A bit of history: I used to get mid-range phones and then be frustrated by their performance after a year or so (battery and audio usually). Then, one of the local providers had a promotion on an iPhone and I really considered getting it... until a friend pointed out about the discounted version was older and the performance would degrade quick (and also support, really). So I switched to high end-ish and "recently released" phones.
I had a Samsung Galaxy S9 since 2018, which was a fabulous phone and, despite the battery getting worse, it still did everything I wanted it to do. Over the holidays my phone died - it fell into a lake and then died with the inflated battery syndrome. So I guess it's time to pick up a new phone. With the above philosophy, I established a list of criteria:
- Battery life - I want the phone to last at least 2 days with moderate usage,
- Camera quality - My wife is very happy with the iPhone 11 camera capabilities,
- More-than-Europe coverage, because we go outside EU once in a while and
- 5G connectivity - this is a "nice to have" thing because I find 4G OK and 5G is spotty at best where I live.
Based on the above, I looked at some performant phones today:
- Iphone 11 (my wife's phone)
- Iphone 14 pro
- Pixel 7 pro
- Samsung S23 ultra
- Samsung A54
- Samsung Z-Fold 5 - for giggles because I can't possibly justify 2000 Euros for a phone
I looked at various reviews source and got the following table:
| Phone | Outdoor | Indoor | Low light | Portraits | Battery |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Iphone 11 | 136 | 119 | 78 | 114 | 94.00 |
| Iphone 14 pro | 147 | 129 | 81 | 119 | 84.00 |
| Google Pixel 7 pro | 163 | 147 | 110 | 141 | 83.00 |
| Samsung S23 ultra | 156 | 148 | 106 | 130 | 126.00 |
| Samsung A54 | 122 | 113 | 64 | 109 | 119.00 |
| Samsung Z-Fold 5 | 133 | 123 | 90 | 119 | 95.00 |
Camera data comes mostly from DXOMark (at the time of writing, they didin't have a Z-Fold 5 review so it's interpolated based on Z-Fold 5 vs 4 comparison and the Z-Fold 4 data) and the battery life score comes from GSMArena.
On paper, Samsung S23 Ultra is the best for battery and Pixel 7 Pro has the best camera. Surprisingly, Z-Fold 5 has a low battery score.
Using the magic of Excel, I did a ranking average for each component:
= (RANK.EQ($B2,$B$2:$B$7)
+RANK.EQ($C2,$C$2:$C$7)
+RANK.EQ($D2,$D$2:$D$7)
+RANK.EQ($E2,$E$2:$E$7)
+RANK.EQ($F2,$F$2:$F$7))/5
The results are "as expected":
| Phone | Average | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Iphone 11 | 4.6 | 5 |
| Iphone 14 pro | 3.6 | 3 |
| Google Pixel 7 pro | 2.2 | 2 |
| Samsung S23 ultra | 1.6 | 1 |
| Samsung A54 | 5.2 | 6 |
| Samsung Z-Fold 5 | 3.6 | 3 |
The just rank evaluation makes them seem quite far apart (0.6 between the first two - 10% when comparing to the max value i.e., the number of items). Therefore, I tried to base myself off the relative values with the following method:
For each category (column), calculate a percentage value as cell_value/max(category).
The formula I got is:
=(
$B2/MAX($B$2:$B$7)
+ $C2/MAX($C$2:$C$7)
+ $D2/MAX($D$2:$D$7)
+ $E2/MAX($E$2:$E$7)
+ $F2/MAX($F$2:$F$7)
)*100/5
The result I think reflects better the reality:
| Phone | Average | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Iphone 11 | 78.04 | 5 |
| Iphone 14 pro | 80.40 | 4 |
| Google Pixel 7 pro | 93.03 | 2 |
| Samsung S23 ultra | 96.85 | 1 |
| Samsung A54 | 76.22 | 6 |
| Samsung Z-Fold 5 | 81.26 | 3 |
As you can see, the order remains the same, but the valies show that the ranks 3,4,5 are only 3.2%-ish apart. So if you don't need the absolute best in something, maybe you can get it down to cost, or obsession if you can still find a way to justify Z-Fold 5.
The simple excel file I used for ranking is below:
HTH,
Member discussion: