(upbeat music)
- So the phones, they fold now,
they fold like this and they fold like this,
and they fold like this.
And they also fold like this.
So lots of different ways to fold,
but here's the question.
Why would you want that?
What I want to do in this video
is talk about all the different kinds of folding phones
that are coming out right now,
and what their benefits really are.
Because look, folding phones are super expensive.
You are not getting one of these for less than 1300 bucks.
Unless we talk about this weird LG
with its extra screen case thing.
In general, folding phones are more expensive.
They're usually more fragile,
and they're also usually thicker than a regular phone
when they're folded up.
Plus on top of all that, every single one of these phones
has its own particular software quirks.
That is all a lot of reasons not to buy a folding phone.
And honestly, I don't think you should buy a folding phone.
Not yet anyway.
But assume the price could come down
and the durability hit some bar where it's good enough.
And that might take a while, but assume all that happens,
then the question really is
why would you want one of these folded the phones?
And the answer turns out to be different
for every single one of these phones.
Well, maybe some of them are actually kind of like tablets.
They're computers?
No, we are not going into the what's a computer question.
We're just gonna call these Android devices.
Okay? (laughs) Done.
I put these Android devices into four basic categories.
There are flip phones, like the Galaxy Z Flip.
There are single screen folding phones,
like the Galaxy Fold.
There are dual screen folding phones,
like the Microsoft Duo.
And there's other, like this LG here.
You know what?
Let's just get other out of the way,
because other is where LG lives.
This is the LG velvet,
with a second screen accessory case for it.
And it basically lets you run two apps at once.
And I mean, it works sorta,
but the thing is just big and thick, kind of fussy.
Other is also where LG does other weird things
like the LG wing concept,
which rotates and shows a second screen behind it.
I love you LG,
and you deserve to have one of these ideas become a hit.
Just not there yet.
I just hope you keep swinging for the fences.
So really all of the momentum right now
is behind these three ideas.
The flip phone, the single fold folding phone
and the dual screen folding phone.
And each has its benefits and drawbacks.
And you know, just saying, "Benefits and drawbacks,"
Is really cliche and it's easy to ignore.
So I'm gonna try and hit this a little bit harder
because this is really important.
They are good at different things.
And what that really means is they have different purposes.
And you should know what the purpose
of each device is going in
because that purpose is the answer
to the reason why you might wanna buy
one of these folding phones.
Now, there is one purpose
that all three of these phones share.
They're just cool.
They're cool, and they're different, all right?
I mean, this is rad.
This is literal glass that folds in half.
I mean, come on, you can't be cynical about this.
And the Duo is just beautiful.
Look how thin it is.
Just look at it. It's amazing.
Luxury tiers exist in pretty much
every major consumer product category.
And these are luxury products.
Phones aren't just about functionality,
they're also cultural artifacts, just like any other thing.
There's luxury handbags, and now you've got luxury phones.
There's this other benefit to these phones
that they all share that's a little bit hard to quantify.
You close it, and your phone stuff is shut,
it's done inside the phone.
You don't just set the phone down,
you physically change it's state.
It becomes an entity attentional act.
It says, "I am done with this."
And maybe that also is going to mean
that you need to make an equally intentional act
to open it up and look at your phone.
And maybe that makes you
just a little bit less likely to have all of your attention
dominated by your phone, Android device, whatever.
So let's talk about each of these categories
of folding Android devices and what they're good at.
Theoretically anyway,
sometimes the execution falls a little bit short.
The first and the simplest category is the flip phone style.
This takes the phone shape that you already know,
and maybe love, and then you get to fold it in half
and get something smaller.
It is a little bit of a thicker package,
but it's a smaller one.
So it sits in your pocket or your bag differently,
and I think better.
You get the physical benefit of a more compact device,
like literally it's like a compact,
like here's my compact that I use for makeup for video.
And it's like kind of similar in size.
Anyway, that's it.
It's a very cool luxury phone
that you can close and be done with,
that also maybe fits in your pocket
or your bag more easily.
Really that's enough. The end on flip phones.
Okay, then there are the big boys,
the Galaxy Fold and this thing right here,
the Galaxy's Z Fold 2 5G.
Now I literally un-boxed the Galaxy's Z fold 2 5G
just a couple of hours ago.
So I'm nowhere near ready to review it yet.
But I could tell you that I'm already impressed.
The build quality on this thing
is so much better than the first Fold.
This outer screen is actually usable,
and the inner screen is made out of glass
and it's way nicer 'cause it just has
a little hole punch camera instead of a giant notch.
But this category overall is really simple.
It gives you a phone that turns into a small tablet.
So you get a bigger screen when you want it,
and a smaller screen when you don't.
