Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 review: a major Korean revolution

As Chinese manufacturers introduced increasingly thinner yet better-equipped foldable smartphones, voices grew louder suggesting that Samsung had missed the boat. Paradoxically, it was Samsung that practically founded the category of phones with foldable displays. Some naysayers would even say that no fundamental change has occurred since the second generation (which, of course, isn’t entirely true). Last year’s “Special Edition” Fold was already a harbinger of positive changes at Samsung. However, the lucky number seven in many respects surpasses even the desires of the most optimistic fans. Where does the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 excel and where does it still need refinement?

Price doesn’t matter, packaging remains modest

If you thought that a smartphone priced over 50,000 CZK would offer luxurious packaging or at least some pleasant bonus, I must disappoint you. Whether it’s the inexpensive Galaxy A06 or a top-tier, premium model, the only difference is the craftsmanship of the box in which the phone arrives. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is sold in a minimalist yet high-quality looking case, which upon opening immediately reveals the phone itself in its unfolded state. However, next to it, you will find only a USB-C cable and the usual supply of paper documentation. It’s a shame, at least a simple plastic case could have been included in the package.

Top-notch construction with an impractical flaw

Moreover, the case could solve perhaps the biggest, and from my perspective, the only significant problem with the phone’s construction. It largely utilizes sharp lines with only minimal rounding at the edges. This, along with the very thinness of both halves, means that you don’t have much to grip when trying to unfold the phone. And the relatively strong magnet holding the two halves together doesn’t help much either. In fact, I’m not entirely surprised by stories of users “improving” their expensive, premium smartphone with adhesive tape. The reason is simple: while the volume rocker on the right half provides some grip, there is absolutely no support on the left side to help you open it.

Well, I’ve exhausted the major negatives, and now all that’s left is praise. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is undoubtedly an impressive piece of hardware. When closed, many might even overlook that it’s a foldable smartphone. After all, its dimensions are 158.4 x 72.8 x 8.9. For comparison, the Galaxy S25 Ultra measures 162.8 x 77.6 x 8.2 mm, and the Fold’s weight of 215 grams essentially matches regular smartphones. However, just like with them, the protruding camera module is not included in the thickness here. This module on the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is indeed significantly protruding, representing almost one-third of the device’s total thickness.

Unfortunately, this is the price for trying to fit the best possible camera setup into a thin foldable phone. On one hand, I understand the module’s design, which falls within Samsung’s design language. On the other hand, if there has to be a prominent camera module, I prefer the solution used by Honor or Vivo a bit more. Here, the modules are even more massive, but because they are centered on the back, the phone doesn’t wobble as much when laid on its back – and it’s really extreme with Samsung.

Furthermore, with Samsung, the module cannot be used as a leverage point for better phone handling, which is practically the only advantage of prominent camera modules. However, after extended experience with the phone, when compared to the poorer ergonomics of opening the phone, I personally consider the module’s design to be the lesser problem.

The real “wow” comes after opening

Thus, when closed, the usage doesn’t fundamentally differ from a regular smartphone. While flat surfaces and sharp edges don’t enhance ergonomics, the narrower display width partially compensates for this, and the phone fits quite well in the hand. However, the true enchantment arrives only after you open the phone. Suddenly, it transforms into a small tablet measuring 158.4 x 143.2 mm with a thickness of just 4.2 mm. Even more impressive is the overall impression of the construction’s solidity. When closed, both halves hold rock-solidly together. When opening, you feel a smooth operation and pleasant hinge resistance.

And after fully unfolding, both halves adhere to each other and feel like one piece during use. Without any play or other hitch. From a structural standpoint, Samsung has made a huge leap forward. Meanwhile, the declared durability of IP48 standard was maintained – meaning protection against ingress of particles larger than 1 mm and water immersion up to 1.5m depth for 30 minutes. Both halves of the phone then fit together almost perfectly, the only exception being a tiny gap near the hinge itself, through which the drop-shaped folded display is visible. The phone’s construction is made of an aluminum alloy, whose strength Samsung emphasizes in its very name – Armor Aluminium.

The front display is protected by tempered glass with arguably the longest name in history, namely Corning Gorilla Glass Victus Ceramic 2. The back, however, has to settle “only” for Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 with a pleasant-to-touch, matte finish. According to Samsung, the lifespan of the Galaxy Z Fold7’s inner display has also been significantly improved generation-over-generation. It should withstand 500,000 opens and closes, which is more than double compared to the Z Fold6 with 200,000. So, if you open the phone 100 times a day, it should theoretically last for more than 13 years – however, these are laboratory values, and reality will likely differ somewhat.

