Samsung drops Snapdragon for the Galaxy Z Flip 7 — here’s why it makes sense

After months of speculation about the status of Samsung’s custom Exynos chip program, we finally have an answer — it’s alive and kicking inside the new Galaxy Z Flip 7. This includes customers in the US, who had previously only been treated to a modern Exynos chip in the Galaxy S24 FE.

However, this choice leaves Samsung with two different chips inside its latest flagship foldable portfolio. The Exynos 2500 is in the Z Flip 7, but Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite powers the Galaxy Z Fold 7. But what does this all mean for consumers? Is someone getting a raw deal? Let’s investigate.

While the Snapdragon 8 Elite is a well-known quantity at this point (it powers virtually every Android flagship, after all), this is the first time we’ve seen the Exynos 2500. We’ll have to wait a little longer to benchmark the chip, but we can already glean some interesting performance and feature details from Samsung’s spec table.

First, it offers a beefy CPU setup: a single powerhouse Cortex-X5 (X925), seven Cortex-A725 cores (two at 2.74GHz and five at 2.36GHz), and two smaller A520 cores for background tasks. That’s 10 cores in total, surpassing the 8 Elite’s eight cores, which should make it a dab hand at everyday multitasking scenarios.

That said, with only a single large core and lower clock speeds, we’d expect the Snapdragon 8 Elite to offer much faster single-core performance — and possibly still edge out multi-core tasks through sheer brute force. Still, Samsung’s latest chip is heftier than the last-gen Exynos 2400, which already performed well enough. Given that it’s built on a smaller 3nm GAA process than last year’s model, the chip should also sip on power.

With this in mind, it’s essential to look at the bigger picture when assessing whether the chip is the right choice. The Flip series has much less screen real estate, fewer multitasking capabilities, and a smaller battery than the power-user Z Fold 7. However, Samsung increased the Flip 7’s battery by 300mAh to 4,300mAh, now just shy of the Fold 7’s 4,400mAh capacity. Even so, opting for a potentially more frugal, possibly cooler chip over the powerful but sometimes scorching 8 Elite still makes sense for the Flip, while the Fold’s power users won’t begrudge the performance/heat/power trade-offs so much.

This is reflected in the graphics department, too. Yes, Qualcomm’s Adreno 830 is the fastest mobile GPU around, but it’s arguably overkill for most modern games and can run hot, making it more suited to larger form factors. Samsung’s Xclipse 950 GPU still supports ray tracing (now up to 28% faster) and has gone from six Work Group Processors (WGP) and four Render Back-ends (RB) to 8WGP/8RB. A ballpark guess would be roughly 20-35% faster rasterization than the previous gen, enough to keep the Flip sailing through games — even if it likely won’t catch the market leaders.

One final key difference between the two is AI capabilities. Snapdragon’s Hexagon DSP has proven to be pretty potent and helps power Galaxy AI. Even though it’s difficult to make like-for-like comparisons here, nearly all of those same features also run on last-gen chipsets. Samsung states that the Exynos 2500 is 39% faster than its predecessor at AI workloads, which is obviously a meaningful improvement for on-device tools. Ultimately, what matters to you and me is whether Samsung’s latest AI tools run on both chips, and they do.

Otherwise, the processors share many other capabilities. Networking includes 5G sub-6GHz, mmWave, and satellite, as well as Wi-Fi 7. Bluetooth 5.4 versus 6.0 is a minor difference, and there are a few others in terms of 8K video recording and camera support. But this makes no real-world difference in terms of the new foldable handset that Samsung has just put on the market.

At the time of writing, Samsung hasn’t specified exactly which chipset powers its more affordable Galaxy Z Flip 7 FE. We do know it’s an Exynos model, and it appears to be either the Exynos 2400 or 2400e, which would match the lower $899 price point, much like the mainstream Galaxy S24 FE.

If that’s the case, the phone will certainly still be powerful enough to handle daily workloads and more. That chip was, after all, flagship-tier in the S24 series, and we had few complaints about it back then. In fact, its battery life proved exceptional compared to Snapdragon. However, it’ll lack the flagship Flip 7’s more powerful gaming, AI, and multitasking capabilities and will feel even more off the pace compared to the even more powerful Fold 7.

Still, this chip worked well in the Galaxy S24 FE, and helped Samsung build a phone with flagship credentials but without the huge price tag. Exynos has helped Samsung hit the right price point to challenge the superb Moto Razr series, so trimming a bit of performance is undoubtedly worth it.

Like all clamshell foldable devices, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 7 has to meet specific design requirements to accommodate its fashionable form factor. While we’re used to the battery and capacity compromises, weighing up chipset pros and cons versus the mainstream Galaxy S flagships isn’t something consumers have had to worry about in the past. But should you worry?

While I can’t be absolutely certain until we have the phone in the lab to test, I see no reason for consumers to worry about the performance of the Flip 7. Barring unforeseen issues with its manufacturing process, it won’t be slow. While it might not benchmark quite as well as the Snapdragon 8 Elite-touting Fold 7 or S25 series, the chipset will likely marginally outperform last year’s model or thereabouts, and that’s plenty of power for this form factor.

In all honesty, the Snapdragon 8 Elite is an overkill performer. It’s great for power users, emulator lovers, and those who might be planning to use their phone as a desktop PC, but it’s more than you’ll need for typical mobile tasks. It certainly suits the Fold audience, but it’s rather hot when pushed, which isn’t great for a clamshell. Smaller foldables benefit from a slightly lower performance point that sips the phone’s battery rather than guzzling it — and the Exynos seems to fit that bill.

There’s the cost factor to consider, too. We know the Snapdragon 8 Elite is quite pricey, which probably doesn’t help the Fold 7’s astronomical $2,000 price tag. Would the Flip have cost even more than $1,099 with the 8 Elite? Perhaps, and that certainly wouldn’t have done the handset any favours, given that it already costs more than many traditional flagships. That said, consumers might rightly feel the phone should include the very best at this point, especially as there’s only a minor difference in battery capacity. In this case, the Exynos 2500 might quite reasonably feel like a drawback.

If you wanted to be cynical, Samsung needs to find a way to recover the expense of its custom silicon efforts, so it needs to get its latest Exynos model into at least one phone. While traditional flagship consumers might scream foul at different chips across the S series, there’s a reasonable dividing line between the classic glass slabs, booklet foldables, and clamshells that gives the company an out. A chip that’s “more than good enough,” even if it’s not the fastest, fits with familiar trade-offs of designs that favour fashion over function, especially if consumers struggle to tell the difference anyway.

Ultimately, unless you’re pushing the envelope with heavy emulators or trying to turn your phone into a workstation, the Exynos 2500 is set to be more than powerful enough for a stylish clamshell foldable like the Z Flip 7. It looks to strike the right balance of performance, efficiency, and cost — making it a smart pick for most people looking to live on the foldable edge without unnecessary excess.