We’ve been testing the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, Samsung’s latest foldable phone. I can rightly talk about how this phone looks, what I think of it and what it brings to the emerging foldable phone ecosystem. But I also want to talk about Samsung’s problems with this phone.
The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 is not a cheap phone. It’s one of the most expensive phones in Samsung’s catalog, priced at 2009 euros, which is 100 euros more expensive than its predecessor. Why is that? What’s so special and new about it that justifies the higher price?
It’s not an investment anyone wants to make, or really likes to double down on, or wants the latest, whatever the cost. But is it worth the investment?
This New Design Suits You Very Well
The slight redesign of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 aims to make it look more and more like the Galaxy S24 Ultra, which means that Samsung has eliminated the rounded corners to give the phone straight lines, but, as with the S24 Ultra, I think the change suits it perfectly.
Technically, the physical dimensions change, but the change is so small – just one millimeter on each side – that it’s barely noticeable. As you’ll see in this review, many of the Z Fold 6’s design details duplicate those of the Z Fold 5, including the rest.
The front screen is taller than it is wide and particularly thin, there are three main cameras on the back, a speaker and microphone on the top and a speaker and USB-C port on the bottom.
On the left is a SIM slot (with eSIM support) and on the right are the volume and power buttons, as well as the fingerprint reader.
Speaking of design, especially foldable design, we have to talk about the hinge. Samsung’s hinge is IP48 certified, making it dust and water resistant for the first time. This hinge is powerful and allows the screen to be moved at any angle without worrying about it opening due to stress on the hinge. Another small design detail is also good news.
What’s more, thanks to its flat design, the screen can be held upright. A small detail, but one that, if you allow it, makes me happy with this type of phone.
Like the Galaxy S24 Ultra, this phone has a more square design, with fewer corners, and the edges of the phone sink into your palm when you hold it in one hand. Personally, I don’t mind this, but I think some people might get tired of the sharp edges.
I always run into the same problem with these foldable phones, I end up using the open state more than the closed state and, to be honest, that’s not a complaint. You have to make the most of such a large screen that has basically replaced my tablet.
It’s comfortable to use it in the open state for a few hours, even more so than in the closed state, which doubles in thickness when you close it.
Samsung hasn’t changed much in terms of connectivity. It retains all of last year’s standards: Wi-Fi 6e, Bluetooth 5.3 with aptX support, GPS, NFC, USB-C 3.2 ……. And in general, the phone works perfectly. Although Wi-Fi 7 would have been better, I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
The changes to the screen are minimal, it keeps the old formatting
When I say minimal changes, I mean that the changes are only a few millimeters. The external screen is 6.3 inches with a resolution of 968 x 2,376 pixels and includes a dynamic AMOLED 2X panel with a refresh rate of 120 Hz. It is identical to its predecessor, except for the resolution.
The internal screen is a 7.6-inch, 120 Hz 2X dynamic AMOLED panel with HDR10+ support, a brightness of 2,600 nits and a resolution of 1,856 x 2,160 pixels. Apart from the pixels, the parameters are identical.
I quote my colleague Jesús Maturana’s thoughts on the Galaxy Z Flip 5: the external screen is still too narrow and too high to make writing on it complicated, while the internal screen is large, bright and easy to operate even with one hand, but of course your fingers have to reach it.
The colors are good, but as this is a Samsung phone, the colors always tend to be too saturated.
The problem with the internal screen is that Samsung, despite being a leader in the manufacture of foldable screens, hasn’t managed to make the fold of the screen blurry and the fold is very visible. In contrast, other brands, such as Honor and Oppo/OnePlus, have managed to make the fold almost invisible.
The sound is still pretty good, even at higher volumes, with minimal distortion and support for Dolby Atmos. Honestly, it takes a good ear to pick up the nuances of surround sound on a phone that already has larger speakers than normal.
Samsung bets even more on AI as a savior
Samsung has not only added to the design of the S24 Ultra, but also Galaxy AI and all the new Google AI features that are present in the S24 series.
But what’s most interesting are the tricks of the Galaxy AI, a system developed by Samsung itself, especially those centered on translation and converting voice into text, which can be done directly from the device without having to access the cloud.
The new Galaxy AI features have been specifically designed for a type of phone that, for lack of a better description, we can say is suitable for professionals.
If you’re someone who has a lot of meetings, Note Assist is the most important feature, as it can save you a lot of time. You can record audio from the Samsung Notes application for transcription at the end of the meeting and it also provides you with a summary.
