If you’ve been hearing one refrain over and over from people who have been using Samsung’s new fleet of foldables, tablets, and wearables — all introduced in late July at Galaxy Unpacked in Seoul — it’s likely been one lamenting the lack of forward progress with this generation: too much the same. Having spent some time with much of the new hardware, I absolutely see where those feelings are coming from, but there’s still one device here that can proudly wear a badge of progress, one that makes some very strong arguments towards upgrading (even from a recent model). That’s because the Galaxy Z Flip 5 is easily the best hardware from Samsung this summer.

But last year’s Galaxy Z Flip 4 was also really, really nice, and is single-handedly the phone that got me to finally start feeling comfortable with the idea of folding-screen phones. The Galaxy Z Flip 5 needs to not just show it can make smart enhancements to Samsung’s winning formula, but it needs to recapture that same sort of initial magic. And while I didn’t see sparks, I think I’ve met my new favorite folder.

Source: Samsung

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5

Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip 5 demonstrates refinement in all things. This mature, comparatively affordable foldable is the company’s best to date, and sets a high bar for the competition. The newly expanded exterior display is actually useful this year, and encourages fun new ways of interacting with your phone. Combine that with a precision engineered flat-folding body, and this might just be the foldable to beat.

SoC

Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy

Display

6.7″ 2640 x 1080 120Hz OLED primary display; 3.4″ 720 x 748 60Hz OLED cover display

RAM

8GB

Storage

256GB or 512GB

Battery

3,700mAh

Ports

USB-C

Operating System

Android 13 (OneUI 5.1.1)

Front camera

10MP f/2.2 (1.22μm pixels)

Rear cameras

12MP f/1.8 wide-angle (83˚ FoV, OIS, 1.8μm pixels); 12MP f/2.2 ultra-wide (123˚ FoV, 1.12μm pixels)

Connectivity

5G (inc mmWave), LTE, Wi-Fi 6E

Dimensions

Unfolded: 71.9 x 165.1 x 6.9mm, Folded: 71.9 x 85.1 x 15.1mm

Colors

Graphite, Cream, Lavender, Mint

Weight

187g

IP Rating

IPX8

Price

Starting at $1,000

Pros

• Big, actually usable Flex Window is everything
• Refined, fold-flat design is an engineering accomplishment
• Manages to make using a smartphone feel fun again

Cons

• Camera could really use a telephoto option
• Battery sufficient at best and still needs faster charging
• Flex Window app support is a WIP

Availability and network

Samsung unveiled the Galaxy Z Flip 5 on July 26, with preorders going live that same day. We’ve now entered the period of general retail availability, and as of August 11 you can find the Flip 5 on the shelves of major retailers and carriers everywhere. Preorders reportedly set new records, surpassing the Flip 4 by a wide margin and accounting for the lion’s share of interest in Samsung’s newly launched hardware — considering how much more affordable this is than the Fold 5, that’s maybe not a huge shock.

While you can pick up the Flip 5 at carriers like Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and US Cellular, in order to get the phone in one of its Samsung-exclusive colorways like yellow or blue, you’ll have to place your order through Samsung.com. The company’s kept its base starting price from last year, but with a twist. $1,000 now scores you a 256GB model, a big step up from last year’s 128GB entry-level model.

Design and display

At a glance, book-style foldables like the Galaxy Z Fold 5 may be able to pass for a standard phone in a chunky case. But the folded-up Flip 5 is unmistakably something exotic, with an eye-catching compact form that is both eminently pocketable and just the perfect size for one-handed use. I’ll talk about interacting with the newly expansive cover screen — now dubbed Flex Window — a little later on, but for now let’s focus on the hardware.

The big news with design changes for the Flip 5 is Samsung supersizing the phone’s exterior Flex Window, blowing it up from a 1.9-inch 512 x 260 window to a 3.4-inch 748 x 720 display that expands to (mostly) fill the available space. Unlike Motorola’s recent attempt at doing something similar with the Razr+, Samsung elects not to have its phones primary camera lenses penetrate this screen directly, and instead carves out a notch for them in the corner — the effect is a cover screen that’s shaped a bit like an inverted file folder.

