The foldable display is the industry’s – and Samsung’s – answer to the static slab-phone design. It enables features of a completely new form, but also comes with limitations.
Flexible display technology can be divided into two main directions: foldable and foldable. Samsung has experimented with foldable devices a lot but never touched the foldable side.
There are many patents for rolling designs that exist, and one of Samsung’s former competitors, LG, even developed a rollable phone prototype before exiting the smartphone market altogether.
I’m not saying that the flexible phone project lost the distinction of LG mobile phones, but maybe it didn’t help. In any case, I remain very skeptical about this use of dynamic displays. I may be an outsider, but I just don’t believe in such rolling designs.
Rollable phones sound exciting in my opinion, but in my experience, turning them into real products presents more problems and compromises than most people realize.
Is the pursuit of flexible phones the end?
Personally, I’m close to saying yes. Flip phones come with so many engineering and design challenges that mass-producing them may not be feasible.
The more you think about this concept, the more problems arise. Here are the main reasons I believe that roaming phones may not be the best.
- Additional moving parts: If rollable phones already seem too complicated, rollables can be even worse. Naturally they present more points of failure than slab type and folding devices.
- The squeegee effect: Keeping dust and debris away from internal parts is already difficult for foldables. A display that slides back into the chassis can attract lint, dust, and particles, then drag the screen into them – like a squeegee – and cause permanent damage.
- Mechanical failure: Even a manual rolling machine sounds like an engineering nightmare. Add engines to the mix, and the risk of failure increases dramatically. Samsung struggled with the Galaxy A80’s super-simplistic automotive design, and the rollable display only adds to the flimsiness and complexity.
- Vehicle slowness: Given how delicate soft displays are, an automatic folding machine will need to work a little harder by design. Watching the phone slowly unlock may look impressive once or twice, but the novelty will wear off quickly.
- Waterproofing: Samsung has spent years bringing sensible IP ratings to folders. A rollable design would likely be more difficult to seal out water and dust. Right now, I’m not convinced that a rugged, well-protected and commercial-looking foldable phone is possible.
- Internal space limitations: A rollable display and its design can take up a lot of interior space, forcing compromises elsewhere. Probably too many. Samsung’s existing folders already have problems with battery life, and rolling will be worse due to sacrificing internal space.
- Cost of production: All the extra R&D and mechanical complexity can push the cost of producing rideable phones beyond reasonable levels. They certainly seem to be right now.
- A fixable nightmare: Folders are already expensive and difficult to maintain. Rollables will likely make repairs more difficult and expensive.
- A few form features: Due to internal space constraints, it seems difficult (or impossible) to achieve a tablet hybrid using a rollable design. The Galaxy Z TriFold can be 3x larger when unfolded. For a mobile phone to hide the screen of a foldable tablet inside its body, it would need a thicker chassis and a new interior design approach.
Abhijeet Mishra / SamMobile
Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold – Source: Abhijeet Mishra / SamMobile
These are some of the issues that come to mind when I think of replacement phones. But the list is not complete.
But what about human intelligence? It can do wonders. Can developers finally overcome these problems with enough time and money? Maybe. But when does the pursuit become pointless?
Right now, I think flip phones are already crossing that line. But the most important thing of all is that foldables can achieve the same basic goal, that is, the characteristics of many forms within the same device, with very few compromises, moving parts, points of failure, and resources used.
That said, I’m inclined to believe that the foreseeable future of flexible displays is still for folders. What comes after that, in the not too distant future, is open to debate. But rollables feel too ambitious, too flimsy, and too expensive to be practical non-rollable alternatives anytime soon.
Finally, flexible designs may find a niche, perhaps when foldables become old news. But until then, and as long as there is still room for growth in the folding department, I don’t believe rollables have a chance. This may not be the most popular opinion, and maybe Samsung will prove me wrong sooner rather than later. Only time will tell.