The folding smartphone market is steadily growing, and it's not a stretch to say that it's in big part thanks to Samsung. The Korean giant has consistently released its Galaxy Z Fold and Galaxy Z Flip series year after year, adding features and improvements each time around. Marketing them strongly throughout the world too! And soon we expect the new editions - the book-like Galaxy Z Fold 4, and the smaller, vertically-folding, clamshell Galaxy Z Flip 4.

The Z Fold 4 follows the tradition of its predecessors of being a tall candybar-shaped phone that unfolds into what is essentially a tablet. It's definitely great for professionals and Android power users, who really want to get into using their phone for more than just phone tasks. But as a tablet, and maybe even a computer! More screen means more apps at a time, or a better video watching experience. The Galaxy Z Flip 4 on the other hand is a small square-ish sandwich that unfolds into a regular-sized smartphone. It doesn't get bigger than usual, it gets smaller. Thanks to that, it's become quite the trendy phone to showcase on Instagram and the likes. Unlike the Z Fold 4, the Z Flip 4 seems to be in tune with more demographics than just the pro or power users.

So, which one should you get? How do Samsung's next foldables fare against each other? Let's have an early comparison of the two and find out together.

Design and Display Quality

Let's start with the Galaxy Z Fold 4. The reason we called it "book-like" is because it unfolds exactly like a book. An unconfirmed rumor has suggested that it's going to have an S Pen stylus slot, and the stylus would be included, but even if that's not the case, we know it'll still be supported. So again - it's a phone for the power users, and Samsung knows it. Samsung has also been working on a dual-sided fingerprint scanner, so we might be getting one on the external display and one on the inner, folding one. Alternatively, it could still just get one traditional fingerprint scanner for unlocking, embedded into the power key.

Speaking of its displays, while we don't know what the Galaxy Z Fold 4's AMOLED external and internal screens will be like in terms of size, as changes since the last generation have been rumored, we can cover the basics. We get one glass-covered external screen, for using the phone when folded, plus an internal, big, folding screen. What we also do know is that the latter could be covered by "Super Ultra Thin Glass", meaning it should feel pretty close to regular glass, if we're being optimistic. The rest of the build is metal frames and a glass back, most likely. Now onto the Galaxy Z Flip 4. It's a clamshell phone, reminiscent of the good old clamshell days, except this is the modern version - with a large display capable of folding, and of course, no QWERTY keyboard or anything like that. It too features a smaller external display, supposedly near 2 inches in size, for accessing things like notifications and checking the time, or answering calls, without unfolding it. The foldable inner display is expected to be a 6.7-inch Full HD+ Dynamic AMOLED one with LTPO variable refresh rate technology.

And for the Z Flip 4, we actually have a reliable leak of its potential available color options - those would be gold, gray, light blue and light violet. And its built is also metal for the frames, glass everywhere else.

Camera

If we're to believe the rumors, the Galaxy Z Fold 4 will adopt the excellent camera system of the Galaxy S22 Ultra flagship. We currently expect a 108 MP main camera, plus a 12MP telephoto with 3x zoom. As for the selfie cameras, those would either be in cutouts again, one under each display, or optimistically, they'd be hidden under-display cameras. We'll find out soon enough.

The Galaxy Z Flip 4 has been rumored to pack a triple-camera system, but not exactly by reputable sources. For now, our best bet is to expect a 12MP wide and a 12MP ultra-wide cameras, plus either a cutout or an under-display selfie camera.

Battery Life and Charging

We're yet to know for sure what the Z Fold 4's battery size would be like, but around 4,400 mAh like its predecessor is a safe bet. In terms of charging speeds, we're still short on leaks and rumors, but we can expect something close to its predecessor - up to 25W fast charging (hopefully higher, though), and up to 11W fast wireless charging. As for the Z Flip 4, we actually have numbers we can count on - 3,595 mAh, as revealed by a recent certification. Even better, reliable leaker Ice Universe had previously said that it'll have a 3,700 mAh battery, which is close enough to the first rumor, that we have a rough estimate. The Z Flip 4 has also been rumored to come with 25W fast charging, and possibly 15W fast wireless charging.