Samsung’s fold 7 finally made me a believer in a foldable phone – 3 reasons

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Key takeaways of zdnet

• Samsung’s fold 7 has reached the point that it now has a similar size to the flagship phone when it stops.
• The software upgrade in a UI 8 and Android 16 at the end take advantage of the productivity capacity of foldables.
• Fold 7 has multiplier modes that make it better than only one phone that turns into a tablet.

Samsung’s Z Fold 7 did not take a long time to change my mind about folding phone. After testing it for less than a week, I am not only convinced that I can use it as my daily work phone, but I also realized that if I went back to a normal phone, I would seriously miss me.

This is a long route with foldables from previous experiences, including extended time with Z fold 5 just two years ago. I have never loved folding phones and after testing them, I have never wooed to change one in my new work phone – which is a long string of various Android models since Nexus One in 2010.

But the fold is 7 different.

Hardware on fold 7 is the light year before the Galaxy fold 6 of the previous year – it is 25% thin, when folded and surfaced. In fact, the fold is the most impressive piece of 7 tech hardware that I have put my hand throughout the year. When you pick it up, it has an immediate wow factor, especially when you place it next to the other flagship phone.

Too: Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 vs. Z. Fold 6: I tried both phones, and the difference is dramatic

But the most impressive part of the fold 7 is not how it looks and feels, rather how it works. More than ever, it has a UX that takes full advantage of all possibilities of the foldable form factor.

So let’s break it. Here are my three reasons why fold 7 has changed my opinion about foldable phones.

1. Looks like carrying a regular phone

The biggest difference with fold 7 is how much it looks and looks like a regular phone when it is closed and you are just looking behind the cover screen or phone. If you see it sitting on a desk or table next to someone else’s phone, you can easily make a mistake for only one more standard smartphone.

In fact, my iPhone 16 Pro Max or next to my Samsung S24 Ultra – two phones that I take every day – Guna 7 is slightly shorter. In fact, a closed fold looks similar to 7 Sony Xperia smartphone And uses the same 21: 9 aspect ratio which is slightly thinner than most of today’s smartphones. However, it is about 10% wide compared to the previous model of fold, and this additional width is enough to feel like a normal phone.

At the same time, it is also lighter (215 grams) compared to my iPhone 16 Pro Max (227G) and Samsung S25 Ultra (233G) – as well as last year’s fold 6 (239G). It is notable to realize that this folding phone is now thin and lighter than the best -selling flagship phones.

Too: I spent a week in New York City with Samsung Z Fold 7 – and it spoiled me the whole time

An advantage I did not expect from the width of the fold 7 when it stops and using the cover screen is that I usually make it easier to use a one-hand compared to a large flagship phone that is usually carried. And then when I am ready to use it two-hand, I can simply open it and when the 8-inch main screen has real magic.

2. Software now plays for its strength

Samsung has long been the builder of some of the world’s most influential, state -of -the -art hardware equipment. So it is not surprising that Fold 7 has finally caught the vision of the foldable phone as a small tablet that is disguised as a phone that can turn into a moment notice.

Now that Samsung has officially pulled the hardware to fold 7 for that vision, it could easily carry a few more generations to get the software right. But thankfully, this is not the case. With help from Google and Android 16Software on fold 7 now does a lot to take advantage of the full productivity capacity of hardware.

Too: Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold vs Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7: After testing both, here is a clear winner

My first and favorite example of this is the new 90:10 Split-Screen View, which is a feature produced in Android 16 with Samsung and its UI 8 software. With this, you can take two apps that are side-by-side on the 8-inch main screen, put your finger on the center line between them and then pull it to one side or other in almost all the way and let it go. This will then snap in the 90:10 scene where you only see a sliver of one app while looking at the other app. However, now you can tap that sliver to open 90% of the screen and take other apps up to 10%. This lets you switch back and forth between the two apps that are helpful in using each other, such as slack and email or a word processor and a web browser.

In this way another good productivity feature “Continue apps on the cover screen” option. It is especially effective now that the cover screen is a normal phone screen size. The way I like to set it is going to the settings. Performance | Select “Continue apps on the cover screen” and then select swipe up “to continue the app. Then, when you are working on an app like your calendar on the main screen and you need to turn off your phone, a round up arrow is on the lower part of your cover screen, which says “swipes to swipe. You just swipe and continue to work on your app on the cover screen. First, first, you have to close the fold screen and open the same application to continue it. Was.

There are many such software options. Look for a future article where I provide a list of productivity hacks from the extended UX on fold 7.

3. Many modes to run productivity

One of the best things about fold 7 is that it is not just a phone and an 8 -inch tablet in your pocket. Due to the folding form factor, it can also do some things that cannot do a standard 8-inch tablet. But before I go ahead of myself, let’s talk about the first standard mode. Then we will meet for creative goods.

If all fold 7 converted their flagship phone into a tablet, when you were free from both hands and ready for multitasks, it would be a win. As mentioned above, improvement in software now makes multitasking much better, more efficient and more productive. Being capable of running 2, 3, and even 4 apps on the main screen of fold 7, it seems like a sharp speed in the sports car compared to the common methods of flipping between the apps on a phone, which feels comparatively pedestrians. There are also some cases where there is just a big screen to see things such as spreadsheets, restaurant menu, desktop version of web pages, and even video calls on Zoom and Google Meat, a huge improvement can happen.

Too: 24 hours later with Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7: Why am I Leaving S25 Ultra behind

I often like to hold 1: 1S and meetings, while some go out to get fresh air and exercise several times a day. One of the biggest challenges on these walks is when something comes, where I need to see or see a document or a message that is not easy to see from my phone. Fold 7 is a winner in those examples because I can open it and use things to look at things in a very useable way using that 8 -inch screen.

Now talk Flex mode – One of my favorite hidden gems on fold 7. To enter this mode, when you are on the main screen, you bend the fold 7 sideways (make sure that the “auto rotate” turns into a quick settings panel) and then you bend the phone at 90 degrees so that it looks like an open laptop and set it. When you are in YouTube you can do this and the video will go to the top screen and the control will go to the bottom screen. You can do this in a typing app such as slack, gmail or chat, while the keyboard is open and the app will go to the screen and go down the keyboard. You can do this with video call apps like Google Meat and Video Tiles and go to the top screen and the meeting will go down – you can also adjust the screen like a laptop to keep yourself in the center for video calls.

Not only fold 7 can act like a mini laptop, it can also act like a desktop computer, can use it Samsung dex And New upgrades in Android 16You can connect your fold 7 to a cable (such as USB-C from HDMI) or wireless manner and you can attach a keyboard and mouse via Bluetooth. Dex has gradually become more useful over the years, but Google made Samsung a solid in Android 16, such as integrating some new features such as “desktop windowing”, which now allows you to open, move and shape many windows within the dex mode so that the environment looks great like Windows or Mac.

I have some suggestions to customize such a setup that I will put in the future article, but the lines below is that this phone can work like a full computer and since fold 7 is already likely to have all your most used apps and data, it can be a functional function in a pinch. This is probably not going to change your full -time PC, but it can actually be more productive than a chrombook or tablet.

final thoughts

These are my first impressions of Samsung Fold 7. I have got a lot to say about it and more things I want to test. But there is no doubt that fold 7 is a success device that brings the promise of real 2 -in -1 phone to reality. Chinese phonemakers have been manufacturing such devices for a few years and Apple will reportly to have released its first foldable iPhone in 2026. But for now, Samsung Fold 7 is the best foldable available in America – and it can also give us a glimpse of what the future of all flagship phones can look.