I tested the 6 best foldable phones for battery life — here's which model is best

The Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold (left) and Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 (right) (Image credit: Future) It’s finally official: after what feels like years of leaks, Apple has entered the foldable race with the iPhone Duo. It brings a host of new features, but also has the same passport-style form factor as the recently launched Galaxy Z Fold 8, Xiaomi 18 Fold, and Huawei Pura X Max.Apple’s first foldable features many of the same compromises you might expect from a first-generation foldable, even from a company as meticulous as Apple, but the biggest concern for most users may be around the Duo's battery life.I’ve spent the past three months using the Galaxy Z Fold 8 and its competitors. What battery life do they offer, and what can we learn from it? I tested six of the best globally available flagship foldables over several weeks to answer that question.How I tested the folding phones' battery life (Image credit: Future | Alex Walker-Todd)Over the past few months, I’ve been developing my own battery testing suite, CellMark, using a combination of AI models. After hundreds of hours and various iterations, I've built a solid test suite that accounts for each phone maker's idiosyncrasies and how the average person actually uses their phone today.For this comparison, I ran the EnduranceMark suite, which loops until the battery level reaches 5%. A test is only valid if it successfully drains 80% of the battery, and each result below is characterized using a standardized metric. I ran two tests from this suite: the Synthesizer test to test drain under heavy loads, and my favorite, the Doom Scroller. As the name suggests, it simulates everyone’s favorite pastime of endlessly scrolling social media.I also ran the ChargeMark charging test to log battery charging times. I paired the three CellMark tests with a web-browsing script that loaded 20 different web pages, scrolled at intervals, and looped to the next page, plus a looping video playback test.As some phone makers aggressively limit background apps, some phones failed to complete certain tests, but I've included the relevant tests regardless.Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more.Of course, these tests aren’t 100% indicative of real-world usage, but anecdotally, the Galaxy Z Fold 8 Doom Scrolling results closely matched my findings during daily use. Having tested smartphones for 20 years, I'm confident in the CellMark app's results.Round 1: The charging testFor years, charging speeds differed markedly between folding phones sold in the US and those sold outside it. Simply put, the former were vastly slower than the latter. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Size 15 min 30 min 100% Drain rate Galaxy Z Fold 8 4,800mAh 33% 66% 69 minutes 69.6mAh / min Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 5,000mAh 41% 71% 60 minutes 83.3mAh / min Pixel 11 Pro Fold 4,806mAh 26% 47% 54 minutes 54mAh / min Moto Razr Fold 6,000mAh 67% 67% 100 minutes 100mAh / min Oppo Find N6 6,000mAh 84% 84% 47 minutes 127.7mAh / min Honor Magic V6 6,660mAh 66% 66% 59 minutes 112.9mAh / min In the above charging test, the Galaxy Z Fold 8's 45W charging speed got it to a respectable 69-minute full charge, but the Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra sustained 45W charging for longer to reach a full charge in one hour.The Moto Razr Fold, Honor Magic V6, and Oppo Find N6 were the top three in ascending order, with Oppo retaining a charging lead it has held for years. The Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold ranked last, which isn’t surprising given its charging is the slowest.For the iPhone Duo, Apple says 60W charging can reach 50% in just 20 minutes. Apple hasn’t published a full-charge estimate, especially since phones optimize charging speeds for longevity, but its claims put the iPhone Duo's charging speed around the level of the Honor Magic V6 and Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra.Round 2: The web browsing test (Image credit: Nirave Gondhia)The second test was web browsing, and each phone ran a script to load 20 of the heaviest webpages on the internet and scroll through them to simulate real-world usage. Running in a loop, this gives us an estimate of the battery life if you’re always using your browser. