DoorDash, Uber Eats... and Tony

25:41They only sell several tens of thousands of vehicles every year as compared to Tesla, which sells over a million cars every year, or even the legacy automakers, which sell millions upon millions of cars. And so, you know, I think there was a lot of excitement. And I think through that haze of excitement, I think that people could make the assumption that this was like a company that was on par at the same level as the rest of the industry or even some of the upstarts like Tesla. But I think that the reality of the situation was they only make a few vehicles every year. They only had two models that were available to consumers, plus an electric delivery van, which was only available to Amazon exclusively for a while, but is now supposedly going to be sold to some other companies as well.

26:23That was a big deal, right? Amazon made a lot of noise about buying a lot of trucks from Rivian. That was going to be a big thing. It was a huge deal. And I think that that was one of the things. Amazon's backing their investment in the company, their commitment to buying 100 ,000 electric delivery vans from Rivian, plus an investment from Ford as well, gave a lot of people the impression that this was going to be the next big electric car company, when in reality, they were going to confront a lot of the same challenges as Tesla. And even as the legacy automakers are really confronting at the moment too.

26:55And if anything, it was going to be a lot tougher for Rivian because as a new player, as a, what they call pure play EV, a company that only makes EV electric vehicles and not any hybrids or internal combustion vehicles. So they have no other revenue to fall back on if the market dips, which it is now, and I assume we're going to talk about, they're going to take it square in the chin. And I think that that's playing out. There's a lot of excitement still about the company. There's a lot of promise, but a lot of questions in the future is a little cloudy, I would say. Okay. Yeah. I am curious how the message from Rivian has changed over the years, because like you're talking about, I think if you rewind to even 2017, there was this sense that we're going to have EVs.

27:36They're going to be everywhere and they're going to be everywhere soon. And everybody was talking about self-driving was going to be the thing. We were going to have like the Uber fleets of self-driving cars. And by now the whole world was going to be different. And obviously that is extremely not what happened. Yeah. I'm getting PTSD just from you saying all of this. Do you remember when 2020 was going to be the year of the fleet of Uber robot taxis? Like that was the year they all gave us. It's insane in retrospect. But I think if I'm Rivian, like You've sort of built up this story over time about what you're doing and why it's important.

28:10But I know we recently talked to RJ, the CEO, after the most recent launch, which I want to talk about. There's a sense that they're just trying to still sort of beat that same drum, that they're like, this is coming. It's going to work. Everything's going to be fine. And I feel like we haven't done that yet. So should we keep believing this guy that this is going to come true? Great question. Answer? I don't know. So two things. I think that obviously electric vehicles are not poised to take over all personal transportation in the next week or so. But by 2020, they will. Exactly. I still have hopes for 2020.

28:45No, but it's not coming quite as quickly as we thought it was, which is not to say that it won't come eventually. And I think a lot of the serious people that are operating this business, a lot of the automakers, the people whose jobs it is, who get paid lots of money to make these types of predictions, are saying that electric vehicles are still the future. Despite a slowdown in sales growth and a lot of investment pullback from some of the major companies, factories are getting stalled. Even Rivian is putting a pause on its plan to build a$5 billion factory in Georgia as sort of a reflection of this kind of the reality that we're facing today.

29:21And that's because of a lot of different reasons. I think first and foremost, the industry kind of put all its eggs in one basket and rushed maybe a little bit too quickly towards this goal, not realizing that both the charging infrastructure was not going to keep apace with their own desires to sell electric vehicles, but also that consumers were not going to be as eager to make the switch as they thought they would be. And that's because of a lot of reasons. The charging is not that great. The prices are still really too high for a lot of people. Politics have kind of reared their ugly head and have complicated a lot of this for some folks.

29:56So it's just looking a lot messier and it's maybe going to take a little bit longer than people thought it was. But that's not to say that eventually the majority of cars that are sold in this country and other countries will be electric. We're already seeing it in some countries in the world. China has been making a lot of progress in pushing up the volume of EVs. Europe is, I think, a little bit further behind, but they're making a lot of progress as well. Norway. Norway is this country where you would think, because of how cold it is, that nobody wants to buy EVs because EVs don't run well in the cold.

30:29But yet, I think over half the vehicles sold in that country are electric. Tesla does very well there. Good for Norway. Yeah, that's right. They're showing us the way, the Norway. So I think it's going to take a little bit longer. Customers are showing a lot of preferences for hybrids, for example. They want to be eased in to this hot bath that's being drawn for them by the auto industry. They don't want to just jump right in. That's a terrible image. You can feel free to edit that out. I don't know why I said that. It's good. It's a little gross in the way that all of these should be. I think that feels right.

