The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 is a bit of a novelty, although it’s a vast improvement over the original Z Flip. Samsung managed to make it water-resistant, add a larger cover display, and squeeze in top-end performance. However, it’s still far from a usable smartphone, mainly because of its weak battery life and a cover display that’s only good enough for viewing notifications and nothing more.
For the new Galaxy Z Flip 4, Samsung has not made major design changes. Most of the changes are internal—battery capacity has been increased, as has charging speed. However, the hinge design has changed. After using this phone for a week, I can conclude that it not only looks great, but is practical enough for daily use. Here’s why.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 price in India
The price of Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 has increased slightly over the previous model at Rs. Prices start at Rs 84,999 and go up to Rs 89,999 for the base 8GB RAM and 128GB storage variant. The 256GB storage variant is even more expensive at Rs. Rs 94,999 (previously Rs 88,999). The customized version is priced slightly under Rs. 1 lakh, 97,999. The phone is available in three finishes: Bola Purple, Graphite, and Pink Gold. I received the 8GB RAM and 128GB storage variant of the Bora Purple.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 design
Samsung has made subtle improvements to the design of the Galaxy Z Flip 4. These differences are very small and it takes a trained eye to spot most of them. The smartphone’s metal frame is now less rounded, with flatter sides and sharper edges. The bezels are now polished instead of matte, making the phone less slippery than the Z Flip 3. The glass panel now has a soft matte finish that resists fingerprints very well.
Compared with the Galaxy Z Flip 3, the hinge design of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 has been improved
While the Galaxy Z Flip 4 looks just as thick as its predecessor when folded or open, the metal frame of the back panel around the hinge is noticeably thinner, giving it a more refined look. The display cover is the same size as before, as is the glass covering it. The camera appears to be slightly raised from the surface, which makes it impossible to lay the phone flat on a table.
The hinge appears to have been improved as it reportedly takes up less space inside the smartphone, allowing Samsung engineers to squeeze in a bigger battery. The hinge also seems to be stiffer, which is a good thing for gaming since the old Flip 3 often folded inward when a little pressure was applied to the center of the main display. It also means that opening the phone with one hand can be a bit difficult. It’s impossible to flip the top half up using just your thumbs, but even previous models were never really intended to do that.
The bezels on the inner display are the same as before, but the notch around the hinge area definitely feels shallower than on the Z Flip 3.
The metal frame of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 (Pola Purple) is thinner on all sides compared to the Galaxy Z Flip 3 (Gold)
While Samsung has tastefully improved the Galaxy Z Flip 4’s design, the phone is still prone to dust (the IPX8 rating only means water-resistant), which remains an issue with both of this year’s foldable models. The internal display is still quite fragile and requires a pre-applied screen protector to help prevent damage from nails and sharp objects.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 specs and software
Unlike the S22 series launched earlier this year, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Galaxy Z Fold 4 come with the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC, which offers slightly better performance and improved efficiency compared to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 SoC. It doesn’t support the S Pen stylus like the Z Fold 4, nor does it support Samsung Dex. Now the battery capacity has been increased from the previous 3,300mAh to a better 3,700mAh, and the charging speed has also been increased from the previous 18W to 25W.
The phone runs Android 12-based Samsung One UI version 4.1.1. There aren’t any major changes here compared to what’s already available on Samsung’s other high-end smartphones. The optimizations brought by Flip 3 are still available, including the ability to open up to five apps in floating windows. However, this seems pointless considering the display’s aspect ratio only really lets you use one floating window at a time (and one app running in the background). If you need to multitask, a taller screen aspect ratio is better for split-screen implementation. Samsung introduced Flex Mode, which basically lets apps (native or third-party) place their content on the top half of the display, while the bottom half can be used as a touchpad or display controls, etc. This doesn’t always work on the Flip 4, as you’re left with a smaller, squared-off screen area.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4’s internal display is the same as before, but brighter outdoors
While the size of the cover display remains the same, Samsung has added the ability to indicate responses to messages by tapping the microphone button that appears before the template response. However, this only works on messaging apps like Slack, Messenger, WhatsApp, etc. and not on emails. Otherwise, the overlay screen is still quite limited and very different from Motorola’s overlay screen implementation on the Razr 5G. I did try a third-party app called CoverScreen OS available on the Play Store, which allowed me to run apps and games on the cover screen and even included an app drawer. However, the 1.9-inch display size still feels quite restrictive in daily use, hampering the experience. Hopefully, the next Z Flip model will have a larger, more usable external display, as well as software that won’t force you to open the Flip to complete tasks on the main display.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 performance
The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4’s 6.7-inch foldable Dynamic AMOLED 2X main display appears to be similar to the one used on the Z Flip 3. It has a 120Hz refresh rate, the same as before, but shows better touch sensitivity when playing FPS games like Call of Duty: Mobile. The display works very well indoors and is clearly visible outdoors in bright sunlight, although it’s highly reflective, which may interfere with what you’re doing. The monitor also supports HDR10+, which works as expected when watching supported content on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.
