The Galaxy Z Fold 7 is coming, but this year Samsung is making sure you know it. The company has been trickling out details about its next tablet foldable. Unfortunately, through the haze of mystery, I can see that Samsung still hasn’t fixed the one big problem I’ve complained about since the first Z Fold.
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 isn’t a lost cause; it could be a very exciting release. We already know there will be an Ultra version of the next Fold, and that can only mean one thing: Cameras. Much. Better. Cameras.
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Will the Z Fold 7 use the exact same cameras as the Galaxy S25 Ultra? The thin new Galaxy S25 Edge looked the same on paper, with its 200MP sensor, but that sensor is actually smaller than the 200MP sensor used on the Ultra. It’s not quite the same, but Edge isn’t Ultra.
Will the Galaxy Z Fold 7 Ultra try something similar? A spec that looks Ultra on paper but isn’t quite the real deal inside? Maybe it will have a smaller sensor or less zoom – the S25 Ultra packs a 5X telescopic lens – combined with some digital trickery.
I’d personally prefer one gigantic 200MP sensor, bigger than any other Samsung phone, and don’t bother with any zoom or ultrawide lenses. Just do everything else digitally, like the Leica Q3. Smartphones don’t have room for the biggest camera sensors, but if any company can fit more into less, it’s Samsung.
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 will be the thinnest, just like the Z Fold 6
Samsung is also hinting that the Galaxy Z Fold 7 will be the thinnest Samsung phone you can buy. Umm, it better be! The Galaxy Z Fold 6 is currently Samsung’s thinnest model, and it isn’t even the thinnest phone I can buy.
The Z Fold 6 is 5.6mm thin when open, and that’s thinner than Samsung’s thinnest Galaxy S, the Galaxy S25 Edge, which is 5.8mm thin. The Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold – the thinnest phone I can buy in the US – is only 5.1mm thin when open.
The thinnest phone in the world is the Oppo Find N5, available in China and a few other markets. The Find N5 is 4.2mm thin when open. It’s powered by a Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, similar to the Galaxy Z Fold 6, but it can pack a larger battery, since its displays are bigger than the Galaxy’s screens.
Will Samsung go thinner than Oppo? I think that’s unlikely, and I don’t even think Samsung will knock Google off its bragging perch in the US market. But the Galaxy Z Fold 7 will be impressively thin, with the professional design language and durability that Samsung has perfected over the past decade.
Will the cover display finally look… normal?
Samsung likes to say that the Galaxy Z Fold cover display is thinner because that makes the phone easier to hold and use one-handed. That may have been true when foldable phones were big chonky boys, but now they are super-thin: the thinnest phones you can buy, when open.
We’ve seen a silhouette of what could be the Galaxy Z Fold 7. The news might not be good on the cover display.
The images that accompany Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 7 hints make the cover display look extra tall, around 22:9. It seems Samsung is sticking with the same design, apart from the new thinness and Ultra cameras – assuming those hints are true.
Maybe Samsung is onto something? The OnePlus Open has a normal-looking cover display, and the Oppo Find N5 should have been launched in the US as the OnePlus Open 2 – the companies share a corporate umbrella. Instead, OnePlus decided to skip a foldable launch this year and focus on flat phones.
Maybe I’ll try a tall Galaxy Z Fold 7 Ultra that is extra thin and it will all make sense. My thumb will casually stretch from one side to the other, and I’ll snap beautiful photos with its cameras, and all will be right with the world. Or maybe it will look weird. I’ll have to wait until Samsung’s next Unpacked event – or until it drops enough hints that it ruins the final surprise.
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philip.berne@futurenet.com (Philip Berne)
