Will foldable phones be the next big thing?

Foldable smartphones are the talk of the town in the tech world today. Our Senior Tech Reporter, Antonio Villas-Boas brings us some insight on whether it shows promise, and the do’s and don’ts to keep in mind before buying one.

Bigger Displays Are A Favourite

The smartphone trend that everybody is loving these days is that of having bigger displays. A foldable smartphone will allow you to have that big display and at the same time not occupy too much space. It will fit in pockets, handbags and wallets with ease, and will be super cool in Boas’ opinion.

The First Look By The Big Players

The foldable smartphone will catch on pretty soon in the market if done right. It’s something we’ve only been hearing about over the years and now Samsung, Huawei and Motorola have released their foldable smartphone designs. The Samsung design opens up like a book, the Huawei design opens up like a reversible book with the screen on the outside and the Motorola one looks a tiny bit like the Moto Razr with the clamp design. There are also rumours in the market of two new foldable smartphone models by Samsung. The bigger rumour is that Apple will also be entering the foldable phone market but there are multiple expert opinions which say that they won’t enter this market just yet. Given Apple’s history, it’s safe to assume that they will observe new trends, and if it’s working for their competitors, they will follow suit and probably do a better job.

Still A Work In Progress

Everything that’s first gen usually needs a lot more work and isn’t exactly a dream come true. As of today, there’s not much in place in terms of how it should look, how it will fold, will the material be glass or plastic or a new material that’s unbreakable, or the technology needed to sustain such a model. The tentative price released by Samsung is a whopping $1980.

Risky Business

2019 is not the right time to buy a foldable smartphone since it will be a huge unnecessary risk. There’s no doubt that with time, the engineers will have figured out how to bring down the price, how to avoid a crease on the screen after it has been folded so many times, and any other flaws that will come to light when released. We, as buyers will have more concrete answers then.


It’s definitely going to be a game changer and will be worth the buy once perfected.