Richard Goodwin 14/09/2017 - 11:16am

You’ve heard about the Samsung Galaxy X, but Samsung could well bring its foldable tech to its Galaxy Note line first

People have been talking about the Samsung Galaxy X for a good long while now. The phone, which is said to be the first handset to utilize Samsung’s foldable technology, has been rumored for almost 18 months now.

The iPhone 8 and iPhone X are now both official, alongside the Apple TV 4K and Apple Watch 3, and most of the rumours about all of the products prior to launch turned out to be true.

The iPhone X is the main event, however, as it is the first redesigned iPhone in three years. Here’s what Apple said about the phone at launch:

“For more than a decade, our intention has been to create an iPhone that is all display. The iPhone X is the realization of that vision,” said Jony Ive, Apple’s chief design officer. “With the introduction of iPhone ten years ago, we revolutionized the mobile phone with Multi-Touch. iPhone X marks a new era for iPhone — one in which the device disappears into the experience.”

“iPhone X is the future of the smartphone. It is packed with incredible new technologies, like the innovative TrueDepth camera system, beautiful Super Retina display and super fast A11 Bionic chip with neural engine," said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “iPhone X enables fluid new user experiences — from unlocking your iPhone with Face ID, to playing immersive AR games, to sharing Animoji in Messages — it is the beginning of the next ten years for iPhone.”

The thing is, however, that the future of smartphone, as Apple puts it, has been around for, well… about three years now. Samsung, Google, Nokia, LG and many others have been using most of the technology found inside the iPhone X for a good few years now.

The Nexus 4 featured wireless charging, Samsung debuting a similar Face ID technology in 2016, LG and Samsung have been doing edge-to-edge displays for years, so what, exactly, is so futuristic about the iPhone X?

Nothing, really. Sure, for an iPhone it’s impressive, but compared to, say, the Galaxy Note 8 or LG V30 or even the Essential Phone, it could hardly be considered innovative. To be honest, it almost feels like Apple lives inside its own little bubble; you can’t call an OLED display on a phone innovative – it’s been done before, AGES ago.

Ditto wireless charging, facial recognition, and buttonless phone design.

Increasingly, if you want innovation you need to look elsewhere. Samsung is pretty much at the sharp end of the stick these days, and the promise of the Galaxy X and its first foldable phone is a truly tantalizing prospect.

I’ve been eagerly following the Galaxy X saga, but I am now even more excited as it appears Samsung is looking to leverage this technology inside its upcoming 2018 Galaxy Note phone.

But today news has surfaced about Samsung’s plans to create a foldable Galaxy Note device in 2018. Multiple sources are reporting that Samsung has stated it plans on making the Galaxy Note foldable in 2018.

Whether this is the Galaxy Note 9 or a separate, additional release remains to be seen. Either way, this would be a very interesting turn of events, as the technology that would make it possible is not yet in the hands of consumers – it’s all locked away in Samsung’s skunk works.

Samsung admitted there are still some “issues” to solve before the technology will be ready for mass consumption, but it seems as if the company is betting big for foldable tech by implementing it inside its seminal Note range of smartphones.

And when you think about it, the Note kind of makes sense – just imagine what you could do with the S-Pen and a foldable design. It’d actually be rather close to an actual note pad if you could fold it.

The advent of foldable devices would be a HUGE deal for the mobile space too, as it represents a complete paradigm shift in the overall design and production of phones. No longer will they just be static blocks – everything will move and that means things like bendable batteries and components.

The idea of foldable tech is nothing new, however – there have been rumors of foldable devices since back in 2008/2009. And Samsung, more than anyone else, has been investing in the technology ever since. The Youm device showed potential, then came the Galaxy X, a now almost mythical device that was rumoured to launch this year, and now we have word that Samsung is seriously considering making the Galaxy Note 9 a foldable phone.

Whichever way you slice it, that’s pretty interesting stuff. Finger’s crossed Samsung gets the technology nailed in time for the Galaxy Note 9’s release window.