Samsung’s foldable Galaxy X may hit shelves in 2019

For years, it’s been rumored Samsung has been working on a foldable smartphone. The company even released a concept video in 2013 of what the phone might look like. The Galaxy X, Galaxy F, or Winner could be released as early as 2019. The device is rumored to have a 7-inch display, a folded wallet design, and could cost over $1,500. Senior tech reporter Antonio Villas-Boas explains what we know so far about Samsung’s foldable phone. Following is a transcript of the video.

Tony: One of the most anticipated smartphones of, well, recent memory is Samsung’s foldable phone. Some have their own ideas of what it should be called. We have – one idea was Samsung Winner which I’m personally all about. I like that a lot. I think it should be called the Winner. The other one is called the Galaxy F. And also the Galaxy X, which is the more, you know, widely accepted name for this foldable phone. Now, we know actually that Samsung is indeed working on a foldable phone that comes straight from DJ Koh. Still, we don’t know when to expect it. Probably not by the end of 2018 is my guess. Wall Street Journal came out with a report. They said maybe 2019. That seems a little more likely.

One of the reasons why I don’t think it’s going to be coming out this year is because, honestly, there are not a lot of rumors about it. Nothing really concrete that we’re seeing online, and that could mean that the phone isn’t really in production yet. However, we can make some educated guesses. There’s some speculation and we can just have a little fun with our imagination too. Samsung even had a video with a foldable phone in it just a few years ago. That gave a hint at the time that Samsung was indeed working on a foldable phone. That was a few years ago, and the company’s just been sort of, I guess, working on it for this whole time.

Samsung Video: All in a day’s work for Samsung.

Tony: One rumor that has made it so far on the internets. It could have a seven-inch display. And diagonally that is. That’s a pretty big phone, right? Of course, it’s foldable. So, it’s not going to be this huge giant tablet that you’re holding in your hands. You know, you could sort of use it for a while. Close it up like a wallet. And once you’ve folded it up, put it in your pocket, like a wallet. It sounds kind of fragile, right? Kind of breakable. But Samsung very conveniently, very good timing, announced an unbreakable sort of display for smartphones. That would be a good fit, I would imagine, with a foldable phone. Because, I mean, there is another foldable phone out there. It exists. Called the ZTE Axon M. And it’s actually a really interesting phone. And basically, it’s just two phones attached by a hinge in the middle. So, it’s kind of like a book. So, there’s already a foldable phone out there. We’re hoping it’s not it. And we don’t expect that to be the design. Because it does make the phone really thick. I mean the Axon M is just really chunky. It doesn’t inspire the future of smartphones.

We’re banking and hoping on the more sort of wallet design. Something else we’re expecting. A large battery. I’m imagining that it would need a pretty significantly large battery to power a seven-inch display. A larger battery means, you know, a thicker phone. A heavier phone too. We are expecting this phone to be expensive. I think it’s gonna be closer to the $1,500 range. And we’re also expecting Samsung to have a very limited release of this. There are a lot of issues that we have no idea about. We just do not know. This is kind of just what we’re expecting and hoping to see. Maybe early 2019. Stay tuned. It’ll be interesting to see if Samsung includes its signature Infinity edge. Maybe they might not include it on the Galaxy Winner. Right? Winner? Make it so, Samsung.