Samsung Unpacked Event LIVE: I’ve got all the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Flip 5 news as it happens

For reasons I can’t quite put my finger on, the Galaxy Watch line has always left me a little cold. Maybe it’s the design or the fussiness of the software that leaves me at odds with Samsung’s smartwatches.  

But as Kozuch points out, the Galaxy Watch 6 looks set to offer a more complete smartwatch than its predecessors, potentially rubbing shoulders with the Apple Watch 8. It looks like it will have the Google Pixel Watch beat, but I wear that smartwatch more for its design than its capabilities. Nevertheless, the Galaxy Watch 6 has my curiosity. 

Fellow Managing Editor Kate Kozuch has a positive take on the Galaxy Watch 6, noting it “seems like the most polished Samsung smartwatch yet, ushering in thoughtful design and wellness upgrades.” 

Plus she’s got a full video rundown of her hands-on time with the Galaxy Watch 6 so check it out below. 

I do like the new hinge on the Galaxy Z Fold 5, and a thinner and lighter design is always appreciated. 

But no space to store the optional S Pen, no dust resistance, and slow 25W charging leaves a fair bit to be desired for a phone that costs $1,799 / £1,749. Maybe Samsung is running out of ideas, despite touting its engineering chops. 

As mentioned earlier, my boss Mark Spoonauer wasn’t blown away by the Galaxy Z Fold 5. Almost by default the Fold 5 will likely make it onto our list of the best foldable phones, but it’s not exactly a beacon of next-gen design and tech; Samsung has played it safe. 

Check out the video below for Spoonauer’s early Galaxy Z Fold 5 impressions. 

I think the Galaxy Z Flip 5 might be my favorite of all the new Galaxy devices. The bigger cover display looks great and actually a heck of a lot more functional. Plus the gapless design is pretty neat. 

“Rather than trying to reinvent the foldable, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 makes several smaller upgrades, including a larger outer display, gapless design and camera improvements. They’re iterative changes, but ones that bring the phone back into the top of the conversation,” Velasco concluded in his Galaxy Flip 5 hands-on review. 

Despite this Unpacked being what we all expected and nothing more, other than the appearance of celebrities (yawn), we’ve still got a bounty of first impressions of the newly-unveiled Galaxy devices, and in video form no less! 

Let’s kick it off with our hands-on impressions of the Galaxy Z Flip 5, courtesy of Phones Editor John Velasco. See the video below. 

Not to name any names, but one Tom’s Guide editor even summed up this Unpacked with: “What a boring Unpacked……probably the most boring one ever.” 

Can’t say I disagree much!  

In an hour, Samsung managed to announce two foldable phones, two smartwatches in two different sizes and a trio of tablets. That’s a fair bit in some 6o minutes. 

But it’s arguably rather telling that it didn’t take a long time to detail these devices, as they are all pretty much incremental upgrades. I and others at Tom’s Guide were expecting this as the leak and rumors basically ruined any surprises. 

And the general march of technology from Samsung tends to be iterative at the moment. Still, I was hoping for a form of “one more thing” with Samsung reviving the Gear VR line with a mixed reality headset to challenge Apple’s Vision Pro, but that was wishful thinking. 

And with that, another Galaxy Unpacked comes to an end. 

I’m going to exhale for a moment and then be back with some thoughts and analysis. 

Should you put in a pre order for the new Tab S9? Well, let me point you in the direction of Computing Writer Tony Polanco’s Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra hands-on review for his early impression of the big tablet. 

And Polanco has his impressions of the standard Tab S9 in his Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 hands-on review. 

Back onto the Galaxy Tab S9 series. Samsung has done a fair bit under the hood to improve cooling and make the tablets more water resistant (I don’t suggest you take a tablet swimming or in a shower though). 

Pricing for the Tab S9 starts at $799 for the standard model, $999 for the S9 Plus, and $1,199 for the Tab S9 Ultra. And pre-orders are live today. 

Before I go on and talk more about tablets. Here’s Kate with a TikTok on the Galaxy Watch 6. Do give it a look. 

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♬ original sound – Tom’s Guide

Now Samsung has moved onto the Galaxy Tab S9 series. As predicted it’s evolution not revolution here.  

