3 days ago
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 has me excited for Samsung's Galaxy G Fold tri-fold
After months of leaks built a lot of anticipation, Samsung finally unveiled its vastly improved Galaxy Z Fold 7 last week. I've spent eight days with it, and as I found in our Galaxy Z Fold 7 review, it's the best folding phone for most people despite its shortcomings. Samsung's new folding phone is its best yet, offering radical improvements in design, display, and hinge to create the first folding phone that feels no different from a regular smartphone when folded.
Alongside the Galaxy Z Fold 7, Samsung announced the new Galaxy Z Flip 7, the Flip 7 FE, and the Galaxy Watch 8 range. Yet, the expectation was that Samsung would also provide a sneak peek, like it did with the Galaxy S25 Edge at the Galaxy S25 launch, of its first product in another category: a Tri-folding phone with dual hinges that is expected to be called the Galaxy G Fold.
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After using the Galaxy Z Fold 7, I'm a lot more excited for Samsung's first tri-folding phone. Here's why.
The key learnings from the Galaxy Z Fold 7
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 proves that Samsung can build an excellent thin phone, and this will be necessary to ensure the Galaxy G Fold remains pocketable and ergonomically friendly when folded to a regular smartphone-sized screen.
At 4.2mm thick when unfolded, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is one of the thinnest folding phones you'll find. At 8.9mm thick when folded, it's virtually imperceptible from a regular smartphone. Yes, there's a camera bump that's necessary to house the 200MP camera, which is better than the same one on the Galaxy S25 Edge, but not as good as the same sensor in the Galaxy S25 Ultra.
For Samsung to make its tri-folding phone appealing, it'll need the Galaxy Z Fold 7 to get even thinner. The only other tri-fold, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate, measures just 3.9mm thick when unfolded, but the Galaxy Z Fold 7's improvements have convinced me that Samsung can also deliver here.
Another area where the Galaxy G Fold is likely to excel is in software. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 suggests that we could see more experiences optimized for the big screen that have been built in partnership with Google. Android 16 introduces support for native multitasking and is optimized for the big screen, featuring several Gemini features designed specifically with the large screen format in mind.
One key Galaxy Z Fold 7 feature makes the difference
The larger screens on the Galaxy Z Fold 7 also demonstrate that Samsung can address another key issue: the crease.
Simply put, it's the least perceptible crease I've used on a folding phone, and I've used almost all folding phones released globally. Yes, you can still notice it under specific light reflections, but you see it more than feel it when running your finger over the crease.
By nature of their form factor, tri-folding phones have two creases in the display. The noticeable divot in past Samsung folding phones would make the tri-folding screen feel appalling, but the redesigned titanium hinge and the carbon fiber sheet have convinced me that it won't be a problem.
As I exclusively discovered during an interview with Samsung's VP of smartphone development (embedded above), the company has a very nifty hinge design that is designed to improve how the crease ages over time.
Expect there to be a lot of competition
Samsung is widely credited with helping create the current folding phone market, and it is also widely expected to be a driving force behind trifolding smartphones. However, its rival companies have already proven that the tri-folding phone form factor has competition.
Huawei launched the Mate XT Ultimate Design as the world's first trifold smartphone, building on Huawei's extensive history of making folding phones. The company is widely expected to launch a successor in the coming months, and it remains to be seen whether the Galaxy g-fold will simply match the Mate XT Ultimate or surpass it.
Then there's the Tecno G Fold concept, which was recently launched by Tecno ahead of an expected unveiling at MWC 2026 in February. The Techno G fold is just a concept, and Tecno's previous Phantom Ultimate concept never graduated to a commercial product, but it shows that companies are taking the tri-folding form factor seriously. Much like Samsung built the current folding phone market, it is likely to play a starring role in making trifolding phones a reality.
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 will need some improvements
One area I hope Samsung will improve considerably is the battery. The Galaxy Z Fold 7 features a 4,400 mAh battery, while the Huawei Mate XT has a 5,600 mAh battery. The latter is a larger phone, so it's expected to have a larger battery, but it's similarly sized to Huawei's Galaxy Z Fold 7 competitor, the Mate 60.
Samsung has proven steadfast in its desire to stick with the tried-and-tested Lithium-Ion battery technology, but I hope the Galaxy G Fold is when Samsung finally makes the switch to Silicon Carbon battery technology. This would allow the Galaxy G Fold to feature a more dense battery – up to 24% more capacity in the same physical volume – without compromising its thinness. Suppose the capacity remains the same as the Galaxy Z Fold 7. In that case, it will likely have worse battery life, even with phenomenal optimization, meaning it may not last a full day of usage.
On the camera front, the Galaxy Z Fold 7's camera specifications surpass those of the Mate XT Ultimate on paper, although I haven't had the opportunity to compare them yet. The 200MP main camera has a higher resolution than the 50MP main, and the 12MP ultra-wide camera is nearly identical. The Fold 7 only offers a 3x telephoto zoom from its telephoto, so this is an area where the Galaxy G Fold will be closer to the 5.5x zoom offered by Huawei.
There is one other decision that Samsung may want to reconsider: the lack of the S-Pen. The company removed the digitizer layer to make the Galaxy Z Fold 7 much thinner, but it means there's no S Pen support at all. Considering that Samsung's tablets all support an S Pen, it'll be interesting to see if the company can bring this feature back.
I love the Galaxy Z Fold 7 despite its flaws, and it's easily the best folding phone for most people, especially as it's more widely available. Now I can't wait to see what Samsung can do in the tri-folding arena when the Galaxy G Fold launches later this year.
