Pros of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7

• Compact design
• Good enough battery life
• Decent performance

Cons of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7

• Outer display still underutilized
• Camera not on par with flagships

Jump directly to:

• Galaxy Flip 7: Bigger Display and Thinner
• Galaxy Z Flip 7 With Android 16
• Good Performance From the Exynos 2500 on the Flip 7
• Flip 7 Camera Trade-offs
• Good Enough Battery Life on the Galaxy Z Flip 7
• Is the Galaxy Z Flip 7 a Good Buy?

Galaxy Flip 7: Bigger Display and Thinner

	Design and Build Quality
Displays	Internal 6.9-inch LTPO OLED 2520 x 1080 pixels 1~120 Hz refresh rate	External 4.1-inch OLED 1048 x 948 pixels 120 Hz refresh rate
Dimensions and weight	Opened 166.7 x 75.2 x 6.5 mm 6.6 x 2.9 x 0.25 in 188 g | 6.6 oz	Closed 85.5 x 75.2 x 13.7 mm 3.4 x 2.9 x 0.54 in 188 g | 6.6 oz
Resistance	IP48 Gorilla Glass Victus 2 (external display)

Like on the Fold 7, Samsung made the Galaxy Z Flip 7 thinner than its predecessor, but not as much. When opened, the phone is less than half a millimeter thinner, at 6.5 mm, which is imperceptible. When closed, the phone measures 13.7 mm, a little more than a millimeter thinner than its predecessor.

Despite the diet, the phone still feels solid, thanks to its premium build quality, and the IP48 rating should be enough to survive water splashes and some protection against solid ingress (but not dust!).

The Galaxy Z Flip 7 is wider and taller than the Flip 6, allowing for the use of larger displays both inside and out. The difference is not enough to compromise the device’s pocketability, but depending on your hand size, it may affect ergonomics. The volume rocker sits a bit higher than usual when the phone is opened and may require repositioning your grip to be used.

As mentioned before, the display got an upgrade on the Galaxy Z Flip 7. The LTPO OLED panel is a big 6.9-inch (up from 6.7 on the Flip 6), and features smooth animations thanks to its 120 Hz refresh rate, while also saving power when displaying static content.

The advertised peak brightness is 2500 nits, but we measured almost half of it at 1340. Regardless, the screen is readable in most conditions outside. The external display is equally usable outside, and now offers a smooth 120 Hz refresh rate (versus 60 Hz on the Flip 6).

Speaking of the external display (called both Cover Screen and FlexWindow by Samsung, confusingly), it finally matches its rival, the Razr Ultra, and also envelops the camera modules. The area around the camera is practically useless, yet the expanded usable area in general is a welcome upgrade, even at a lower resolution compared to the Motorola rival. But there is still a usability limitation, which will be covered in the software section.

Galaxy Z Flip 7 With Android 16

	Software
Operating system	Android 16, One UI 8 7 years of security updates 7 years of version upgrades

One area in which the Samsung foldable easily beats its Motorola rival is in the software support policy. While the Razr will get only three Android upgrades and four years of security updates, Samsung promises seven years of support for both security and feature updates. Better yet, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 comes with Android 16, the latest version of Google’s operating system.

Like on the Fold 7, the experience using One UI 8 over Android 16 is mostly the same as on the Galaxy S25 phones we tested with the previous system version.

One annoying difference, however, was noticed on the initial setup, which could not be done without an internet connection. We experienced the same restriction on the Galaxy XCover 7 Pro, but curiously, not on the Fold 7. After setting up and updating the Galaxy Z Flip 7, we found 8 third-party pre-installed apps and 37.1 GB of used storage space.

As for the bigger cover screen, the bad news is that the same limitations found on previous Flip phones still apply. The display officially supports a limited feature set, basically working as a widget display.

And some of the widgets will prompt you to “Open phone to continue” when interacting with them, which is an understandable but annoying limitation. On the positive side, you can imagine the Flip 7’s cover screen as a “digital detox” feature thanks to its limited feature set.

