PROS
CONS
Specifications
- Ceramic-coated aluminum
- 1.4 oz for the aluminum model
- 4.6 x 2.8 x 0.30 in
- 5-10 card capacity
- Limited lifetime warranty plus a 50% bonus for abuse
Full Review
The Fantom R is a modular wallet that smoothly ejects from 4 – 13 cards. Just activate the lever at the top of the wallet with your thumb and your cards will display in a perfect fan. It’s made from ceramic-coated aluminum with comfortably rounded corners and edges. Modular attachments include coin, cash, and key holders.
Materials & Design
Much like the Ridge, Dango Dapper, Ekster Senate, and other wallets that we’ve talked about here at Wallet Surfer, the Fantom R is designed to be more of a cardholder than a traditional multi-use wallet. It’s modular, too, which I’ll get to in a minute.
The foundation is a ceramic-coated aluminum frame with a lever mounted at the top that ejects your cards. Both the lever and the body have a dished-out indented area that forms a thumb slot. This fits your thumb perfectly and lets you easily eject your cards with just one hand. I love this feature.
The Fantom R comes in three different card-carrying capacities. The largest will hold up to 13 cards Needless to say, the wallet gets thicker (and heavier) as you increase capacity.
In general, the Fantom feels hip, like you’re holding a next-generation wallet in your hands. The wallet is angular, but the corners are rounded, and the ceramic coating makes it feel soft in your hand.
The word “ceramic” usually means hard and unforgiving, but not here. In fact, it feels just the opposite, much more forgiving to the touch than aluminum.
The handy thumb slot and metal material give it a bit of a masculine, edgy vibe that feels distinctly modern but also not too out there. The matte color of the frame and a wide choice of finishes go a long way to helping the wallet look classy and expensive.
The Fantom I’m demonstrating in this review has the carbon fiber finish.
It’s modular
The Fantom is a modular wallet with more add-ons than you can shake a stick at. The base wallet ships without any way to handle cash, receipts, and other miscellanea, so the first accessory you’ll probably want is either the titanium money clip or the silicon money band.
I personally like the silicon band because it slips in and out of my pocket easier without hanging up like a metal wallet clip can do sometimes.
The big advantage of the money clip is that it can ride on both sides of the wallet. This matters because all of the other attachments, including the money strap, only mount to one side. The bottom line is that you never have to remove the money clip when swapping out accessories. That’s a bonus.
The money clip attaches to these two threaded holes, so it can be mounted to ride on the front or back of the wallet.
In addition to the money clip, these are the other choices of attachments.
- coin holder
- cash holder
- silicone band
- key holder
- ID holder
- tracker
Check the Fantom website accessories page for the details and prices of each attachment.
The key thing to remember is that the modular attachments can only be used one at a time. If you decide you want the coin holder rather than the key holder, you’ll have to remove one before you can install the other.
There are three screws on one side that are used to anchor all of the attachments. The attachments ship with a tiny screwdriver, but the screws are a standard Phillip’s head, so any jeweler’s screwdriver will work just as well.
The different modules aren’t difficult to remove and install, but the process isn’t particularly fast, either. And you always have to be careful not to lose those tiny little screws.
Daily Performance
Over a month of morning coffee runs, grocery hauls, restaurant take-out, and generally running around town, I’m happy with the way the Fantom R performs. Of course, there are a few caveats along with kudos.
Capacity and ease of use
I chose the 10-card capacity version because I typically carry around 7 – 8 cards. I’ve tested my Fantom R with as many as 9 cards inside and the ejection system still works smoothly.
But 10 cards? No way. They just won’t fit. If any of your cards have raised letters and numbers, the card count will be reduced even more.
When loading the cards, there is just enough clearance at the top of the wallet that the cards make a satisfying sound when they lock into place. You can feel the mild resistance at the leading corner of the stack of cards when you insert them.
