Galaxy Fold Hands-on Video Reveals Troubling Crease

It’s easy to understand why people are excited by foldable smartphones — they introduce a unique design while giving people a tablet-sized work space that can fold up and fit into their pocket. But a new hands-on video showing off Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy Fold in action might wind up dimming some of that enthusiasm.

Unlike Samsung’s slickly produced promotional videos for the Galaxy Fold, this video appears to show the device out in the wild. And it provides a clear, full-body look at the nasty crease that the phone’s plastic foldable screen is prone to develop.

Credit: phoneoftime/YouTubeIn addition to there being a crease down the center of the Galaxy Fold’s unfolded screen — it looks almost as bad as what you’d get if you folded a paper poster and tried to revive it — the edge tucking of the screen also look a bit inconsistent from corner to corner.

This isn’t our first hint that Samsung’s foldable or other similar devices from other companies, might suffer from screen jankiness. Forensic, frame-by-frame breakdowns of the Fold and Huawei Mate X unveilings point to at least somewhat of a crease problem with the phones.

But this latest YouTube video, which is meant to show the carrier unlocking process for an AT&T Galaxy Fold, provides a couple solid minutes of time to stare at the big problems facing this run of foldable phones and their plastic displays.

Gorilla Glass maker Corning and other companies are hard at work right now on a smooth-and-rigid-yet-bendable glass screen solution that could eventually replace the plastic panels appearing in this initial batch of folding smartphones. But Corning’s solution won’t be ready for a couple of years.

The Galaxy Fold debuts April 26, with a starting price of $1,980. While the phone is clearly aimed at early adopters who might be willing to live with a few imperfections in the name of having the latest and greatest technology, it will be interesting to see if the crease is as visible in real life as it has been in early hand-son videos — and how people paying up for the phone react to that.