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Size 100 --> 0% Drain rate Drain rate Galaxy Z Fold 8 4,800mAh 17 hours 44 minutes 5.64 %/hr 270.7 mAh/hour Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 5,000mAh 14 hours 11 minutes 7.05 %/hr 352.5 mAh/hour Pixel 11 Pro Fold 4,806mAh 13 hours 52 minutes 7.21 %/hr 346.6 mAh/hour Moto Razr Fold 6,000mAh 20 hours 14 minutes 4.86 %/hr 291.7 mAh/hour Oppo Find N6 6,000mAh 18 hours 52 minutes 5.48 %/hr 328.8 mAh/hour Honor Magic V6 6,660mAh 18 hours 11 minutes 5.50 %/hr 366.3 mAh/hour The Galaxy Z Fold 8 proved surprisingly strong here, but that's where a smaller screen comes in handy. Its drain rate was the lowest of all tests, meaning a larger battery at the same drain rate would theoretically give us the best battery life overall.The Pixel 11 Pro Fold fell short of the competition, even though its drain rate was only the third-highest, while the Motorola Razr Fold proved that the Razr Fold — and its Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 processor — is very well optimized for web browsing. Apple hasn’t revealed any iPhone Duo web-browsing estimates, so it’s unclear what to expect.Round 3: The video playback testThe other fairly standard test is video playback, which lets us directly test many phone makers’ listed claims. This involved looping a locally stored 4K video in the default media player with the phone’s brightness set to 50%. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Size 100 --> 0% OEM Claims Drain rate Drain rate Galaxy Z Fold 8 4,800mAh 20 hours 32 minutes 26 hours 4.87 %/hr 233.8 mAh/hour Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 5,000mAh 20 hours 39 minutes 27 hours 4.84 %/hr 242.1 mAh/hour Pixel 11 Pro Fold 4,806mAh 18 hours 14 minutes 24 hours 5.48 %/hr 263.6 mAh/hour Moto Razr Fold 6,000mAh 20 hours 49 minutes 39 hours 4.80 %/hr 288.2 mAh/hour Oppo Find N6 6,000mAh 22 hours 47 minutes 26 hours 4.39 %/hr 263.4 mAh/hour Honor Magic V6 6,660mAh 21 hours 57 minutes 24 hours 4.56 %/hr 303.4 mAh/hour It’s clear that every phone maker makes bold battery-life claims that don’t always reflect your real-world experience. Here, Samsung, Oppo, and Honor deserve credit for fairly accurate video playback claims, whereas the results on the Moto Razr Fold and Pixel 11 Pro Fold fall far short of what's stated.For the iPhone Duo, Apple claims that you'll get up to 35 hours of video playback on the inside screen and up to 44 hours on the outer display. If it lives up to these claims, or even comes close, it will likely have the best video playback battery life of any folding phone.Round 4: The Synthesizer performance testWeb browsing and video playback are two common ways we use our phones, but companies also optimize for these scenarios, and phones struggle considerably under heavy loads.To test this, I built the Synthesizer, which runs a series of calculations around ever-increasing prime numbers and runs numerous I/O operations in the background, both designed to heavily tax the chipset. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Size Elapsed Projected Primes IO operations run Drain rate Galaxy Z Fold 8 4,800mAh 20 hours 32 minutes 5 hours 51 minutes 25.8M 5.57M 16.07% Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 5,000mAh 20 hours 39 minutes 6 hours 03 minutes 27.0M 5.99M 15.54% Pixel 11 Pro Fold 4,806mAh 18 hours 14 minutes 7 hours 05 minutes 26.6M 4.21M 13.27% Moto Razr Fold 6,000mAh 20 hours 49 minutes 10 hours 55 minutes 31.5M 7.12M 8.60% Oppo Find N6 6,000mAh 22 hours 47 minutes 11 hours 32 minutes 31.4M 9.08M 8.15% Honor Magic V6 6,660mAh 21 hours 57 minutes 12 hours 37 minutes 33.4M 10.92M 7.45% None of these results are surprising on their own, but together they show just how differently each phone maker has balanced power and efficiency.The Galaxy Z Fold 8 and Fold 8 Ultra use the high-specification Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy chipset, and Samsung doesn’t throttle performance of the chipset. The result is ~5.5 hours of battery life at high performance.The Tensor G6 inside the Pixel 11 Pro Fold is surprisingly well optimized, but as the above test shows, Motorola, Honor, and Oppo all offer considerably better battery performance and battery-life balance. The result is sustained high-load performance for much longer.Round 5: The doomscrolling test (Image credit: Nirave Gondhia)When I started building CellMark, I set out to build an app that could, among other tests, simulate social media usage. Considering how we use our phones — and my additional needs for visual ways to demonstrate battery and charging tests on social media — this felt like the most natural test to build.It’s also where I've faced challenges with Oppo and Motorola phones specifically, which prevent the CellMark app from running tests longer than nine hours. Despite this, it reveals a lot of interesting data. