Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE review: Not like this

Tom's Guide

2 days ago

The Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE has faded into the background compared to the much-upgraded Galaxy Z Flip 7, and the giant step forward for Samsung that was the Galaxy Z Fold 7. But as Samsung's cheapest folding phone to date, it shouldn't be ignored.
I've been wanting a cheaper foldable from Samsung for years at this point, and I'm glad one has finally arrived. What I'm less happy about is Samsung's decision to use the Galaxy Z Flip 6 as a base, as that leads to a number of consequences for the quality of the new phone's features, and not all of them good.
But with the Galaxy Z Flip 7 still starting at more than $1,000, and the standard Motorola Razr (2025) basically the only other choice at this price, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE is still worth considering. It's a way of getting a foldable phone while still spending around the same amount of money as you would for a non-folding flagship phone. Just make sure you read through our testing results and my thoughts on this phone before you make any big decisions.
While the Galaxy Z Flip series has never been as expensive as the Galaxy Z Fold, its $1,000 price tag could never really be called approachable. Starting at $899/£849/AU$1,499, the Z Flip 7 FE is on par with a Galaxy S25 or iPhone 16, making your buying decision a little easier. I still wish the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE price had gone lower, though.
Samsung could have blown the foldables market wide open with a $600/700 model, making this technology affordable to even more potential users. Instead, the £200/$200/AU$300 difference between this phone and the more premium Flip is kind of small.
What's worse is that the gap shrinks to $150/£140/AU$200 if you go for the Z Flip 7 FE's 256GB storage version (costing $959/£909/AU$1,599) to match the Z Flip 7's default capacity. Maybe 128GB is enough for your needs, but for future-proofing purposes, more on-board storage is my preference.
Both of Samsung's latest flip foldables use the same combination of 50MP main, 12MP ultrawide and 10MP selfie cameras, identical right down to the sensors, lenses and available formats. But when you compare the photos from these phones side-by-side, there are still some differences.
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For instance, this main camera shot of a field and footpath has ended up brighter on the FE for some reason. It's the same in a different image across the Welsh countryside below too.
Presumably there's some difference in how the two different chips in the Z Flip 7 and Z Flip 7 FE process their shots. Because with identical camera hardware and software, there's not much else that could cause this disparity.
This shot of a bridge over a stream was taken at 50MP on both phones, rather than the default 12MP. Here we see the regular Z Flip 7 pull ahead as it's brighter without losing detail.
At 2x zoom, pointing the phones down this path, we see the Z Flip 7 FE's shot is brighter again but loses color as a result. Both are still detailed though, using the 50MP sensor as a substitute for a proper telephoto camera.
We now move to the ultrawide camera, the other main sensor on both the Z Flip 7 FE and Z Flip 7. This egg box looks more saturated in color in the Z Flip 7 FE image, which is beneficial given the dark wood the box is made from. It's the first of these images where I think the Z Flip 7 FE outright beats its more expensive sibling.
Finally, we have a portrait mode selfie. The Z Flip 7 has given us the more saturated shot, but at the expense of texture detail in my skin and my shirt. The Z Flip 7 FE's portrait effect is much stronger for some reason, but has also blurred part of my glasses by accident.
Many of Samsung's latest features are available here on the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE since it's running One UI 8, just like Samsung's other new foldables. That includes all the abilities built into Google Gemini, which works alongside Samsung's own Bixby assistant.
Together, the two digital helpers are ready to answer questions, provide summaries, adjust your settings or enable Now Bar and Now Brief, available on both the inner and outer Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE screens for quickly referencing your daily schedule.
For creative purposes, you can make generative edits and fixes to your images, or try the newly upgraded Audio Eraser to clean up the sound in your videos.
Unfortunately, there is no DeX mode available here, despite Samsung having added support to the Galaxy Z Flip 7 for the first time. Not everyone cares about having a desktop mode built into their phone, but it can certainly be handy with the right accessories.
Like Samsung's other recent flagship phones, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE is promised to get seven years of Android updates and security patches. Even though the Z Flip 7 FE's hardware isn't as new as the other two foldables Samsung launched this year, its software will always be on par. And what's more, that's more than twice as long as the three years of support you get with the Razr 2025.
Presumably as part of its cost-cutting strategy for the Z Flip 7 FE, Samsung gave its new cheaper foldable an Exynos 2400 chipset. This is a flagship-grade chip from the previous year, and a step behind both Samsung's latest, 3-nanometer Exynos 2500 used in the regular Z Flip 7 and the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip used in the Z Fold 7 and most flagship Android phones this year.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7
Motorola Razr (2025)
Chipset
Exynos 2400
Exynos 2500
Dimensity 7400X
Geekbench 6 score (single-core / multi-core)
2044 / 6761
2286 / 8079
1089 / 3075
3DMark Wild Life Extreme Unlimited (score / fps)
3042 / 18.2
4325 / 25.9
1021 / 6.1
Adobe Premiere Rush time to transcode (mins:secs)
1:15
1:04
1:21
The Exynos 2400 does outperform the Motorola Razr's Dimensity 7400X chip on all key fronts, but lags behind the newer Exynos 2500, especially on the GPU front. But outside the lab, the Z Flip 7 FE runs into a problem — heat and performance throttling.
