Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 battery size could be its Achilles heel

With Samsung’s first set of 2022 flagships now well out of the door, all eyes are on its upcoming foldable phones. The Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Z Flip 4 are expected to appear at the company’s next big launch event sometime in August. Tidbits about the phones have been trickling in from the rumor mill, and now we have some more information to share about Samsung’s next clamshell, courtesy of folks over at GalaxyClub.

According to the publication, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 may not make great strides in the battery department. Its predecessor, the Galaxy Z Flip 3, housed a battery with a 3,200mAh rated capacity that Samsung advertised as 3,300mAh typical capacity.

The Z Flip 4 reportedly features a sub-battery with a 2,400mAh rated capacity and a main battery with a 903mAh rated capacity. That brings the total rated battery capacity to 3,300mAh. This means that the typical battery capacity that Samsung could promise on the Z Flip 4 would be around 3,400mAh — a tiny 100mAh upgrade.

In our review of the Galaxy Z Flip 3, we noted that the battery was the Achilles heel of the phone. The device could barely push through a day with light usage. Screen-on time with the display set to 120Hz adaptive mode was just over four hours, whereas it should have been a minimum of six hours as expected from modern flagships that cost the same.

That said, a new chipset might make the Galaxy Z Flip 4 more power-efficient. The device is expected to carry the rumored Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Plus, which should be a speedier version of the existing Gen 1 SoC. The 2022 processor might prolong the battery life of Samsung’s new foldable a bit more compared to the Snapdragon 888 on the Z Flip 3.

Meanwhile, the upcoming Galaxy Z Fold 4 is also not expected to bring significant battery improvements. Previous leaks suggest the phone will pack the same 4,270mAh capacity as the existing Galaxy Z Fold 3.