a few weeks ago, I switched out my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra for Samsung's newest folding firms, the Z Fold 6 and the Z Flip 6, and cards on the table, I got some bones to pick. So, starting with the Fold. On one hand, this is a nice, neatened up, lighter, thinner, faster version of the last phone, but every time I take it out my pocket, I also can't help but feel like Samsung hasn't fixed the fundamental issues here, and I'm not sure Samsung is even trying to fix the fundamental issues. So, if you're coming from a non-folding phone, the first thing that you're going to instantly notice is the crease, and it's getting to the point where now I am perplexed. I am perplexed how even six generations in, Samsung still hasn't managed to just fix this line going down the middle of their screen that companies like OnePlus have already proved can be done better with their gen one folding phones. They just need to improve the hinge. It's the way this phone is pinching on the screen.

every time you close it, and it's only going to get more noticeable the more you use it. The main rear cameras are good is what I would say if this was an $800 phone. Coming from the s24 ultra, you really can feel the compromise, whether that's the more limited Zoom range, the slightly less reliable focusing system thanks to the lack of laser autofocus, or just the extra bit of graininess that creeps into dark photos and videos because of the smaller sensor here. Now, most people who go out and buy and use this phone probably won't know what they're missing out on, but that's my job. Having used both of these phones to tell you that what you're getting here stings a little bit, especially considering that you can now get a brand new Galaxy s24 Ultra for like $1,000, while the zold 6 will run you $1,900. It's two times the price, and it shouldn't be. See, it made complete sense to me that the first Galaxy fold was significantly more

expensive than a normal phone. I mean, a lot of R&D would have been required to build all the new parts and concepts from scratch for something that Samsung didn't expect to sell many units of, so they had to recoup the cost somehow. But that's not the case anymore in the current market. This hinge and this folding screen, these are standard parts. This phone almost definitely does not cost more than $200 extra to produce than this, but it's like $800 to $900 more expensive to you for no other reason than that's become the default expectation for a fold, and they know they can get away with it. Paying $1900 for a phone, you would expect this to be the place where Samsung throws every single thing they got at the wall, but instead you get basically the same camera setup as not even the S24 Ultra, but the tiny base Galaxy S24, and your selfie cameras are even worse. The front one's not too bad. It takes 10-megapixel shots that make you look nice. It's

standard Samsung fair, but the inside 4-megapixel camera makes you look sick. And I don't mean that as a compliment. I mean that literally. Shooting photos on this reminds me of shooting photos on the PlayStation Portable camera like 15 years ago. And I have heard a few people saying, Well, this camera is designed for video calling, which is low quality anyway, so you're not going to notice the resolution. But I disagree. The resolution is so low that you can't record 4K video with it, which I have found myself wanting to do a pretty decent amount. The camera seems to have a persistent faintness to it, presumably because of the extra layer of pixels on top of it, but also since the whole appeal of a phone is to use it while it's open and use flex mode to prop the thing up to record videos, I don't think you can argue that this camera is only for video calls. At least 20% of the time, this is the camera that you're going to want to

use to shoot stuff, so the quality really matters, and it just makes you wonder how did this happen. Samsung introduced this 4-megapixel under-display camera on the Z Fold 3. It was terribly received then, and they've had the 4, the 5, and now the 6 to fix this. And so how have we ended up in a situation where this is the camera experience from a $2,000 2024 flagship-grade enthusiast smartphone anyways? The front screen is wider than it was before, which is a nice improvement. It looks neater. They've got rid of all of the weird corner screen bezels, but it does still feel just a little bit like no man's land. It's very close to feeling like you're using a normal phone, and that's impressive considering what this is, but it's still just a little worse in every way, a little bit too tall, a little bit too narrow, and a decent amount chunkier than a Barone. And this whole structure creates a bit of a thermal compromise.