There are three models, like before: a standard Tab S9, S9 Plus and S9 Ultra. 

Pricing for the Galaxy Watch 6, the 40mm version starts at $299 / £289 with the larger 43mm model costing $329 / £319. This is a price hike from the Galaxy Watch 5, which started at $279, but still undercuts the Google Pixel Watch and Apple Watch Series 8. Colors for the Galaxy Watch 6 are graphite, silver, gold or black depending on the size you choose.

The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic starts $399 / £369 for the 44mm size, with the 47mm watch priced at $429 / £399. The Watch 6 Classic comes in black and silver for both sizes.

Ooooo the rotating bezel is coming back on the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, I’ve always liked that feature. 

Samsung is continuing to champion all the health tools of the Watch 6, which comes in two sizes 40mm and 43mm. The Classic comes in 44mm and 47mm. And both watches will get access to new native apps like WhatsApp and Audible. 

Samsung is now talking about the newly revealed Galaxy Watch 6. A big ol’ focus is on health and sleep; as a lover of beer, burgers and late nights, this isn’t my area of expertise. 

But my good pal Kate Kozuch isn’t just a TikTok-er, she knows her wearables. So check out her Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 hands-on review. 

Pricing is around what was expected. The Galaxy Z Fold 5 starts at $1,799 / £1,749, which in the U.S. is the same as the Fold 4 but in the U.K. is some £100 more expensive; as a Brit that sucks a bit. 

The Galaxy Z Flip 5 starts at $999 / £1,049. Again the U.K, price has been hiked by £100; so much for ‘Great’ Britain. 

“PC like power in your pocket,” says Samsung. Yeah, I don’t think so; it’s not a Steam Deck. Still, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 power isn’t to be sniffed at. 

But I’m not feeling the drive to upgrade from my Galaxy Z Fold 4. In fact, check out our Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 vs Galaxy Z Fold 4 for an early rundown on what’s different. 

Samsung is talking up the Galaxy Z Fold 5, which looks impressive enough in isolation but not exactly a revolution over its predecessor. 

As it happens, Tom’s Guide big boss Mark Spoonauer already has his Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 hands-on review. And, well it’s not glowing. 

“The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 offers several improvements, including a new hinge, a thinner and lighter design and better multitasking. But this feels like a very iterative upgrade when the competition is stepping up its foldable phone game,” said Spoonauer. 

Now we’re talking Galaxy Z Flip 5 and foldables engineering. The reinforced display on the Flip 5 has a new shock dispersion layer to make it more durable. 

And that tech will be available on the newly announced Galaxy Z Fold 5. This is the one for me! 

Samsung is touting the photograph chops of the Galaxy Z Flip 5. It hasn’t said it yet, but we know the rear camera array comprises a 12MP f/1.8 main (83 ̊ FOV) + 12MP f/2.2 ultra-wide (123 ̊ FOV). The selfie camera comes in at 10MP. 

Overall expect a boost in photo quality, mostly thanks to software and AI processing. And get ready for some selfie action! 

TikTok star in the making, Kate Kozuch has a video on the Galaxy Z Flip 5. Check it out below! 

And then give the Tom’s Guide TikTok a follow for more tech new and experiences. 

@tomsguide
♬ original sound – Tom’s Guide

You can do a fair bit more with the outer display of the Galaxy Z Flip 5 (which has been bumped to 3.4 inches). I expect other phones makers like Oppo to follow Samsung’s example here. 

Samsung is touting the design a lot but hasn’t motioned specs… and I’m already sick of hearing “join the flip side.” 

Right now Samsung is introducing the Galaxy Z Flip 5. The big take away here is the larger outer display; I think it looks great and I’m not a Flip fellow! 

Roh’s preamble is over and he has announced the new foldables. As it happens, we got early previews of the phones, so check out our rundown on the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 and our Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 hands-on. 

Here’s the bossman himself, TM Roh! Live form Seoul. 

Live every tech boss does at the start of these showcases, Roh is chatting how great tech is and how it enables “unlimited possibilities.” 

I like phones so I guess I agree to an extent. But let me here about the next-gen foldables! 