The other major development this year is the reengineering of Samsung’s hinge design, with the immediately noticeable consequence that the phone now folds completely shut — no visible gap at the hinge end. It may seem like only a small change, but I think this is a significant accomplishment for a phone this many generations in, eliminating what I’d characterize as one of the Flip’s big compromises. All the “not quite perfect” anomalies that we’ve learned to accept and live with as the cost of getting to enjoy the early years of this novel form factor are finally gone. Samsung tackling this challenge gives me hope that we’ll continue to see the company polish its approach until maybe foldables really do reach the level of durability and uncompromising design that we’ve come to expect from standard smartphones. At least, it had better step up, because if it rests on its laurels here, Samsung risks being surpassed by competition that’s also been working hard to get its own foldables as mature as possible — like Xiaomi’s been up to with the Mi Mix Fold 3.

Just like before, Samsung gives the corners of the Flip’s screen some tiny protrusions that serve to prevent the two halves of the display from physically making contact, even when folded shut by this impressively flat new hinge — otherwise, this design would practically invite screen damage.

Maybe the only real negative from this otherwise positive development is that it can be a little tricky to flip open the Flip one-handed. Your thumbnail will fight for purchase along the glossy polished edges of the phone’s frame, and even when you get it in there resistance is high, with the threat of your nail scratching the screen lingering in the back of your mind. I’d love it if Samsung required just a tad less force to open the phone — maybe dial back the intensity of the magnets in the corner that help hold it shut. I also keep wishing that there were a little divot on the side, letting you get some leverage on the screen without needing to force your nail in there.

To Samsung’s credit, the Flip 5 easily opens when using both hands, remains open and perfectly flat without issue, and is a breeze to fold closed (even one-handed), generating a satisfying “snap” in the process. Despite that flexibility, the hinge is stiff enough to support the screen without moving while set to any arbitrary angle you like. Towards 90 degrees, you can feel a bit less resistance, but the display never feels loose, nor threatens to close on its own.

As a consequence of this unusual folding design, Samsung gives the Flip 5 a high aspect ratio: this is one tall and narrow phone. I quite like the narrow side of that, but one-handed reachability quickly becomes a real problem when you’re trying to get to your notifications up top. And I admit this entirely a me-problem, but the open Flip 5 is just too tall to fit inside the charging pocket on my electric motorcycle.

When it comes to the display itself, visually, what we get is quite nice here. The screen is once again a 6.7-inch 2640 x 1080 panel — that’s plenty sharp for this size, and the AMOLED output is plenty readable, even in sunlight. 120Hz operation keeps things looking smooth, and while I don’t love the look or feel of the installed screen protector, it’s not overly distracting and easy enough to dismiss as an inevitability.

Then there’s the crease. It isn’t bad-bad, but it’s there, and it’s something you’re not going to quickly forget about. Honestly, my feelings with it on the Flip 5 basically line right up with what I thought about on the Flip 4: it blends in nicely when viewed head-on or against dark backgrounds, but it becomes increasingly visible when viewed at an angle; you absolutely feel the crease when swiping across the middle of the screen; and I quickly found myself tweaking how I interacted with apps in order to avoid swiping across the crease. I’d prefer not having to deal with any of this, but I don’t think this is a problem we can expect Samsung to eliminate in the near future.

Other hardware and what’s in the box

Samsung’s doing some really nice stuff with the color options it’s making available for the Flip 5, and especially when you factor in the Samsung.com-exclusive shades like yellow and green, there are some really attractive possibilities here. Sadly, we’ve yet to see the manufacturer extend the fully customizable bespoke program that let you configure a Flip 3 or Flip 4 to its latest generation.

Making our way around the phone’s perimeter, we’ve got our USB-C port centered on the bottom edge (which I’ll complain about a little later when we talk battery), flanked by speaker and mic holes. Up the right side, past the hinge we’ve got our power button and volume rocker. Once again, the power button houses the phone’s fingerprint scanner, and like so many of the sensors I’ve seen implemented this way, its performance is extremely hit-and-miss; some days it feels as responsive as ever, while others it’s hitting its failed-scan limit almost instantly and forcing me to authenticate with PIN. Adding duplicate scans of frequently used fingers helps (especially in upside-down orientation since you’ll be unlocking from the Flex Window a bunch) but it’s still a problem. Up top, we’ve got nothing but a mic hole, and over on the left there’s out SIM tray and a window for antennas.

