Samsung has just announced its much-awaited Galaxy Z Fold Special Edition in its home market of South Korea, and it brings several advancements that users have wanted from a Samsung foldable for many years now.
It has several upgrades and changes over the standard Galaxy Z Fold 6.
- The main rear camera received a much-needed upgrade: it is now the same 200 MP main sensor as on the Galaxy S24 Ultra, with a f/1.8 lens and a 24 mm focal length, complete with OIS. The other cameras remain the same as the standard Z Fold 6 (10 MP 3x telephoto, 12 MP Ultrawide, 10 MP cover display selfie camera, and 4 MP inner display selfie camera)
- The chassis of the phone has been completely redesigned, with the thickness measuring 4.9 millimeters when unfolded and 10.6 millimeters when folded completely, which is drastically thinner than the standard Galaxy Z Fold 6’s 12.1-millimeter thickness when folded.
- The display aspect ratio is now much more practical. Gone is the tall and involved 22:9 6.3-inch cover display since the Special Edition has a 6.5-inch cover display with a wider 21:9 aspect ratio. The inner display size has also grown to 8 inches on the new Special Edition.
- The Z Fold Special Edition weighs 236 grams, which is slightly lighter than the Z Fold 6, which weighs 239 grams.
However, the battery/charging combination remains the same as the Z Fold 6: 4400 mAh battery with 25W wired charging and 15W wireless charging support.
It is available in a single 16 GB RAM and 512 GB storage configuration and is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy chipset. It only has one color option: Shadow Black.
The phone boots One UI 6.1.1 with Android 14 out-of-the-box, and the company promises 7 major OS updates and 7 years of security patches. Since One UI 7.0 is currently in development and is not ready for rollout yet, the update is expected to be made available at a later date.
Sadly, there is one major drawback. To achieve the thinness and the lower weight of the Z Fold Special Edition, Samsung had to remove the digitizer layer on the display, which was responsible for S Pen support. Hence, the S Pen is not supported on this Special Edition device.
Also, the inner display now has a standard punch-hole selfie camera (4 MP sensor) and not an under-display unit. I guess these compromises were made to achieve the other benefits.
It is priced at KRW 2,789,600, which converts to $2,028/โฌ1,868, and the device is sadly expected to remain exclusive to China and South Korea, with no plans for a further global launch.
I honestly feel that this device is the result of direct competition from Huawei’s foldables in China, especially the new Mate XT tri-foldable and the older Mate X5, which has since made Huawei the best-selling foldable brand globally by surpassing Samsung.
Since Huawei’s foldables are known for their thinness and lightness while packing great hardware, it is very clear that Samsung is trying to imitate the same formula with the Z Fold Special Edition to try and pull some sales.
However, the Special Edition could’ve easily been the standard Z Fold 6. While the company may not generally prefer losing S Pen support for the thinner chassis, it could’ve easily given the wider cover display and the better 200 MP main camera to the standard edition available globally.
And what’s even better is that Samsung managed to keep the phone slimmer and lighter while keeping the same durable hinge as the Z Fold 6: the Special Edition is also IP48 rated, just like the standard edition.
However, it is what it is, and unfortunately, we will never see a wide release for this phone. Samsung fans might have to wait one more year to hopefully see some of these advancements on next year’s Galaxy Z Fold 7.