too it's not hugely surprising. I mean, when unfolded, you're having to light up a larger screen area, which creates more heat. And then, when folded, this is a thicker slab, which makes it harder for that heat to escape. And this isn't some niche perk that only affects your gaming frame rates after prolonged periods of play. So many times when I have this phone open and it's like slightly warm outside, I'm noticing I can barely see my screen because it's dimming itself to try and prevent overheating. And two times it's actually gone one step further and refused to open my apps 'cause of temperature. Just to clarify, I don't live on some subtropical paradise island basked in sun all day. I live in the UK. There is no reason I should be getting temperature warnings this severe with normal usage. Oh yeah, also one of the things I love about the Galaxy S24 Ultra is the battery life. That's one phone that I've never had to worry about. But this with both a smaller battery capacity and a larger screen to power it

runs out anywhere between 15 and 25% faster, and that puts it very much in the anxiety Zone. I mean, I do nowadays pretty much always carry around a power bank, so I'm not left stranded, but that's just made me realize how much more often I'm reaching for power here. The flip does kind of fix this issue, but I'm getting to that phone. There was also quite a bit of emphasis that Samsung placed on the new AI features here. Of course, they did. It's 2024, but uh, are they good? Some of them are. I'd say the vast majority do still fall into the fun to play with, but I won't use often category. I suppose the most useful kinds of AI features are the ones that allow you to do things that you already do but better or faster, as opposed to the ones that just continuously add more different options because you know, we're only human. There's only so many features that you're going to be able to integrate into your life, but this is why I love.

the idea of all of this automatic translation stuff like being able to have a WhatsApp chat across a usually impenetrable language barrier. But not not actually having to think about the language barrier anymore. And also the new smart select tool. It's exactly what I was saying. It's making the kinds of things that you'd already be doing anyways trying to fiddle around and select stuff faster. I was also super excited about this new sketch to image. And there are moments where it all works the way you expected. Where you manage to perfectly place a one-of-a-kind dinosaur within the scene of your day out in the park. And you feel like the protagonist in a superhero movie at the single moment where unlimited power has just been dropped in your lap. But I would say there's too many constraints right now. It seems like there's some sort of safety restriction when it comes to adding things to faces. Which I mean it makes sense considering all the havoc that's been wrought by Deep fakes lately. But then at the same time faces are the

main useful thing that you might want to add things to, and there's also other issues I'm bumping into like draw smaller objects or Draw objects closer together to generate. I think Samsung's just not ready for my big Ideas yet, and you know what, using this feature consistently reminds me of just how silly it is that the one phone specifically designed to look and feel like a not ad does not come with a built-in S Pen like the s24 ultra does. You know the smaller of the two phones, so the only real remaining question is then, do the folding features make it all worth it? I feel like I've made it pretty clear at this point that you're giving up a lot to get these features. You're paying twice as much money, you're having to deal with a crease, a terrible underscreen camera, two displays with unorthodox aspect ratios, a compromised battery, and no S Pen. So should you? Well, as far as the physical act of being able to prop your phone up on flat surfaces

it feels cool. I've used it a fair bit to record time lapses of things happening or watch movies on a plane by sitting the phone up on my trade table, but it doesn't really matter. I would say you'll actually have a distinctly better experience just using a normal phone with a kickstand case, since you'll get a bigger, more natural screen ratio, and also often times with these cases magnets for better wireless charging. I mean, there are things that do uniquely utilize the display on this phone. The taskbar, for starters, is an amazing addition. This whole one tap to instantly being in another R is a genuinely UNG gimmicky efficiency improvement that you just can't have on a smaller phone, but ultimately it's not for me. You might know that I spent a few months trying to use an iPad as my main computer, and the whole reason that failed was simply because of the mobile operating system. Same thing here. While it is impressive how much this thing can do for a phone, the truth is that for most people this

phone is still a little bit too fiddly and not quite efficient enough to be a good main computer, which makes it hard to justify. Given that for this price, you can actually buy a good equivalently performing flagship phone and still have the money left over for a great laptop. So I fold, and if you're looking at buying this, please make absolute sure that these specific folding features are things that you'll definitely use. Because if you splurge on a fold and all you end up doing is playing Candy Crush, but either squeezed or stretched, that will be a poor purchase decision. I just feel like these Z folds are a little bit stuck. Not that many people are buying them, so Samsung seems to have lost the drive to actually fix the fundamental compromises, which in turn makes them persistently hard to recommend outside of their niche. The Flip six, though, is actually very different and, in my opinion, a phone that makes more sense. If the fold is the insecure teenager trying desperately to be something they're not.