Excellent fingerprint reader

Physical buttons are represented by the traditional pair of a volume rocker and a power button. Both are located on the right side of the phone – even when it’s open. When using the phone in the closed state, they are on the bottom half, but this doesn’t matter, as both are comfortably reachable with the thumb of the right hand. Regarding fingerprint readers integrated into the power button, I thought nothing could surprise me in this regard, yet it happened during the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 test.

The reader is truly extremely responsive and accurate. Truly, I don’t think I’ve ever experienced such a good reader in a power button. You don’t have to pay attention to how you place your finger; just a fleeting touch is enough, and the phone is unlocked. Given the optimal placement of the button, I usually had the phone unlocked already while taking it out of my pocket. However, if this bothers you, you can enable the option to require pressing the button itself in the settings.

Great display inside and out

Unfortunately, just like with the rest of Samsung’s production, the Dolby Vision standard is ignored here as well. However, for both displays, at least HDR10+ support is available. And this brings us to the more interesting of the two displays. And I don’t mean that in any derogatory way towards the excellent outer display. I was simply most curious about the inner foldable display, right after the construction itself. The crease is, of course, somewhat less noticeable generation-over-generation than on the Galaxy Z Fold6.

While it’s not as much of a “wow effect” as the thin design, on the other hand, a prominent crease certainly wasn’t the biggest issue plaguing the previous Fold generation. But back to the tested Fold 7. The crease is noticeable here both to the touch and visually, however, I probably won’t surprise many by stating that after a short period of use, you get used to both.

Yes, the crease is still there, but…

Personally, it didn’t even take me a day to get used to this, and I was able to successfully ignore the crease. The crease reminds me most when watching full-screen videos, where it’s clearly visible in the black bars in conjunction with ambient light. The inner display has grown by 0.4″ to a total of 8″, which is currently the size of small tablets. However, compared to those, the Fold’s inner display offers a significantly different, practically square aspect ratio of approximately 9:10. For work, web browsing or social media, and especially for multitasking two applications open side-by-side, this is an absolutely ideal choice. Even games handled the atypical aspect ratio excellently, allowing me to enjoy my favorite trains in Sid Meier’s Railroads! on a larger display.

Where this aspect ratio display is not suitable, however, is naturally for videos. With prominent black bars, the video itself often takes up even less space than on a classic smartphone with a large display. The resolution of 1968 x 2184 px ensures a solid image density of 368 ppi (pixels per inch). Like the outer panel, the inner panel also offers a solid, though not exceptional, brightness of 2,600 nits. I was a bit worried about readability in sunlight due to the different display surface and reflections of the surroundings – completely unnecessarily. Occasionally, a reflection at the crease might cause a minor issue, but otherwise, the inner display is very well readable even outdoors. Finally, I have bad news for S Pen enthusiasts: its support has been completely removed in this generation of the Fold.

Top-notch speakers as a given?

One of the casualties of the generation-over-generation thinning of the entire smartphone are the speakers. There are two of them, utilizing thin vents on the bottom and top edges of the front half of the device, with the top one also serving as the earpiece. To fit them into this year’s Fold, Samsung had to use smaller drivers than last year. The overall volume is sufficient for most conceivable scenarios, but among TOP models, it falls rather below average. Similarly, the bass component could be a bit more pronounced. However, mids and highs work more than well here. For my part, I can recommend enabling the Dolby Atmos feature, which is for some reason disabled by default.

Performance here is truly flagship-level

In terms of performance, the tested Z Fold7 can hardly offer more. Not only does it rely on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, but it is also the most powerful variant of this chipset with an overclocked processor at 4.47 GHz and graphics at 1.2 GHz. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is thus the most powerful foldable smartphone in the world, surpassing even its major rival, the Honor Magic V5. The tested unit offers 512GB UFS 4.0 storage combined with 12 GB RAM, but a 256GB variant is also available, as well as a 16 GB / 1TB version.

It’s probably unnecessary to write that the smartphone can easily handle any game. However, what interested me personally was how Samsung would cope with an extremely powerful chip in such a thin body in terms of heat dissipation. Well, the phone can indeed get warm, and you’ll feel it during intense gaming, but given the thickness of the construction, it manages to keep temperatures quite well in check, as evidenced by the 3DMark stress test. Here, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 performed quite well, considering it’s not a gaming phone.

