As we not too long ago reported right here at TechRadar, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 might grow to be the world’s thinnest booklet-style folding telephone at launch – the newest rumors recommend an unfolded thickness of simply 3.9mm.
The earlier record-holder, the Oppo Find N5, boasted a formidable unfolded thickness of 4.2mm – and as I famous in my full Oppo Find N5 assessment, this shaped an enormous a part of the telephone’s wow issue.
And throughout all telephone makers, the progress of folding telephone designs has been a reasonably marvelous factor to witness. Samsung actually deserves due credit score for taking step one means again in 2019 with the unique Samsung Galaxy Fold – the distinction between that early mannequin and fashionable folding telephones is solely night time and day.
However, I’m not so positive that Samsung ought to make a precedence of releasing the thinnest folding telephone attainable – the truth is, I’d go thus far to say that there’s one other essential facet of the Galaxy Z Fold design that wants attending to first.
Cover display screen compromises
It goes with out saying {that a} folding telephone’s cowl show will in all probability by no means look fairly the identical because the show discovered on a slab telephone.
To obtain a roughly sq. internal show, folding telephones sport narrower, taller-looking cowl shows supposed for answering messages shortly and taking calls.
With that mentioned, telephone makers have tended in the direction of widening the quilt show of folding telephones as a lot as attainable – other than Samsung, which equips the current-gen Galaxy Z Fold 6 with a tall show that has a 22:9 facet ratio. For comparability, the Galaxy S25 and most fashionable smartphones have a 19.5:9 facet ratio.
Let me shortly add that I’ve by no means used the Galaxy Z Fold 6 for any substantial size of time – however I’ve briefly gotten hands-on with Samsung’s booklet-style foldable.
I’ve additionally used the aforementioned Oppo Find N5, which has a 20.7:9 cowl display screen, and its older cousin the OnePlus Open, which has a 20:9 cowl display screen. Having used these telephones as day by day drivers, I can confidently say that I wouldn’t wish to use a telephone with a good narrower cowl show.
Though the important thing promoting level and most technically spectacular facet of folding telephones are their giant internal shows, the expertise of utilizing the quilt display screen nonetheless issues.
After all, there are many use instances the place opening the internal show doesn’t fairly make sense – on a cramped prepare, on the gymnasium, or checking one thing shortly on Google.
I positively observed that articles, social media feeds, and video games felt extra cramped when utilizing the aforementioned foldable telephones, so I’m not satisfied the expertise could be a lot better on the Galaxy Z Fold 7’s anticipated 22:9 show.
However, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 has been tipped to get a bigger cowl show – a 6.5-inch panel, up from 6.2 inches on the present Galaxy Z Fold 6 – I’m actually eager to see whether or not a bigger panel on the identical facet ratio could be a passable repair.
The skinny telephone revolution
As hopeful as I’m for a wider cowl display screen on the Galaxy Z Fold 7, it’s much more seemingly that Samsung will push forward and launch a thinner, lighter model of its iconic folding telephone with few different design updates.
And if the product technique Samsung hinted ultimately yr is something to go by, we might be in for a couple of years centered on skinny designs.
The Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge is ready to launch on May 12, and as I wrote in a earlier characteristic, I believe Samsung is more likely to maintain this new product line operating for at the least a couple of years as telephone makers cut up their product choices into heavier efficiency and camera-centric handsets and ergonomic skinny telephones.
I’m a bit stunned that the Galaxy Z Fold 7 would land within the latter camp, given Samsung’s framing of the Z Fold line as centered on productiveness, but when the Z Fold is to play an element within the skinny telephone revolution, I reckon we’ll see most of Samsung’s design prowess spent on ergonomics, ie. thinness, with the subsequent few iterations.
So, that’s me sticking with OnePlus and Oppo with regards to book-style folding telephones – at the least for now. Most of the above is predicated on rumors, and the Galaxy Z Fold 7 isn’t anticipated to launch till later this yr, so you’ll want to keep watch over our Samsung Galaxy telephones protection for the newest updates.