31:00So anyway, so amidst all of this, you have Rivian, a small company with a lot of buzz, trying to do its best. And it's struggling. I mentioned the factory. They're losing a lot of money. You know, their cash pile is dwindling. So they have to make what's called a volume play. They need to say, OK, we need to start selling a lot of cars. The cars that they have right now, the truck and the SUV, are very expensive. They're over$70 ,000,$75 ,000. You can get up to$80 ,000 with options. That's just too expensive for most people to afford. So they need to make a play for that middle segment, which is why we got the R2 reveal, a$45 ,000 midsize SUV that can go over 300 miles on a single charge and accelerate from zero to 60 in under three seconds, allegedly.

31:44So I think that that's why the R2 is a very important car for Rivian. It's their play at the mass market. They're saying we need to start selling more cars to more people. And here is the product that's going to be the one to do it. Yeah, the R2 strikes me as maybe more than just an important car for Rivian, like an important car for this whole industry right now. Because correct me if I'm wrong, but there's really not a ton out there in kind of this price range and this sort of specific level of coolness. Like we were talking before we started recording about Hyundai and Kia. And I actually think what those companies are doing in this space is really interesting.

32:19but I also think fundamentally the people who want a car like this are maybe more likely than most to be looking at these cool new brands. I notice Rivians on the road, like the amount of Rivians that I'm aware of relative to the amount of Rivians that exist is so much higher than any other car on the road right now. Do you know what I mean? It's very distinctive. It really, it draws attention to itself for sure. Right. And I think that's really powerful and important. And if you can do that with a car that many people can actually afford, that seems like a potentially huge deal. But then there are two questions where, one, is this actually something lots of those people want?

32:56And then, two, can Rivian actually get around to making enough of them to make a difference? And I do feel like those are both still pretty open questions, right? Absolutely. You know, the fact that the car is not going to go into production until early 2026, I think, is also going to be an issue. I mean, that might as well be 2 ,000 years from now. We might have self-driving by then. Exactly. So whether or not the R2 is still generating excitement then is, I think, very much an open question. But that's not to say that people were very excited, at least the people in my very narrow view of social media, very excited about this car.

33:30Lots of people that were kind of tripping over themselves to praise it. They loved how it looked. They liked the specs. They liked the price. But like I said, it's going to be up to the consumers as to whether or not it actually turns out to be a popular one and whether or not Rivian can survive. long enough to actually put it into production, which is going to be a huge challenge for the company. Yeah. What's been the read on the R1T and the R1S so far? Are they generally, they're very cool when I see them, I like them, but what is the kind of broad consensus on whether these are actually good cars?

34:01Yeah, no, people really love them. They have a very dedicated fan base. It's very different than the Tesla fan base. It's very interesting. If you go on to like Reddit and some of the message boards and listen to, you know, sort of like what people talk about, They talk about the cars a lot differently. There's obviously less focus on RJ Skaringe, the CEO, as some sort of lord and savior, which contrasts very much with what Tesla does. Which I'm assuming RJ is pretty happy with. I'm sure he is. I'm sure he is. But yeah, these are well-loved cars. The people who own them love them. I think the software experience leaves a little bit lacking, but that's typical across the industry right now.

34:37The car industry as a whole is kind of fumbling the ball when it comes the software. The cars do not have Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, which is not a very popular decision. And a lot of the owners would love to see phone projection brought into their cars. But that said, the cars themselves are very delightful, but they're expensive, as I mentioned before. And so the segment of the population that actually owns these vehicles is still very small. You notice them. They're very noticeable. But still, I mean, your eyes glaze over the Toyota Highlanders and the RAV4s and the Honda Pilots because there are just so many of them, whereas the Rivian stand out, which I think, you know, is a good selling point.

35:14But I think it kind of obscures how actually small the population of people who own these vehicles actually is. Oh, for sure. I'm pretty sure there's just one in my neighborhood, but I just notice it every single time I see it. So I'm like, God, there's a lot of Rivians out there. It does seem like to your point about Tesla, I think there's a thing that Rivian did kind of accidentally really well, it seems like, which is it grew right as Tesla, I think, was peaking in people's minds as like a cool company that was going to save the world and be good for it. And every time I hear RJ talk, you get the sense that he is trying to still be optimistic and happy and like tell you about a better world in increasing distance from what people perceive about Elon Musk in particular, right?

35:57And Tesla, for better and for worse, has always been super attached to Elon Musk. So it feels like if I'm Rivian, or frankly, any of these other companies, It's like all the people who believe in the mission, but are falling out of love with Elon Musk for one reason or another are looking for somewhere to go and care about and put their money in and put their fandom in. Those people are gettable. Those people are all gettable. Do you think they are? The other thing that I wondered is like, are we just going to get past that and these are just going to go back to being cars? Well, yeah. I mean, something interesting that RJ said in our interview with Abigail Bassett, the writer who interviewed him for us, was that he was very impressed with what Tesla has been able to do.

