Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3 vs Z Fold 2 with Camera Test Comparison By Danny Winget

What's up everybody. This is Danny, and today we're going to compare the brand new Samsung Galaxy z, full 3 versus the older galaxy z4 2. I've been using the zfo2 since launch, so I've been using this for about a year, and I've been using the galaxy z43 now for a couple of days. So I want to go over all the things that make an actual real world difference, and we'll also do a camera comparison to let you know if it's any different. So by the end of this video, you will know if you need to upgrade or if you're good, to stick with your galaxy c42 another year, even though there is an updated design, I'm going to keep it 100 real after using the zfo2 for a couple of days. It feels pretty much the same as the z-fold 2.

, which is not a bad thing, because the z-fold 2 has incredible build quality. So it's no different here. The new phone is slightly thinner, and you can see that when you lay them next to each other, the hinge is refined and smaller, and it's 11 grams lighter, but in the hand, it's nowhere near as drastic as it is, with the z flip to the z, z-flip 3. That one just feels totally different to me with the squared off design, but regardless it feels premium and well-built the side-mounted. Fingerprint scanner still works great, so I have no complaints there, but where I feel the major difference lies is in the displays, especially the smaller cover display.

First, it's 120 hertz, so it feels significantly smoother and faster and believe it or not. This cover screen is really useful, and I do use it a lot. So I'm glad that Samsung upgraded this with a faster refresh rate. Second, is the brightness difference, even with the faster refresh rate I found the cover display to be brighter even in the summer heat. So that's something that you're going to notice, and that is the same with the bigger internal display too.

I noticed that it's slightly brighter, so a lot of people will be happy with this. You do get the same. Size displays on both phones, the cover display and the main 7.6 inch display is the same resolution with this same fast, 120hz refresh rate, so they both look fantastic. The difference here is the under display front-facing camera on the new z-fold 3. It is less noticeable than the punch hole camera on the z-fold 2, and I believe this is the first Samsung phone with this tech, but you can still see it.

Do you see the dots there so overall, I do like this design choice better, because it makes the experience a little better, but it does have an effect on image? Quality and I'll show you that later on in this video, but the good thing is you don't have to worry, because you still have that front-facing camera on the cover display. So I would definitely use this if you're going to take selfies. A huge thing for me is the durability improvements. The new z43 does have tougher gorilla, glass, Vitus and new armor aluminum to make things more durable. All around, but what has me excited is that the z-fold 3 is ipx8 water resistant.

Let me repeat that if you drop this foldable in water, it will survive. That is freaking awesome from what Samsung said water can enter the hinge area, there's nothing. They can do to stop that, but all the components on the inside are membrane sealed, so they won't get damaged. I believe this is the world's first. So this is a big reason for you to upgrade from the z-fold 2, because if you drop your z-fold 2 in water, you're not going to be very happy, another durability upgrade is the screen protector.

It is 80 tougher and that's great for durability, but the best part of this means finally get s. Pen support on the full three. This is something that we've all been asking for and Samsung delivered. This is great. There are two different pins one that is specifically made for the z fold, three called the s pen fold edition without Bluetooth, and this can sit right inside a case.

So I feel like this changes the game for the full series. There is an auto retractable tip on these versions, so it compensates for the pressure that you put on the screen, and it still feels responsive for me. This really justifies having that large display and there is an s pen pro as well, that will work across multiple Samsung devices, and this one has Bluetooth it's a little larger as well, but you still have that auto-retractable tip if you're already a z-fold 2 owners, and you love that device. The s-pen might be the reason why you upgrade to the z-fold 3. , but you do need to know that the s-pen only works on the bigger internal display and does not work on the outside cover display.

I've never had a problem with the galaxy z4 2's performance with this snapdragon 865 plus processor and naturally the z-fold 3, has Qualcomm's newer, snapdragon 888 with 12 gigabytes of ram. So it should be a little snappier, but when it comes to everyday usage, I wouldn't worry about it. Both of these phones are going to perform very well. I haven't had the zfo3 long enough to quite make a call on battery life just yet, but even with this slightly smaller battery, it seems to be on par with the z, full 2's battery life. So that's good news.