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 Benchmarks

• AnTuTu v10: 2,009,869 points
• GeekBench Single-core: 2,952 points
• GeekBench Multi-core: 9,191 points
• 3DMark Wild Life Extreme: 5,754 points

Extensive connectivity

Just as no one will be surprised by the high performance of the Snapdragon 8 Elite, probably few would expect compromises in connectivity. And indeed, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 offers almost everything a potential customer’s heart could desire. There is support for tri-band Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, and the USB-C connector is paired with a fast USB 3.2 controller. I was curious about the quality of signal reception, both mobile and from satellites for geolocation. In the case of the former, I didn’t explicitly notice any problems anywhere, but it can generally be said that the reception is slightly weaker than with a regular smartphone. This could theoretically be an issue in areas with weak coverage.

Samsung works magic with battery capacity

Despite drastic liposuction, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 retained a battery with a capacity of 4,400 mAh. Given the much lower thickness, this is certainly a considerable success, yet competitors can offer even larger batteries in similarly thin designs. However, we must not overlook the traditionally excellent optimization that smartphones from the South Korean giant are known for. This is no different here, and the tested new device pleasantly surprised me in this regard. During a typical workday, I had no problem getting over 6 hours of active use on a single charge. And I used the phone quite actively with the larger, inner display.

I couldn’t resist and had to verify the impact of using the outer and inner displays. I left the phone playing a video in a loop for 3 hours with the brightness manually set to 50%. After this time, using the smaller of the two displays, the phone’s battery dropped by 17% from a full charge. In an identical scenario, but using the inner display, the battery level dropped to 81%, or by 19%. Charging is, typical for Samsung, slower and can utilize a maximum of 25W power. From 15% to 100%, the phone’s battery will be replenished in approximately 1 hour and 10 minutes. Wireless charging with 15W charging power support is also available as a backup.

OneUI 8 suits the foldable

From a software perspective, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 pleasantly surprised already at its launch by arriving, along with the Z Flip7, as the very first phone with pre-installed Android 16 operating system. Hand in hand with the new Android comes the new OneUI 8. Although “new” might be a slight overstatement here. After relatively major changes in OneUI 7, Samsung here is rather fine-tuning details and better integrating AI tools. This, incidentally, confirms rumors about a change in Samsung’s update strategy. Be that as it may, what’s important is that Samsung intends to remain among the leaders in software support longevity, which should reach 7 years here as well.

Samsung’s software and Android itself have undergone significant transformations over the years since the first Fold’s introduction. I dare say that there is nothing here from this perspective that would complicate my life with a “foldable”. Surfaces no longer need to be configured separately; instead, when opened, the phone simply displays two surfaces from the front display side-by-side. However, if the option to set up two completely different desktop layouts suits you, you can still activate this option in the settings. I have already mentioned the excellent multitasking capabilities, especially when using two applications in split-screen mode, above. Naturally, working with applications in windows is also present, which logically makes much more sense here than on classic phones.

I must also commend the bottom bar, which you might recognize from tablets. This bar appears if you drag from the bottom edge in an application – and if you continue dragging, the classic gesture to return to the home screen is performed. Within the bar, you have access to pre-selected applications and the three most recently used applications. Plus, there’s also a button for quick access to the menu of all applications. Last but not least, from the bar, you don’t just have to launch applications in full-screen mode; by holding and dragging, you can launch an application in a multitasking window.

The transition between the outer and inner displays is traditionally seamless, allowing you to instantly continue working in an open application. Nevertheless, you might encounter applications that need to be restarted to run on the full area of the large display, but I’ve only encountered a minimum of those. Traditionally, there’s also a mode where additional controls are displayed for selected applications in a partially open state – for YouTube, for example, for playback control, and for the browser, a touchpad with a scroll area. However, this “mini notebook” mode seems more like an interesting gimmick to me than something truly useful.

Galaxy AI still without Czech language support

Naturally, a whole suite of AI tools must be present. I like that Samsung put everything in one place in the settings, where you can go through individual features, including instructions on how to use them. However, unfortunately, the functions themselves lack Czech language support. However, if you know English, for example, and travel to an exotic country, you will certainly appreciate the interpreter nonetheless. Especially since it has newly learned to work with the outer display, where the simultaneous translation can be shown to the other party.

An interesting feature is background noise removal for both audio and video recordings. The gallery includes AI photo editing features with the option to redraw objects or transform portraits into several different styles. However, at least the second option doesn’t seem particularly convincing; I wouldn’t recognize myself in the transformed images, but at least the AI took off some extra pounds.