36:38But that new cars that are electric sold each year has just reached about 8 % to 9%. And what he was interested in, it was going after that 90 % that are still not buying electric vehicles. I mean, that's the obvious line that he's going to deliver, of course, which helps sort of sell the prospect of the R2 as this mass market volume play that they are hoping it will be. But yeah, I think that he needs a Model 3. And Rivian is looking for a Tesla Model 3 moment, I think, with the R2 here. Because Tesla, for a long time, there was no guarantee that that company was going to succeed. In fact, they very nearly failed many times, especially during the Model 3 ramp up.

37:17Yeah, Tesla was just as precarious as Rivian is now. If not more so, absolutely. And it was only because of the car's popularity and the company's ability to get it out in the numbers that it did, which started slow and then eventually ramped up to a pretty steady clip that people were starting to actually get their vehicles, most likely at the expense of Tesla's employees who have numerous of them have sued the company for many, many, many problems that they've had. But yeah, that prospect, I think, is still up there on top of the hill. And I think Rivian sees it up there and it needs to get up to that moment where they're starting to produce cars at a steady clip and people are loving them and buying them, which is, I think, given the current situation around EV sales and the sales growth slowdown is why things are as complicated for the company.

38:10So, yeah, I think he wants to get to that Tesla moment. But what's most interesting to me about the image that he's projecting and how RJ talks about the company, especially just in the words that he uses during these events, is they may aspire to be like Tesla, but I think they would rather be more like Apple. The way that they talk and the way that they present their products and the way that people talk about their products feels more like Apple than Tesla, which is like optimism and the design is very friendly. and RJ is out there literally talking about one more thing in revealing the R3 and the R3X, which is the classic Steve Jobs line.

38:47Although Elon stole it as well, I think a couple of times, but that's all Apple. So there's been lots of talk. Should Apple buy Rivian? Apple's own car project ended. I was going to say being Apple in cars might not be the thing to shoot for here. Right. So I think a lot of people sort of see a possible synergistic moment here. We're to car apple here's here's a here's a struggling car company that would slot perfectly in with your line of products i don't know if rj or tim cook are talking or whether or not that would that would be appealing to them at all but you know there's that that certainly doesn't stop the talk that's out there yeah it's an interesting way of thinking about it and it does make me wonder if somewhere rj is sitting around being like do i need a little more of a god complex if i'm gonna make any of this work like you get the sense that too much god complex bad but maybe you need a little bit like if if you don't believe it how is anybody else going to you know right exactly just a little bit of confidence that's all it takes so that's what i tell you all the time just a little bit of god complex and everything will be fine but so i i think this moment is so interesting to me for exactly the reason you're describing right there's the r2 and i think i also want to know what you think about the r3 because it was the it was the one more thing the sneaky little thing that kind of got everybody really excited like my favorite thing about the r3 reveal was everybody posting pictures of SUVs from the 90s that look exactly like the R3.

40:07But then everybody being like, yeah, I don't care. I still want it. And like, there is something about this space that people still like feel real feelings about, even though they're becoming these sort of increasingly mainstream family cars. Like, well, yeah, and especially because if you look at some of the design that's out there today, and just the the vast majority of cars that people buy, it's it's there's very little that distinguishes one car from the next. They've all I think it's like the industry has all just sort of settled on this kind of shape of a car, this kind of SUV crossover shape that is the most popular amongst all the cars.

40:40And it kind of has scrubbed out a lot of the things that made like cars unique and interesting to people. There's just very little to differentiate one brand from the other. I mean, like, yes, you can probably notice, you know, a BMW grill is different from a Ford, from a, you know, and the shape of a Mercedes is a little bit different than maybe an Audi. But in the end of it, I think if you did a blind taste test with a bunch of people, I think that they would have some difficulty distinguishing one car from the next, which is, I think, a lot of why you see some excitement around Rivian, because there is something that's distinctive about it.

41:16There is something that's kind of, especially with the R3, that's very retro-futuristic, right? It has this kind of hatchback shape that is very reminiscent of like, you know, 70s era VW Golfs, or I saw some people talking about the Lada Niva, which I was not overly familiar with. I'm not like a huge car guy, so I don't really go too deep into like the lore, but like the Lada Niva, I was, I've been like reading lots of articles because I'm fascinated now by this like little legendary Russian off-road hatchback that is like fascinating. And it does look a lot like, uh, like the R3X especially, but you, you know, so I think that that was appealing to people, especially if you sort of look at all of our products, our phones look the same, our cars look the same, our laptops all generally look the same, our TVs all look the same.

