Galaxy Z Flip 5 Review: It is easily the best Flip in the series and perhaps the best flip phone in the market in terms of specs, but does the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 do enough to justify its still very premium price tag? Let’s find out!
There weren’t very many (read ‘any’) commercially successful folding display phones when Samsung stepped in the foldable ring. The brand paved the way for foldables, and since the launch of the first Galaxy Z Fold and Galaxy Z Flip, the world of foldable smartphones have come a long way, and well, so has Samsung’s own foldable line. When launched initially, there were a number of rough edges in Samsung’s foldable devices.
But the brand, to its credit, has kept ironing out creases (pun intended) in its foldables. Each new Galaxy Z Flip and Galaxy Z Fold has been better than the previous one. This is the case with the latest ones as well.
The latest Galaxy Z Fold 5 and the Galaxy Z Flip 5 are miles ahead of the Flip and Fold that were first launched by Samsung. We are going to be looking at Samsung’s latest foldable, especially the Z Flip 5. The phone comes with a number of improvements, and Samsung has fixed a lot of resident issues that previous generation Galaxy Flips suffered from.
The Galaxy Z Flip 5 comes with a number of high-end features and specs, but with a starting price of Rs. 99,999, it remains on the expensive side. Is it worth flippin’ for?
Table of ContentsGalaxy Z Flip 5 Review: Flexing it with a Flex window!
While the new Galaxy Z Fold has little to show off when it comes purely to looks, the case is actually quite different when it comes to the Galaxy Z Flip 5. While the basics of the phone remain the same – it has a foldable display that folds into a clamshell form factor, leaving you with a square-shaped palm fitter, it still has a few differentiating factors that help it stand out amongst the Galaxy Z Flips of the past. The biggest one, quite literally, is the secondary display on the phone, what Samsung calls the Flex Window. On the earlier Flips, this display used to be all of 1.9 inches or smaller. On the Galaxy Z Flip 5, Samsung has now stretched it to 3.4 inches, which makes for a massive Flex Window. It is not as big as the 3.6-inch one on the Moto Razr Ultra 40, but it is still a big step up from what Galaxy Flips used to come with.
This big, beautiful AMOLED display covers almost the entire upper half of the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5, edging around the main cameras of the smartphone.
Another difference comes in the way the phone now sits in one’s palm. Thanks to the new and improved hinge on the Z Flip 5, the phone shuts all the way when folded down and feels more compact and symmetrical. The earlier Galaxy Z Flips used to have space between the two folded displays near the hinge, making it feel slightly ‘off’ and also allowing dust to creep in between. When folded shut, the hinge reveals the engraved and the only Samsung logo on the device. Between the display on the upper half, the hinge and the middle, and the glass at the bottom half, the Galaxy Z Flip 5 looks nothing like any other phone in the market, and thanks to its boxy shape, it stands out as a Galaxy Z Flip, which means the phone is unlikely to be mistaken for some other device.
Flip the phone open, and you come face to face with a beautiful 6.7-inch main AMOLED plastic display surrounded by thin bezels. There is a small dot notch on the top center of the display that houses the front camera of the phone. The crease from the fold on the display still exists and is still quite visible and palpable. But one gets used to it with time.
The device has straight aluminum sides. The lock button, which also doubles up as a fingerprint scanner, is on the right side of the frame, and just above it sits the volume rocker. On the left, you get the SIM card tray, while the base of the phone holds the USB Type C port and speaker grille.
The phone measures 165.1 x 71.9 x 6.9 mm when unfolded and 85.1 x 71.9 x 15.1 mm when folded, and weighs 187 grams. Because it has a boxy build, the phone does not feel slim in particular and feels even more chunky when folded shut. It slips into pockets more easily but does feel like a big block and bulges out. Props to Samsung for improving the hinge of the Z Flip 5, but it is still a struggle to open the phone with a single hand. It comes with an IPX8 rating, which makes it water resistant so that you can use it on your runs, workouts, and even in the rain.