Benchmarks didn’t disappoint. The phone scored 1,286 points and 4,076 points respectively in Geekbench’s single-core and multi-core tests and 9,21,680 points in AnTuTu test. The software experience is smooth and surprisingly smooth. The phone doesn’t heat up much when playing games (high settings) or watching movies. It does get hot when recording video outdoors, but not as much as the Galaxy S22, Galaxy S22+, and Note 22 Ultra, which run quite hot when using the camera app or under load. Much of this can be attributed to the new processor, which should run cooler and more efficiently.
Case display size is the same as Galaxy Z Flip 3
Battery life is pretty impressive for the fashion-forward smartphone Samsung is touting as the Z Flip 4. The larger battery and more power-efficient SoC mean I don’t need to switch the battery performance profile to light mode for regular use. The phone often lasted me a full day, which included about an hour of gaming. The phone lasted a little over a day with regular non-gaming use, making it more practical than the Flip 3, which only lasted a day even with light use. Using the Light performance profile can definitely add a few hours to your battery life, and it doesn’t affect performance too much, which is a good thing. Fully charging the phone using a third-party 61W USB PD charger takes about 1 hour and 55 minutes, which is relatively slow compared to Samsung flagships, but still fast enough for most people.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 camera
Another aspect that hasn’t changed much with the Galaxy Z Flip 4 is its camera. Samsung appears to have retained the same camera setup as before, with two 12-megapixel sensors on the back for the main and ultra-wide cameras, and a 10-megapixel camera embedded in the internal display for selfies. There is one subtle change, though, regarding the main camera – it now appears to have a larger sensor and larger pixel size (1.8μm pixels vs. 1.2μm pixels on the Z Flip 3). Samsung also retained OIS.
The camera layout of Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 is similar to that of Z Flip 3
The main camera provides good detail during the day. As long as there’s enough light, colors are vivid and dynamic range is pretty good. The ultra-wide-angle camera takes decent photos, with noticeable barrel distortion and purple fringing in brighter areas, and less detail around the edges. Thankfully, the tint matches that of the main camera, so Samsung is committed to keeping it consistent. Close-ups of both people and objects feature good detail, edge detection, and blur. Selfies perform well in all types of lighting conditions, but I prefer taking selfies with the main camera as they contain more detail and look sharper. The camera also captures some crisp macro photos from a distance.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 daylight camera samples: main camera, ultra-wide-angle camera, close-up
When shooting in low light using any of the three cameras, the camera app automatically activates Night Mode, which works really well. The main camera takes sharp photos in street lighting scenes and shows good detail and good dynamic range in dim light. The ultra-wide camera’s quality is good in street lighting scenes, but it doesn’t capture much detail in dim light.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 low-light camera sample. Top: Portrait selfie using main camera, night mode
Video quality is good across the board, with good detail and stability at all shooting resolutions. I also tried HDR10+ capture (which is an option in the labs section), and apart from some stability issues, the results were great. Low-light video has surprisingly low noise and good stabilization when shooting at 1080p or 4K autofps, but 4K 60fps footage appears noisy and lacks stabilization.
judgment
While its camera performance is quite impressive, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 doesn’t offer much flexibility when it comes to cameras compared to the Galaxy Z Fold 4 or even the Galaxy S22 and Galaxy S22+ (review). Samsung’s current flagship non-foldable phone does offer better all-around performance at a lower price, but it’ll be nice to see how Samsung manages to close the camera and overall performance gap between the two series this year.
With no competition in sight (Motorola only launched the new Razr 2022 in China), Samsung is really taking it easy on foldable phones this year. It’s put in enough effort to change or improve upon the previous Flip model’s shortcomings. Everything else remains pretty much the same.
That’s not a bad thing, as the Galaxy Z Flip 3 ( review ) is a vastly improved version of the original Galaxy Z Flip, making it almost a functional, everyday smartphone. Now that most of the kinks have been ironed out, the Galaxy Z Flip 4 is undoubtedly a unique foldable product, not just for fashion-forward buyers, but also for regular users looking for something unique in the Android smartphone space.