42:02So you just want something that's out there that gives you a sense that like, you know, I'm attaching myself, I'm making this consumer choice that gives me a little bit of an elevate, you know, it distinguishes me from my neighbor or somebody else. And I think the Rivian kind of offers that to people, which is why they get so worked up about it. Totally. And I'm just, I'm just looking a picture of the r3 right now and you're right and i hadn't really thought about this that it walks that middle really well where like some of the electric cars we've seen really for a decade now are all trying to look like they're from like a thousand years in the future and even there's a hyundai dealership just down the street from me and literally every time like an ionic 5 comes by it's like oh look a spaceship like you just you built a spaceship that now just sits in my neighbor's garage like cool fine some people want that lots of people want a car and it turns out like it's okay that it can look like a car but also like it's five years from the future not 5 000 and i think like what you're talking about with rivian where they're just like we took a thing people are familiar with and like and just kind of like jazzed it up a little bit is like maybe exactly what people want yeah i think people were especially eager to see some some angles brought back in to the EV design.

43:13Because a common critique that you'll hear is that all the EVs look like jelly beans. So true. Is very much what the Teslas look like. And I think you're now just now starting to see some pushback against that. I think you're seeing it from Rivian. There's another company called Scout Motors that's going to be coming on the scene pretty soon. They're owned by Volkswagen. Again, it's an old, also an old like 70s, 80s era off-road brand that's being revived and brought back and made into an all-electric brand. And, you know, Ford has talked about, you know, maybe electrifying the Bronco. So, you know, I think you're going to start to see some differentiation in sort of like what these cars look like.

43:54And Rivian needs to get out there before everyone else, because pretty soon that space is going to get super crowded, especially the midsize SUV space. I think we've got our fair share of crossovers. We've seen them all, the Mustang Mach-E, the Model Y, the Volkswagen ID.4, the Ioniq, the Kia. And now we need to start seeing something that's a little bit roomier, but also just something different that looks different, that gives somebody the idea that like, okay, this is not just the same jelly bean that I've become used to in EVs. I will never unsee the jelly bean now. And I feel like I hate you for that like i can't i can't stop thinking about jelly beans that i can i can picture them in my head now but it does seem like what that puts rivian up for is a very consequential next like three years because also like you were saying a minute ago every other car company has been promising to do this kind of stuff over the next few years so this idea that you know rivian was early and had some good ideas and made a cool car that a lot of people like and now it needs to figure out how to make lots of them.

44:57Like, I think, to me, at least one of the lessons we've really learned over the last couple years is just how far ahead Tesla was. Rivian strikes me as not nearly that far ahead. And in fact, is kind of at a moment where like, it needs the R2 to work in a pretty big way, or else it's going to have a pretty big hole to dig out of, right? Am I being too pessimistic about its chances there? Not at all. I mean, one of the stats that jumped out to me the most was that I think in its most recent earnings filing, the company said that it loses $47 ,000 for every vehicle that it sells. Good Lord. So to give you a sense of how unprofitable things are for Rivian right now, that's the price of the R2.

45:35That's basically how much they're planning on charging for this new vehicle, which just goes to show how crucial it's going to be for them. Their cash pile is dwindling. They're running out of money. They have this factory plant is on pause. They did not sell as many vehicles as they thought they were going to. I think it was around 57 ,000 last year. And this year, they're saying that it's going to stay pretty flat. They're going to sell basically the same that they did last year, which is not something that investors see a lot of confidence in. Obviously, they want to see growth. This company and a company that sells the same number of vehicles that it sold last year is not really exhibiting growth in the way that I think a lot of people would like to see.

46:15Is that because Rivian can't make enough to satisfy demand? Or is it because maybe everybody who wants the stuff that Rivian is already making has one? So for a while, they were supply constrained. They were not able to make as many as people wanted. And now they are demand constrained because not as many people can afford the vehicles as they would like because they are expensive. The ones that they sell now, the R1S and the R1T. So, yeah, it's been flipped on them and they're running into these problems. And it's not just Rivian. All the companies are sort of in this weird liminal space right now where they need to make more vehicles.

46:54They want to sell more vehicles, but people don't want to buy as many as they thought they would because the prices are still too high. The used market still is mostly Tesla. The vast majority of the EVs that are up for sale that are used are Teslas. And those are on the used Tesla. That's 21 ,000, 22 ,000. That's pretty attractive. And Tesla keeps cutting its own prices, which is also driving other companies to cut prices as well, which reduces margins and makes things more difficult in terms of trying to eke out a profit. But the company does say that it will be profitable in the fourth quarter of this year, whether that's EBITDA profitable or operationally, whether they have free cash flow.

