The nostalgia of foldable smartphones resulted in many smartphone manufacturers trying to bring their iconic devices to the market again but with new features and technology, but in the same foldable design of the past. 

Smartphone manufacturers like Motorola, Samsung, Huawei have launched a few foldable devices. These include foldable tablets and smartphones. This was only a matter of time before Apple picked up this trend and accepted that the future of smartphones and tablets lie in the foldable design.

Apple has applied for the registrations of a lot of patents regarding various technologies and designs, which would enable a foldable design in a smartphone or a tablet. 

A recent development is that two such designs aimed at a foldable smartphone have passed internal testing. Apple would now evaluate findings and decide on one of the two designs. One design is similar to a Moto Razr foldable design where a flexible OLED is used. Another design is similar to the Microsoft Surface Duo, where two separate displays are connected via a hinge.

The most challenging part for the manufacturers is to design and develop a hinge mechanism, which will last a few years and go through half a million folds at least in order to be commercially viable. Another issue is regarding the flexible display, unlike the hinge, the flexible display will show some sort of wear and tear after a while. This is why a lot of research is being done to develop such a mechanical hinge solution that puts less stress on the flexible display in the folded condition. Each year the flexible display technology shows improvements and is almost ready to be inserted in a lot of foldable devices, but another constraint is the price at this point. 

If a foldable device cannot be offered at the current price of flagship devices, it will not be sold in large numbers. The less the sales expected from a foldable device, the higher its price will be set.

The foldable smartphones have grabbed the attention of the smartphone users, but it is the price which is the issue here. Unless the prices of such foldable smartphones decrease below $1000, it will not capture the market share as much, and will remain a niche segment.

Lets see what foldable prototype Apple design team finalizes, the Microsoft’s Surface Duo design or the Moto Razr’s clamshell design. I hope it’s the latter one.