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Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 Audio test

OTHER AVAILABLE TESTS FOR THIS DEVICE

We put the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 through our rigorous DXOMARK Audio test suite to measure its performance both at recording sound using its built-in microphones, and at playing audio back through its speakers. In this review, we will break down how it fared in a variety of tests and several common use cases.

Overview


Key audio specifications include:

  • Two speakers (Top left side, bottom left side)
  • No Jack audio output
  • Dolby Atmos technology

Scoring

Sub-scores and attributes included in the calculations of the global score.


Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4
134
audio
134
playback
130

158

132

149

141

162

123

162

106

157

133
recording
143

147

125

146

101

157

113

170

129

145

151

166

Playback

Pros

  • Good tonal balance
  • Good dynamics

Cons

  • Disappointing spatial performance
  • Inconsistent volume steps

Recording

Pros

  • Excellent recording quality at loud concerts
  • Very good recording quality with main camera
  • Decent side rejection with audio zoom feature

Cons

  • Inconsistency across use cases, subpar performance when recording front camera video or with memo app
  • Ineffective wind noise reduction

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 achieves a DXOMARK Audio score of 134, making it a great pick for audio-centric smartphone users. It’s especially great for recording loud music and an improvement over previous Galaxy devices in terms of playback quality. However, given the phone’s large dimensions in its unfolded state, our testers expected even better results from the Samsung.

In playback, it does best for listening to music, but it also a good option for watching movies and gaming, offering a good tonal balance and dynamics across all use cases. On the downside, individual sound sources are not easy to locate in the scene, and the volume steps are inconsistent.

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 is also a very good recording device. In fact, it is one of the best to date for recording concerts and loud music with the main camera. Main camera audio performance is very good in general, and the audio zoom feature does well at rejecting sound sources located to the sides. However, performance is somewhat inconsistent across use cases, with front camera and memo app recordings achieving considerably worse results. Wind noise reduction is pretty ineffective as well.

Test summary

About DXOMARK Audio tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone audio reviews, DXOMARK engineers perform a variety of objective tests and undertake more than 20 hours of perceptual evaluation under controlled lab conditions.
(For more details about our Playback protocol, click here; for more details about our Recording protocol, click here.)

The following section gathers key elements of our exhaustive tests and analyses performed in DXOMARK laboratories. Detailed performance evaluations under the form of reports are available upon request. Do not hesitate to contact us.

Playback

134

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

163

Black Shark 5 Pro
How Audio Playback score is composed

DXOMARK engineers test playback through the smartphone speakers, whose performance is evaluated in our labs and in real-life conditions, using default apps and settings.

Listen to the tested smartphone’s playback performance in this comparison with some of its competitors:

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4
Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max
Xiaomi 12S Ultra
Recordings of the smartphones playing some of our music tracks at 60 LAeq in an anechoic environment by 2 microphones in A-B configuration, at 30 cm
Here is how the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 performs in playback use cases compared to its competitors:
Playback use-cases scores

In playback, the Z Fold4 delivers good timbre, with sonority that is similar to more conventional Galaxy phones, such as the S22 Ultra. The device offers a good tonal balance, with satisfying treble rendition, solid midrange, and decent bass. This said, some more depth in low-end extension would not hurt. The Samsung also does well for dynamics, thanks to a sharp attack, decent bass precision, and very good punch.

Results for the spatial attribute are pretty good, but there is some room for improvement. Wideness is good in landscape orientation, but considering the phone’s fairly large dimensions it could be wider still. Unfortunately, with the device unfolded and held in portrait orientation, only mono sound is available. Given the Z Fold4 design, this seems like a lost opportunity. Localizability in general isn’t great, with individual instruments sounding blurry in the scene. This said, distance and depth rendition are both pretty good.

The Z Fold4 achieves a good maximum volume level and is perceptually louder than other Samsung Galaxy models. Minimum volume is intelligible but not too loud. However, the distribution of volume steps is somewhat inconsistent. Like with most Samsung Galaxy phones, audio artifacts are pretty much a non-issue, but speakers are very easily occluded while the phone is held unfolded. Both speakers are located where you would usually place your palms.

Listen to the tested smartphone’s playback performance in this comparison with some of its competitors:

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4
Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max
Xiaomi 12S Ultra
Recordings of the smartphones playing some of our music tracks at 60 LAeq in an anechoic environment by 2 microphones in A-B configuration, at 30 cm
Here is how the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 performs in playback use cases compared to its competitors:
Playback use-cases scores

Timbre

130

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

158

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Timbre score represents how well a phone reproduces sound across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, midrange, treble, tonal balance, and volume dependency. It is the most important attribute for playback.

Music playback frequency response
A 1/12 octave frequency response graph, which measures the volume of each frequency emitted by the smartphone when playing a pure-sine wave in an anechoic environment.

Dynamics

132

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

149

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Dynamics score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, for example how precisely a bass note is reproduced or the impact sound from drums.


Spatial

141

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

162

Black Shark 5 Pro

The sub-attributes for spatial tests include pinpointing a specific sound's location, its positional balance, distance, and wideness.