47:33it's not exactly clear quite yet. But they say that by pausing this plan to build a factory, which was going to obviously expand their ability to make more cars, they're going to be able to get the R2 out the door faster because they're going to make it at their factory in Illinois. And that's going to be able to reach customers faster, which they say was going to increase their chances of kicking that revenue stream up and getting it flowing a lot faster and improving their financial situation. So yeah, we'll have to see. So they know they need to be in the game here. If they do a Tesla and like promise a thing in two years that ships in five years, like they're probably dead in the water.

48:10Yeah. And they've already confronted a lot of issues around wait times and software issues. I mean, it's, you know, you can set your clock to it in terms of like these companies and the same problems that they're running into. You would think, you know, seeing the Tesla playbook, you know, you would also see the trade-offs and the pitfalls that were along the way. But it's the same thing there. I mean, they had a problem with their software was bricking the cars for a little while. They had to push a software update. I do think that the R2 in particular, this is going to be their Model 3. This is the one that they think is going to be the high volume seller.

48:45The R3 is going to be the icing on the cake. That's going to be like the fun little cousin to the R2, but that's going to be the real play that they hope is going to be the one that takes over the streets and transforms them from a small company to hopefully one that's successful and has a future ahead of it. Okay, fair enough. Does it seem like there's any other company kind of of Rivian's size and prestige that might just totally eat its lunch? Yeah, Polestar, they're a performance brand. People who like to go vroom, vroom really fast like the Polestars, which is cool. They're cool cars. They're really cool.

49:20They're also kind of Apple-ish in a way. They're all white and they have, even though it's Google's Android software native. There's just something that's very Apple about Polestar. But Polestar seems to, to your point, have no particular interest in like, they're not trying to be Toyota. Yeah. No, I don't think so. They're trying to be Mercedes. They're trying to be Audi. That's fine. There's a lot of money to be made in that segment as well. I think what they have to be worried about is Ford and Jeep. And I mentioned Scout as well, but I don't think Scout really has... We don't really know what they're going to be yet.

49:51But I do think Jeep in particular, given sort of the similarities and the overlap in the customers that are interested in these cars and Rivian's vehicles has the potential to eat Rivian's lunch, as you put it. So, and Jeep has said that they are coming out, you know, with all electric, there's going to be an all electric Wrangler. There's going to be an all electric Grand Cherokee. They're coming. Also, I think if Subaru got off its ass and actually made some good EVs, that could hurt as well, because I see some overlap in customers there. But Subaru is sort of in the same camp as Toyota. They're kind of dragging a little bit on the EV rollout.

50:27So Rivian still has a possibility here. And I do think that they could have a first mover advantage if they can get the R2 out in the timeframe that they said that they will. Yeah. And as we've learned, there's nothing like an existential threat to your company to get you to actually ship your car. It's very motivating, I've heard. I've not experienced it myself, but yes. And then, yeah, but then the China question kind of looms over all of this, right? Will China eventually be able to sell its cheap electric vehicles in the United States is a huge question. Elon Musk has said himself that would be a devastating blow to the EV industry in the United States.

51:04And BYD in particular, China's biggest automaker has said that they're going to start building a factory in Mexico, which is right on our doorstep. So the tariff situation is still very unfriendly to Chinese-made EVs. Obviously, the policy situation is very bad for them. It would be very expensive for them to try to sell, but it's still an open possibility. Fair enough. So it's going to be in a big couple of years. I feel like we've been saying for 10 years, it's going to be a big couple of years, but this one feels real. Yes, it does feel... I mean, I think we're starting to see a lot of pieces fall into play.

51:39All of the automakers are jumping on the Tesla charging bandwagon. They're all going to start using superchargers. They're giving out adapters to their customers. They're going to have the Tesla port built in natively on the vehicle themselves. The R2, for example, is going to be the first Rivian vehicle to have the Tesla NACS charging port in the vehicle. So those vehicles will be able to charge at Tesla supercharger stations. That's going to be huge as we start to see that get adopted widespread. And then you've got the incentive that are available. The federal EV tax credit can now be taken at the dealership.

52:12You go into a dealership, you're like, I want to buy an electric vehicle. Does it meet these criteria? Do I meet the criteria? If so, yes, great. You get a$7 ,500 discount at the point of sale. That's going to be a huge, big incentive, I think, for a lot of people to buy electric cars. I think more of these mass market cars, more of these volume players like the R2. I think the Chevy Blazer went through a bit of a software issue, but now is back and available for sale, as well as the Chevy Equinox EV is going to be coming out. These are common, normal, everyday vehicles that most people can afford.