You’d be forgiven for assuming that speakers were an afterthought on a phone with this much else going on, but sound output really isn’t too shabby. Sure, the bottom speaker pulls the lion’s share of the load here, and its audio sounds nothing like the frequency curve you get from the earpiece speaker, but with the two going at once — not too bad at all. On voice calls, I occasionally ran into some crackling, but nothing too distracting.

Once again, this year Samsung gives its Flip IPX8 ingress protection, meaning you’re protected against water, but not so much dust. Even the water feels iffy, with Samsung warning the protection “is not permanent and may diminish over time because of normal wear and tear.” It’s not like the phone’s going to tell you when you cross that threshold, either, and while that day is probably a long way off, I hate the feeling that it’s looming out there, threatening to ruin the phone.

I really can’t over-emphasize just how great this phone feels to hold … when it’s folded up. The palmable form factor is a revelation when paired with an actually usable screen like this, and while there are some software issues I’ll get to shortly, I like this experience so much that I’m not sure I wouldn’t be interested in a phone this size that didn’t fold out to full-size. It reminds me so much of the sort of weird, fun phones that startups were trying to make into things in the mid-2010s — you guys remember the Runcible? In a weird way, this is its mainstream spiritual successor.

Samsung’s commitment to eco-friendliness may not extend to practices that would meaningfully reduce the biggest and most expensive e-waste, but at least the company’s sticking with its recent trend of including nothing worthwhile in its phones’ packaging. The Flip 5 arrives (unfolded) with a USB-C to USB-C cable, a SIM tool, and a quick-start guide that basically just lists the contents I shared with you. It’s a real page-turner.

Software and performance

The Galaxy Z Flip 5 runs Samsung’s One UI 5.1.1, based on Android 13. That skin is largely a known value at this point, and really, I don’t mind Samsung’s software. Coming from a Pixel, it does feel heavy all over, but I really, really like just how much there is to do here — how many settings can be tweaked, how many custom screens configured, all in the name of making this phone feel as personal as possible.

Performance is nice and consistently smooth, as I’d only expect from a $1,000 flagship. The custom-tweaked Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Mobile Platform for Galaxy had no problem keeping up with the demands of apps during my testing, even when going split-screen with two. There’s just 8GB of RAM here, but I really don’t think anyone’s going to be clamoring for 12GB. With these totally decent hardware spread, it’s just a little frustrating to see Samsung pass on DeX support here. I know that hardly anyone seriously uses DeX even when they have the option, but it’s weird to see Samsung denying the Flip 5 an opportunity altogether.

The most important software stuff is that concerning the foldable experience here. While split-screen is hardly exclusive to this form factor, the physical crease adds a nice touch to it, and being able to articulate the handset around it really emphasizes the separation between apps. Flex Mode does the heavy lifting here, letting you control split-screen, choose to get playback controls on the bottom half of the panel, or even use that space as a touchpad — when’s the last time you used an on-screen cursor to interact with Android apps? While it’s not hugely different from what we saw on the Flip 4, I’m still happy.

As the Flip 5 ships, its Flex Window cover screen offers some basic functionality: notifications, access to widgets like calendar, weather, and stopwatch, and lets you run a select few Android apps on this tiny screen. YouTube, for one, actually works pretty well, as does Netflix. Maps has potential — I think it really wins out with convenience, letting you check where you are at a glance — but the small display area quickly crowds up with toolbars.

Samsung’s included Flex Window widgets work reasonably well.

If you’re not wearing a smartwatch, your phone can always count steps in a pinch, but pulling up an app to check on your progress multiple times throughout the day sounds like a chore. With a step-tracking widget on the Flex Window, the Flip 5 lets you see where you are at a glance. The weather widget is another one I get a lot of use out of, quickly letting me check out the forecast for the next few hours — or learn what’s coming my way the rest of the week with just another swipe. This is another use case I might rely on a smartwatch for, but the larger screen here improves usability while also sharing more information. While I love many of these widgets and appreciate the limited app support, ultimately, it’s a tantalizing tease, and it won’t be long before you’re downloading Good Lock and its MultiStar module.

