battery life it has ever shippedRead the review
iPhone 18 ProA variable aperture, the first 2 nm chip in a phone and the longest battery an iPhone this size has carried, for a hundred dollars more.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 UltraThe telephoto the Fold 8 gave up, an eight-inch inner screen and a cover display shaped like an ordinary phone, for two hundred dollars more.- Google Pixel 11 Pro XLGoogle Pixel 11 Pro XLThe brightest screen Google has made and the first Pixel that charges as fast as it lasts, in a body that needs two hands.
iPhone 18 Pro MaxThe 18 Pro with the extra room given almost entirely to the battery: 45 hours of video, and a weight you notice within the hour.- Google Pixel 11 ProGoogle Pixel 11 ProA brighter screen, twice the base storage and a chip that still loses to Qualcomm: the Pixel to buy, again.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8The Snapdragon is back and the price is up a hundred dollars; almost nothing else about the Flip changed this year.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8Samsung turned the Fold sideways and the shape works, but a $1,899 phone with two cameras and no telephoto is a strange thing to sell.
Samsung Galaxy S26 UltraA screen strangers cannot read over your shoulder, 60W charging at last and an f/1.4 lens: the most changed Ultra in three years, and still a familiar one.
Nothing Phone (4a) ProA $499 phone with a big 144Hz screen, a periscope zoom and long battery life, if you can live with IP65 and three Android upgrades.