The six top foldables you can buy

Samsung continues to dominate the foldable market in 2023 despite increased competition from the likes of Oppo, Motorola, Google and others.

Samsung’s latest edition of its flagship foldable – the Z Fold 5 – is the finest one we’ve reviewed to date, though it’s certainly a year for refinement. It’s very similar to the top-end Z Fold 4 from last year, boasting the same general design, cameras, battery life and charge speeds, but there are key improvements including a redesigned hinge that finally allows the Fold 5 to close completely with no awkward gap.

It also boasts the top-end custom Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy chipset that makes it, along with the Flip 5, the most powerful foldables around right now, making light work of high-end gaming, split-screen multitasking and just about anything else we could throw at it during testing.

As ever, there are two OLED displays here, a smaller 6.1-inch outer panel and a larger 7.6-inch internal one. While there’s minimal change in terms of hardware, Samsung has done an admirable job at convincing developers to add support for the boxy aspect ratio, with previously-missing entries like Instagram now available in all its full-screen glory. It’s a stark change to the hit-and-miss experience on offer from the Google Pixel Fold.

The 4400mAh battery remains just about enough to comfortably get through a day without scrambling for a charger, though with 25W charge speeds, it could be faster.

If you’re after a foldable that’s a little cheaper and smaller, there’s the Motorola Razr 40 Ultra or Samsung’s own Z Flip 5.

Reviewer: Lewis Painter
Full review: Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 review

If you’ve got your heart set on a clamshell-style foldable, the Motorola Razr 40 Ultra should be of serious consideration. The Razr 40 Ultra takes the clamshell experience to the next level with a large 3.6-inch pOLED exterior display with a super-smooth 144Hz refresh rate.

The display is large enough not only to run widgets like the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 but any Android app you like, allowing you to control smart home tech, reply to incoming messages and get directions from Google Maps having to unfold the display. It not only cuts down on how often you’ll have to open the phone, but the folded form factor makes it comfortable to use too.

That’s not to say that you’ll always be using the external display, especially with a tall, narrow 6.9-inch pOLED display found within. It’s super smooth at 165Hz, and boasts LTPO tech that allows it to intelligently adapt the refresh rate depending on what you’re doing. The catch is that you can’t force that top-end 165Hz refresh rate, so it’ll only be available when the phone deems it useful.

The Razr 40 Ultra’s hinge also allows for a near-gapless fold that reduces dust ingress, an improvement on the older Razr (2022), and also manages to reduce both the visibility and the tactile feel of the crease on the inner display.

The 12MP main camera may not sound that impressive on paper but paired with OIS, PDAF and a wide f/1.5 aperture, it excels both in well-lit and low-light environments. It’s still not quite on par with top-end flagships, but it’s impressive for a slimline foldable and beats the dual 12MP offering of Samsung’s Z Flip 5.

The phone is powered by the year-old Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, which may put some off, but everyday performance is solid. It does tend to overheat when playing graphics-intensive games, however.

The 3,800mAh battery is an improvement on the Razr (2022)’s 3,500mAh cell and it’s capable of lasting all day, though it won’t make it that long into the second. It’s a good thing it charges in less than an hour with 30W fast charging tech.

Reviewer: Lewis Painter
Full review: Motorola Razr 40 Ultra review

It’s finally here, Google’s first foldable phone. The Google Pixel Fold sees the big tech brand jump on the folding device bandwagon, and there is a lot to like.

Google has come close to nailing the design with its first folding phone, offering a combination of displays that makes it ideal for use in many scenarios. The 5.8-inch screen on the outside is more than large enough to accommodate regular phone use, while it opens up to reveal a 7.8-inch display that offers a more expansive canvas but without feeling awkward to navigate.

The handy choice of displays is matched by the remarkable thinness of this phone, which makes it comfortably pocketable. At just 5.3mm when unfolded, and 12.2mm folded, it’s impressively portable. It’s a tad frustrating that it doesn’t naturally fold completely flat, but that won’t really affect your day-to-day.

Aside from the exciting folding design, you get a typically strong Google Pixel experience across the board. And, that includes the camera. The main 48MP camera offers versatility, when you need a great shot at a pinch, while the 10.8MP 5x telephoto lens is easily one of the most impressive lenses on a foldable. The telephoto deftly enables crisp close-ups and refreshing accurate bokeh effects.

Reviewer: Lewis Painter
Full review: Google Pixel Fold review

If you’re in the market for a foldable with decent water resistance, your options are admittedly limited to the book-style Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 and its clamshell sibling, the Galaxy Z Flip 5, with both boasting IPX8 water resistance that should protect them from being submerged in 1m of water for up to 30 minutes.

Compared to last year’s Z Flip 4, the Z Flip 5 sports a much-improved cover display experience. It’s now larger at 3.4 inches, taking up much of the exterior panel of the foldable, and brings with it new functionality. There’s a new range of widgets designed for the display, along with support for apps, though the app support is painfully limited (only 6 are supported at the time of writing) compared to the Razr 40 Ultra, limiting just how useful it can be.

Improvements to the waterdrop hinge allow the Z Flip 5 to close completely flat for the first time, allowing it to shave a couple of millimetres from its folded form factor, making it a little more pocketable than before. It’s also absurdly powerful with the same custom Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy as the Z Fold 5 that makes it comfortably more powerful than any other clamshell on the market right now.

But while these improvements are welcome, it’s not a complete redesign. The dual 12MP sensors on the lid remain essentially unchanged for the second year in a row, and while they’re perfectly capable snappers, they’re beginning to look a little dated compared to other foldable camera setups.

Battery life could also be better, matching the Z Flip 4’s 3,700mAh cell though with a much larger exterior panel to power this time around. It could still get us through a day, but only with about 5-15% left in the tank. That’s a little too close for comfort.

Reviewer: Lewis Painter
Full review: Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 review