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Elapsed (~100% > 5%) Cards scrolled Drain Drain Thermal Galaxy Z Fold 8 9 hours 58 minutes 13,257 9.22 % per hour 442.6 mAh/hour Fair Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 13 hours 04 minutes 16,144 7.19 % per hour 359.7 mAh/hour Critical Pixel 11 Pro Fold 10 hours 54 minutes 14,087 8.62 % per hour 414.2 mAh/hour Fair Moto Razr Fold 14 hours 53 minutes 18,067 6.31 % per hour 420.2 mAh/hour Fair Oppo Find N6 - 12,432 2.42 % per hour 145.2 mAh/hour Nominal Honor Magic V6 - 12,415 2.79 % per hour 167.3 mAh/hour Nominal First, the thin body on the Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra and larger battery mean it runs considerably hotter than all the competition.The thicker build and vapor chamber of the iPhone Duo should mean this won’t be an issue for Apple's first foldable, although the A20 Pro chipset is a powerhouse. The Galaxy Z Fold 8 proves it's possible to be a small phone without succumbing to overheating problems, despite using the same processor as its sibling.The performance of the Pixel 11 Pro Fold proves the Tensor G6 is a welcome improvement over the Tensor G5, while the Honor Magic V6 reigns supreme yet again. Swipe to scroll horizontally Phone Duration Nominal Fair Serious Critical Galaxy Z Fold 8 9 hours 58 minutes 46.0% 54.0% 0% 0% Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra 13 hours 04 minutes 68.8% 0.5% 3.1% 27.5% Pixel 11 Pro Fold 10 hours 54 minutes 44.2% 55.8% 0% 0% Moto Razr Fold 14 hours 53 minutes 83.2% 16.8% 0% 0% It’s worth noting that the Find N6 and Razr Fold results ran for 9 hours before ending, and while all phones drain much faster as thermal temperature rises, both likely had the lowest drain and best thermal performance.The key takeaway there? The processor makes a big difference: the Find N6 has one fewer performance core than its rivals, while the Razr Fold uses the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 rather than the high-performance Elite version. Both companies made these choices with battery life in mind, and it becomes especially apparent when you look at thermal performance in these tests.The 24-hour Galaxy Z Fold 8 run (Image credit: Richard Priday / TechRadar)Just days before publishing, I tested the Galaxy Z Fold 8 with a few changes to determine what battery life would look like under more optimal conditions. The surprise is just how much of a difference it makes.Running the Doom Scroll test on a Galaxy Z Fold 8 with background data sync disabled and brightness set to 40%, I achieved 24 hours and 42 minutes on a single Doom Scroll run. That’s nearly 150% higher than the rest of the Galaxy Z Fold 8 testing results.Also, every foldable phone maker tells you to open the phone for the fastest charging, partly because of thermal management. During this test, all 8,907 logged telemetry samples showed a nominal thermal status. In simple terms: unfold your phone to keep it cooler.How might the iPhone Duo's battery compare? (Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)Apple claims the iPhone Duo has better battery life than the iPhone 17 Pro Max, offering up to 35 hours of video playback when unfolded or 44 hours when folded. That puts it 35% higher than the Galaxy Z Fold 8, and paired with a thicker body and better thermal management, the iPhone Duo could set a new battery-life benchmark for folding phones in the US.The true test will be in real-world use cases like Doom Scroller. I’m excited to see how optimized the iPhone Duo is, but am cautiously optimistic that it can at least match the Galaxy Z Fold 8. We’ll find out once the iPhone Duo goes on sale. Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!And of course you can also follow TechRadar on TikTok for news, reviews, unboxings in video form, and get regular updates from us on WhatsApp too. Nirave is a veteran tech journalist and creator at House of Tech. He's reviewed over 1,000 phones and other consumer gadgets over the past 20 years. A heart attack at 33 inspired him to consider the impact of technology on our physical, mental, and emotional health.