Galaxy Z Flip Review: Z Best of Z Best?
Purchase Price: $1,300
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Product Specs +
- 6.7 inch 1080p by 2636p
- 425ppi
- Foldable AMOLED
- Snapdragon 855+
- 8GB of RAM
- 256 GB of storage
- 3300 mAH battery
- Android 10
Camera Specs +
Rear Cameras
12 MP F/1.8, 27MM Wide 12 MP, F/2.2, 12 mm ultrawide Shoots 4k at up to 60 FPS
Selfie Cameras
10 MP F/2.4, 26MM Wide
Video
Shoots 4k at 30 FPS
Folding phones have finally hit the mainstream market, and that means these devices are becoming more accessible for general people like you and me to purchase. I purchased a brand new Galaxy Z Flip for $1,300 and this is without a doubt, the most expensive phone I have ever spent my hard earned money on. After spending a significant amount of time with this costly little phone in my pocket, I can confidently tell you that the future of mobile technology may very well draw its ancestry based off this phone. However, does that mean you should be buying this particular phone at this current time?
Size Matters
The first thought that crosses my mind when I see a phone with folding mechanics like this is how much space it’ll save in my pocket.While we usually think of occupying length, we rarely consider thickness. The best way to describe the Galaxy Z Flip folded together is by envisioning two modern cell phones stacked together. While closed in its clamp-shell form, the Z Flip adds a lot more bulk to your pocket space than if you have a single candy bar shaped phone. This is the conundrum we face when navigating the future of mobile phones. Do we prefer to have thinner devices that are larger in size in lieu of more compact forms that are thicker? For a female consumer, this isn’t as big of an issue when you can carry your phone in a purse. For males, I find it much more uncomfortable with this bulky folded phone in my pocket over a flat screen form factor.
Then when you open up the phone, it becomes a flat 6.7 inch 1080p super AMOLED display. Look, I get that this is a unique display, but for $1,300, I still can’t find a way to validate paying that much money for a phone that isn’t quad HD or 4K. Sacrificing that higher resolution for the gimmick of folding glass leaves you not only with an inferior viewing experience, but you’re also left with a slight visible crease splitting the center. I’m personally not sure if I would deem that tradeoff worthy as 90% of the time, you’ll be using the phone in its open position anyway. The crease on the Z Flip didn’t distract me during everyday use. In fact, when this was my daily driver, I rarely noticed it. What did bother me was the feeling of the touch-screen as this is not the dragon glass feeling experience many of us are used to on our smartphones. Fingers and fingerprints would often get caught onto the display.
Not Quite There Yet
Powering the Galaxy Z Flip is a Snapdragon 855+ with 8GB of RAM. While those numbers are very acceptable for a flagship device and performance is smooth, this is not the highest end processor on the market today. In fact, the Snapdragon 865 launched alongside this phone on the Galaxy S20. I’m not one for solely relying on numbers and while the Z Flip performs like a flagship phone should, it is rather difficult to swallow a $1,300 pill and not receive Z best of Z best.
The Z Flip powers through with a 3,300 mAh battery that is cleverly implemented where the weight is split between both sides of the flip phone. This allows the phone to have even weight distribution for you to set the phone onto a table halfway folded. While this is a great design choice, unfortunately the battery life was just average at best. I stretched the battery life to about three and a half hours of screen-on time, good for 10-12 hours of battery life. I love that the Z Flip retains the flagship feature of wireless Qi charging, but due to the unique folding mechanics of this phone, some wireless charging pads may have difficulties finding the sweet spot. For example, in my Tesla Model 3, the Qi charger stand can’t hit the sweet spot when the Z Flip is folded nor does the Z Flip fit in the stand while unfolded as the aspect ratio makes the phone dimension too long.
Prior to the release there was a lot of paranoia about the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip’s display being easily damaged and scratched. I discovered the phone scratches easily despite my very careful use of technology. I pride myself in taking excellent care of my collectibles and devices, yet I still found scratches that would unwittingly appear. With this unique form factor, case makers are only starting to catch up in supplying consumers with cases and screen protectors. We just don’t have the assortment of cases you’d usually find offered for Samsung phones. While Samsung gives you a default two-piece plastic phone case, it’s slippery and not that nice feeling in your hand.
There’s also the case of the hinge I want to bring to your attention. I have not noticed the flipping mechanic benefitting my lifestyle at all. It’s a fun trick to set your phone down and prop it up to take a selfie, but it’s a low angle selfie which isn’t very flattering. It’s more logical simply to hold the phone up and take a photo like you normally would. It is amusing to use this phone propped open 75% of the way while scrolling through Reddit or Amazon as it feels like I’m using a communicator straight out of Star Trek. The hinge is cool to play with the first couple of days, but the novelty quickly wears off. The phone is opened dozens of times a day and each time it happens, it becomes more of a hassle. While I don’t think folding phones are a gimmick, it still is an extra step you have to take to access all of your apps and messages. Samsung attempted to alleviate the need to open up the phone by adding a small screen on the outer shell. The 1.1 inch super AMOLED display occupies a compact section on the bottom corner of the top shell and allows you to see some notifications that you can interact with by tapping or scrolling. With such limited surface area, reading your notifications or any information displayed there is ineffective. I feel like this area needs to be a larger interactive display and I believe Samsung will do that in the next generation. If that display can do 30% of what users would normally do on their main screen, the phone wouldn’t need to be unfolded as much thus saving some stress on the hinge.
The Future Is Here…?
On the top rear side above that small display, the Z Flip has two 12 MP cameras featuring one ultrawide and another regular wide lens. If you are upgrading from a camera-centric phone like the Pixel 2 or Pixel 3, don’t expect a quantum leap of quality. Photos come out with the signature Samsung oversaturated colors and overall, the photos do look good for a flagship phone. Where this phone lacks is the camera experience as auto exposure and auto focusing just don’t feel like they quite match up with some other flagship devices. Lowlight results were a disappointment as many of the images required multiple attempts to have any kind of sharpness to them. The Z Flip wasn’t created with superior photo quality as its main objective and while Samsung does a good enough job to live up to certain expectations, I would recommend going with the S20 family for a better camera experience if you must have a Samsung.
Although I included a fair amount of negative points about the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip, this is still a device that gets me excited about the future of technology. Just a couple of years ago, flip phones were an ancient relic but now they’ve risen from the smartphone graveyard guiding design into the future. The thought of something other than what we’re accustomed to in the smartphone era is refreshing to me. But that’s all it currently is. What it comes down to at the end of the day, is that flip phones really shouldn’t be that exciting. The concept isn’t new. They also don’t add much towards the overall user experience. Once that invigorating honeymoon phase leaves you, it’s just a phone that’s not very convenient. However, the future is brimming with hope. The future just isn’t here yet.
Shot on Samsung Galaxy Z Flip
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Alex
Caught in between the conundrum of his fascination with retro and the future, Alex has a very unique taste in technology. Never one to follow trends like his millennial peers yet constantly desiring to get ahead of the curve, he sees technology like he does his other love: comic books. Always looking for the best value or a hidden gem, his collector mindset reflects on some of his favorite gadgets: the Moto X (2015), HTC U11 and the Google Pixelbook. If there’s a good tech deal out there, Alex is on the hunt!