It was back in February that Samsung had added the second foldable phone to its line-up in India, the Galaxy Z Flip. Unlike the Galaxy Fold, this was more in line with convention as far as the unfolded form factor was concerned. We had experienced it then in detail, and absolutely loved what the future was trying to show. In the midst of the Coronavirus lockdown and work from home routines, the good folks over at Samsung made all the efforts to get me the new variant of the Galaxy Z Flip to experience for a few days. This is the Mirror Gold variant, which now joins Mirror Purple and Mirror Black colour options. And a new lower price tag as well, which now reads Rs 1,08,999.
Speaking of which, it is always difficult to assess how good a foldable screen might be and how well it’ll hold up over a prolonged period of usage in an initial review. But now that we had some serious mileage on this Galaxy Z Flip unit, it is safe to say that the foldable screen and the hinge are holding up very well indeed. No ripples, no swollen areas and no smudges or creases at all. In fact, it is quite easy to get used to the central crease where the display folds as you swipe vertically and horizontally on the screen. If there was ever a doubt about the longevity of a foldable screen, Samsung has given an emphatic response, at least for the phones that it makes.
Swiping on this display surely feels different. That is because the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip’s foldable screen isn’t made of the same materials as your standard smartphone displays. Instead of the hard and scratch resistant glass, it has multiple layers of plastic fused together with an ultra-thin glass added. Hence, it feels softer to touch as well.
Not to forget that tiny display on the outside, which helpfully brings your attention to any new notifications on the phone if you have kept it folded. Apart from telling you the time. That being said, I somehow preferred to keep this unfolded on a table while I was working, because the really slim form factor just looks very attractive.
Performance remains top notch, as you would expect from a phone powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855+ chipset with 8GB RAM. Its slick all around, no heating of the back panel when you really stress it with multiple apps and battery life (it’s a 3,300mAh battery pack doing the duty) is good enough for a day and a half if you have the adaptive battery optimizations enabled. There is 256GB storage, and at present, this is the only variant available in India.
At the back are dual 12-megapixel cameras which do a good job with photos and videos in good light scenarios. They can do 4K video recording, and the camera app can add a bunch of effects to your photos and videos. What this dual camera setup returns are very good photos as long as the ambient lighting is adequate—be it indoors or outdoors. Good colours, though a bit restrained, lots of detailing and contrast make all the difference. However, when the lighting goes a little dim, there is a significant loss in quality of photos that emerge—there is some amount of noise that is quite visible, and the details get softened out as the image processing goes about trying to compensate.
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