Foldable phones are cool again.
Actually, maybe they never stopped being cool. There is still something satisfying about opening a phone and suddenly having a small tablet in your hands. It feels futuristic in a way normal smartphones stopped feeling years ago.
And foldables in 2026 are much better than the awkward first-generation versions. They are thinner, lighter, the hinges feel more mature, batteries are improving and manufacturers are still working on making that crease in the middle less obvious. Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi and others have clearly reached the point where foldables are no longer just experimental gadgets.
But every time one appears, the same question comes back.
Do I actually need my phone to fold?
Because the demo always looks great. Open a huge screen. Run multiple apps. Watch YouTube while replying to messages. Edit documents. Read websites like you’re holding a tiny tablet.
Then real life happens.
You pull the phone out to reply to WhatsApp.
Check Instagram.
Scan a QR code.
Take a photo.
Open Maps.
Pay for coffee.
Most of those things work perfectly fine on a normal phone.
That is where foldables still feel slightly strange. They solve a problem that some people definitely have, but perhaps not enough people have.
For someone constantly reading documents, multitasking or travelling without a tablet, a Fold-style device actually makes sense. One device replaces two. That is genuinely useful.
But for someone who mostly uses TikTok, WhatsApp, Spotify, banking apps and a camera?
You are carrying around a very sophisticated hinge to do exactly what your old phone already did.
Then there is the part nobody shows quite as enthusiastically during launch events.
Repair.
A normal phone already makes you nervous when it hits the floor. A foldable adds a flexible display, hinge and more moving parts into the equation. Manufacturers have improved durability dramatically, but even the latest generation still has to deal with things such as dust protection, hinge reliability and long-term display wear.
And foldables are not exactly cheap either. Recent high-end models from Huawei and Xiaomi are still comfortably in premium-laptop territory, with some versions costing well above USD2,000.
That changes the conversation.
At RM2,000 or RM3,000, being slightly impractical can be fun.
At premium flagship prices, you start asking harder questions.
What am I actually getting from this?
Would I really use the big screen every day?
Will I still enjoy opening and closing it after six months?
Or will I eventually use the outside screen 90% of the time because opening the phone becomes one extra step?
None of this means foldables are bad. Quite the opposite. They are probably the most interesting thing happening in smartphone hardware right now because at least manufacturers are trying something different.
Normal phones have basically settled on the same rectangle.
Foldables are still experimenting.
That is exciting.
I just think there is a difference between something being cool technology and something being useful technology.
Foldable phones have definitely nailed the first one.
I’m still deciding about the second.