Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: Release date, price, specs, and everything you need to know
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The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 is official, delivering a thinner, lighter, wider, and squarer design than previous releases. It's the thinnest Z Fold yet, putting it on par with some other large foldable phones, yet also bringing important design changes like a handy lip around the edge to make it easier to open.
Looking at it, there's little doubt that this is a Galaxy Z Fold phone. Externally, it appears more or less identical to recent releases but squares the corners to make it look and feel more like a book. Samsung also slimmed up the design by a full millimeter but said it didn't change out the camera hardware for something more powerful because it wanted to focus on this being the thinnest Z Fold possible.
As expected, Samsung is launching the phone with Galaxy AI packed inside, powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy processor. This includes all the handy note-taking features from the Galaxy S24 Ultra, plus a few new ones tailored to the Z Fold's larger display.
Our Galaxy Z Fold 6 review takes a deeper look at what this new foldable offers while offering some insight as to whether you should buy one. However, if you're just looking to learn more about the phone for now, we've got all you need to know about it below.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: Price and availability
After being announced at Galaxy Unpacked on July 10, 2024, the Galaxy Z Fold 6 officially launched on July 24. The base model ships with 256GB of storage and starts at $1899. Upgrading to the 512GB model will cost you $1999, and 1TB of storage brings the price up to $2099. All models ship with 12GB of RAM regardless of storage size.
Samsung.com orders also have the choice of two additional colorways: Crafted Black — which looks like the phone has carbon fiber on the back — and white.
The Galaxy Z Fold 6 is sold in three main colors everywhere else including Silver Shadow, Pink, and Navy. Phones purchased through your carrier of choice in the U.S. will include 1 year of Samsung Care+ for free.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: Design and displays
Samsung is retaining the same design language from previous Galaxy Z Fold phones with one seemingly small but surprisingly important decision: the corners are now almost fully square. That makes it look and feel more like a book, and it also works to make the screen appear slightly larger since the corners are now filled with more display versus having cut-out rounded corners as in previous models.
Samsung also adjusted the aspect ratio of the phone slightly, adding 3mm to the cover display while only making the phone physically 1mm wider than the Z Fold 5. Smaller bezels and a tweaked hinge help with these measurements.
The phone's height shrunk by 1.4mm when compared to the Z Fold 5, and it's even 2.5mm wider when unfolded than that phone. Samsung further reduced the weight of the phone again this year, bringing it down to 239g. That's down from 252g on the Z Fold 5 and 263 grams on the Z Fold 4.
A new floating edge design makes its way all the way around the top, bottom, and outer edges of the phone, making it easier to open than before. Previously, the edges of Z Fold phones closed completely flat, making them slightly difficult to open when not using a case with a built-in lip. It's a similar effect to how some laptops are difficult to open if they don't include a small lip for your fingers.
The hinge has been further tweaked to deliver a reduced display crease inside, plus the Galaxy Z Fold 6 is now IP48 water and dust-resistant. That marks the first time ever that a Samsung foldable has received dust-resistance certification.
The Galaxy Z Fold 6 is the thinnest, lightest, and widest Z Fold ever. Plus, it has IP48 water and dust-resistance for the first time ever in the series' history.
As expected, Samsung further improved the Galaxy Z Fold 6's displays to make them brighter and smoother looking. The cover display has grown to 6.3-inches — up from 6.2 inches previously — making it 3mm wider than the previous phone because of the aspect ratio change and smaller bezels.
That cover display is now fully LTPO with the ability to scale from 1-120Hz. That's an improvement from the Z Fold 5's 48-120Hz panel. Both inner and outer displays are capable of up to 2600 nits of brightness, further increasing that rate over the 1750 nits on the Z Fold 5.
Additionally, Samsung increased the PWM dimming rate of both displays to 480Hz. That matches the Galaxy S24's improved PWM rate which also matches that of the iPhone, but it's still not as good as the thousands of hertz offered by other companies.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: Cameras
The Galaxy Z Fold 6 doesn't change much about the cameras over the Z Fold 5, but it does upgrade the ultrawide camera to a newer 12MP sensor. This should deliver slightly better imagery than the old sensor. Otherwise, the rest of the cameras are the same as the Z Fold 5.
That includes a 50MP main camera, 12MP ultrawide camera, and 10MP 3x zoom telephoto camera on the back. The cover screen camera is 10MP and the under-display camera found under the large folding display is still 4MP.
But while the hardware remains mostly the same, Samsung is upgrading the camera experience with some AI fun. A new Portrait Studio feature lets you take a portrait photo of someone and then use AI to edit their appearance. This can include making them look like a Pixar cartoon, turning the photo into a watercolor painting, and more.
Samsung’s ProVisual Engine from the Galaxy S24 Ultra is also included, featuring Instant Slow-Mo, Motion Photos with better HDR, shutter speed boosts, dual recording so you can use the front and rear cameras at the same time, single-take mode, and even built-in ND filters for helping to balance bright sunlight in photos. ProVisual Engine is also supposed to enhance zoom capabilities thanks to onboard AI processing.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: Specs, battery, and performance
Like the Galaxy S24 series, the Galaxy Z Fold 6 is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy. This special version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset features slightly better performance, made even better by the expanded vapor chamber inside the Z Fold 6.
Samsung told us that the new vapor chamber is much larger than the one in the Z Fold 5, helping to reduce processor heat in order to keep performance high.
Elsewhere, the Z Fold 6 does little else to surprise. It features the same 4400mAh battery and 25W charging as the Z Fold 5. It's got the same Armor Aluminum frame as that phone, but improves the glass with Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on the front and back of the phone. The back glass also features a pleasing, fingerprint-resistant matte texture.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6: S Pen and accessories
Hopeful rumors pointed to the S Pen finally being built inside of the Galaxy Z Fold 6, but that turned out not to be the case. Thankfully, Samsung still sells the excellent S Pen case that features a refined design and the return of the slim S Pen we loved last year.
Alongside that is the launch of a handful of new AI features for the S Pen including a way to turn your doodles and sketches into something more detailed. You can either doodle freely in a note or even make sketches and markups on photos, then tap the generate button to let Galaxy AI turn even the most rudimentary sketches into art. We have a few examples from our hands-on in the image gallery above.
Samsung has also brought over the Note Assist feature from the Galaxy S24 Ultra including note summaries, spelling correction, auto-formatting, sentence suggestions, translation, and more.
In addition to the S Pen case, Samsung is providing a bevvy of different case styles and designs to fit user needs. This includes artsy cases, ones with kickstands, leather cases, and more.
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