Primary camera significantly improved

One of the bigger compromises of previous Fold generations was the camera. Not that it was explicitly a weakness, but it simply didn’t come close to flagship models. However, this changes with the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7, at least for the primary camera. It received identical hardware to the top-tier Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra. Thus, it offers a 200MP ISOCELL HP2 sensor. The remaining two cameras on the back remained unchanged generation-over-generation, which is certainly a bit of a shame. However, I can praise the presence of autofocus even on the ultrawide camera and the ability to record in 4k at 60 frames through all sensors.

Camera Hardware

• Primary Camera – 200 MPx, 1/1.3″, 0.6 µm, f/1.7, PDAF, OIS
• Ultrawide Camera – 12 MPx, 1/2.55″, 1.4µm, f/2.2, 120°, AF
• 3x Zoom Camera – 10 MPx, 1/3.94″, 1.22 µm, f/2.4, PDAF

Primary Camera

In the case of the main camera, the upgrade truly benefited, and the results are, as expected, excellent. The camera exhibits excellent dynamic range, captures even the finest details, and maintains sharpness even in poorer lighting conditions. There is no sign or sound of noise here. Color reproduction is “Samsung-like” more saturated, but here too, great progress has been made over the years, and now it’s more about slight stylization than overtly oversaturated colors.

The phone then also uses the sensor for taking photos with 2x zoom, where you won’t be able to tell that they weren’t taken by a camera with optical zoom. The primary camera performs equally well at night. Here, the phone uses automatic night mode, and the results are once again worthwhile. The camera can capture enough light and thus has no problem with sharpness or noise.

Ultrawide Camera

Even the ultrawide camera used doesn’t perform explicitly poorly. While its parameters aren’t exactly the best on the market, it’s largely saved by post-processing, which Samsung simply excels at. Firstly, the color reproduction is practically identical to that of the primary camera, although the dynamic range isn’t as wide, and I occasionally noticed blown-out highlights in the images. Fish-eye effect correction works very well here, and thanks to autofocus, the sharpness and amount of detail in the images are also very good. However, with poorer lighting conditions, the level of noise in the images noticeably increases. Thanks to autofocus, the camera is also suitable for macro shots, although I usually found it more effective to use the optical zoom camera for those.

Optical Zoom Camera

This brings me to the last of the camera setup on the back. Besides fairly successful macro shots, it also performs well when shooting outdoors in good lighting conditions. Here too, the camera maintains a standard in color reproduction, amount of detail, and sharpness. However, as soon as lighting conditions worsen, the image quality noticeably degrades. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be night photography; often, just going indoors is enough to notice detail smudging and noise. Software simply cannot work miracles, and the tiny sensor combined with the optics used here undermines its performance.

Video

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 price and availability

In our market, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is currently sold in three memory variants: 12/256, 12/512, and 16/1024 GB. The individual versions are then available in “Jetblack”, “Silver Shadow”, and the tested “Blue Shadow”. The prices for the individual variants are then 48,990, 51,790, and 57,990 CZK including VAT.

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 review conclusion

The new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 represents the best from the South Korean giant’s workshop. It’s truly evident that the manufacturer put effort into it, and it’s hard to find negatives with it. All the energy Samsung invested in the design of the construction has paid off, as it truly stands out as a differentiating parameter compared to all previous generations. And I don’t necessarily mean just the device’s thickness. The Fold’s construction has matured overall, feels solid, and additionally offers a front display with a very usable aspect ratio. The only pity is the difficult opening, which I would rank among the biggest negatives not only of the construction but also of the smartphone as a whole.

On the other hand, if you are willing to carry the Z Fold7 in a case, it should significantly alleviate these problems for you. However, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 is not just about its foldable design. It is a top-tier flagship smartphone in many respects. It offers top-notch performance, a consistently smooth system as a given, and long software support as a great bonus. Equally important is how it can work with both displays and utilize the area of the inner, almost square display – and here too, the new model excels.

It’s a shame that Samsung hasn’t yet considered Czech language support in its AI tools. I also appreciate the inclusion of an excellent primary camera in all circumstances, and the ultrawide camera also doesn’t disappoint. It’s only a shame about the weaker portrait camera, which would deserve at least a better sensor, although I objectively understand that every tenth of a millimeter counts here, and fitting a larger sensor might not be easy. We’ll see if any progress is made next time, perhaps.

Editor’s Rating: 92 / 100

Are you interested in the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 or another foldable smartphone?