Chat Assist is available on the S24, but is now also available on Samsung’s foldable devices and allows you to type different styles of text or check spelling and grammar with artificial intelligence.
Navigation assistance is integrated into Samsung’s browser and currently translates websites and summarizes articles.
Portrait Studio allows you to create AI portrait images of people. It is based on photos of people you already have in your gallery, interesting, but there are many other apps in the Google store that make better portraits.
Instant Slow-mo, a function that improves on that of the S24 and that when you long press on a video, the AI inserts frames to make a slow-motion, but now you can save that resulting video as a new one.
Sketch to Image allows you to draw on top of photos with doodles and generates realistic elements with AI, possibly one of the most interesting and fun details.
Translation on two screens is an improvement on the direct translation system from the mobile phone and the fact is that now you can do simultaneous live translation and the text can be seen on the internal screen and on the external screen in each person’s language.
In terms of performance, the static tests indicate exactly what we thought, top-of-the-range performance for a device in this category, but curiously, if we compare it with the latest foldables of this type, it’s not as if there is such a significant leap in performance.
Open and background applications open quickly. There is no delay in the interface. In games the performance is top notch, even in games where the graphics level is very demanding. And the fact is that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 continues to perform better than ever, although, as always in the high generation of Qualcomm, the processor gets quite hot when you have it running at high performance for more than 5 minutes in a row.
Last year’s camera set-up, but it works
Repeating the cameras of the Galaxy Z Fold 5 is not as bad as it might seem. As long as they are good cameras and the set that Samsung chose for the previous generation and in the current Z Fold 6, maintains its quality very well.
This is the camera configuration of the Galaxy Z Fold 6.
50 megapixel wide-angle main camera, f/1.8, 23mm
10 megapixel telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom, f/2.4
12 megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, 123˚, 12mm, f/2.2
10 megapixel front camera, f/2.2, 24mm
4 megapixel front camera under the internal screen, f/1.8, 26mm
On a practical level, I find no differences with respect to the previous generation. A very complete camera kit, but one that does not reach the quality level of the Galaxy S24 Ultra, rather on a par with the Galaxy S24.
Very good photos, with good color reproduction and exposure in almost any lighting situation. Also in low light situations. Like all Samsung phones, it tends to oversaturate colors, especially greens and blues, but it’s a style of photography that you end up liking, especially when viewed on its AMOLED screens.
The video is still very good, both day and night, with surprisingly high quality image stabilization while you move.
My biggest complaint is with the 10-megapixel telephoto lens with 3x zoom, which is clearly the worst camera among the main ones, with a lack of definition that is not typical of this range, especially with a price of over 2,000 euros. And like last year, the front camera under the screen of the big screen is almost unusable, neither in photo nor in video, with blurred quality.
It maintains autonomy for a day of use, although be careful how many hours you use the big screen
The 4,400 mAh battery of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 is identical to that of the previous generation. What’s more, it also repeats the charging speed of 25 W (without charger in the box), 15 W wireless charging and 4.5 W reversible wireless charging.
Considering that the screens are essentially identical, but it has a more powerful processor, the battery performance has not been affected or at least there is no really visible difference.
As with the Galaxy Z Fold 5, the battery lasts a full day of “normal” use without any problems. What is normal? have found myself using the large screen more than the external one.
In addition, all the traditional applications of social networks, work and browser use, camera and GPS with Google Maps that you might need on a normal day. Quite a lot of use of 5G networks and less time than I would like of Wi-Fi and the Galaxy Z Fold 6.
The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 Is a Good Option
At this point, I think the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 is the best book-type foldable you can buy in Spain, not because it has the best hardware or the best design, but because Samsung is the only one that has a mobile of this type with the best software tools and, in the end, this weighs a lot.
Therefore, yes, it is the best foldable, but by a whisker.
Other foldables such as OnePlus Open or even Honor Magic V2 have better hardware on paper, and although they have good software and unique solutions for this type of screen, Samsung is still in the lead and the artificial intelligence tricks or how well they have adapted their version of Android, One UI 6.1, make the product stand out.
This is the general problem with the Galaxy Z Fold 6: if they had stuck with the Galaxy Z Fold 5, lowered the price and updated the software with the AI tricks included in this version, we would all have won. Samsung would have sold more phones, current users would get more out of their current phone and future buyers would have a cheaper and very complete foldable.