the flip is its eccentric sibling who sure they're a little bit odd but they understand who they're trying to be through many years of bulking up the specs on these phones. ITA Samsung's now got to a stage where the Galaxy Z flip 6 is basically a flagship Galaxy s24 plus that costs $1 to $200 more more but folds in half and that isn't pointless. It's partly just a bit of fun which doesn't hurt in an era where everyone's always saying that smartphones have peaked. I can't lie if Samsung ever gave you the option to have their top end Ultra phones also fold without any compromises I take it in a heartbeat and they've really dialed into that fun with all the unique front screen customization and funky case options and this new uh photo ambient feature which overlays real weather effects onto photos that you've taken. It's very pointless but brings me joy. It's got a potential lifestyle benefit because unlike the front of the zold 6 which is

basically just a slightly less comfortable phone. The front of the Flip 6, it has a very clearly distinct feature set to the main screen. This is much more like having a smartphone and then a completely separate smartwatch, as opposed to this, which is like a smartphone and then a slightly worse smartphone. And when I switched over to the Z Flip 5 last year, I did find that the physical barrier to go from this Smartwatch stage to the smartphone stage actually did make me use my phone L, and then you do lose the three times telephoto camera that the S24 Plus has, so you only get a main and an ultra-wide. But I would actually say that it makes up for it with selfies. See, unlike the Fold, which can use its high-end rear cameras to take selfies, here that's actually the default way to take selfies. If you want to take good selfies on the Fold, you have to unfold, open the camera, flip that camera, tap the cover screen preview button, physically turn the phone over, being careful not to swipe anything.

on screen, and then take your shot before closing it all back up again. Here you just double tap the power button and then tap the screen. It's not a perfect system because then at the same time anytime you want to take a photo of what's in front of you, you do have to manually flip the phone open, but the point is this phone is a unique proposition that makes it distinct and useful for more than 1% of the population. Now there are a few things that I would say are compromised like you still have to deal with the crease, but for whatever reason, it is significantly less noticeable on this flip than it is the fold. The buttons are a little high up when the phone's open, and I do feel like they could quite easily shove them down and they'd still work fine in both unfolded and folded States. The screen is a little bit tall, not as tall as the cover screen on the fold, but still taller than I'd like, and it's only got a 1080p resolution as

opposed to the Quad HD that you get on their flat flagships. But I think that's okay. I keep my phone on 1080p anyways for battery life and temperature reasons. And it's got the same chip as the S24 Ultra, same RAM, same base storage, same wireless charging speeds, and yeah, the battery capacity is smaller too, just like the Fold. Also has a smaller battery than normal bar phones. But unlike the Fold, which is like a normal phone that extends into a big tablet, this is a normal phone that folds into something half that size, which means you save a lot of battery compared to a normal phone, and you end up with something very close to that of an S24 Plus. So my through line for this phone is very much that six generations in, you still have to make compromises for a phone that folds. If all you want is the best bang for your buck, it isn't this, and to be honest, it never will be this. However, if you just really like the idea of a folding phone, then you're giving up

surprisingly, little to get it here, and you also scoop up a couple of little perks while you're at it too. So I had a funny situation a couple of weeks ago. I was stuck in a plane while England was in the Euros football final, which, by the way, the men's team has never won, so this was a big deal, and it felt like every single person on that flight wanted to do one thing and one thing only: find a way to stream the game. But they couldn't. The football was being streamed for free in the UK on BBC player, but you know when you're flying 40,000 ft above the Atlantic Ocean, your phone is going to know that, and the app will refuse to play due to Geographic license restrictions. I could literally see the lady in front of me searching live for the best VPN deals on this flight, so you can imagine how desperately, desperately I wanted to grab her and tell her that I had it. Is this Sur Shar VPN? We pulled it up, we switched our location to the UK.

and we managed to watch England fudge the finals once more live. After which, we kind of wish we hadn't bothered. But the point is, I'm consistently glad that I have this subscription. And given that with the code boss, you can now get it for just $29 a month, with a 30-day money-back guarantee, for an unlimited number of users, with four extra months for free, it's a bit of a no-brainer.

Samsung Z Flip 6 / Z Fold 6 Review - Don't make a mistake!

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Samsung Z Flip 6 / Z Fold 6 Review - Don't make a mistake!

Samsung Z Flip 6 / Z Fold 6 Review - Don't make a mistake!

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