There is a massive gap between the Z Flip 7 FE's full potential and what you get after a few minutes of activity. Playing Ex Astris at max graphics settings, the Z Fold 7 FE struggles to keep up at maximum graphics settings. This is a game that runs perfectly on a Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, but the Exynos 2400 struggles to keep a high, consistent frame rate.
Similar to the chip downgrade, the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE uses 8GB of RAM, instead of 12GB like Samsung's other foldables. Its available storage capacities are either 128GB or 256GB, a step down from the 256GB/512GB offered on the Z Flip 7.
The Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE inherits the Galaxy Z Flip 6's oddly-shaped 3.4-inch, 60Hz cover display. The folder-shaped cutout works fine, but it's not as exciting or useful as the full top half of the phone being a 120Hz 4.1-inch display, as it is on the Z Flip 7.
Equally, given Samsung is reluctant to give users proper access to apps on the outer screen, you don't miss out on too much compared to the more expensive flip foldable.
That said, it's questionable if the extra space on the Z Flip 7 really makes a difference. Both of Samsung's new flip foldables are still focused on using widgets on the cover screen, rather than normal apps like its main rival, the Moto Razr 2025. It means the inner display is still where you'll spend the vast majority of your time, even if you can check notifications or appointments, alter quick settings or even take photos with the phone folded (at least without additional modifying apps downloaded).
The whole Z Flip 7 FE feels unfortunately dated, even if it's a brand new phone based on a one-year-old design. Such is the leap Samsung made with the Galaxy Z Flip 7.
I didn't notice how the inner screen of the Z Flip 7 FE is a smaller 6.7-inch panel rather than 6.9 inches as you get on the Z Flip 7, but I did notice the bezels being way thicker and more obtrusive on the FE. There is definitely a difference in the depth of the crease in the display too, but not one that spoils the experience on the FE.
The most noticeable physical difference is the hinge. The Z Flip 7 FE's mechanism is way stiffer than the Z Flip 7, despite both phones having smooth folding actions, and being capable of holding their position at any point between open and closed. Samsung wasn't kidding about the advancements it made to the Z Fold 7's mechanism, but it's hard to understand without comparing it directly to what the old hinge feels like.
On the brighter side, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 FE is actually a touch lighter than the Z Flip 7. The FE also has the same water and dust resistance rating (IP) as the Z Flip 7, the same Gorilla Glass Victus 2 protecting the back and cover display and the same Armor Aluminum frame. None of these will hopefully ever matter to you, but if there's ever an accidental drop or immersion, you'll be grateful for the durability.
It's slightly disappointing that you only have black and white colors to choose from on the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE. The Z Flip 7 comes in black, blue and red (plus an online-exclusive mint green), which give users the option of a more exciting color if they want.
Our lab testing of the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE's display revealed it has one advantage over its rivals — a higher peak brightness. It's behind on color gamut coverage though, although at least it has similar color accuracy to the regular Z Flip 7.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7
Motorola Razr (2025)
Peak brightness (nits)
2105
1989
1916
sRGB color gamut volume (%)
141.3
151.7
207.3
DCI-P3 color gamut volume (%)
100.1
107.4
146.8
Color accuracy (∆E, lower is better)
0.24
0.23
0.34
The Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE features the same battery capacity as previous Z Flip models: 4,000 mAh. Meanwhile, you get an upgraded 4,300 mAh cell in the standard Z Flip 7.
Between that capacity difference and the power efficiency of the two different chips, it's no surprise that we found a big battery life gap in our testing. In our test, which sets phones to constantly open different sites on a web browser over cellular data until the battery gives out, it took 9 hours and 12 minutes at regular adaptive refresh rate mode for the Z Flip 7 FE to give up, below the average phone's result by more than an hour. The Z Flip 7 managed 12 hours and 24 minutes. And the Razr 2025 does even better, lasting 13 hours and 36 minutes.
Charging is again a choice of 25W wired or 15W wireless, something that the regular Galaxy Z Flip 7 doesn't change either. A drained Z Flip 7 FE fills reaches 56% capacity after 30 minutes, at least making it a bit faster to power up than its rivals. The Razr 2025 makes it to 42% on the same charger, and the Z Flip 7 to 55%
I fully swapped to the Galaxy Z Flip 7 after I finished testing the FE, and it's confusing to think that both of these phones came out at the same time. The regular Z Flip 7 is a brilliant device, and deservedly sits at the top of our best foldable phones guide. But whether the Z Flip 7 FE deserves similar praise is not so clear.
If the Z Flip 7 FE was cheaper, or shared more of the Z Flip 7's upgrades, this would be an easy phone to recommend for foldable-curious users wanting to eke the most out of their phone-buying budget. But the phone we have is lower-powered, a lot less power efficient and uses outdated design elements, while dropping the cost by less than a fifth — not much of a discount considering what you lose out on.
The ideal user for the Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE is someone craving the futuristic and convenient form-factor of a flip foldable, but also, counterintuitively, doesn't mind getting lesser and older hardware in its place.
The software and camera experience is on par with the full-fat Galaxy Z Flip 7, so you don't have to worry about missing out on updates or image quality compared to the more expensive Samsung flip phone. But you'll have to accept you could have get more camera, performance and battery life potential for your money by settling for a non-folding flagship phone.