Is the Galaxy Z Fold 4 worth the upgrade over the Galaxy Z Fold 3?
The Galaxy Z Fold series is one of the best ever since the first Galaxy Fold came into the market and was a huge success for Samsung. While other manufacturers are also making the foldable, Samsung has been the top player thus pushing the foldable in the mainstream smartphone segment. Last time in 2021, we saw the launch of the Galaxy Z Fold 3 which was a very good and capable foldable out there.
The Galaxy Z Fold 3 (Review) has excellent specifications like a powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset, 120Hz AMOLED display, a great set of cameras and much more. But there were some issues like the battery life was not so good and the chipset did have some heating issues. However, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 brings some substantial upgrades over the Galaxy Z Fold 3.
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 brings a slightly better display, a more powerful Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC, better battery life, etc. So how good of an upgrade is the newer Galaxy Z Fold 4 over the Galaxy Z Fold 3 and is it worth buying? Let's find out in the full review.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Design:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 sports almost a similar design to the Galaxy Z Fold 3 where Samsung has used Armor Aluminum which makes it solid and durable and you get a similar sized 6.2-inches HD+(904x2136 pixels) display on the outside. In contrast, inside there is a similar 7.6-inches display. Around the display, there are very tiny bezels around and the thin glass applied on top of the display is also present.
If you have been using the Galaxy Z Fold 3 in the past, there is one such difference now the Armor Aluminum rails are flatter thus making it easy while fold. Now the gap has slightly decreased while folding thus leaving a very tiny gap. Like the Galaxy Z Fold 3, inside the display, there is an in-display selfie camera which is hidden and gets noticed when the display is turned off.
The back of the Galaxy Z Fold 4 has a similar camera module as the Galaxy Z Fold 3 which houses triple cameras with a LED flashlight. The hinge is now stronger than before and you can set the foldable between 75 and 115 degrees thus making it easy for daily usage. Like the Galaxy Z Fold 3, you get the IPX8 rating which makes it water resistant as it can survive under fresh water at 1.5 meters for 30 minutes.
This time Samsung has used slightly stronger Gorilla Glass Victus + glass for protection both on the front as well as on the back. Around the sides, there is a power button which also doubles up as a capacitive fingerprint scanner and on top of that there are the volume buttons that do feel tactile while clicking. On the left side, there is a dual SIM card slot with no microSD card slot for storage expansion.
There are two speakers on the left and top of the Fold with a single microphone at the bottom. On the top, there are three microphones and at the bottom, there is a USB Type-C port with the speaker grill at the right/rear side at the bottom. In terms of dimensions, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 is shorter by 3mm and thinner by 0.2mm.
In terms of weight, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 weighs around 263 grams thus making it 8 grams lighter than the 271 grams weight of the Galaxy Z Fold 3. In the folded state, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 is also wider by 4mm compared to its predecessor. Like the Galaxy Z Fold 3, the back here also supports wireless and reverse wireless charging capabilities. Overall, the build and design feel premium.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Display:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 sports the same display at 7.6 inches but now the inner display has a slightly wider aspect of 5:6 instead of 4:5 on the Galaxy Z Fold 3. Just like the Galaxy Z Fold 3, this display panel has the Eco2 Plus thus making it very power efficient. The outside display is slightly larger and is having a screen-to-body ratio of 23.1:9 compared to 25:9 on the Galaxy Z Fold 3.
The inner display like the Galaxy Z Fold 3 has a hidden selfie camera. Both displays are having a 120Hz refresh rate where in settings under Motion Smoothness there are two different options - Adaptive and Standard where the Adaptive mode sets the display at 120Hz and it just works like an adaptive refresh rate where while playing a video, the refresh rate switches to either 48Hz or 60Hz while scrolling a website, the refresh rate switches to 120Hz and 24Hz while watching static content.