Overall though, it's pretty thick.
And it's also not very easy to carry around.
But maybe it's easier to carry around
than say like an iPad mini.
And actually the screen on the inside
is virtually the same size as an iPad mini.
You know what?
I've reviewed the original galaxy Fold last year, twice.
Once on the broken first design,
and then once again on the redesign.
And in those two reviews,
I really did figure out why I think this form factor
is so interesting.
So I'm just gonna quote myself.
Think about this thing that happens all the time
with your phone.
You pull it out to check something quick,
but then all of a sudden, a half hour has gone by
while you were scrolling Instagram or whatever.
It's a real problem.
But it's a problem I didn't really have
with the galaxy Fold,
because when I was just using the tiny screen,
I wanted to get something done and put it away really fast.
'Cause the tiny is not that good.
But then when I unfolded it and used it,
I was really using it. I had to hold it in two hands,
it became an active thing that I chose to be doing.
It required some intentionality.
So I ended up feeling better
about how I was using this phone
than I usually do when I use a regular phone.
That is the reason to get a folding phone
that turns into a little tablet.
You have a big immersive screen for phone apps
when you're using it intentionally,
and you keep everything else short and quick
and to be done with it, and you put it away.
Now, maybe this year, Samsung and Google are going to wow
me with big improvements for how Android works on tablets.
And we'll be talking about
using Android to to do tablety things
instead of just big immersive phones things.
But that's gonna have to wait for the full review.
My hunch right now though, is mostly what we talking about
very big phone apps that feel immersive,
and then a lot of split-screen stuff.
Which leads me to the dual screen idea of the Surface Duo.
Instead of folding glass, you have two separate screens
and a big gap in the middle.
And by the way, you're probably wondering
why I don't show you the device
with the screen on
and the bezels and how big they are
and just show you how everything works.
Well, I can't.
Microsoft has set the terms of this embargo
that lets me tell you everything I want
about the hardware itself,
but I can't give you anything that I've learned
from turning the screen on
until the full review.
Which is a choice, I guess,
but wait for the full review on this thing.
Besides we've already got hands on with the Microsoft Duo
showing the screen and how some of the software works.
Tom Warren got to look at this almost a year ago.
Okay.
So why would you want a device with two separate screens
in a three 60 hinge?
Well, a few reasons.
One, it has even more of that,
"I am done if I'm having to fold."
Because there's no screen on the outside at all.
More importantly though,
is it can be really thin.
When it's opened up, it's less than five millimeters thick.
It's actually like directly comparable
to my very super thin Kindle Oasis e-reader.
Plus the screen flips all the way around 360.
So then you can use it one handed like a phone.
Well maybe not quite one handed,
look how wide this thing is.
You'll need your second hand.
Anyway, the screen in phone mode is quite big.
You can also get a bunch of other modes,
like sort of a tablet with a gap, and like 10th mode,
and a book mode.
And Microsoft calls these postures.
Postures?
Is hinge the posture?
'Cause that's my default posture,
is that hinge straight there?
Anyway.
The gap between the screens actually tells you
everything you need to know about what the Duo is about.
You're really not gonna want to stretch stuff
across these two screens all that often,
except for maybe like Kindle books.
No.
What this thing is for is running two apps side by side
and sometimes running one app
and then getting a big old thumb keyboard at the bottom.
Mostly though it's about multitasking.
How often do you wish
that you had two windows open on your phone?
Maybe you've never even thought of that,
but if you could,
maybe you would use your phone a little bit differently.
And that is Microsoft's bet.
That you really do want to have two apps open at once
more often than you realize.
Having it be two apps side-by-side
also gets around that whole Android apps
aren't great on tablets thing too,
since it's just two phone apps side by side.
If you use the Duo like Microsoft intends,
I guess it really isn't a tablet or a phone.
It's more like two phones. Like dual phones.
Like a duo.
Got me.
So there you have it,
there are three main categories of folding phone,
all of which are very cool.
All of which might help you
be just a little bit less obsessed with your phone.
And all which honestly have really different visions
for how to evolve Android into our folding phone future.
And I don't know which one is gonna win out.
Maybe all of them will stick around,
that's kind of what I'm hoping for,
but despite all these big ideas
and how fun these phones are to play with,
I do have a bet
for which one I think is most likely to win out
over the long term.
And it's the one that ends up
costing less than 1000 bucks,
because while all these ideas are great,
they're all just still too damn expensive.
Hey, thanks for watching.
You probably wanna know more about the Duo,
or maybe you wanna know more about the Z Fold 2.
Well, I'm reviewing both of these phones,
so let me know what you want to know down in the comments.