Galaxy Z Fold battery test shows who's king

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 features the biggest screens on a Galaxy Z Fold smartphone yet (not counting the Galaxy Z Fold SE, which was limited to just two countries) and the latest and most powerful Snapdragon processor under the hood, but it also uses the same 4,400 mAh battery as the last five Fold models.

Naturally, that’s raised concerns among prospective buyers. Many have been wondering what the battery life of the phone will be like. The answer: the same or slightly better battery life than the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and notable gains over the Galaxy Z Fold 5. That's according to an aggressive battery test performed by our friend Ben at Lover of Tech on YouTube.

The test included tasks such as 4K video recording, Instagram Live, TikTok browsing, YouTube playback, and music streaming, and the Galaxy Z Fold 7 came out on top with a total screen time of 5 hours, 36 minutes, and 31 seconds. It also maintained the coolest temperature under load, undoubtedly helped by its larger footprint, which helps with heat dissipation.

The Fold 6 clocked 5 hours, 15 minutes, and 15 seconds of screen on time, while the Fold 5 fell behind by a little over an hour. When performing the above mentioned tasks for one hour each, the Fold 7 either drained the same amount as last year's model or had a minor lead. The Fold 5 lagged behind the other two in every test, which shouldn't come as a surprise.

The takeaway? If you're upgrading from the Fold 6, you won’t see a major boost in battery endurance. But if you’re coming from an older model like the Fold 5 or Fold 4, you will notice the difference. While a bigger battery would have been nice, Samsung’s software and hardware optimizations once again prove the company can squeeze out maximum efficiency from the available battery capacity.

Watch the battery test in the video below.