52:44And if they are sold at a price point that car buyers think is right for them, I think you're going to really start to see things shoot up in terms of sales growth. Fair enough. So yeah, we're going to get a real answer on Rivian here one way or another pretty quickly, whether this company is a neat brand that has sold a good story about itself or is a real power player. And it makes me feel better to know that that's coming because I've come into this being like, do we know anything about whether that Rivian is actually going to work? And I feel like the answer is we don't, but we're about to.

53:11Yeah. And I think that they have a lot of smart people that work for them and it seems like they have a lot of interesting partnerships, but yeah, there's a lot that's still up in the air. I think that it'll be a really interesting year for them and for the rest of the industry. Totally. I do love the headlights. I am normally a gigantic antagonist to all weird ideas about headlights because they're just all the worst. And the Mustang thing where the turn signal goes It was awful. I hate it all. Rivian did a good job. So for that reason alone, I hope it works. The oval speaks to your need for rounded symmetry.

53:47It just feels right. It just feels right. It just feels nice. It's like it's smiling at me. Happy little face smiling at you. All right, Andy, thank you as always. Appreciate it. Oh, my pleasure. Thanks, David. All right, we're going to take one more break, and then we'll be back with the Verge Cast Hotline.

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57:05We're back. Let's get to the hotline. As always, the number is 866-VERGE-11. The email is vergecast at theverge.com. We love all your questions, and we try to answer at least one on the show every week. Before we get into this one, first of all, thank you to everybody who called and emailed about TikTok. You had awesome feedback. It was great to hear from you. I promise. Neil, I, Alex, and I are all still friends. We're going to get to a bunch of your feedback on Friday, I think. I want to give all that stuff a few more days to play out, just because there's a lot happening really fast. And one of the things we talked about last week was the huge lack of information that we have.

57:39And we're starting to get more information. So we're going to get to all of that on Friday. So stay tuned. For now, we have a question from Terry. Hi, this is Terry in Philadelphia, and I'm preparing for a professional exam. And every time I do, I become obsessed about a particular piece of technology, thinking that if I buy one more gadget, that will make the stress of this thing that will define the arc of my life, or at least what my salary raises this year, just kind of go away. That current obsession are folding phones. I am a massive man with hands that can just hold an entire country ham.

58:14So it feels like a folding phone would be perfect for the fact that I seemingly have the hands of a steelworker, despite being an actuary. And one of the things that gets me is whenever I read a review and one of the dings is its expense, is how to interpret the fact that I'm now like a year out from the Fold 5 and the Pixel Fold, and I can get them all used for like$800 off. Do I just effectively add one point to the Verge review score? How do you factor in the fact that stuff gets cheaper when you're interpreting the review on a review site? Any insight would be great. Love the show. Stay classy.

58:57All right. This is one of my favorite and one of the most relatable questions we've gotten on The Vergecast in a long time. Allison Johnson is here to help me answer it. Hi, Allison. Hello. Do we love Terry? I feel like we love Terry. I feel like the thing where I'm like, I have a big project to do. Let me buy a gadget that will solve all of my problems is extremely, extremely relatable. I feel seen. Yeah. Like this planner is going to do everything for me. I have brought you here because I think there are two questions inside of this question. both of which I want to talk about one is for our massive man friend Terry with huge country ham hands is a foldable phone the right call that's question number one and then question number two which I want to get to is how do you think about price in a review like that and how should we think about price of these things over time as they inevitably come down but let's just start with the beginning thing the foldable phone question is a foldable phone going to solve all of Terry's problems forever for the rest of his life.

59:55Yes, Terry, I have great news. All you need to do is spend upwards of$800 on a gadget. No, I think there's something there. I think that's fair to think that you have a phone that's like normal size. And when you want to do something kind of fiddly or you just want more screen space, open it up and you have like almost a tablet. So I think that's real. I think Terry is on the right track. I'm curious what your experience has been with foldable phones in terms of like the productivity they enable. Because for me, I've used most of my foldable experiences with the Pixel Fold at this point. And what I have found is that as a thing for just more screen real estate, whether it's like I have a PDF that isn't, you know, scaling well to my phone or whatever, or a thing I want to actually mark up with a pen, foldable phones, awesome.

1:00:47The thing that has not worked for me that I have found very frustrating is I hoped that typing would be better on a foldable phone because you can do the split keyboard thing and sort of type with two thumbs on a bigger screen and it would be better. I have not found that to be the case at all. But I'm curious what your experience has been. Like, what do you get from the bigger screen that way? Yeah. For me, it is the productivity stuff. And like the scenario I keep coming back to is like, I just hate tabbing around between apps and you just always end up doing it. I'm like planning dinner with friends and you're in the little chat app.