Opening full apps on the small display requires activating an experimental feature in the Labs settings, but that only supports a few hand-picked apps (Maps, Messages, Netflix, WhatsApp, and YouTube). To run other apps, Samsung still requires installing the MultiStar app, just like on the two-year-old Galaxy Z Flip 5.

Using apps not made for the cover screen still poses some problems due to the small usable space. Typing can be a challenge when you cannot see the text field, for example. Samsung tries to help by offering an aspect ratio button, but it is still a stopgap option until Google adds better support for displays with large unusable spaces.

Good Performance From the Exynos 2500 on the Flip 7

	Performance
Processor	Samsung Exynos 2500
Memory	12 GB LPDDR5x RAM 256 / 512 GB UFS 4.0 storage No storage expansion
Connectivity	5G, eSIM, Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, NFC

When rumors indicated that the Samsung Exynos 2500 processor would power the Flip 7, fans were worried that the performance would not be competitive with the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip used in most Android flagships. Although benchmark numbers confirm this suspicion, we can say that in everyday usage, both chips perform neck and neck.

	Galaxy Z Flip 7 (Exynos 2500)	Galaxy S25 Ultra (Snapdragon 8 Elite)	Galaxy Z Flip 6 (Snapdragon 8 Gen 3)	OnePlus 13 (Snapdragon 8 Elite)	Xiaomi 14T Pro (Dimensity 9300)
AnTuTu	1,673,636	2,341,216	1,456,322	2,695,676	2,013,101
3DMark Wild Life Extreme Stress Test	Best loop: 5573 Worst loop: 2393 Stability: 42.9%	Best loop: 6986 Worst loop: 3253 Stability: 46.6%	Best loop: 4735 Worst loop: 1815 Stability: 38.3%	Best loop: 8751  Worst loop: 4410 Stability: 50.4%	Best loop: 2983 Worst loop: 2633 Stability: 88.3%
3DMark Steel Nomad Light Stress Test	Best loop: 2557 Worst loop: 1115 Stability: 43.6%	Best loop: 2581 Worst loop: 1363 Stability: 52.8%		–	Best loop: 1132 Worst loop: 1086 Stability: 95.4%
Geekbench 6	Single: 3105 Multi: 9562	Single: 3187 Multi: 9947	Single: 2259 Multi: 6915	Single: 3125 Multi: 9697	Single: 2188 Multi: 7158

Helped by the fastest memory standards available, the Exynos chip was snappy in regular usage, opening apps, multitasking, video calls, GPS navigation, etc. There were some instances where the Flip 7 got a bit hot, but nothing uncomfortable to the touch.

Performance tests showed the Flip 7’s Exynos chip significantly slower than Android phones powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite SoC, particularly on the AnTuTu and 3DMark Wild Life tests. On the other hand, GeekBench and the other 3DMark tests, Steel Nomad and Solar Bay, returned competitive results from the Flip 7.

In general, gaming on the Flip 7 is indistinguishable from other Android flagships, with good performance and compatibility, thanks in part to the AMD Radeon GPU on the SoC. Having said that, longer gaming sessions will make the phone hot and consequently reduce performance to avoid overheating.

Flip 7 Camera Trade-offs

	Camera
Main Camera	50 MP, f1.8, OIS
Ultra-Wide Camera	12 MP, f2.2
Selfie Camera	10 MP, f2.2
Max. Video Resolution	4K60, 1080p60 Slow motion: 1080p240

The camera department on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 is basically unchanged from the previous model: A 50-megapixel main camera, a 12 MP ultra-wide, and a 10 MP selfie. The lack of a zoom lens sets it apart from flagship phones, but that is a typical trade-off in flip phones.

Photos from the main camera were good, with a good level of detail and color reproduction in both daylight and night shots. And the reasonably big sensor used (at least for a flip phone) resulted in good results even at 2x digital zoom. The Galaxy Z Flip 7 offers digital zoom at up to 10x magnification, but the pictures at max zoom have a lot of digital sharpening and look artificial at a closer look.