We’ve got an into video. That’s pretty standard for these showcases. This one it touting the history of phones in a slightly cheesy way. 

I’m here for it! 

And we’re off! Galaxy Unpacked July 2023 has started. 

With Samsung touting the catchphrase “join the flip side” I expect Unpacked to open (pun intended) on the Galaxy Z Flip 5. 

Personally, I’m more of a Fold person than a Flip guy. But the Flip phones are pretty cool. 

Just a few minutes to go now! The Galaxy Unpacked holding video just got dramatic…! 

Even though the leaks and rumors have arguably ruined what to expect at Unpacked, I’m rather hyped for it. 

I use the Galaxy Z Fold 4, so I’m ready for what’s next even if we get only a few minor tweaks; improving the best foldable phone is no bad thing. And I’ve been enjoying using foldable phones for a couple of years now. 

But I’m also a recent convert to smartwatches, the Google Pixel Watch being my wearable of choice at the moment. So I’m curious to see what Samsung can bring to the table with the rumored Galaxy Watch 6. 

Well, the recent generations of Galaxy Watch have become ever more capable and have found their way onto our best smartwatches list. 

Naturally, the Apple Watch Series 8 is the smartwatch to beat, but it will also have to see off the Pixel Watch which has become one of the most popular Wear OS watches. Check out our early showdown of the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 vs. Google Pixel Watch.

As someone who also looks after computing at Tom’s Guide, I’ve got a vested interest in tablets. And Samsung is expected to reveal a suite of them at Unpacked 2023 today. 

Let’s talk about tablets. Samsung is likely to reveal a Galaxy Tab S9 today, potentially in standard, Plus and Ultra guises. That said, we’ve yet to hear many rumors about a Plus model. Regardless, expect evolution here at best for Samsung’s new tablets.

From what we’ve heard so far, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 is going to be an incremental upgrade over its predecessor, likely bringing in the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip. A Galaxy S9 Ultra model has been tipped with up to 16GB of RAM and 512GB of onboard storage — those are some laptop-level specs. 

With Kate in Korea, we’ve got proper boots on the ground for one of Samsung’s biggest launches of the year. But we also have Senior Writer and phones expert Richard Priday at a Samsung event in London’s Kings Cross, where Samsung has a big flagship store. 

I’m expecting Mr Priday to have some change to go hands-on with the latest Samsung devices and let me know what he thinks. No I’m not jealous! 

Samsung isn’t known for having a “one more thing” moment at its launch events like Apple is. But if we did see something like that today, chances are it could be a health-tracking ring, like the Oura Ring tracker.

Rumors of what we assume would be simply called the Galaxy Ring have been circulating for a while now, with the most recent report saying the ring’s finally in development, with Samsung exploring alternative names as suggested by several trademark applications for smart ring or smart glasses products.

After Blass’ big leak, let’s take a breather for a moment. 

Yesterday, Kate visited the Samsung Innovation Museum in Suwon. There, among a handful of exhibits showcase’s Samsung’s history in technology, she snapped a pic of the Watch Phone circa 1999. 

It’s safe to say that Samsung’s smartwatches have come a long way since the Watch Phone. Over 20 years later, the Galaxy Watch is the Android smartwatch, offering a slew of communication and wellness features. At Unpacked, we’ll see what’s in store for the Galaxy Watch 6 family. I think it’s safe to say it’ll have some upgrades compared to the Watch Phone…

Yup! Evan Blass always does this. The leaker has… leaked a load of last-minute information about pretty much everything we can expect at Unpacked 2023.

Blass is definitely not someone you want at surprise parties that’s for sure!

X marks the spot! It’s only Tom’s Guide’s very own social media star Kate Kozuch at Unpacked 2023. 

Make sure to follow her updates on Twitter. 

If you want to watch Galaxy Unpacked live then you can. Simply check out the video below, but do keep an eye on this blog for my words of wisdom. 

For more details check out our guide on how to watch Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2023 live and what to expect. 

Good morning, good afternoon or good where ever you are! Managing Editor and general gadgets guy, Roland Moore-Colyer here to bring you the latest from Unpacked 2023, 

It’s some 40 mins away from starting, so lets get wiggle on!