Setting the Standard mode will limit the display to 60Hz and this does provide much better battery life. Combined with the 120Hz refresh rate you get a 240Hz touch sampling rate which is good but still not the best as other smartphones do have slightly higher touch sampling rates. In terms of display brightness, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 can reach a peak brightness of 1000nits which is good.
The outer display can reach a peak brightness of around 800nits while watching content in HDR. The display has good visibility under direct sunlight and you also get the Extra Brightness option which increases the brightness further. The display of the Galaxy Z Fold 4 has two different settings to choose from - Vivid and Natural.
The Vivid mode provides saturated colours and covers the DCI-P3 gamut scale whereas the Natural provides the sRGB content with realistic colours. The display of the Galaxy Z Fold 4 has support for HDR on YouTube and also you get Widevine L1 which allows streaming of HD content on OTT platforms like Netflix, Prime, etc. but currently, Netflix does support HDR as of now.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Performance:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 is powered by the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset which is also found on the Galaxy Z Flip 4 and this chipset is a good upgrade over the Snapdragon 888 found on the Galaxy Z Fold 3. In terms of daily usage, the smartphone can handle all the things like scrolling between webpages, rendering videos, playing games, etc.
The Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 is a very good chipset as it does not have any throttling issues and games like BGMI can easily run at HDR graphics with Extreme frame rates smoothly without any lags or stutters. In the CPU throttling test, the smartphone could maintain a sustained performance of around 80-85 per cent which is very good. The benchmark scores came out well.
In terms of network connectivity, there is support for good carrier aggregation and you get support for 12 bands of 5G. The Galaxy Z Fold 4 is available in three different variants - 12GB LPDDR5 RAM with 128/256GB/1TB storage variants which is a good upgrade over the Galaxy Z Fold 3 that came with only 8GB RAM variants.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Software:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 runs on the OneUI 4.0 built on top of Android 12 and this OS is called the Android 12L which is specifically designed for tablets and foldables. Some of the features include the taskbar which is a minimized view of the dock icons and then there is the enhanced multi-widow support where the split between applications can be the either horizontal or vertical way.
Samsung has its own Pop-Up View where you can use one application as a full window and on the other hand, you can collapse the other application in a floating window by adjusting anywhere on the display. However, if you want slightly better multi-tasking you can forcefully open up to 8 different applications by making some changes under Labs inside the Advanced features in Settings.
The Flex Mode has been carried forward from the Galaxy Z Fold 3 where you can set the foldable between 75 and 115 degrees where the top half of the display shows the application and the lower half of the display shows the different controls thus making it easier for multi-tasking usage. For example the Gallery app, the top half has the content and the lower half contains the trackpad-like touch area for navigating between contents.
There is also Samsung DeX support where you can use the smartphone by connecting to the television or laptop in both a wireless and wired manner. The Apps Panel has located to the side and houses a total of eight different applications which includes four of which you can choose yourself and another four are picked from the recently used applications.
However, currently, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 is running Android 13. Though you get a good software experience, there is some amount of bloatware installed which can be uninstalled. In terms of software updates, Samsung here is also providing another four years of AndroidOS updates and five years of security patches which is simply amazing.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Cameras:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 sports a triple camera setup that houses a 50MP f/1.8 Samsung GN3 sensor for the main camera, 12MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera and a 10MP f/2.4 telephoto camera which has 3x optical zoom. There is a 10MP f/2.2 camera on the cover display whereas the inner display gets a 4MP f/1.8 under-display camera.
The main camera takes images with a good amount of details that look sharper and have good dynamic range. However, there is some amount of noise present in the background but still, you get good contrast and ISO levels are also well balanced. Using the 50MP mode, the images come out with good details but do introduce some noise compared to 12.5MP images clicked as usual.
The images shot during the night come out with details that look sharper and have good dynamic range but there is a lot of overexposure in the background and some amount of noise in the background. However, colours come out naturally and these were the results with the night mode turned off. By default, the Auto Night Mode triggers which result in good details in shadows and reduce noise in the background.