Volume

123

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

162

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Volume score represents the overall loudness of a smartphone and how smoothly volume increases and decreases based on user input.

Here are a few sound pressure levels (SPL) measured when playing our sample recordings of hip-hop and classical music at maximum volume:
Hip-Hop Classical
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 71.1 dBA 67.3 dBA
Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max 74 dBA 71.1 dBA
Xiaomi 12S Ultra 72.6 dBA 69 dBA
The following graph shows the gradual changes in volume going from minimum to maximum. We expect these changes to be consistent across the range, so that all volume steps correspond to users’ expectations:
Music volume consistency
This line graph shows the relative loudness of playback relative to the user selected volume step, measured at different volume steps with a correlated pink noise in an anechoic box recorded in axis at 0.20 meter.

Artifacts

106

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

157

Asus ROG Phone 5

The Artifacts score measures the extent to which the sound is affected by various types of distortion. The higher the score, the less the disturbances in the sound are noticeable. Distortion can occur because of sound processing in the device and because of the quality of the speakers.

Playback Total Harmonic Distortion (Maximum Volume)
This graph shows the Total Harmonic Distortion and Noise over the hearable frequency range.
It represents the distortion and noise of the device playing our test signal (0 dB Fs, Sweep Sine in an anechoic box at 40 cm) at the device's maximum volume.

Recording

133

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

157

Black Shark 5 Pro
How Audio Recording score is composed

DXOMARK engineers test recording by evaluating the recorded files on reference audio equipment. Those recordings are done in our labs and in real-life conditions, using default apps and settings.

The Z Fold4 does well for recording and is especially recommendable for recording loud music with the main camera, where it delivers an excellent natural tonal balance, with very satisfying treble and good midrange as well as a clean and powerful low end. Unfortunately, timbre performance drops slightly when recording with the front camera or memo apps.

In a similar way, dynamics are good but somewhat inconsistent across use cases. Attack is sharp when using the main camera but less so when recording with other apps. Overall dynamics performance is excellent for recording loud music, with a very accurate envelope and impactful attacks.

Despite the device’s large dimensions, maximum volume is similar to, or even slightly lower, than other Samsung devices, and overall Volume performance is average. The same is true for recording artifacts. In addition to the usual moderate distortion and compression when recording loud content, speech appears to be slightly impaired by overzealous noise reduction. The device is immune to microphone occlusions when unfolded, but finger noises can be noticeable, especially in the folded state and when held in portrait orientation.

Wind noise reduction leaves room for improvement. Voices are hard to understand with a strong wind, especially with front camera video and when recording in the memo app. The main camera does better in this respect.

Here is how the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 performs in recording use cases compared to its competitors:

Recording use-cases scores

Timbre

143

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

147

Honor Magic3 Pro+

The Timbre score represents how well a phone captures sounds across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, midrange, treble, and tonal balance. It is the most important attribute for recording.

Life video frequency response
A 1/12 octave frequency response graph, which measures the volume of each frequency captured by the smartphone when recording a pure-sine wave in an anechoic environment.

Dynamics

125

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

146

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Dynamics score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, for example how precisely a voice's plosives (the p's, t's and k's, for example) are reproduced. The score also considers the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR), for example how loud the main voice is compared to the background noise.


Spatial

101

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

157

Asus ROG Phone 5

The sub-attributes for spatial tests include pinpointing a specific sound's location, its positional balance, distance, and wideness on the recorded audio files.

Recording directivity
Directivity graph of the smartphone when recording test signals using the camera app, with the main camera. It represents the acoustic energy (in dB) over the angle of incidence of the sound source. (Normalized to the angle 0°, in front of the device.)

Volume

113

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

170

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Volume score represents how loud audio is normalized on the recorded files and the how the device handles loud environments, such as electronic concerts, when recording.

Here are the sound levels recorded in the audio and video files, measured in LUFS (Loudness Unit Full Scale); as a reference, we expect loudness levels to be above -24 LUFS for recorded content:
Meeting Life Video Selfie Video Memo
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 -25.8 LUFS -21.6 LUFS -22.7 LUFS -21 LUFS
Apple iPhone 14 Pro Max -26 LUFS -22.9 LUFS -19.2 LUFS -19.6 LUFS
Xiaomi 12S Ultra -28.3 LUFS -20.8 LUFS -19.1 LUFS -20.4 LUFS

Artifacts

129

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

145

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Artifacts score measures the extent to which the recorded sounds are affected by various types of distortions. The higher the score, the less the disturbances in the sound are noticeable. Distortions can occur because of sound processing in the device and the quality of the microphones, as well as user handling, such as how the phone is held.

In this audio comparison, you can listen to the way this smartphone handles wind noise relative to its competitors:

Recordings of a voice sample with light background noise, facing a turbulent wind of 5 m/s

Background

151

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4

166

Black Shark 5 Pro

Background evaluates how natural the various sounds around a voice blend into the video recording file. For example, when recording a speech at an event, the background should not interfere with the main voice, yet it should provide some context of the surroundings.

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