Report: Apple is testing foldable iPhones, having the same problems as everyone else::Don’t expect these clamshell-style foldables in 2024 or 2025 or maybe ever.
Did anyone ask for folding phones?
Report: Apple is testing foldable iPhones, having the same problems as everyone else
Submitted 9 months ago by L4s@lemmy.world [bot] to technology@lemmy.world
Comments
Pistcow@lemm.ee 9 months ago
KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 months ago
For the love of god, yes. About half the time, I want a phone. The other I want a tablet. A foldable phone similar to the galaxy fold is exactly what I want.
But I’m locked into the Apple ecosystem for multiple reasons. And no, “just get two devices” isn’t that great an option. I don’t use them at the same time, why not just have them be the same device? Also helps with the fact that I might want to go back and forth between something in both modes.
Pistcow@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Well, I just got the S24 Ultra and it’s darnn near tablet size. This dwarfs my previous Note. I’m just happy to finally have a flagship Samsung with a flat screen. Rounded screens suck.
n2burns@lemmy.ca 9 months ago
Sales suggest, “Yes.”
SinningStromgald@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Steve, it was fucking Steve wasn’t it?
ccdfa@lemm.ee 9 months ago
I live in Korea and I see the Samsung foldable phones in the hands of like every 5th person, so yeah I’d say they sell
Pistcow@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Interesting. Seattle, Washington pretty tech centric city, I’ve only seen the one guy. Mostly a 80/20 split between Iphone/Samsung flagship phones.
agitatedpotato@lemmy.world 9 months ago
That’s different than people asking for them. Between status symbols and advertising you can sell anything, weather it was asked for or not. On a real level the whole industry of advertising is to get people to buy things they wouldn’t buy otherwise.
JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz 9 months ago
Samsung is up to Fold 5, so at least someone keeps buying them. Though they are also up to Flip 5, a concept so dumb I honestly won’t believe anyone wants or uses one, so who knows.
Pistcow@lemm.ee 9 months ago
I have seen 1 Fold in the wild, and even then, the guy’s screen was having issues.
JoBo@feddit.uk 9 months ago
Yes! Phones with small screens are not useful. Phones which don’t fit in pockets are not useful. Flip phones solve the problem and I’ve been wanting one for twenty years.
wreckage@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I think the solution is bigger pockets.
I can easily fit my 6.43 inches phone on my pockets, but that might not be true with women clothes
GeekySalsa@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Yes. I have the fold 3 and will ask for another foldable when the time to upgrade comes.
mannycalavera@feddit.uk 9 months ago
I can’t wait for Apple to announce in a key note they’ve revolutionised the phone market again with the world’s first folding phone.
Those apple boys are so talented 😊.
killeronthecorner@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Did you say folding phone? Ew
I think you’ll find it’s the new iPhone 17 with dynamic flex technology and that Tim Cook will repeatedly say on stage that this has “never been done before”.
menemen@lemmy.world 9 months ago
But what apple specific non standard proprietary shit will they implement that Hou will have to buy from them for 20 times the price that competitors offer the equivalent. This is the interesting question.
bruhduh@lemmy.world 9 months ago
They actually was first with FOLDING phone though, remember iPhone 6 bending drama
theherk@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Me too, because in spite of marketing garbage the product will probably be best in class or at least providing competition thereof.
VampyreOfNazareth@lemm.ee 9 months ago
It would be the height of stupidity to copy the bending screen fad. It would also cannibalise sales on their product lines.
gregorum@lemm.ee 9 months ago
the problems:
- they’re crap
- they break easily because they’re crap
- they’re expensive and have a high cost of ownership because they’re crap
- NOBODY FUCKING WANTS THEM
so, why is this happening?
ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 months ago
Personally, I love fold phones. They give me portability and a big screen which are the two things I most want in a phone
imaqtpie@sh.itjust.works 9 months ago
Yeah I totally believe that they break easily and are way too expensive. But that applies to any cutting edge product ever. Assuming the flaws can be engineered out, the fundamental benefit of having a large screen on a small/portable phone is definitely a killer feature.
KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 months ago
Shit on Apple for a lot of things, but if they put out a foldable it’s not likely to be crap hardware. Just overpriced with an annoying OS.
lepinkainen@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Just like Samsung’s phones then? 😆
gregorum@lemm.ee 9 months ago
I get that Apple’s version would be the swankiest version, but I’m not there for it.
jaschen@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Um… I started with a Fold 2 and currently on a fold 5. Maybe YOU don’t want them, but it’s hardly nobody.