No real differences in fast charging speeds. They both can wirelessly charge as well and they both have reverse wireless charging. So you can charge your devices on the go which I think is really handy. Both of these phones are 5g capable, so you're ready for the fastest speeds available out there, but you can really see where the millimeter wave cutout is on the new z-fold 3 right here on the side. The thing I think I like the most is the price cut, so it's 200 less this year, starting at 17.99 for the 256 gigabyte storage model and there's also a 512 gigabyte one available as well, and if you hurry up in pre-order, then you can pretty much get that storage upgrade for free. So I'm going to leave a link down below.

So you can go ahead and check that out. The new colors look sweet here with phantom green phantom, black and phantom silver to choose from and there's also a tom brown edition which I'm a fan of, and you can see. I have the z-fold two in the tom brown edition and I went for it again this year, so make sure you stay tuned for that unboxing, it's going to be special. So, let's jump into the cameras, I'm not going to lie. I was a little disappointed when there was no hardware upgrade for the triple camera system.

This is the same 12 megapixel camera system that is on the zfo2. So even though that the housing looks different, the hardware is the same, but I was curious because the new phone 3 has the snapdragon 888 with a better ISP. So with that plus software improvements wouldn't make an actual difference to image quality. So I went out shot about 150 pictures, put them side by side and here's what I came up with on the results. First, if you're, taking selfies at all, don't use the under display camera on the main display use the one on the cover display, because the quality is much better.

If you think about it like this, it makes things a lot easier. The under display camera is pretty much made as a webcam, so use that for video conferencing, things like that, but if you're going to take selfies or record video with the front facing camera, always use the one on the cover display. Remember those dots that we saw on that front-facing camera earlier, I'm assuming that's. What's making the light pattern happen in bright sunlight. I just wanted to test that out, but the good thing is that you have the cover display front facing camera, so definitely use that, like I said, video isn't as drastic, but it also takes a hit.

Take a look at this sample alright. So this is the front facing video and on the newer galaxy z43, you can see that it's limited to full HD, and you can shoot 4k on the older z-fold too. So that's kind of weird, but you can see that the quality is much better on the older phone. When it comes to daytime pictures, as you would have guessed, there isn't a huge amount of difference. I find the scene optimizer to vary between devices, so I decided to turn it off in my testing, but they definitely go back and forth when it comes to exposure and brightness of the overall picture.

Sometimes the z-fold 2 creates the brighter picture overall, which I was surprised by, but then there are outcomes like this portrait shot of my wife. That just looks so much better on the new zfo3. So there are definitely some software tweaks implemented here. I want to reiterate that this is not in every shot, but the contrast differences are noticeable in certain scenarios. There are instances where the highlights and overall image balance is carried over from the flagship Samsung phones, like the galaxy s21 ultra, which I'm happy to see even in mixed lighting like this, the overall dynamic range and balance is better on the newer phone.

I am seeing this on the main camera shots, but also tested out the 2x to see if that's any different, and even though the differences aren't major, I can see them. I took a ton of pictures and I did notice a slight white balance variation as well between the two, but you really need to be nitpicking to see the difference, and if you didn't have these images side by side, you probably wouldn't even notice. Furthermore, I think the potential of the software is shown best in this shot. Just take a look at the clouds on the z-fold ii, there's clipping everywhere, where it's better controlled on the z-fold 3 and the 2x shows the same improvements with better contrast and if you punch into the 2x image, the picture looks less noisy on the new phone. So that's promising.

I saw a lot of shots where the detail is better on the new phone as well also with mixed lighting, even with the ultra-wide. I am seeing some slight dynamic range improvements as well. The HDR is still pretty aggressive on both, but look at the windows up here. There's less smearing and the super bright background is exposed better, but this is where things get complicated, because software is software and there are times when the zfo2 does, the exact opposite and outshouts the z-fold 3. Some shots just have better exposure and overall balance, some are also just sharper with more detail.