1:01:22You got to switch to Google Maps. You got to look at a PDF of the restaurant's menu. The foldable phones let you put two things on the screen at once and like hold two thoughts in your head at one time. I so appreciate them for that. I will occasionally indulge in a game that's fun on a bigger screen. But for me, it's definitely the like, oh, I can just breathe and put all these things out. Or I have Spotify in a little window and Duolingo. It's just like a little bit more of a computer experience than a phone experience. I agree. Typing is weird. It feels strange. Yeah, I keep thinking I'm going to get used to it, but I haven't.

1:02:04But you're totally right. The two apps side by side thing, especially for something like research and note taking is really useful. Just for me, being able to have like the browser on one side and a Google Doc or my notes app or whatever on the other is amazing. And I never noticed how annoying it is to constantly switch between apps on my iPhone as I have after using the Pixel Fold a bunch. So I'm with you. So, okay, Terry, you should buy it. It's going to be amazing. Let's talk about prices because I think you were on this show when all this stuff first came out. And I think we more or less agree$1 ,800 is a ludicrous amount of money to pay for a phone.

1:02:40Like if you want to and you have the money, go with God, right? But$1 ,800 is a tremendous amount of money. But these things are now a year or in the Galaxy Folds case, sometimes a couple of years old, the prices are coming way down. Does that make you think differently about them? This is the question I ask myself every day, just even when you consider when one of these phones comes out, especially Samsung, they'll throw a new phone at you if you trade something in or if you sign up on your carriers, you promise to pay them thousands of dollars over the next three years, they'll throw a phone at you.

1:03:18So what does a phone really cost is the question. I think there is kind of a calculus as, you know, when you get to like a year out, the prices will kind of come down sometimes. I think foldables have been a little more stubborn, but the thing to kind of balance that with is always like, what do we think is coming out next? Is it going to be a big year, like a big leap forward this year? I would argue that the Galaxy Z Fold 4 to 5, like not much changed there. And if you were looking at a at a Z Fold 4 and skip the 5, that probably would have been a good call. I think there's some interesting things coming up this year where the pixel fold looks like it might get a little thinner and kind of a less like rectangular shape where it's like real kind of squat and wide.

1:04:15Sort of maybe something like the OnePlus Open, which I think has the best format of like when it's closed and when it's open. So all that's to say, I don't know. I don't know how you think about the price. You do want to factor in like the years of security updates in the OS updates that you're promised. Like you, if you're buying a model that's a year out of date, you have to minus one year on all those things. Those are, you know, I want to keep that in mind, but I would kind of keep an ear to the ground on like what's coming up and then see what the deals are now. And just don't forget that when the new phone comes out, you can usually do pretty well.

1:04:56Yeah, it's a tricky one because I think my go-to advice on all technology for a long time has been buy the most expensive, best, newest thing you can afford and then keep it as long as humanly possible. And that advice I mostly stand by, except that I obviously recognize that many people can't, for whatever reason, afford the best and biggest and newest thing, right? And I think particularly with foldable phones, that's really complicated because there isn't, like you're saying, that sort of graceful scaling that happens where like if you want to buy an iPhone 13 in this the year 2024, I think that's a perfectly valid thing to do.

1:05:32It's not what I would do because of my aforementioned belief in buying the new thing and keeping it forever. But the iPhone 13 is a really good phone. There is no version of that three years ago in foldable phones. And they're getting better so much faster. And they're so not yet mature that, and like, as soon as you brought up the Pixel Fold, I'm like, uh, I just think about how much better, like the Pixel watch got from one to two, like the Fold. Google has a long history of making like kind of first things and then pretty good second things. And so even at a thousand dollars, like, are you going to buy that phone?

1:06:04And then in six months be like, uh, I should have just bought the$1 ,800 one because it's dramatically better. Or should you have waited six more months after that? But then at that point, you're waiting for the folder. It's like, it's just a forever. It's like a hamster wheel. Yeah, it really is. But I'm curious for you as a reviewer, like this is something I've struggled with over the years in reviewing products is how much to think about what they cost. And I think sometimes it's really obvious, right? Like we, I made a big show of yelling$3 ,500 a lot when we talked about the Vision Pro. But in terms of like, as you're reviewing a phone, a foldable phone, or even just, you know, the most other kind of thousand dollar-ish phones, do you spend a lot of time thinking about the price as you're reviewing it?

1:06:47I do. Kind of trying to bear in mind like the way that most people buy phones, especially in this country, looks very different. You know, nobody's walking into Verizon and just putting$1 ,000 on the table. So that kind of figures in. But even when that's the case, like you have a whole lot of capital with like if you're ready to switch to a new wireless carrier, you can like easily get$1 ,000 phone out of that. So like just the just kind of keeping in mind the weight of that, that, you know, anybody is potentially putting down on one of these devices. And I do think of them as they're kind of a moment in time, the review.