The ultra-wide camera performs fine, but with noticeably fewer details and some distortion issues. The limitations of the ultra-wide camera are especially noticeable at night, with the small sensor incapable of capturing detail. Night mode helps the ultra-wide camera a lot, with good images if you manage to hold the Flip 7 still. 

Selfies from the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 are very good when using the main camera. The bigger external sensor gives much better results than the typical pinhole selfie camera, but framing shots can be a bit tricky. Even so, optical image stabilization and the sharpness of the main camera return better images, even adding a more natural depth of field.

Using the internal selfie camera gave OK photos, with a lower level of detail and color reproduction than the external camera. Colors were slightly washed out, but this was only noticeable when comparing them with the main camera pictures; they were otherwise perfectly fine for a smartphone selfie.

The flip form factor not only offers the option of using the sharper main camera for selfies, but also the ultra-wide lens, which covers a wider angle of view than the internal camera. Remember to use the Night mode for low-light ultra-wide photos, as the limitations mentioned earlier still apply for selfies.

Good Enough Battery Life on the Galaxy Z Flip 7

	Battery
Battery Capacity	4300 mAh
Wired Charging Speed	25 W
Wireless Charging Speed	15 W

Tech enthusiasts were understandably worried about the Exynos 2500 chip on the Galaxy Z Flip 7, due to the low energy efficiency of the chips in the past. In our test with the Samsung foldable, however, we didn’t find any issues with battery life, and the phone lasted more than a full day with regular usage.

Our usual battery life test failed to run on the phone, but with typical usage (maps usage, music streaming, photos, quick hotspot use, and some messaging), the phone showed almost half of its battery capacity left after a day. 

Charging	Galaxy Z Flip 7 (4300 mAh | with 45W charger)	Galaxy Z Flip 6 (4000 mAh | Apple 61W charger)	Galaxy S25 Ultra (5000 mAh | Samsung 45 W PD)	Pixel 9 Pro XL (5060 mAh | 140 W USB-PD)
10 minutes	22%	15%	27%	24%
30 minutes	56%	34%	73%	57%
1 hour	94%	57%	99%	91%
Full charge	75 min	127 min	61 min	1h20
PC Mark Battery test	n/a	14h18	17h06 21028 performance score	15h39 12986

The increased battery capacity to 4300 mAh (up from 4000 on the Flip 6) helped, and the new 3nm chip probably impacted as well. Samsung offers the usual suite of power-saving features, including limiting the CPU and display performance and whitelisting background apps for further savings. 

When it comes to charging, there is no adapter in the box as usual, but using a Samsung charger compatible with the phone’s maximum 25 W input, a full charge took 75 minutes, with half an hour enough for a 56% charge. On top of that, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 also offers wireless charging and reverse wireless charging.

Finally, to extend the battery lifespan, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 offers a comprehensive list of options, including turning off fast charging, limiting charging at up to 80/85/90/95%, and stopping at 80% at night and then completing charging at the alarm clock’s time.

Is the Galaxy Z Flip 7 a Good Buy?

If you are looking for a powerful and compact smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 is probably your best option. It may not offer the best performance or camera when compared to a similarly priced bar smartphone, but that is a trade-off we have come to expect even after Xiaomi, Motorola, and others entered the market.

Samsung still offers the best software support in the flip category, with the Flip 7 beating its direct rivals by at least two more years of updates. If you treat the phone well enough, you can confidently gift it to a relative or keep it as a (still usable) backup phone until the beginning of 2032.

Having said that, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 is still a very expensive phone, and it is hard to justify buying it if you have a recent flagship phone, especially when it comes to camera and performance. An upgrade from a previous Galaxy Flip is also hard to recommend, unless you have a really good trade-in offer. The bigger display is definitely welcome, but One UI still limits its usefulness.

Still, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 is a versatile and compact phone that further refines the flip recipe. Five years after the release of the original Flip, being able to fold the phone into a small pocketable brick still feels like the future, but Samsung needs to work on making more apps functional on the cover screen.