But the reason I showed you both sides of the spectrum is this: if you're happy with your z-fold 2's camera already, I wouldn't worry about upgrading just because of the camera because many of the shots I took side by side. It was hard to tell the difference and I think that most average consumers wouldn't be able to tell the difference right away, but the flip side of this coin is you know that Samsung is going to keep pushing software updates to these phones and the snapdragon 888 ISP is powerful, and naturally they have more power to work with there. So if I had to bet on camera quality over time, I would bet on the zfo3. Processing also seems to be different. Here too, it seems like Samsung could be dialing back on the over sharpening when you punch into the shot.

Look at the text, the z-fold threes look so much smoother. So I do like this a lot. I noticed this too in low-light shots, and this might be a mixed back for some people sharpness a lot of times helps with details. So a lot of people might prefer the z-fold 2 here. But if you look at the nightmare shot, I prefer the processing on the z-fold 3.

The software improvements also make it over to low-light images, but again don't use the under display camera. The image is just worse at night again. Here's an example just use that cover display front-facing camera, and you should be just fine trust me on this. The z-fold threes looks a little brighter, but I actually prefer the more natural approach on the z-fold 2 on this one. After looking at some images, I did notice that there is more aggressive noise reduction that is happening on the fold 3, and this can make things look softer, even though that the noise is better.

So I'm sure that we'll see improvements with software updates, since this is still early software, but let me show you what software can do with the same hardware. The images look very similar here, but punch in, and you can see where the bump in noise reduction works on the z-fold 3's favor. Here I, like it better portrait mode seems to be a little sharper too. Look at the logo in front of the golf cart. Here's a shot without night mode in a really dark area.

Initially the z-fold twos looks better, but even with a one. Second shorter exposure, the z-fold, three's night mode looks brighter and more detailed. Here is again another example. Even without night mode, the z-fold 3 hits better look at the trees here and if you punch in you can see it even better, then, when night mode kicks in, you just get better contrast and white balance overall and then, if you punch in again, you can see what the fold three is capable of. So I hope Samsung keeps pushing the software for the best experience.

I didn't see a huge difference with 99 percent of the shots when it comes to reflections since gorilla glass DX is covering the cameras, but on this picture I did see a difference with the reflections, so that could be a real thing. I can keep showing you improvements with the z-fold threes processing like this one, but you can really tell that this is software, because when the improvements don't calculate, then you get the z-fold 2 flipping the situation where it outperforms the z-fold 3. So I did find the results to be somewhat inconsistent, sometimes, but the majority of the time the full 3 did better. So as software updates roll out I'll keep you updated. But I wanted to include this early camera comparison, because I wanted to show you that image quality can be improved with the same hardware, not to justify Samsung's position on not changing the camera system, but software and processing play a huge part in image quality.

So, upgrading to the fold three, you may see a bump up in photo quality but, as I said during the daytime comparison, if you're happy with your z-fold 2, then stick with it. But I did see some slight improvements in 4k video. Take a look at that tree. It is more detailed. Both don't do the best with exposure of these bright lights, so I wouldn't consider either of these phones low light beast when it comes to video.

But if you look at the faux 3, it does have more saturation and added color, so you can really see that in the foliage. So let me know if you like that or not when you consider all the little things. I think this is a very solid upgrade from the Galaxy Z, full 2. The good thing is that the z-fold 2 is already so good that if you don't care about the 120 hertz cover display the water resistance, the faster processor, the new colors and the s-pen support, you're, probably good to keep your z-fold 2 another year. For me, I'm jumping in I'm going to upgrade.

I feel like all of these minor improvements put together, make it feel like a new device. It's fresh enough for me, so I will be upgrading, especially with that price cut. Let me know how you feel about the galaxy z43 and if it's enough for you to upgrade or actually jump into a foldable, it is about the super storm out here. So I'm going to sign out hit that like button. If you enjoyed this subscribes to the channel for a lot more videos on the Galaxy Z, flip 3 and on the Galaxy Z, full 3- and I will see you guys in the next one.

Source : Danny Winget