Samsung Display is reportedly developing foldable OLED displays for a number of big brands, and now even Google is throwing its hat in the foldable market ring. Could the upcoming Pixel 6 have more of a bend to it?
The global display manufacturer is developing foldable OLED panels for Oppo, Xiaomi and Google for upcoming smartphones, and each will launch sometime in 2021 or in early 2022, according to a recent report by The Elec. We're having foldable smartphones coming out the wazoo.
- Samsung may see more foldable competition in 2021 — thanks to Samsung?
- Apple's foldable iPhone could have a strange flip phone form factor
- Rumour: Apple commissioned LG to design flagship foldable iPhone
Each of the requested OLED panels from Samsung Display are in-folding, meaning they could either have a clamshell-design like the Galaxy Z Flip, or a horizontal fold similar to the Galaxy Z Fold 2. Oppo's foldable is supposedly a clamshell-type smartphone.
As for Google's foldable, Samsung Display will be developing a foldable OLED panel around 7.6-inch in size. With this size, we can expect it to be a clamshell, too.
Oppo, which has recently seen a lot of hype around its rollable Oppo X 2021 prototype, will have a 7.7-inch smartphone when unfolded, with a 1.5-inch to 2-inch small outer screen display just like the Galaxy Z Flip. Xiaomi's foldable will have 8-inch panel size, along with a 6.4-inch outer screen.
As the report claims, each of these phones are expected to come out within the year, meaning the next Google Pixel might be a foldable, or Google could be making another line of smartphones altogether.
Samsung is the undisputed king of the foldable smartphone market, and is rumoured to bring out the next iteration of its Z Flip and Z Fold later this year. Now that it's making foldable OLED displays for other big vendors, it appears to be creating competition for itself. Surely, if the reports are true, the company will want to bring out its foldable smartphones sooner rather than later.
Will we see a foldable Pixel this year? Only time can tell, but we do know a few things about the rumored Pixel 6 already.
