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Huawei’s latest Tri-Fold Smartphone Concept creates an IMPOSSIBLE Task for Phone Case Makers…

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A photo of TCL’s tri-fold smartphone concept

Spotted in the wild in the hands of Huawei CEO, it seems like the Tri-Fold smartphone may just end up becoming a reality. Whether we need one is an entirely separate question (has that truly ever stopped tech companies?), so let’s ask ourselves something more relevant – How would you design a protective case for this new breed of smartphone?

A brief recap on the phone itself – photos of Richard Yu, CEO of Huawei, emerged last week holding a strange smartphone. It was a foldable, but unlike conventional flip or fold phones, this one had three panels with two hinges (sort of like this wild Samsung concept from 2020). Dubbed the tri-fold, this phone managed to get quite a bit of coverage on the internet, with people speculating tech specs, launch dates, and even one Twitter (or X) user wagering a price of $4000 USD. Nevertheless, when I saw the phone, I had three distinct thoughts in this exact order.

A. Wow, that’s an impressively thin tri-fold phone.
B. Is there really a market for this?
C. There’s absolutely no way you can make a case or screen guard for this phone.

I’ve made an illustration below of what the phone would look like if you went about designing a case for it (and why the case wouldn’t work), and I’ve also taken the liberty of designing what I believe is the only possible case style you can make for such a phone.

With regular foldables, the obvious way to make a case is to design a two-part case that protects the bumper around the front, and the entire back. Regular smartphones have two displays, one front-facing one, and another folding one, and it’s important to remember that the case should never obstruct the display. With Huawei’s Tri-Fold, however, you’ve actually got one single display zigzagging from the front to the inside. Look at the image above and you’ll understand what I mean. Designing any sort of case (with as many parts as possible) complicates the phone’s usage rather than protecting it. Think of the obvious 3-part case that snaps onto all three panels and you’re faced with two massive problems – firstly, the case obstructs the screen when you look at how it fits on the middle panel. Secondly, shutting the case would mean having it sandwiched within the phone’s panels and probably press/damage the display… sort of like shutting your laptop screen with a charging cable, USB drive, or even your keys kept on the keyboard.

An impossible case design shown in red, and the only plausible case design shown in green.

The only real way you can make ANY sort of protective case for the Tri-Fold is to design one single part that fits only on the rear of the back panel. This means the first two panels don’t get any form of protection (because they can’t, really), leaving more than 60% of your phone vulnerable to drops, etc. The most you can really do is add a bumper protector to the front that only covers the edges, but that still leaves the middle panel (the most crucial panel in my opinion) to damage. It’s safe to say that screen protectors are out of the question too – something that still wasn’t a problem for regular two-fold smartphones, because you can still shield the front-facing screen with a plastic or tempered glass protector.

Huawei CEO Richard Yu pictured holding a prototype of Huawei’s alleged tri-fold smartphone

That basically puts a lot of pressure on Huawei to make sure this phone is rock-solid… which is already a pretty big challenge considering they also need to make the phone slim, and ensure that those hinges work with 100% reliability. The hinges are a separate issue too, given that so much depends on both hinges working flawlessly every time to ensure you have a flat screen when you open your phone completely. The one standout positive with this phone is that at least it gives you a more palatable aspect ratio when opened completely, as compared to the current foldables that give you a weird square display that doesn’t really work well with landscape OR portrait media. For now, details on the Huawei Tri-Fold are incredibly scant, although PhoneArena does a pretty good job speculating and gathering as many rumors to paint a full picture of this absolutely wild device. Whether it’s a good idea to make a dual-hinge tri-fold phone with an alleged $4000 price tag is still an entirely different debate.

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Foldable Phone Designs are about to get more interesting but also less diverse

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The number of foldable phones launching each year is slowly rising, suggesting that these former novelty items are here to stay. To manufacturers’ credit, the phones are getting more reliable and attractive, even if their prices are still prohibitive for most people. With more players in the market, it’s bound to become a somewhat livelier place, with brands putting their own spins or changing designs to match or challenge their rivals. It now seems, however, that the still niche foldable phone category is about to enter another tumultuous phase with new designs that could shake up the market and some companies throwing in the towel, leaving only a few designs to stick and stagnate.

Triple Folding Phones

The biggest and perhaps only reason for a foldable phone would be to provide a device that can be used as a regular phone when wanted but can transform into a tablet when you want more screen real estate. The current crop of foldable phones does meet those requirements, though almost barely. As tablets, they’re painfully tiny even compared to the already small iPad mini and some 7-inch slates. As phones, some designs make them awkward to use because of their narrow and tall external screens.

One possible solution would be to have a large screen that can fold in three parts, turning into a phone-sized slab, albeit probably a bit thicker than even today’s foldable phones. Samsung has, in fact, been working on such a design for years and it finally showed off a prototype two years ago. It turns out that it might even launch its first tri-fold phone slash tablet later this year.

Designer: Samsung

This timeline is reportedly due to one of Samsung’s biggest rivals trying to make a move first. Huawei, who is rebuilding its empire in some markets, is rumored to be launching a foldable phone that transforms into a 10-inch tablet. Just for the title of being the “world’s first,” Samsung could be taking a big risk and making a leap of faith to get that triple foldable phone out the door quickly, even if it means repeating the mistakes of the first Galaxy Fold.