The ultrawide camera does a good job in terms of images that come out with sharper details and good dynamic range during the day but there is some amount of distortion around the edges. At night, the ultrawide camera does suffer from a slight amount of noise but the Auto Night Mode does work well in providing good dynamic range and the colours also look very good.
The 10MP telephoto camera does a good job in terms of details that look sharper and the dynamic range is good with very less noise in the background. The contrast is good at 3x zoom levels, and the images have natural colours without any oversharpening like on the main camera. You get good dynamic range and also here the Auto Night Mode gets triggered when you take an image during the night.
Without the Night Mode, the images come out with sharper details but there is some amount of noise in the background present and also colours look slightly washed out. But once you turn on the Night Mode, the images do have less noise and the dynamic range comes out very well. The portraits come out really well using the main camera as you get proper edge detection and a good level of background blur.
The dynamic range is good and you get the natural skin tone of a human subject. The foldable also allows taking 1x or 3x really good portraits. There is no dedicated macro camera so you cannot take any macro photos but you can use the main camera by going closer to a subject. In terms of selfies, you can use both the 10MP camera of the cover display and also the 4MP under-display selfie camera.
The selfies from the 10MP front camera come out with sharper details and good dynamic range with less noise in the background. The skin tones look natural without any oversharpening as such and the same goes for portraits that come out with good edge detection and proper background blur. You can also use the ultrawide camera as a viewfinder for selfies that come with a decent dynamic range.
The colours look good but there is a lot of noise present in the selfies taken from the ultrawide camera. The selfies from the 4MP hidden camera come out with a decent level of detail and a lot of noise is present in the background. In terms of videos, the main camera does a good job in terms of dynamic range and colours look natural without any oversharpening.
The main camera can record 8K videos at 30fps whereas all the other cameras can record 1080p videos at 30fps and 60fps. The ultrawide camera does a good job in terms of dynamic range and details look sharper but there is some amount of noise present. The telephoto camera does a good job in terms of details that look good and the noise is significantly less in the background with good dynamic range.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Battery Life:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 sports a similar sized 4400mAh battery as that of the Galaxy Z Fold 3. Here you get much better battery life than its predecessor with normal usage like scrolling through webpages, streaming social media, and doing other lighter tasks with the display set to Adaptive, the smartphone easily lasted for one and a half days which is far better than a half day backup on the Galaxy Z Fold 3.
With heavy multi-tasking that includes running benchmarks, rendering videos, calling for 7-8 hours, etc. the Galaxy Z Fold 4 can easily last a single day which is good. The standard screen-on time with heavy usage is around 3-4 hours and with normal usage, the screen-on time is around 5-6 hours which is far better than the Galaxy Z Fold 3.
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 has support for 25W fast charging but you do not get a charger bundled inside the box. However, with other 25W fast chargers, it takes around 1 hour and 20 minutes for a full charge from 0 to 100 per cent. There is also support for 15W wireless charging and also reverse wireless charging at 9.5W. Overall, the battery life is much better than its predecessor but still charging speeds are slower.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 Audio Quality:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 sports a dual stereo speaker setup that sounds equally good from both the top as well as the bottom. There is support for Dolby Atmos but you do miss out on a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Verdict:
The Galaxy Z Fold 4 definitely feels like a good upgrade over the Galaxy Z Fold 3 in almost all aspects as it is lighter, has a better chipset for daily tasks, better battery life and also the newer set of cameras are good. However, it does come with a hefty price tag but you get the peace of Samsung with a longer software update cycle and the foldable form factor just makes it amazing.
But there are some areas where it could have been better. In terms of charging, 25W is not the fastest since other brands do offer better 65/120W fast charging speeds, the battery life though good is still not the best and low-light performance could have been better. But still, Samsung has really been the game changer ever since its first foldable and the Galaxy Z Fold 4 carrier it forward further.
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