Are Foldable Phones Really the Future? My Trip to Samsung\'s Home Turf Gave Me a Glimpse
Samsung and other device makers are betting big on foldable phones. In Seoul, they're already everywhere.
As I sit in a quaint Japanese-style pub in Seoul's ritzy Gangnam district, a member of the waitstaff excitedly walks over to my table. He's spotted the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 I'd brought with me sitting alongside plates of meat skewers and cups of sake and is eager to get a closer look.
Like many people I met in Seoul last month, Donghwan Yoo is a fan of foldable phones. Such devices are seemingly everywhere in the capital city of Samsung's home country, and many Koreans that my colleague Amy Kim and I spoke with have adopted them in the last six months to a year. Yoo was enamored with Samsung's flip phone from the very start, having purchased the first model more than three years ago because it's easy to carry around, he tells me through Google Translate.
"It's small and convenient to bring anywhere," he says.
Yoo's appreciation sums up the impression that Samsung and other major phone makers are hoping foldables will have. While smartphones have gotten faster, thinner, larger-screened and smarter over the last 15 years, their overall shape -- that solid black slab -- has largely remained the same. Samsung was one of the first companies to attempt changing that, nearly half a decade ago, and now in 2023, other major phone makers like Google and OnePlus are following suit.
That shift is a sign that major tech companies view the smartphone as in need of a shakeup. Seoul seems to be embracing it wholeheartedly, with Z Flips and Z Folds visible on a daily basis.
The emergence of foldable phones doesn't mean traditional smartphones are disappearing. But my studying of market research data and my conversations with both analysts and foldable phone owners suggest they could become the new norm for high-end Android phones.
As I wandered around Seoul, a city of more than 9 million people where Samsung's influence is broadly reflected in the consumer tech market, from flip phones to refrigerators, I felt like I was getting a glimpse into that future.
Lisa Eadicicco
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