Stylus Support Inside and Out

One of the biggest draws of foldable phones is, of course, their big screens. They’re not just perfect for showing more content, but they’re also great for actually creating content. With tablets now being seen as productivity and creativity tools thanks to the iPad Pro, these foldable phones are truly powerful laptops you can fit in your pocket, at least in theory. Ironically, very few of the brands actually support such a use case with the right accessories. Even Samsung forces you to buy the S Pen Fold Edition if you want to scribble and doodle on your foldable phone like a notebook.

The newly launched mouthful that is the Honor Magic V2 RSR Porsche Design bucks the trend by actually including a stylus inside the box. Granted, the price of this limited edition would make you think it should include such an item, but you’re also paying for other luxuries at the same time. For example, you get two charging bricks instead of one. Some foldable phones other than Samsung don’t even advertise support for a stylus even if they’re capable of supporting one.

Designer: Honor

More interesting, however, is how the Honor Magic V2 RSR Porsche Design actually supports that active stylus not only on the large internal screen but also on the smaller cover screen. That one-ups even Samsung who is famed for its stylus-enabled Galaxy Note phablets, now sold under the Galaxy S Ultra brand. Honor is showing that such a set of features is possible, and it could lead to a long-overdue trend in the foldable smartphone market, presuming there’s still one in the next few years.

Design Monoculture

One of the reasons why the foldable phone market seems to have stabilized a bit is because of the number of players now in the ring. Of course, you have Samsung and Huawei leading the charge, but now you also have Xiaomi, OPPO, Vivo, Tecno, OnePlus, and Honor in the running. Unfortunately, there are whispers that two of these are bowing out of the race, and their absence could actually have an indirect though significant negative impact on foldable phones as a whole.

Those rumors claim that both OPPO and vivo are calling it quits in the foldable market. The cited reason is not exactly surprising, with both brands suffering significant losses in foldable phone sales last year and they don’t believe they can throw in more resources to recover. It’s unknown at this point whether OnePlus will also be following its cousins, though there’s a real possibility that these manufacturers will pull out sooner rather than later.

Designer: OPPO

While that indeed sounds like a win for Samsung and Huawei (and Honor), it might not actually be good for the entire market in the long run. Competition often breeds innovation, with these brands pushing each other to develop new designs and features at every turn. With only two contenders, each with their own separate kingdoms, there might not be enough incentive to push the boundaries, leading to stagnation and eventual death of the market.

Designer: Vivo

Uncertain Tomorrow

Of course, there’s still no confirmation that OPPO and Vivo are indeed making an exit strategy, but it does paint a picture that isn’t as rosy as these brands try to paint. Even with the popularity of clamshell-style foldables and with new models coming out year after year, actual sales might actually reveal a very different and less encouraging situation. Given the way technology is developing, foldable and rollable displays will eventually be a staple of tomorrow’s devices, but that doesn’t mean the market won’t experience a few flops first along the way.

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Samsung triple foldable phone rumor hints at a 2024 launch

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Foldable smartphones are an attempt at solving an old problem with two diametrically opposed goals. On the one hand, people want large screens that give them enough space for their content, from videos to social media to even work. On the other hand, they still want a device they can conveniently carry around, especially inside their pockets. Today’s generation of foldable phones similar to the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold deliver a phone that does transform into a tablet, but the latter is admittedly still a small piece of screen real estate, even smaller than the iPad mini. Having a regular tablet-sized display requires drastically changing the design and construction of a foldable phone, which isn’t exactly easy to pull off, judging by the current state of foldables. That’s not to say that manufacturers haven’t been working on a feasible solution, and Samsung itself might be ready to unveil its answer this year to beat one of its rivals to the punch.

Designer: Samsung (via @Tech_Reve)

The current design of foldable phones has never been the endgame. If you reference Samsung’s concept video back in 2013, you will realize its ambitions go beyond this simple foldable design. A phone that unfolds into a tablet would definitely need more than just one fold, and the company’s display manufacturing arm has been working on such a screen for years now. In fact, it demonstrated in 2022 how close it was to an actually usable form, suggesting that such a device is not only plausible but might even be just around the corner.

A new rumor adds fuel to speculations that Samsung might, in fact, announce this “Flex S” triple foldable phone this year, maybe even alongside the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Flip 6. Samsung might be in a rush to push out this revolutionary new device due to rumors that long-time rival Huawei also has a tri-fold phone that it will be launching in the second half of 2024. Unsurprisingly, Samsung wouldn’t want Huawei to claim the title of “first,” even if the Chinese brand has extremely limited market reach these days.

A triple folding phone, under the prototype name of “Flex S,” will drastically change the game when it comes to foldables. Not only will it offer a much larger screen in tablet form, it also allows the collapsed phone form to retain a wider aspect ratio, unlike the Galaxy Z Fold designs so far. At the same time, it also offers new modes of use for the device, from a tent-like stand mode to a unique laptop mode that’s like having a mini dual-screen laptop.

That said, haste always makes waste and Samsung should have already learned its lesson five years ago. Even after years of R&D, the first Samsung Galaxy Fold (no “Z” in the name yet) was plagued with problems, especially when it came to reliability. Given how a new tri-fold design will once again test the durability of flexible screens, there will be even more risks and costs this time around. And with Huawei’s limited presence in global markets, Samsung has no need to be afraid of not being the first, but that has never stopped any company from rushing out a product launch anyway.

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