Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 Review: First Impressions

First Impressions

Will the Galaxy Z Fold 6 put Samsung back at the top of the foldable category over excellent rivals like the OnePlus Open? It’s too early to say for sure, but this certainly feels like a bigger upgrade than last year.

Introduction

Samsung has just had its traditional summer Unpacked event, showcasing a new range of foldable phones and wearables. Among the highlights is the Galaxy Z Fold 6.

I got to spend a few hours with the Galaxy Z Fold 6 ahead of its unveiling alongside the Galaxy Z Flip 6 and Galaxy Watch Ultra. 

While it’s far from a complete rethink of the book-style foldable, Samsung has certainly looked to the competition to see where the focus should be this year. 

Is this the flagship foldable to get this year? Or are you better off sticking with the Z Fold 5, or plumping for one of the excellent rivals, the OnePlus Open?

In the UK, the Galaxy Z Fold 6 starts at £1799 for the 256GB model, rising to £1899 for 512GB and £2099 for 1TB. In the US, prices start from $1899.

Design and Screen

• Slightly altered aspect ratio
• The interior crease remains

With the Z Flip 6, Samsung decided against making wholesale changes to the design but that isn’t so much the case with the Z Fold 6. The sixth iteration of Samsung’s original foldable is noticeably lighter (239g v 253g) and thinner when folded (13.4mm vs 12.1mm) than the outgoing model, making it much more comfortable to use.

It’s a very nice foldable, especially in the new navy or pink colourways (it’s also available in silver). The edges are a little more squared off than previous models and the matte sides look great.

The outer screen is 0.1-inch bigger and has a slightly different aspect ratio too, making it marginally wider. We’re not talking Google Pixel Fold wide, but it’s not quite as narrow as before and feels more usable. 

I still prefer the squatter look of the Pixel and OnePlus Open as they have outer displays akin to traditional phones, although Samsung’s slight changes here are a move in the right direction.

The outer 6.3-inch OLED display, which Samsung calls the Cover Screen, remains HD+ in resolution with a 120Hz refresh rate. It’s a decent panel for answering calls, replying to messages and checking your Instagram feed quickly.

Most of the fun happens on the larger 7.6-inch interior panel. This OLED screen can now hit 2600 nits of brightness and one issue I’ll delve into shortly aside, it’s a really nice screen that is great for gaming, watching YouTube or just scrolling through Instagram. I still love having such a large canvas easily accessible in my pocket.

There is a caveat, and it’s the same caveat that has been present on every iteration of the Z Fold series to date – the crease. The divet that runs down the middle of the screen is still present and still an eyesore.

When most of the foldable competition, including the Pixel Fold and OnePlus Open, have eliminated it, Samsung feels stuck in the past by not being able to find a smart way to get rid. You might get used to the sensation of running your finger across the crease after a while  – and those that have used Fold devices before will feel at home – but for a device that costs £1799/$1899, it’s something I would rather do without.

Performance and Specs

• Top-tier chipset from Qualcomm
• Up to 1TB storage
• Improved cooling

The Z Fold 6 is Samsung’s foldable flagship, and the specs showcase the high-end nature of the device. It is powered by the same Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy as the Galaxy S24 Ultra we reviewed earlier in 2024, paired with 12GB LPDDR5 RAM and up to 1TB of storage. There’s also support for Wi-Fi 6E, 5G, Bluetooth 5.3 dual SIM with a nano-SIM and eSIM.

I only spent a short time with the phone, and wasn’t able to run any of our usual benchmarks or try out any intensive games, however with it being the same chipset as the S24 Ultra I would guess performance would be very much the same. Our reviewer raved about the performance of that flagship, so check out our Galaxy S24 Ultra review for some insight into how the Z Fold 5 will perform.

Samsung reps did say the Fold 6 has a much larger vapour cooling chamber compared to the Fold 5, hopefully ensuring it stays cooler during longer gaming bouts. In terms of year-on-year improvements, Samsung claims the Fold 6 has a 25% increase in GPU and a 14% increase in CPU performance.

During my briefing ahead of the launch, the cameras on the Fold didn’t get much focus – which leads me to think the changes are minimal. Of course, that could be far from the truth but I will have to get the Z Fold 6 into our labs to put the camera system through its paces.

On paper, the cameras dotted around the Fold 6 are very much the same as those on the outgoing model. On the back, there’s a 50MP wide (OIS, f/1.8), a 12MP ultrawide and 10MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom. Inside there’s a 4MP under-display camera, while a 10MP selfie camera can be found on the Cover Screen.

Software

• Impressive software support
• Galaxy AI additions 

Galaxy AI was the big software focus with the S24 series, and a lot of those smarts are again big additions for the Z Fold 6.

Features like Google’s exceptionally useful Circle to Search, which lets you draw around anything on the screen to find out more, works very well on the larger screen and you can now circle QR codes and maths equations.

The auto-formatting and AI summary features make a lot of sense on the larger interior display, especially as the Fold 6 still supports the S Pen for doodling and note-taking. The S Pen functionality is also extended with generative portraits. As an example, Samsung demoed quickly drawing a set of glasses on a dog and then using the AI to turn them into something that looked a lot more realistic.

Our Mobile Editor Lewis spent a lot of time delving into these Galaxy AI features in our Galaxy S24 Ultra review, so that’s the best place to familiarise with the smarts.

Samsung has been at the forefront of excellent software support on Android, alongside Google and its Pixel range, and it’s no surprise that it is promising to support the Z Fold 6 with seven years of software updates. 

Early Verdict

Will the Galaxy Z Fold 6 put Samsung back at the top of the foldable category over excellent rivals like the OnePlus Open? It’s too early to say for sure, but this certainly feels like a bigger upgrade than last year.

The changes to the footprint of the device are small, yet should make the Z Fold 6 more pleasant to use whether it’s folded or unfolded.