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.
It’s a gimmick that makes phones less reliable and doesn’t add value to the experience.
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.
Why the fuck would I want mechanical stress?
The phrase “what’s stopping you” implies we’re all interested, but hesitant.
This is a really, really bad assumption.
Why are you not interested? I personally like the idea of either having a normal size phone that gets larger or a normal size phone that gets smaller. Are you saying you sre not interested in foldable phones at all?
Disinterest is the default position until something sparks interest. Asking why I’m not interested is, with respect, a nonsense question that can only have one answer: because I haven’t seen anything about it that sparks my interest. “It folds” is not enough to make me feel any desire to own one; I don’t care that it folds. I don’t need it to fold. To me, this is like installing a microwave in my vacuum cleaner. Like, sure, now my vacuum cleaner objectively does more stuff and “is better,” but that’s not exactly a feature I’m looking for in a vacuum cleaner, and size-changing is not a feature I’m looking for in a phone.
If you want one, you should get one. I’m glad the option exists so that people for whom “it folds” is enough to spark interest can be happy and have neat toys.
I respect your opinion although I cant see why you think foldable phones dont make the phone “better”.
Price. It’s just too high to consider for me right now when I can get phones with the same computing power for half the cost
Uhh the price tag? I just bought a new phone after 6 years of honoured service from my old one, payed the new one a whopping 300€ and it already felt like a rip off. Ain’t no way I’m paying four digits for a phone.
