The unique selling point for foldable phones is the screen real estate. Microsoft's dual-screened Surface Duo comes to mind when speaking about this particular topic, but the company has seemingly "neglected" it and will only support the Surface Duo 2 till 2024.
Luckily, other alternatives to this entry will continue to receive support and come with the same offerings (or even better) than the Surface Duo. A perfect example would be Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 5, which ordinarily costs you $1,799 for the 265GB model. However, you can get it at a discounted price of $1,399 at Amazon. This translates to a 22% discount or a whopping $400 tipped off the scale.
Right off the bat, Samsung pulled out all the stops with the massive 7.6-inch AMOLED display on the Galaxy Z Fold 5, thus making it the perfect multitasking companion. Not forgetting the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset under the hood, a significant bump compared to its predecessor. This makes it the perfect candidate for users who like gaming on their phones and predominantly handle work-related tasks on their phones. Don't worry; it won't heat up like the just-released iPhone 15.
It's worth noting that the Fold 5 also comes with a cover screen, facilitating more straightforward navigation when handling less screen real-estate-demanding tasks such as answering phone calls or responding to texts. Samsung has achieved these feats without compromising the phone's aesthetic appeal, as it's thinner, lighter, and sleeker.
The crease in the middle while using the phone in tablet mode is subtle. Samsung also promises a great user experience with 1750 nits of brightness on the Fold 5, which makes it easy to use outdoors without compromising on the vibrant and vivid colors displayed on the screen.
Samsung has also heavily invested in the entry's durability, which sports Gorilla Glass Victus 2 external protection and IPX8 water resistance. Unfortunately, the Galaxy Fold 5 doesn't support expandable memory via a microSD card slot, meaning your best bet would be getting one more storage (up to 1TB). It also runs on Android 13, with a 120Hz refresh rate.
The 4400 mAh battery seems promising and will probably get you through the day on a single charge, depending on your usage. But if you manage to empty the tank, fast charging, Qi wireless charging, and reverse wireless charging to ensure you're covered and connected at all times.
Why I'd go for this deal
Aside from it being a solid phone that supports multitasking, the Fold 6 stacks 5 cameras in total. That's the wide, ultra-wide, and telephoto cameras at the back, then there's the two selfie cameras on the cover and main display. I'm big on photography, so this is a big win.
Here's the complete rundown of each camera's capability:
- main camera - 50MP
- ultra-wide camera - 12MP
- telephoto camera - 10MP
- cover display selfie camera - 10MP
- inner display selfie camera - 4MP
It's also worth mentioning that the foldable phone ships with an AI-powered image signal processing (ISP) feature designed to correct visual noise that negatively impacts images taken in poor lighting.