Why MultiStar? Because that’s how you put whatever app you want on the Flex Window. That immediately sounds awesome, but when you take a bunch of apps designed for big, rectangular screens and shove them into this tiny square (with a weird corner cut) it doesn’t take much imagination to realize that some are likely to rise to that challenge better than others. While some apps are totally usable and feel like Samsung should have just given them the green light from the outset, you don’t have to look far to find software that just doesn’t know what to do with this janky, cramped, irregularly shaped space. Have you ever wanted to browse Tinder while being utterly unable to see what anyone looks like? It’s not Love Is Blind, but with the Flip 5 it might as well be. There’s potential there, at least, and I love that Samsung trusts us enough to try out apps that can’t guarantee a great experience.

When MultiStar lets you use any app, Flex Window performance is much more hit-or-miss.

Messaging works surprisingly well on this external screen, and with a display that’s finally large enough for a workable keyboard, you can get more precise with your communication than voice typing might allow (not to mention, a whole lot more private). That extends beyond native notification support to even some of those MultiStar-enabled apps — I’m a huge Google Voice stan, and the app manages to work really well even in this compact space.

The other big win for me is the interaction between the camera and the Flex Window. But that makes this the perfect moment to transition over to talking about the Flip 5’s cameras in general.

Camera

Samsung gives the Flip 5 a pair of 12MP sensors for its main cameras: the primary 83˚ FOV wide-angle camera with OIS and an f/1.8 aperture, plus an ultra-wide 123˚ FOV option with an f/2.2 aperture. Quality from both is fine, with the sort of Samsung over-saturated intensity we’ve come to expect — if you’re into it, the Flip 5 delivers in spades. Low-light performance is workable, but expect a fair amount of light bloom and flare from out-of-frame sources. Where this setup is most lacking, though, is in the absence of any kind of telephoto option here, and while digital zoom will do what it can, that’s a road paved with compromises.

The 10MP selfie cam is nothing particularly special, but takes clear, if slightly washed-out-looking shots. I just appreciate that Samsung’s not trying to do any under-display nonsense on this foldable, and gives the camera a good, respectable notch cutout. But honestly, this is not the conversation worth having about selfies on the Flip 5, because this phone has some tricks up its sleeve.

Really, the camera on the Flip 5 is all about the intersection between that imaging hardware and the foldable form factor. That means we get quite a few cool features, like the way the half-open phone is effectively a stand for its own camera. The real winner is the ability to use that screen as a viewfinder for the phone’s primary camera in what amounts to a massive upgrade for your selfie game. The experience is impressively flexible — you can toggle on the front preview with your phone unfolded, right from the camera app, or call it up when the phone’s closed shut with a quick double-tap of the power button. You can even toggle between a smaller view that shows everything the sensor sees, or zoom in to fill the space.

I think the only thing that could make this better is if the phone had some kind of Sony-style hardware shutter button. Right now, the volume rocker is just too close to the primary camera, and I embarrassingly keep getting my hand in shots when trying to use it to snap a pic. Sure, you can always raise your palm for a gesture-controlled shutter, but that feels so inelegant. Give me a nice hardware shutter button on the opposite side of the phone’s body — and ideally, on the bottom half, down below the hinge.

Battery life

If there’s one subject I’ve seen more hand-wringing over in regards to the Galaxy Z Flip 5, it’s the phone’s battery capacity — or, rather, the lack of anything to brag about there. A lot of people weren’t too pleased with the paltry 3,700mAh capacity available on the Flip 4 (even though that represented a nice step up from the Flip 3), and Samsung’s not doing anything to expand on that this year — we’re right back in 3,700mAh territory.

Particularly heavy smartphone users may experience that as a legitimate limitation, but I was honestly fine with the Flip 4’s endurance, and the Flip 5 has done nothing to change that situation for me. If anything, it feels like I’m probably stretching things even further on the Flip 5 because I’m able to get so much more done straight from its exterior Flex Window, a similar experience noted in our Moto Razr+ review earlier this summer. Accomplishing quick tasks on that tiny outer screen really saves on power that would otherwise be spent illuminating the expansive inner screen.

