As someone who is already using the Galaxy Z Fold4 since its launch last year, I also did a video talking about my long-term experience with that phone in another video. I was looking forward to the new Z Fold5. However, it doesn’t seem like that much has changed, right? The biggest change is the hinge, but is that enough to entice its fans to upgrade?
There are a few more upgrades that Samsung didn’t talk about – so I want to address them in this in-depth technical review of the Galaxy Z Fold5.
Hinge
The biggest upgrade is obviously going to be the hinge. Closing this gap is something that I wanted Samsung to do since last year – and they did it for the Fold5. I also said that there is no gap when it’s closed but actually, there is a very, very tiny gap.
This is a safety measure as any tiny debris would definitely damage the screen if both sides of the screen touched each other when it is closed. Either way, I don’t have to wipe the dust off the unfolded display before I use it every time.
Of course, Samsung still manages to retain the IPX8 rating even with this new hinge. Brilliant!
Display
Now for the displays. I’ll talk about the unfolded display first. It has the same size, resolution, and refresh rate as before – but the max brightness has been upgraded.
We did 2 sets of tests – one for the left half and another for the right half. We measured around 1,200 nits brightness for both sides and excellent color accuracy too. I’m impressed!
Crease
And I also want to talk about the crease for a while. The Z Fold5 is still new, so the crease is still very shallow. However, as we’ve said in the Z Fold4 long-term review, the crease will get deeper as time goes by.
Cover display
It still retains the same size and shape as before – which I actually prefer because it will affect the unfolded display – and this cover display retains the same resolution and refresh rate.
It did get an upgrade in terms of brightness – and our colorimeter reports more than 1,000 nits max brightness. The colors are great as well.
Performance
The other big upgrade is going to be the chipset. Of course, it is using what is the latest and greatest to this date – the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. Samsung also claims that it has a larger vapor chamber to help cool the chip too. And in our gaming test video, we did see vast improvements in terms of the gaming experience. It can run games like Genshin Impact at the highest possible render resolution at the highest graphical quality setting at 60fps.
While it can’t maintain 60fps all the time, it is still above 50fps nearly all the time. This is actually due to the higher render resolution on the Galaxy Z Fold5. Thanks to the GPUWatch utility that you can enable within the developer options menu, we can see that the Z Fold5 is rendering the game at 1920×1559 pixels whereby the S23 Ultra is only rendering at 1853×964 pixels.
That means the Z Fold5 actually stresses the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 harder than the S23 Ultra.
Moreover, the increased vapor chamber size also means that the Z Fold5 never reaches 40°C in an air-conditioned room. With all things considered, this is an amazing phone for gaming.
As a quick mention – the storage and RAM speed is also very fast.
Battery life
Of course, changing to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset also indirectly affects other aspects of the phone.
Like, the battery life. It still has the same 4,400mAh battery as before and since we have a standardized battery life test, we can reuse last year’s data for the Fold4.
I did two tests. The first one is for the cover display. It lasts 14 and a half hours – which is 29.31% more than the Fold 4.
As for the unfolded, large display – it lasts for 10 hours and 49 minutes, which is 8.34% longer than the Fold 4.
I have to say that my Z Fold4 rarely runs out of battery anyway, and now with an even more efficient chipset – I don’t have to worry as much.
Charging speed
The charging speed remains the same as before – so 25W is the most that it charges from 15% to completion in about an hour – which is actually faster than the Z Fold4’s charging speed by nearly half an hour. No idea why, but the data doesn’t lie.
By the way, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5 also has the bypass battery feature also. To know how to enable it, watch this video here.
Cameras
Okay, now the cameras. They’re actually since the Fold3 but since the chipset has changed, that means the image signal processor (ISP) has also changed. That should result in better images when compared to the Fold4.
To have a look at all the pictures and videos taken by the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5, watch our video at the top of this review.
Software
And in terms of software, it did get an upgrade too, albeit a tiny one. It is running on One UI 5.1.1 and it comes with 2 new additions that I think matter a lot. The first one is the ability to have a total of 4 recent apps displayed in the taskbar.
The second feature is the addition of the new Flex Mode Panel that shows you multimedia control buttons and you can change between a few things – including a trackpad. Pretty handy.
USB 3 and Samsung DeX
Of course, the Z Fold5 has a USB 3 port at the bottom and also Samsung DeX which is also present in the previous generations.
Design
The overall design of the Fold5 is also the same as the Fold4 so there’s really nothing to talk about here. I do want to highlight that because of the new hinge that closes with virtually no gap, it improves the experience for left-handed users like me. It just feels better to hold.
Should you buy the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5?
And finally – do I think the Z Fold5 is worth the price? It’s actually the same price as the Fold4 here in Malaysia – and I’d say that you should know what you’re getting before committing. I have seen a lot of posts in the Z Fold group on Facebook that are arguing whether or not the Fold5 is a good upgrade or not.
In summary, there are only 2 camps of opinion. The first camp says it’s not worth the upgrade because the only differences are the chipset and the hinge – which we have proven in this video that there are actually a lot of things that are different – and the other camp says that both the chipset and hinge improvements are worth the upgrade.
For me, I do kinda lean towards the second camp, especially if you’re upgrading from the Fold3 or the Fold2.
We’ll provide even more data to help you decide whether or not to upgrade from the Fold4 to the Fold5 as we’ll have a comparison coming in a week or two.
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