We’re in the midst of an arms race in the premium phone market, with Samsung, Google, Huawei, and others all battling for the most eye-catching foldable design. But if rumors are to be believed (and yes, that’s a big “if”), Samsung is working on a rollable screen phone that could bring sci-fi elements into your very real pocket.
Rumor has it that Samsung will adapt the Rollable Flex OLED display concept it showed off in 2023 into a mainstream design. Korean news outlet The Elec claims that this phone would start with a typical “candybar” form factor, but would unfold to a massive 12.4-inch display. That’s roughly the same size as an iPad Pro, in a gadget you can put in your pocket (assuming you’re wearing men’s pants, anyway).
The phone is expected to launch in the second half of 2025, which would put it in the same price range as the next-gen Galaxy Z phones, presumably the Z7 Fold and Z7 Flip. The only other detail shared is that it uses the under-display camera that the Z series has featured for several generations.
Foldable phones are still a tiny fraction of the market, even though the category has been around for over five years. That’s because prices are climbing to $2,000 and users are reluctant to shell out that much money for a device that’s inherently less durable than a traditional smartphone. The leak suggests that Samsung is particularly disappointed with sales of the Galaxy Z6 and S24 series. Again, that could be because prices have climbed to $2,000. might well It has something to do with phones costing more than a month’s rent.
But Samsung still needs to stay in the premium status symbol market, if only to keep up appearances. In addition to the fierce competition from the iPhone, the Z Fold series shines brightly. Google’s Pixel 9 Pro Fold is slightly thinner, and Huawei currently holds the title of stunning presentation with the tri-fold Mate XT and its 10.2-inch display. Samsung needs an ambitious new device, the phone equivalent of a Nissan GT-R, to get consumers excited about the brand and its lower-end devices, where the real sales volume and money are.
And Samsung is certainly well equipped to pull this off. It’s South Korea’s largest company, frequently competing with its Display division for the most advanced technology on the market, and supplying millions of displays per year, even to its competitors. Remember, most of the iPhones you see are equipped with a Samsung OLED display.
But it’s still a huge risk. Such a form factor would pose immense technical challenges before it could reach commercialization, including fitting a usable battery for a tablet-sized display into a phone-sized frame. The disappointing performance of separate batteries remains one of the major weaknesses of Samsung’s sixth-generation foldable phones. The 2023 concept display used a motorized frame to show off the rolling action, with no hands-on demonstration available. Who knows if that’ll make it into the final design.
Even if this rumor is true, there’s a good chance that Samsung will have such trouble developing the device that it will miss the 2025 release window, or be abandoned altogether. But even as someone who waits a generation or two before buying new technology, I can’t deny that I’m excited. I’ve literally dreamed of a device like this, a phone-sized thing that transforms and unfolds into a laptop-sized screen. I hope it’s real, and I hope Samsung can make it a commercial reality.
