A day in Paris with the Galaxy Z Flip 6: camera, AI and battery in everyday use

I got to test the new Galaxy Z Flip 6 in Paris. Samsung invited me on a press trip to be there live at the Olympic Games and test the Z Flip 6 extensively. According to me, Samsung still had no influence on this hands-on review. Here I show how the foldable smartphone held up in everyday life in Paris, especially in terms of camera, AI features and battery.

Design and cover display

The design has practically not changed compared to the Z Flip 5. The frame is about half a millimeter flatter and looks a bit more angular, which I do not mind. The 3.4-inch Super AMOLED front display is visually appealing and functional: you access notifications and widgets and use it as a preview for the main camera.

Camera: selfies with the main camera

With one tap you bring the preview onto the front display and use the 50 megapixels of the main camera instead of the 10 megapixels of the front camera on the inner display. The quality is considerably better, and that was the highlight in Paris. You can set the device up, and then it is a built-in stand. You can also trigger the camera remotely with a hand gesture. On top of that there is an autofocus that recognizes the entire scene, so the landmark and you are centered in the picture. You can simply travel alone and still take great pictures.

The automatic AI editing is crazy: a photo of the Eiffel Tower, shot just from the hip, was edited in terms of light and contrast as if it had been taken with a professional camera. With the Object Eraser I removed the people from the photo. It is not perfectly clean, but your eye rests on the Eiffel Tower, and I find it enormous that it works at all.

Zoom: The Z Flip 6 has a 50-megapixel main camera and a 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera, which can produce really good shots. There is no telephoto lens, and you can only zoom 5x with the main camera. The shots do not knock my socks off, and the AI editing makes only a small difference when zooming. It cannot be compared to the Google Pixel 8 or 8 Pro. If you want the best zoom camera right now, you have to go for the Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Food and night: The camera captures food in an Instagrammable way, and thanks to AI no manual editing is needed. Shots in poor light or at night are also edited automatically with AI support, with a good result and little noise.

Portrait Studio: A selfie can be turned into a drawing or a cartoon using AI. I always wanted to be a Disney character.

AI features

• Interpreter: Very handy abroad. My school French is rusty. You activate the Interpreter via the notification panel. I tested it at lunch with the professional breakdancer Jilou from Team Galaxy. The translations are still faulty here and there, but for asking for directions or ordering in a restaurant it is enormously helpful. I would not use it for an important negotiation. I assume it gets better with every update.
• Circle to Search: I have been using it constantly since the beginning of the year with the S24 Ultra. I circle what is on the screen and get Google information without typing. In Paris it was extremely useful: hold the camera up to a building, press and hold the bottom edge of the screen, circle it, and the results appear.

Battery and processor

For three days we were out and about all day every day: lots of filming and photography, Google Maps, testing AI features and sending footage via Quick Share. I am glad the battery got a bit larger at 4,000 mAh. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy is more powerful and more energy efficient. In combination, the battery lasts a little more than a day. On a mobile network it can be a little less. With my constant use in Paris, it was time to charge at 10 p.m., which is fine, because not even I use my smartphone that intensively in everyday life.

Verdict: who is the Z Flip 6 for?

The Z Flip 6 is a nice overall package. The videos are nice and sharp, typical for Samsung, and of above-average quality. But the camera is not comparable to the S24 Ultra, Pixel 8 Pro or Xiaomi 14 Ultra, which have more cameras and significantly more features. That is not the aim either: the unique selling points are the handiness and the coolness factor of a flip phone, plus high-quality build, great AI features, the best processor currently on the market, and solid battery performance. When traveling, the camera with the zoom and triggering by hand gesture are incredibly practical.

An upgrade from the Z Flip 5 may not necessarily make sense, unless you want the larger battery and the better 50-megapixel main camera. If you have a Z Flip 4, you also get the big cover display, and then it is definitely worth it.