What’s the story on Samsung’s foldable phone? | Apps

The Samsung Galaxy X has long been rumoured as Samsung’s foldable smartphone. Until very recently, at least, when rumours suggested the Galaxy X would in fact be a gaming phone, while the Galaxy F will be the foldable phone.

So will it be the Galaxy X or the Galaxy F? Well, no one actually knows and the rumour of a foldable smartphone has been going on for so long, we’re not convinced it will ever launch – it’s becoming a phantom phone.

As we’ve only heard Galaxy F mentioned once, we are sticking with Galaxy X, so here is the story of Samsung’s foldable smartphone.

Samsung Galaxy X: Release date and price

• Possible MWC 2019 launch, reveal in November
• Might come before Galaxy S10
• Could cost $2000

Samsung’s foldable phone has been rumoured to be coming for years. Literally years. In 2017, there were reports suggesting we would see it at IFA 2017, but surprise, surprise, that never happened.

Since then, we’ve head murmurings that the device will finally make its full debut at Mobile World Congress 2019. That date would still make sense even though Samsung mobile chief DJ Koh said in ear;u September 2018 that the foldable device will be revealed in some way this year! 

Samsung might preview it at the Samsung Developer Conference in November in San Francisco. That may be because developers can design bespoke apps for the device that utilise the two parts of the screen. 

The company will apparently begin mass production of the foldable smartphone in November 2018, reveal prototype models to carriers behind closed doors at CES 2019 and reveal it officially at MWC in February.

Supporting this theory, Samsung’s mobile chief DJ Koh recently told Korean journalists that the company was working to produce a 5G phone, which wasn’t going to be the Galaxy S10, leaving some to assume this first 5G device might be the famous Galaxy X. Based on Koh’s comments, it’s thought there will be four phone launches in 2019 for Samsung, comprising the S10, Note 10, a 5G phone and a foldable phone.

The Galaxy S10 typically launches around MWC 2019, suggesting the CES 2019 rumours for the Galaxy X mentioned above might have some legs, especially if it is destined to be the company’s first 5G phone too.

Samsung is reported to be more interested in being the first to bring a foldable smartphone to market, rather than focusing on sales, which given its rumoured cost is probably a good thing. Koh suggested the foldable phone’s launch is imminent, noting Samsung doesn’t “want to lose the world’s-first title”. He explained Samsung has been “focusing on developing innovations” and has solved issues related to the phone’s design.

For those eagerly waiting its release, we hope you’ve been saving since rumours started because it’s been claimed the Galaxy X could cost within the $2000 region. Ouch.

Samsung Galaxy X: Design

• Display panels that fold outwards
• Smartphone into tablet
• 5-inch to 7-inch

What will Samsung’s foldable smartphone look like? Well that’s the million dollar question that no one currently has the answer to. Or at least no one allowed to share the information has the answer.

It’s long been claimed that the foldable smartphone will have a 5-inch display that will fold out into an 8-inch tablet. Bloomberg made the claim back in 2016 before the Korea Herald added “sources familiar with the matter” have said the Galaxy X will have display panels that fold outwards to become a tablet rather than folding into the screen. 

More recent reports have suggested the Galaxy X will feature a 4.5-inch display that can be used as a regular smartphone, opening out to a 7.3-inch display when unfolded, but it is unclear for now how this will work or what the device will look like.

ZTE released the Axon M in October 2017 as a dual-screen flip phone that featured two displays that opened out but the displays were broken up by a hinge, something the Galaxy X will presumably avoid with a foldable display.

Samsung Galaxy X: Display

• OLED display likely
• Folding display or rolling display

Samsung is the OLED king so it would come as no surprise to most if its foldable smartphone features an OLED display. What the specifications of this display might be are anybody’s guess for now though.

The company previously showed off a roll-out OLED display in May 2016 at an event called SID in San Francisco but whether the Galaxy X will opt for this kind of technology or something entirely different is not yet known.

The roll-out OLED display was just 0.3mm thick and featured 10R rolling radius, with the ability to roll up like a scroll. It was able to pump out 1080p resolution across a 5.7-inch display but this was without a touch-control layer.

More recently at the beginning of 2018, Samsung mentioned foldable OLED displays several times in an earnings call, claiming these would drive growth along with Bixby. This suggests that the foldable smartphone will feature an OLED display that folds, as oppose to rolls.

Samsung Galaxy X: Camera and hardware

Rumours have been thin on the ground regarding what specifications the foldable Galaxy smartphone might offer. And when we say thin on the ground, we mean thinner than the other rumours, which pretty much means, no one knows much at all, if anything.

If the Galaxy X does eventually turn out to be a gaming phone as well as foldable phone, or even just a gaming phone, we can certainly expect flagship hardware, especially in terms of processor, graphics and RAM.

Even as just a foldable phone however, we’d still expect decent specifications, including battery, camera and hardware, especially if the $2000 price tag is accurate. Samsung’s flagship smartphones offer great camera results so it would be surprising for the Galaxy X not to follow suit. After all, a folding smartphone come tablet would be great but it still needs to perform as well as a flagship smartphone would.

Samsung Galaxy X: Conclusions

The Samsung Galaxy X is one of the most rumoured smartphones out there, falling into the Surface Phone category. It might never appear and even if it does, it will probably be completely different to what the rumours have claimed so far and no doubt be called something completely different too.

We will continue to update this feature as more rumours appear surrounding the Galaxy X but bear in mind this foldable phantom might be a long time coming.