GeekySalsa@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I’ve had my fold3 for over 2 years and I absolutely love it. I don’t think I can go back to a bar-phone now. Also, even if you really don’t like folding phones, why fight creativity? Before this phones were getting so boring and completely lacking innovation. They still are in the non-folding market. Even if you don’t like them, choice is never a bad thing.
BombOmOm@lemmy.world 9 months ago
People keep buying them because they don’t realize they are crap. We probably have another few years of this until the people with disposable money get tired of the crap phones.
Kirca@lemmy.world 9 months ago
They aren’t crap at all, stop projecting your opinion as fact.
At worst they’re niche, but provide tangible and easily understandable benefits that you might not care about that others love. That’s like me hating on the newest Samsungs camera, just because I personally don’t value mobile photography.
Your complaints about durabilitu are pretty tied these days, the technology has improved a lot and you can realistically be as careless as you can with any other cell phone. There are valid concerns , such as Samsungs issue with hairline cracking along the hinge, but you can stop parroting points addressed over the past 5 years now.
jaschen@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Their screen is glass under the screen protector and OLED display. So like most phones out there with a screen protector.
As for durability, I have washed and dried my phone in the laundry and dropped my phone going 60mph out of my pocket while riding my motorcycle. Granted I have a case, but still. I’m currently using it to reply to your incorrect message.
glarf@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Hard disagree, fold 4 gang.
Nurgle@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I’d probably never buy one, but they are currently growing very quickly in China. They sold 1.2MM units in Q2 which is a 173% YoY growth rate.
trucy@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 months ago
Why don’t we get back to smaller smartphones like a decadr ago?
metallic_substance@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Same reason you can’t buy a new small pickup truck. They don’t make them because the mass market isn’t there
Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 9 months ago
Cmon! If I promise to put truck nuts on it and drive aggressively will you let me get the small one?
GenEcon@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Because they don’t sell.
TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 9 months ago
If you ignore screen size (which people erroneously use as a metric for phone size, since it’s an easily findable and easy to understand number) and instead look at actual phone dimensions, most phones now aren’t actually dissimilar. Bezels have shrunk a lot.
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Galaxy S24, Jan 2024: 147mm x 70.6mm
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Galaxy S5, Feb 2014: 142mm x 72.5mm
S24 frontal area = 10,378mm²
S5 frontal area = 10,153mm²
The S24 is only 2% larger than its decade-old equivalent. Not something you’d even notice.
If you include the thickness of the device, then the S24 is actually 4% smaller than its decade old equivalent.
Now sure, there were smaller phones, especially if you go further back, like an iPhone 3G genuinely would be considered tiny now.
It’s just worth noting that phones aren’t actually growing each year anymore like people say they are, and they haven’t for a while. Bezels shrinking is a huge change in design for TVs, monitors, laptops, phones.
People are just hearing things like “6.3 inch screen” and they think “wow, my old phone only had a 4.5 inch screen. This phone must be so much larger!”
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Kiosade@lemmy.ca 9 months ago
I have an iphone mini… you need smaller than that? Why? It’s pretty darn small already.
Ugurcan@lemmy.world 9 months ago
They quit Mini business at iPhone 13.
NoisyFlake@lemm.ee 9 months ago
I also have one, and it’s a damn shame that Apple stopped the mini series after the 13. I don’t need half a tablet in my pocket, I need something that easily fits in my pocket and can take halfway decent pictures. I’m not sure that my next phone will be an iPhone because of this, and I’ve exclusively used iPhones since the 4S.
Kosta554@feddit.nl 9 months ago
I would really like to upgrade my 12 mini to an newer Mini model if they ever made one!
chemicalwonka@discuss.tchncs.de 9 months ago
I personally don’t care I don’t want a foldable phone ( my last job gave me a Flip 3 and it was a terrible experience) I’d rather phone with a removable battery than with a foldable screen.
glarf@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I can’t speak for the flip, but the fold 4 is fantastic. I can’t imagine going back to a slab
dm_me_your_boobs@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Same here. I absolutely love mine. Zero issues more than a year in.
JoBo@feddit.uk 9 months ago
Removable batteries for sure, but I spent 20 years waiting for the clamshell design to make a comeback and I love my Flip (4). Phones need to fit in pockets and have a decent sized screen.
