Over the years, one of my biggest complaints about foldable phones has been that while many of these have all of the bells and whistles, they usually fall short in the camera department. When you spend between $1,500 and $2,000+ on a phone, you would expect it to feature the best hardware across the board, but that simply hasn’t been the case.
Even with how drastic an overhaul the Pixel 9 Pro Fold received last year, it still didn’t offer the same camera features as the Pixel 9 Pro. Sadly, this is also the case with the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, as the camera hardware is practically identical to its predecessor.
Meanwhile, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is not only incredibly thin, but its primary camera has also been upgraded, utilizing the same 200MP lens found on the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Not to mention that foldable phones that are available abroad, such as the Honor Magic V5 or Oppo Find N5, usually don’t suffer from the same issues, at least not usually.
With that, I ventured out and took a bunch of pictures with all four foldable phones in an effort to see how well the Pixel 10 Pro Fold compared. Before we get into the nitty-gritty, I want to note that all of the pictures you see were taken with the default settings. The images were not manipulated in any way to provide the most balanced comparison possible.
Pixel 10 Pro Fold vs. Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7
We’ll kick off this camera showdown with the two phones that many are likely considering as we head into the holiday season. It’s also an interesting comparison because while Google didn’t really do much in the way of upgrades, Samsung took the opposite approach with the Galaxy Z Fold 7. However, even with the new 200MP sensor, I’m not sure that it’s really all that much better than the Pixel 10 Pro Fold.
Right off the bat, we get the patented Samsung saturation, albeit not as pronounced as I’ve become accustomed to. It’s saturated enough to notice compared to the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, but it’s not like the picture looks bad by any means. That said, the 10 Pro Fold took a picture that was a bit more true-to-life, and a bit brighter, even if it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme.
The picture of the tree has me feeling a bit perplexed, as the tree from the Fold 7 doesn’t stand out quite as much, and it’s not until you look at the grass behind the tree that you see a clear difference. To be honest, this was one of the closer pictures to judge, as both phones do a good job at capturing what I was actually seeing.
This picture below really surprised me. To my eyes, the Pixel is more vibrant and captures more detail than the Z Fold 7, which is not what I was expecting.
It’s a fall picture with lots of bright colors, so I assumed Samsung’s saturation processing would rear its ugly head. If anything, I’d probably go so far as to say that the picture is a little blown out, especially when you look at the trees and leaves around the steps in the background.
Naturally seeing as I’m a sucker for having a phone with a good telephoto camera, I also snapped a few shots with each of the phones. Unfortunately, this is where the Galaxy Z Fold 7 fell, and fell hard. It’s immediately apparent in every image, but especially so with pictures that have text in them.
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The entire picture just looks like it’s an attempt at being AI generated, while the Pixel looks crisp and clean without much artifacting at all. There’s also the picture of the “Social” sign, and while the letters look fine, the visible brick just looks pale and without life.
Pixel 10 Pro Fold vs. Honor Magic V5
It’s been years since I’ve used an Honor phone, and have never used any of the company’s foldable phones. Thanks to Android Central’s Nick Sutrich, I’ve been able to spend some time with the Magic V5 and was able to include it in this camera comparison. And let me tell, this phone might just the most perplexing of them all.
The image above looks like Honor took Samsung’s old image processing algorithm and cranked the saturation up to 11. Like the Fold 7, it’s not that the picture from the Magic V5 looks inherently bad, as the colors do pop, especially on the mural. However, if I were to make any edits, dialing back the saturation would be the first thing I’d do.
Here’s where things get weird. In the picture of the tree, it’s like I jumped in a time machine and went back at least a few years. The V5 clearly didn’t know what to do with all of the various colors and the grey sky, so it just blew everything out. As a result, there’s hardly any definition, and the picture just looks…bad.
Then, there’s the picture above of the park bench, and it’s like a completely different phone took the picture. The Magic V5 is slightly brighter than the Pixel, all without blowing out the details in the background. If I had to pick one, I’d flip a coin and would be happy with whatever fate decided.
As for telephoto images, I didn’t really find anything to complain about. They’re not bad pictures, and I don’t prefer the way these look compared to the ones from the 10 Pro Fold.
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The Magic V5’s pictures are different, with the only exception being the close-up of the mural, as I think the saturation got in the way and tried to smooth over the image just a bit too much. On the bright side, there aren’t any artifacts where the AI/algo tried to fill in non-existent gaps.
Pixel 10 Pro Fold vs. Oppo Find N5
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Until the Galaxy Z Fold 7 rolled around, my primary phone had been the Oppo Find N5. Since there wasn’t a OnePlus Open 2 to speak of, this was the closest I could get, and it’s been one of the more enjoyable phones to use, even with its various ColorOS quirks.
However, I have to admit that when comparing images between the Find N5 and Pixel 10 Pro Fold, I only found one that I wouldn’t consider to be a coin flip. The image in question is the one where I zoomed in on the mural.
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Almost nothing is right about this picture, except that I’d argue the Find N5 shows more details around the lines of outlines of the artwork and of the brick itself when compared to the Pixel. Besides that, something funky is going on with the color grading, and the words at the bottom look like they’ve been smoothed over once or twice. While there aren’t any artifacts, which is a good thing, I’m just not really a fan of the way the picture looks.
Especially when you look at how the Find N5 compares to the Pixel 10 Pro Fold in the other pictures, practically walking in lock-step with one another. Perhaps the N5 just wasn’t happy with how close of a zoom I was trying to get, or maybe something else is going on. But I was really disappointed to see those specific results.
Is there a winner?
If you told me that I had to pick just ONE of these foldable phones based solely on the cameras, I’d honestly probably go with the Pixel 10 Pro Fold. There’s no bias here, as I was honestly expecting either the Magic V5 or the Find N5 to “win” by a landslide. That simply wasn’t the case, which I’m still rather surprised about.
However, there are a couple of things that I learned after taking all of these pictures and comparing them: image processing can make or break a phone’s camera system, and Samsung still can’t figure out what to do with text when you want to zoom in to capture something.
Although I’d like to sit here and say that I could probably get all four phones to produce near-identical results, doing so would mean getting into the various Pro Modes.
So if you want a foldable phone that takes the best-looking photos without tinkering, the Pixel 10 Pro Fold is your best bet.
