Foldable smartphones have reached their fifth major generation, as heralded by Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Fold 5...
For me it's definitely the durability concerns. I've valued my phone's water and dust resistance since getting an ip67 phone years and years ago. My brother had a flip and a grain of sand in his pocket got under the display; when he closed the phone the display died. And they expect me to pay more for the privilege.
I’ve had my Galaxy zflip 3 for about 2 years now. Lots of comments here are saying they are too fragile or poorly made but that has not been my experience:
the battery is fine
the screen hasn’t scratched
it flips open fine with a one handed flick of the wrist
I’ve dropped it several times without damage
it has been used in the rain and snow
I’ve replaced the screen protector once myself due to it peeling at the fold. Having to change screen protectors happens on every phone I’ve owned due to peeling somewhere
I can drop it in my pocket folded without worrying about keys, coins, or whatever else scratching up the screen
being able to use the phone as it’s own tripod is nice for photos
flipping it shut to end phonecalls is satisfying
price is about the same as any other new Samsung phone (I got mine close to free trading in a Galaxy s10e)
The new flip 5 looks really nice with the bigger cover screen but I don’t plan to upgrade anytime soon since this phone is working well for me.
I got one, but got rid of it after the screen cover plastic became rigid and creaky…twice. Worse, Samsung said they’d cover it once under warranty, and that after their ubreak ifix people were telling me it’d cost $200 to fix and I had to explain I had a protection plan to the braindead tech ten times.
I respect your opinion, but for me is it hardly a gimmick. I don’t need a tablet in my bag to view websites that aren’t compatible with mobile layouts, I have a tablet in my pocket whenever I want. Sure it’s not for everyone, just like iPhones vs Android, but the form factor of foldables absolutely solves the needs of some customers and I’m grateful there’s a line of products out there that fits my needs.
It took me a week or so to get used to the form factor but since then I can’t imagine going back to a slab. Different strokes for different folks.
I work with a lot of crappy websites and embedded systems. I can’t always carry a laptop, so a mobile device fits my use case very well. I also use my large screen to do split screen with two apps open at once, it makes taking notes and observations from videos and documentation a breeze.
Honestly, I just don’t find them very appealing, one of my coworkers has one and having the thing unfold into a shape more like a small tablet just looks like it’d make it harder to use one handed, and having a weird seam in the middle looks distracting. They look kinda cool and novel because I’m not used to seeing screens fold like that, but I don’t see myself actually preferring one once the novelty ran out.
I’ve avoided the like the plague for all the obvious reasons, my mum has been using one for a few years now and ran into just about all of those reasons.
Permanant mid fold in screen.
Durability lasts far fewer actions than what was in the specs and warranty.
Refurbishing only introduced new issues and failed to resolve old issues.
The fact that there will always be a seam in the folding screen. If I feel it while swiping over it or there’s weird glare because the surface is uneven that would drive me bananas
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