PhreakyByNature@feddit.uk 9 months ago
Doubt it will ever get back to how it was with how easily they could be removed but there may be steps towards it euronews.com/…/new-eu-law-to-force-smartphone-mak…
PuddingFeeling907@lemmy.ca 9 months ago
You can replace the battery easily on fairphone 5
BaardFigur@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I’d rather have a unfoldable phone and a tablet than a foldable, which is literally just the worst of both worlds.
ExLisper@linux.community 9 months ago
I would love a foldable phone if the other half you have a good hardware keyboard on it.
Coreidan@lemmy.world 9 months ago
The only improvement I care about is bringing back physical buttons. Touch screens suck ass. I don’t give a fuck about cameras. I don’t give a fuck about folding bullshit. All I want is an interface that doesn’t blow dick. Apple is garbage along with the rest of them.
rottingleaf@lemmy.zip 9 months ago
Most of the buyers think that touchscreens are very future and normal buttons are very past, because touchscreens are like magic, look! And because everybody uses them. And because more pixels. And because they don’t have to reliably enter text most of the time. Especially not looking at the phone.
I think it all still gets down to people poking screens with their fingers thinking it looks smarter and more elegant (LOL). It has a lot to do with how it looks for others.
KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 months ago
It’s more the fact that hardware buttons take away from screen real estate. Yeah, the touch method kinda sucks, but when you’re done with the keyboard it poofs away into more screen.
If you try to put a keyboard on a recent phone for example, and you don’t try to minimize it into oblivion, you’re losing about 4/5ths of the screen. That isn’t a crazy amount, but when you’re playing a game or watching a video, that loses out on quite a bit of space.
Not to mention the aspect ratio would be off for so many things.
skulblaka@startrek.website 9 months ago
I remember hearing something a few years ago about some companies working on better tactile feedback on touch screen buttons, making them more “clicky” and feeling more like real physical buttons. Sounded complicated and I don’t think anyone really did anything with it except for Samsung making the home button super clicky on my old Galaxy. I wonder if that will ever resurface, it seemed like a good compromise for folks who wanted real buttons.
sebinspace@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Only folding phone I’ll accept is a Surface Duo type setup. Don’t fold the panel itself, just have a different panel.
KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 months ago
With a seam? I think I’d personally absolutely hate that.
sebinspace@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Okay
BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Samsung briefly had an S4 like this. Oh, I so wanted it to come to market.
autotldr@lemmings.world [bot] 9 months ago
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Apple is purportedly working on a foldable iPhone internally, according to “a person with direct knowledge of the situation” speaking to The Information.
The report has a long list of design challenges that Apple has faced in developing foldable phones: they’re too thick when folded up; they’re easily broken; they would cost more than non-foldable versions; the seam in the middle of the display tends to be both visible and feel-able; and the hinge on an iPad-sized device would prevent the device from sitting flat on a table (though this concern hasn’t stopped Apple from introducing substantial camera bumps on many of its tablets and all of its phones).
If many of those challenges sound familiar, it’s because it’s a detailed list of virtually every bad thing you could say about current foldable Android phones, even after multiple hardware generations.
Our first Pixel Fold didn’t even survive the pre-release review period, and those well-earned durability concerns plus the relatively high cost have limited foldable phones to roughly 1.6 percent of all smartphone sales, according to recent analyst estimates.
It makes sense that Apple would be testing some big swings as it thinks about the next era of iPhone design; our iPhone 15 review called them the iPhone’s “final form,” insofar as it feels like there’s not much room to continue to improve on the iPhone X-style full-screen design that Apple has been iterating on since 2017.
It sounds like foldable phones will only be in Apple’s future if the company can manage to overcome the same issues that have tripped up other foldables—though to be fair, the company does have a pretty good decadeslong track record on that front.
The original article contains 336 words, the summary contains 279 words. Saved 17%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Mr_Dr_Oink@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Apple already made a folding phone. It was called the iphone 6.
theangryseal@lemmy.world 9 months ago
My boomerang lasted many years though, I’ll give it that.
I just upgraded from the 6 Plus to the 12 Max like a year ago.
I know Lemmy hates Apple, but I love iOS. Probably because I started on it. My son almost has me convinced though. I might let him pick my next phone and put LineageOS on it.
9715698@lemmy.world 9 months ago
If I were to get an iPhone, the primary reason would be for longevity. The update support has just been so hard to find on Android. Let’s see now that Google and Samsung are pledging more than 2 OS updates, but their commitment remains to be seen.