There is a nice balance of mild resistance when inserting the cards that is just enough so they don’t easily shake out once they’re in there. Fantom showed some care here in getting the tolerances just right.
I love the fanning feature. With just one hand, you can hold the wallet and eject the cards with a gentle push with your thumb on the lever. The lever action is smooth and it fans out all of the cards evenly every time. It’s fun to do and a fidget spinner if there ever was one.
One of the subtlest (and classiest) features that the Fanom designers incorporated is a dampening feature that controls the speed of the lever when it returns to its original position.
The lever doesn’t snap unceremoniously back into place with the speed of a spring-loaded mousetrap. Instead, it has a controlled return, as if in slow motion. A very nice touch.
One of the paradoxical things about the Fantom R is that you don’t even half to use the lever to eject your cards. The wallet is designed with a redundant thumb slot you can use to manually pull out your cards and fan them out. It’s almost as quick as using the lever.
In my mind, Fantom could have just as easily have removed the card ejection mechanism entirely. This would make the wallet shorter, lighter, simpler, and probably decrease the overall price by half. But the lever action makes the wallet a lot more fun.
Carry-ability
The big question that most guys like me have (and I consider this to be more of a guy’s wallet) is: How does it fit in my pocket? I carry my wallet in my front left pocket along with my iPhone, so it’s critically important they coexist in peace and harmony.
To avoid pocket bulge and damage to my phone, I like my wallet to fit next to my phone, not on top of it. Unfortunately, the Fantom R is a little too bulky for that. The two end up jostling around together.
The good news is that Fantom has designed their wallet with ceramic-coated aluminum and nicely rounded corners and edges, so scratching isn’t a huge issue.
However, the silicone money band attachment is also ceramic coated but the edges are sharp and angular which means they can potentially cause some damage. That’s something they should think about fixing.
Accessories
In regards to the modular accessories, I have only tried the silicone money band and the money clip. If you purchase all of the accessories, you can quickly hit the $200 mark (that’s in addition to the $94 price of the wallet). For instance, the coin holder is $44 and the key holder is $10 more than that.
Over and above the expense, the accessories are not easy-on and easy-off. You have to remove 3 screws each time and then reinstall them with the new accessory. Kind of a pain.
Plus, each module increases the thickness of the wallet. And you can only use one accessory at a time.
The exception is the money clip because it fits on the opposite side of the accessories. This location means it doesn’t have to be removed to install other modules.
To be fair, no one is twisting your arm to buy these accessories. The basic wallet works just fine without them. But if you so desire, Fantom has provided plenty of modular options for you to consider adding. Heck, one of them might be exactly what you’re looking for.
Warranty
I have to admit that I have never heard of a Wear and Tear warranty like Fantom’s. This line from their website sums it up.
“Product damaged through wear and tear, misuse, or neglect can be replaced by Ansix Designs at 50% of the MSRP.”
Of course, you either have to ship it back to Canada or show proof of the destroyed wallet. For the latter, they don’t specify what kind of proof will suffice.
Additionally, the wallet is backed up by a more conventional limited lifetime warranty.
Should you buy it?
There is surely a parade of metal wallets out there, but Fantom has taken their metal wallet design to the next level. They hype it themselves by calling their design “revolutionary.”
As the photo below shows, the Fantom R is totally unique and unlike any other metal wallet I have tested. And I’ve tested a lot.
The Fantom carries all my debit, credit, and expired gift cards with ease. It’s super-stylish with a one-of-a-kind design that protects cards from bending while allowing easy access with the ejection system. It’s RFID blocking, too. The wallet slides smoothly into a front pants pocket (even tight jeans), and comes out just easily.
The modular accessories are expensive and tedious to install, but if you love to tinker and customize a wallet to your liking, opportunities abound.
My general consensus is that it’s a damn good wallet. It’s quality-built, durable, and handsome – overall, more than worth your time if you haven’t found your perfect wallet match yet.