I held the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and it finally feels like Samsung actually tried

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold series is the most widely available book-style foldable phone family. However, I’ve begrudgingly recommended these devices to people wanting a large foldable. That’s mostly because Samsung has coasted on the design and hardware front while rivals have sprinted ahead with exciting designs and impressive hardware.

After laying my hands on the Galaxy Z Fold 7, though, I’d argue that in some ways, it’s the most cutting-edge foldable phone of 2025. I spent a little time with the Galaxy Z Fold 7 ahead of Samsung’s Unpacked event, and here are my thoughts.

Easily the first thing that caught my eye about Samsung’s new Fold was just how thin it was. Samsung says it’s actually 8.9mm thin when folded, which means it’s tied with the OPPO Find N5 as the thinnest foldable phone so far. Check out the third photo above, showing off the Z Fold 7 compared to the negligibly thinner S25 Ultra. It really drives home this thin form factor.

Samsung says the Z Fold 7 is light, too, weighing just 215 grams. That makes it the lightest book-style foldable phone in the world so far. It’s slightly lighter than the Galaxy S25 Ultra (218 grams), although I think that has more to do with some other hardware sacrifices that we’ll get to in a bit.

The company has also opted for larger screens this time, namely an 8-inch 120Hz folding screen and a 6.5-inch cover display (OLED). This is a significant jump on paper and once again marks Samsung catching up to competitors. The larger folding screen isn’t something I immediately noticed. However, I didn’t have to struggle to see a display crease despite the company saying it should be less visible.

I’m more enthused by the Fold 7 finally embracing a cover screen aspect ratio (21:9), as that’s closer to conventional smartphones. And it’s something I noticed in my short time with the phone. Between the thin, light design and this aspect ratio, this is as close as a foldable phone has gotten to a conventional phone.

Things aren’t all great on the design front, though. One thing I noticed is that tapping the cover display while the folded device is on a table results in serious wobble due to the camera bumps (check out the first image above). I would’ve preferred a Pixel-style camera bar or a circular camera bump to mitigate this issue.

It’s also worth noting that the Z Fold 7 doesn’t offer S Pen support. Samsung had to remove the digitizer in the display to facilitate this thin design. I’d say it’s a fair trade-off as I’m not a stylus or S Pen user. But it will be a disappointment for these users, especially now that we’ve got a slightly larger screen to work with.

Nevertheless, after years of mediocre foldable hardware, I’d given up hope of Samsung offering a truly cutting-edge design that would compete with rivals. So I wouldn’t be unhappy if they stuck with the same fundamental design for the Galaxy Z Fold 8 and 9.

Hardware design and specs have always been two traditional weaknesses of the Galaxy Z Fold. Samsung clearly nailed the design this time, so what about the specs? Well, about that.

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 should be a performance beast thanks to the Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy processor and 12GB or 16GB of RAM. But you can always rely on Samsung to bring the latest and greatest silicon at the very least. Unfortunately, the company is sticking with a 4,400mAh battery. The chipset should help deliver longer endurance, abd I obviously didn’t spend enough time with the phone to make any determinations about battery life. But this is still a downer after four generations of phone had the same battery capacity. I’m also disappointed to see 25W wired charging once again. This decision is even more annoying in 2025 when the Galaxy A56 5G has 45W wired speeds.

Either way, it’s clear that Samsung lags behind Chinese brands in terms of battery capacity and charging speeds. By comparison, the HONOR Magic V3 has a 5,150mAh battery while the recently launched vivo X Fold 5 enjoys a 6,000mAh (!) battery. I feel like even a small capacity bump would’ve been welcomed here.

Otherwise, Samsung’s new phone also has a couple of new cameras this time. The first is a 200MP main camera, which replaces the long-standing 50MP shooter. I didn’t get a chance to use this camera, but it certainly creates a giant bump, as earlier discussed. And yes, you can indeed shoot full-resolution 200MP shots if you really want to. Meanwhile, the second new camera is a 10MP selfie shooter on the folding display, replacing the crappy 4MP under-display camera. I didn’t try the new selfie camera, either, but almost any conventional camera should be better than an under-display shooter.

Samsung’s secondary cameras are mostly unchanged. The 12MP ultrawide camera is slightly larger this time, but the 3x 10MP camera is still the same telephoto snapper as before. I really wish Samsung would offer a 50MP shooter like its rivals or do a Google and offer a ~12MP 5x camera. I don’t have faith in the phone’s long-range zoom capabilities.

Samsung’s key strength in the foldable phone space is its software, and the Galaxy Z Fold 7 builds on this in a few ways, thanks to One UI 8 atop Android 16. New features this time include side-by-side photo editing so you can still view the original image while editing, Audio Eraser in more Samsung apps, and object eraser suggestions in the Gallery app. Google is also bringing a couple of notable additions. There’s the ability to use Circle to Search in games so you can get tips without leaving the game, AI mode in Circle to Search, and a more optimized Gemini Live for the large screen.

These features are in addition to Android 16 features or previous Samsung capabilities like 90:10 multitasking, DeX, Now Bar, Now Brief, split-screen and multi-window multitasking, and more. I thought previous Galaxy Z Fold models were leagues ahead of rivals in terms of software, and it looks like Samsung is still far ahead of the pack in this regard.

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 will also get seven years of OS upgrades and security patches. This makes it among the best update policies on the market for a foldable phone, tied with the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

It’s a little too soon to say that you should definitely buy the Galaxy Z Fold 7. But its slim and light form factor legitimately stands out as a top-notch foldable design in 2025. So you should certainly consider the phone if the chunky form factor of previous Galaxy Z Fold models put you off in the past. Toss in Samsung’s expansive software, impressive update policy, and top-tier performance on paper, and there’s never been a better time to buy a Galaxy Z Fold device.

Unfortunately, Samsung still needs to address its ageing spec sheet if it truly wants to beat the competition. Additions like a 200MP main camera and a new selfie camera are welcome, but it’s high time for a battery/charging upgrade and new secondary cameras. It also doesn’t help that the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is a little more expensive than last year at $1,999.