Samsung – Galaxy Z Flip3 5G 128GB (Unlocked) – Phantom Black

❤6 months with my phone and i absolutely love it…money well spent
I especially love the pix camera takes❤

I have been intrigued with foldable devices since the ZTE Axon M hit the market way back in 2016. I have since used essentially every foldable to hit the market since. Each has always felt like a niche product and had plenty of issues preventing me from recommending it to a normal consumer. The Galaxy Z Flip 3 represents a shift from this, being a foldable with few flaws that I can finally recommend to certain people. Not everyone, however, due to one big flaw.
—Display—
The display on this foldable looks simply beautiful. The screen quality matches that of the Galaxy S21 series. Everything looks beautiful, and even better, smoother too thanks to the 120 Hz display. That’s right, this phone has a high refresh display. The inside screen folds smoothly without issue, and once unfolded, the crease is rarely visable, except for sometimes when it is under direct sunlight. You can still feel the crease when you run your finger over it, but with normal usage, you will rarely run your finger over it, and when you do it only a very small dip that you forget about eventually.
The cover display got a huge, useful upgrade this generation. You can view notifications from the cover screen, along with a few widgets and even Samsung Pay. You can also set custom wallpapers and animated clock faces that look very nice on the display.
I believe that this is as good as foldable displays can be until we find a way to eliminate the crease.
—Performance—
This phone comes with a Snapdragon 888, one of the most powerful chipsets on the market at the moment. It doesn’t let you down. Roaming my town playing Ingress and Pokemon Go, there was zero lag and everything was super smooth on the 120 Hz display. The 5G connectivity worked great, neither game left me waiting and everything was instant. Most impressively, even gaming in 100F weather, the phone only got lukewarm at most, even in the processor intense city gameplay of these two games. Outside of gaming, everything works great too. Split screen Internet and YouTube ran without a hitch, the screen crease diving the two apps. Pulling up Google Slides and Canvas split screen worked great. One performance thing I have noticed is that the phone does stutter on the home screen from time to time, however. I believe this can be fixed with an easy update however.
—Battery Life—
This is the one MAJOR issue I have with the phone. The battery simply does not last. At most doing basic tasks like acting as a calculator on the side in class, I have gotten at most 3.5 hours of screen on time from this. When watching videos or browsing the internet, around 3 hours. Gaming? Maybe 2 hours at most. Even on light use days I have to charge this device at least one time midday. With heavier use, I might have to charge twice a day. Even if I turn off the high refresh display and use 60Hz mode, that adds a half hour of screen time at most. I get that the folding mechanic severely limits the space for a big battery, but multiple charges a day is a serious issues I still can’t let slide on a phone I need every day. This is an issue across all the flip phone foldables, and is what is holding these phones back in my opinion. Once we get around this issue, these phones will truly be ready for mass adoption.
Overall, if you are near chargers a lot or simply need the folding flip phone now, this is by far the best option. However, you may want to look elsewhere if you need a phone that will last at least the work day.