The future of foldable phones with Android OS

The MWC 2023 in Barcelona was spectacularly conceived by Lenovo, including its Motorola brand. It showcased the Motorola Rizr scrollable phone concept, extending a series of such experiments that began the year before last with LG and continued with Oppo. Lenovo, or Motorola, however, is apparently much further along, and at the press conference presented us with a nearly finished device that was largely functional.

Rizr is Motorola’s scrollable future

The basis of the whole device, called Rizr, is a solid body around which the display scrolls. The advantage of this solution is that, when rolled up, it will be a compact phone with a 5″ diagonal display. When rolled out, the panel diagonal grows to 6.5″. The Android system will be adapted to react smoothly to the increase or decrease of the display and will be able to rearrange everything. For example, this already worked in the YouTube app, where the display would automatically zoom in when a video was launched.

The scrolling display will be used in virtually any circumstance. When rolled up, part of the display will be on the back of the phone and will be used to display notifications or for taking photos. A similar principle is used by the current Motorola Razr. You may also notice that the front-facing selfie camera is not visible by default. It only ever appears as needed by rolling out the display.

At the end of the presentation of the Motorola Rizr scrolling, the information that the manufacturer does not know yet when and if it will even sell this device. At the moment, the development is not over, as evidenced, for example, by the lack of a fingerprint reader. This should be on the right side or somewhere on the back in case of deliveries to end customers, according to the manufacturer.

Foldable phones from Samsung

Samsung is expected to launch three more high-end smartphones later this year. Two of them are expected to be the Galaxy Z Fold5 and Galaxy Z Flip5, while the third is expected to be the Galaxy S23 FE. According to the latest leak, the latter won’t happen and the Korean giant will introduce a new type of flexible phone instead of the next “budget flagship”.

Reliable leaker Yogesh Brar on Twitter said that Samsung will not unveil the Galaxy S23 FE this year, as many unofficial reports claim. Instead, the Korean giant is said to reveal the world’s first dual-bend smartphone. The device will reportedly feature a foldable OLED screen with two hinges that will allow it to transform from a compact phone to a large-screen tablet. It’s possible that this is the device with the alleged Galaxy Z Duo-Fold or Galaxy Z Tri-Fold name that we first heard about a few years ago. It could be powered by the same chip that the current Galaxy S23 flagship series uses, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy. According to Brar, the device will launch alongside the fifth generation of the traditional Z Fold and Flip, which should be in the summer.

The Galaxy Z Fold5 and Z Flip5 are expected to use a new drop-shaped hinge that will allow the internal display to fold with a wider radius. This should result in a less visible crease than the fourth Z Fold and Flip. Such a design would also allow the phones to fold flat. In addition, both should feature IPX8 water resistance.

Oppo Find N3 will offer a better display than its predecessor

In mid-December, Chinese company Oppo expanded its catalog with more foldable phones. In addition to the clamshell dubbed as Find N2 Flip, which will soon head to Europe, the Find N2 smartphone, which is targeted at more demanding users, has also hit the shelves. Now, the first details of its successor are leaking out.

With the details comes renowned leaker Digital Chat Station, who as usual posted his beliefs on the Weibo platform. Although he didn’t reveal that much information, what we know from him suggests that we can look forward to slightly better screen specs. While the panel technology will once again be LTPO-type OLED and the refresh rate will remain at 120Hz, we’ll reportedly see a higher resolution of 2260×2440 pixels instead of the original 1792×1920 pixels.

In this regard, Oppo could even trump the current flagship among Samsung’s folders, the Galaxy Z Fold 4, whose resolution is 1812×2176 pixels. Didgital Chat Station also reported in another post that Oppo’s next slide will offer a 50Mpx main camera and a periscopic camera for better quality zoom shots.