1:07:29So I bear in mind like the prices of the other things out there and they may be discounted. They may have some special deal going. but I think I come back to the MSRP a lot as kind of an apples to apples like gut check of you know this costs this amount of money for real and this one costs this or is that a good deal and there's just a lot of like 4D chess going on and in my mind somewhere but it all has to kind of come out in a way that hopefully makes sense to people yeah I was used to try to think about like okay, if you gave this to me as a gift and it was free, would I like it? And that's kind of one version of the question.

1:08:14And then the other one is, is it worth the cost? And the problem with phones is, is they exist literally on every single part of the spectrum between those two things. It's so complicated. Yes. In a way that like, I pretty much know what an iPad costs, right? Like you just have no idea what your next phone is going to cost in the strangest way. But okay, let's, let's answer a couple of quick questions here for Terry. And then we're going to get out of here. Question number one is, should Terry just buy an iPad? Is that the better idea? I, you know, there's something to that. I'm sort of coming around to this idea of like, wouldn't it be nice to have more gadgets that are just good at doing the thing that you want them to do?

1:08:54Like we've just spent, I know we've spent a lot of time like cramming as many things as we can into a phone and like, that's fun. But sometimes like we were both looking at this like standalone voice recorder today, which is like, what a novel idea. Your phone can do that. But anyway, that's a long way to say like, that's an option. And if the kinds of things he wants to do with it are just better on a tablet, then, you know, think about a tablet. Yeah. I've been debating this ever since I first heard Terry's question. And I think the thing I've come around to is the question is, do you need to have it in your pocket?

1:09:30Right? Because If Terry's like, I'm a big guy, I have big hands. If the answer is like, I want to carry this thing around with me all the time, foldable phone. Because like you can tell yourself you're going to carry an iPad with you all the time. I have told myself that many times. It's just never true. The idea that I'm just going to have it with me all the time, not true. But if you're like, I'm mostly at home and I want a thing that I can like sit with for my reading and research or whatever, I think the iPad's the better advice. The other thing is, if Terry wants a foldable phone, which one would you recommend right now?

1:10:01And the thing for Terry is Terry does care about the price, but we are here to tell Terry, all things considered, here is the one we think you should buy. What do you think the answer is right now? Yeah, like my general pick right now is the Samsung is the Galaxy Z Fold 5. I think they're just kind of, they kind of had a head start and they've figured out a couple more things, you know, with the durability and with the software that I think Google and OnePlus, those are really the only two other options in the US. They're still kind of figuring out. I say that with the asterisk of like the Z Fold 5 form factor might not be Terry's favorite because when it's closed, it has that like long, narrow kind of remote control shape.

1:10:45It's not as bad as it once was, but if you're not enjoying the experience of typing on like a normal slab smartphone, this is gonna feel a little more cramped. Like the keyboard on the front, the cover screen is just a little more narrow. So for that reason, I would steer them towards the pixel fold. And I would hold off on that one maybe because we might get a new one pretty soon. So that was like three answers in one. Okay, that's fair. I will say the only part of that I disagree with is I do have a hard time telling someone right now to buy a pixel fold because I think the odds of there being one that is dramatically better very soon.

1:11:26Yeah, I think it's pretty high. Yeah, I do think the good news is, Terry, if you can wait two months, three months, Google IO is in June. And historically speaking, we are virtually guaranteed to hear about whatever thing they're making around then sometime, even if it doesn't come out till the fall. So you'll at least have kind of a hint about what's coming. But I think I'm with you that if you want to buy a phone that is both a year old and likely to still be good for a while, it seems like Samsung is probably the safest choice. Yeah. Even if it does feel like a TV remote. It does. It's going to solve all of Terry's problems, I'm pretty sure.

1:12:01There we go. Terry, good luck on all of your endeavors with your foldable phone. I hope that helped. Allison, thank you as always. Thank you.

1:12:11All right. That's it for The Verge Cast today. Thank you to everyone who came on the show. And thank you, as always, for listening. There's lots more on everything we talked about on TheVerge.com, especially the Rivian stuff. We had a lot of really good coverage, including that conversation with RJ Scaring, the CEO. We'll put some links in the show notes, but you know, the verge.com. It's a website. We love it. As always, if you have thoughts, questions, feelings, or other cars you want Rivian to make, you can always email us at vergecast at the verge.com. Call the hotline 866-VERGE11. We love hearing from you.

1:12:39Also keep sending TikTok thoughts. This is all happening really fast. We really want to know what you think. And I suspect we're going to talk about it a whole bunch again on Friday. This show is produced by Andrew Marino, Liam James, and Will for. The Verge Cast is a Verge production and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Neelai, Alex, and I will be back on Friday to talk about presumably TikTok, some AI gadgets, and a whole bunch of other stuff. We'll see you then. Rock and roll.

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