Foldables have been around for long enough now that each new phone feels like a little bit less of an upgrade than the last. It’s a watershed moment, really.

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That may sound a tad harsh, but really, it’s a sign that there’s real viability to the whole idea of foldables. Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip 5 brings relatively few new things to the table. It’s got a much larger outside cover screen than last year’s model and a new gapless hinge, but this is by-and-large the same experience Samsung has been offering for the last few years.

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And maybe that’s fine! Starting at $1,000, this is a perfectly competent foldable phone that’s competitively priced with traditional flagships. Your mileage may vary with the actual usefulness of its foldable form factor, but the Z Flip 5 does just about everything it’s supposed to do.

Flexing on last year’s model

If you’re doing spec sheet comparison shopping between the Z Flips 4 and 5, you’d be hard-pressed to find anything meaningfully different between the two phones. Here are the Z Flip 5’s specs, with similarities to the Z Flip 4 specifically noted:

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6.7-inch AMOLED inner display with 120Hz refresh rate (same as Z Flip 4)

3.4-inch cover display with 60Hz refresh rate

8GB RAM (same as Z Flip 4)

256GB or 512GB storage (same as Z Flip 4, minus a 128GB option)

Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor

3,700mAh battery (same as Z Flip 4)

Once you’ve unfolded the Z Flip 5 into all of its big-screen glory, the experience is the same as it’s always been. The big difference, as previously noted, is the addition of a much bigger “Flex Window” cover display. Z Flip 4’s cover display was only a 1.9-inch sliver of screen that could display basic notifications and some widgets (as well as act as a rudimentary photo preview window), but it was meant more for glancing at than actually using.

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Not so with the new Flex Window. It’s obviously not as large as a regular smartphone display, but it’s big, bright, and vibrant enough to be genuinely useful. For instance, you can actually respond to text notifications using a full keyboard. There are also a bunch of native widgets like a weather forecast, a calendar, and a step counter, and you can either swipe between them or see them all at a glance by pinching and zooming out.

Of course, it’s also a better photo viewfinder by virtue of its bigger size, as well. Samsung has also included a good amount of theme, wallpaper, and color customization options to keep people who really care about their phone aesthetics happy. Why customize one screen when you can customize two?

The Flex Window is the biggest physical change to the Z Flip 5 and helps the phone round into a form factor that it can probably keep for years to come. Another change that could facilitate that is a new hinge that lets the device close completely shut, without leaving a gap where dust can settle in.

That’s a change so small as to barely be noticeable, but it’s nice. It just looks better. Speaking of looks, the Z Flip 5 is available in four colors: Mint, Lavender, Cream, and Graphite.

One final bonus to note is that Samsung axed the 128GB storage option without raising the price of the Z Flip 5. The starter model now has twice the storage capacity as it did last year. Again, not really a mindblowing new feature, but something that’s worth appreciating.

Unfortunately, I’m personally still not entirely convinced by the Z Flip 5’s form factor when it comes to practical utility.

Being able to fold up the phone and focus on something else for a while (without losing access to important information thanks to the Flex Window) is great! That’s just about the only thing I really like about the foldable aspect of the Z Flip 5, though. Nothing else about it is offensive or broken, mind you, they just aren’t selling points, to me.

For example, you can still multitask by dragging an app icon from a taskbar on the right side of the screen to the top or bottom while you already have an app open. This is a theoretical value add, but I never found myself using it. On paper, being able to open Twitter (I’m still calling it that, sorry) and YouTube at the same time is great. In practice, it means you can only read one tweet at a time while watching a tiny version of a video.

I feel similarly about “Flex Mode,” which is Samsung’s name for the thing where you angle the screen at roughly 90 degrees and set it on a flat surface for hands-free use. This is perfect for taking group photos or otherwise stabilizing shots without a tripod, but other supposed uses for it are less impressive. Trying to watch YouTube videos with the video on the top half and player controls on the bottom half just means you’re watching a widescreen video being shrunken down to fit into the top half of the phone’s roughly square shape. It’s not a great way to watch things.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5's modest upgrades get the job done