For years, there have been rumors about Samsung working on phones with foldable screens. Samsung has demoed flexible screen prototypes at various events over the years. Unfortunately, foldable screen phones haven’t turned into reality so far, although Samsung made a few curved screen phones to satisfy us.
This year, however, there is a real possibility of a phone with a foldable screen making its way into the market as Samsung has officially announced that foldable displays will enter mass production later this year. When it launches, this phone, often rumored as the Galaxy X, should mark a new chapter in smartphone technology.
Sneak peek into the ideas explored by Samsung
While many of us eagerly wait for the rumored Galaxy X, Samsung has been filing many patents pertaining to full-screen and foldable screen phones. Though filing of a patent application doesn’t guarantee the launch of a product, patents do give us a sneak peek into the ideas explored by Samsung.
Below we have listed a few interesting patents filed by Samsung in the recent past. While the first three of them explore UX/UI ideas on implementing multi-window features on a foldable screen, the last two of them explore UX ideas on full-screen phones.
Foldable screens offer more screen real estate making them ideal for multi-window features.
Multi-window UI example for a video call.
Multi-window UI for camera.
Foldable screens result in displays with new aspect ratios. This creates both opportunities and problems in content consumption as most of it is designed for current form factors and aspect ratios.
A foldable phone patent. One of the many designs Samsung has patented.
The patents below show a couple of UX/UI ideas by Samsung for full-screen phones.
Apart from the few select patents mentioned here, Samsung has filed numerous other patents for full-screen and foldable screen phones. You can check our coverage of other patents here and the rumored Galaxy X here.
Again, it is worth reiterating that filing of a patent doesn’t guarantee the existence of a product. Companies, including Samsung, files hundreds of patent applications every year with many of them never turning into a real product.
