When the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 arrives, probably this July, it may very well be a fairly respectable improve over the Z Flip 5 I personal. It’ll reportedly have a barely larger battery than the Flip 6, which had a barely larger one than the Flip 5, plus a a lot larger outer display screen.
Unfortunately, I can’t wait a number of extra months. After a yr and a half with a Flip, I’ve reached my breaking level.
To be clear, my cellphone by no means cracked. My folding Flip by no means even sprouted a inexperienced line of doom alongside its crease. The manufacturing unit display screen protector did start to peel, however $30 and a visit to uBreakiFix made that downside go away.
No, the tip got here for my Flip when it stopped lasting the day and began waking me up at evening. The battery is consistently dying quicker than it ought to, and ever for the reason that final huge software program replace, the sleep and do-not-disturb modes now not block notification sounds. I can’t determine both one, and the Flip’s distinctive advantages now not really feel ok for me to take care of them anymore.
On battery: I’ve seen this cellphone attain the 80 % mark by 9 within the morning, and threaten to die by 9PM. I virtually don’t even use the cellphone after I’m at work, and but now I really feel prefer it all the time must be plugged in.
I all the time knew I’d be making sacrifices to get a cellphone that folds right into a pocket sq.. The Flip 5’s twin batteries have a complete rated capability of 13.92 watt-hours, lower than even the smallest Galaxy S23 cellphone (14.68Wh) that shipped that very same yr. But utilizing it wasn’t all the time this unhealthy.
At first, my Flip all the time made it to my bedside charger every evening. Later, I may simply get it there by merely utilizing it rather less within the day, turning off AR in Pokémon Go, or turning on battery saver mode within the evenings.
But after a yr, even deleting Pokémon Go totally wasn’t sufficient. When I flew to CES this January, I spotted I couldn’t afford to hold this cellphone at a tradeshow. I needed to transfer all my accounts to a borrowed cellphone simply to do my job. I can’t swear to it, however I definitely really feel like I can hint diminished battery life to Samsung’s One UI 6.1 software program replace that arrived final April, and I wouldn’t be the one one.
It may simply be the battery prematurely growing older, I suppose, however I did a number of cursory checks: Samsung’s inner diagnostics say the battery is “Good.”
I’ve had telephones with weak battery earlier than. There was a time I carried round spare battery packs for my Motorola Droid 2, swapping mid-day, daily, till I moved on. But telephones with battery doorways made that simple; these batteries had been additionally low-cost. And whereas I may in all probability handle to completely change my Z Flip 5’s batteries with a bit of labor, I’d be risking a fragile cellphone that feels poor in different methods, too.
I’m not speaking in regards to the crease, which I bought used to fairly rapidly, or the side-mounted fingerprint sensor that misses for me virtually as typically because it hits. Nor am I speaking in regards to the digital camera, although sure, you do sacrifice within the digital camera division with Samsung’s folding telephones. I knew that out of the gate.
Mostly, I’m speaking about how Samsung actually has but to embrace the potential of the Flip, and the way pointless its outdoors display screen can really feel after the novelty wears.
When individuals ask me what I really favor in regards to the Z Flip, I’ve wound up saying it’s actually about the way it matches in my pocket, and the way superior it feels to fold. It’s a sq. when closed, so it stays put in my pocket and doesn’t jut out.
But it’s not really a small cellphone, and it’s not a very good one-handed cellphone as a result of there’s no one-handed approach to open it. I largely stopped making an attempt after the tenth time I fumbled it to the bottom.
And I do discover myself opening it virtually each time I exploit it, as a result of it’s virtually by no means value bothering with the Flip’s cowl display screen. While it’s really bigger than the screens on early Android handsets, Samsung merely received’t allow you to use the outer display screen like a correct Android cellphone.
Before you ask: sure, I downloaded Samsung’s Good Lock app and used its MultiStar sub-app to painstakingly load every of my most used Android apps onto that display screen, one by one, however it’s virtually all the time extra environment friendly to easily open up the cellphone as a result of they’re tougher to make use of and tougher to launch. Most apps don’t scale correctly, and it takes an additional swipe to begin them; a couple of if I swipe the unsuitable path first.
With the duvet display screen, Samsung inexplicably makes you swipe left as a substitute of up for apps, and proper as a substitute of down for notifications. Even although the bar on the backside appears to be like like my app drawer deal with, it’s really a Samsung Pay shortcut as a substitute, and it nonetheless journeys me as much as today.
For many months, I compelled myself to make use of the duvet display screen to signal my youngsters out of college, to tug up my 2FA authenticator codes, to look at for my Uber driver, to remotely open my storage door. But the one factor I can really do higher there may be selfies, which allow you to level the nice lens in the direction of your self when you body your shot with the duvet display screen. Even so, I believe I’ve gotten extra use out of this Game Boy Advance celebration trick than all the duvet apps I’ve used mixed.
So, after CES in January, I began trying to find my subsequent. I hoped perhaps I may discover a small cellphone once more, however no luck. On Reddit, nonetheless, I noticed a development: many Galaxy Z Flip house owners had been discussing whether or not they need to abandon folding telephones, now that Samsung was all of the sudden providing $500 in trade-in credit in the direction of a Galaxy S25 as a substitute.
After confirming that the vanilla Galaxy S25 is certainly the smallest high-end Android cellphone you should buy at the moment, I used to be intrigued. After listening to good issues in regards to the battery life with this yr’s mannequin and its 15.16Wh pack, I made a decision to leap on the deal.
The S25 doesn’t really feel like a small cellphone in my pocket, I’m afraid. It feels a bit boring in comparison with my Flip, and perhaps I’ll be complaining about Samsung’s newest software program replace a yr from at the moment! But I wanted a brand new cellphone.
So far, the digital camera’s significantly better, and the battery life appears nice. As I write these phrases, it’s 5:40PM, and my evenly used cellphone is at 80 %. There’s lots left within the tank.
Photography by Sean Hollister / The Verge