Generally, I’m once again seeing around a third of battery capacity remaining at the end of the day. I do find myself keeping that figure in mind, since it’s not a ton of wiggle-room and I don’t want to get caught in a situation where I’m pushing my luck too far — but so far it hasn’t been a problem.

Even limited battery may not be a problem so long as you can quickly and easily recharge your phone — but that’s also an area where the Flip 5 stumbles. Samsung has yet to get serious about charging speed on its foldables, and we’re once again limited to just 25W. Considering we’re only recharging a small battery here, that’s still not quite the deal-breaker it might have been on a 5,000mAh phone, but it’s not great, either. Wireless charging support is once again present (if you want to go even slower).

Competition

Internationally, the Flip 5 may face competition from phones like the Oppo Find N2 Flip, but here in the US there are really only two other clamshell folders it’s going to be facing up against: this year’s new Moto Razr+ … and Samsung’s own Galaxy Z Flip 4, for shoppers willing to compromise a little to save a buck (and maybe more than one).

Motorola really stepped things up for this generation, and the Razr+ is easily its strongest foldable (to say nothing of just in general in recent years) to date. It’s also the model with probably the most in common with the Flip 5, and both enjoy access to big (relatively speaking), versatile exterior screens. They’re also closely matched in terms of battery capacity, though the Razr+ squeezes ahead (and manages to support slightly faster charging). If there’s one big downside to Moto’s offering, though, it would have to be the phone’s cameras. And while those aren’t stellar on the Flip 5, either, Samsung takes the lead here. Samsung also runs more modern silicon compared to Moto’s Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chip, and both packages are competitively priced. Frankly, I’m going to go with the Flip 5 largely because I prefer the feel of its squared-off frame to the Razr+’s curved everything.

As for the Flip 4, this year’s big external screen aside, there’s not a ton worth paying more for on the Flip 5. Sure, the flat-closing hinge is nice, aesthetically, but I don’t know that I’d fork over much of a premium for it.

The problem there, though, is more that the Flip 4 really hasn’t come down in price much upon the release of the Flip 5. And sure, you can get a cool customizable Bespoke Edition, but even in the best-case scenario, you’re only saving a couple hundred bucks (let’s not even talk about pressing your luck on the used foldables market), and I just don’t think that’s a big enough discount when you’re already spending this kind of money. While the conversation is very different if we’re talking upgrading from the Flip 4, for a new shopper, it just makes so much more sense to future-proof a little and go right for the Flip 5.

Should you buy it?

Smartphone reviewers go through a lot of hardware, but after my time with the Flip 4 last year, I have to admit that this was one of the few phones I actually found myself missing. Sure, I missed the cool camera tricks I could do with the (even tinier then) external screen, but more than anything I missed how much fun it was to just use day-to-day, flipping open and closed like I’m back using a phone at the turn of the century. Nostalgia’s no reason to drop a grand on a new phone, but this is no one-trick-pony — Samsung’s foldable tech has been maturing at a pace you can feel, and this is very close to just being a standard top-shelf flagship phone that just happens to also fold.

Back then, I suggested that Samsung’s efforts had finally reached mainstream appeal, and that’s even more true with the Flip 5. Working with notifications on the Flex Window is just so satisfying, and messaging on that screen feels like what two-way pagers should have been.

Maybe the biggest thing holding me back from an unreserved recommendation is the feeling that this year doesn’t reinvent the wheel, and that the Flip 6 could finally step up and address some of the issues that have so far gone unresolved: the lack of a really fast charging option, battery capacity that doesn’t inspire confidence, and cameras that feel like holdovers from an earlier generation. None of that is anywhere close to guaranteed, though, and you could easily find yourself waiting another year with not much to show for it.

If you’re interested in getting into foldables right now, the Galaxy Z Flip 5 is absolutely your best place to start. The value proposition is strong, software support is great, and the hardware’s competitive with any other 2023 flagship. I say, the next time you spot a particularly good deal being offered, this is the foldable purchase to jump on.

Source: Samsung

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5

The Galaxy Z Flip 5 is Samsung’s best version of its most accessible foldable phone yet. This year’s Flex Window adds a ton of new functionality to an already successful design. If you’re curious about foldables, but also want a phone that feels very familiar, the Flip 5 is absolutely where you’ll want to start.