| ▲ | erikpukinskis 6 days ago |
| Folding phones are ~1.5% of the market. Apple cancelled their mini line which was 3% of sales. It’s not a big enough slice for them to want to chase. |
|
| ▲ | icedchai 6 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| I prefer a smaller phone, something that fits in your pocket easily with glasses, and am still rocking an iPhone Mini 13. |
| |
| ▲ | ansc 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | I am getting more and more nervous that there will be no good upgrade for me. 13 Mini is such a good size! | | | |
| ▲ | vizzah 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | yeah.. and I am buying $2k unopened on eBay to keep for the future, if my current one is lost. |
|
|
| ▲ | epolanski 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Folding phones are a niche because they are very expensive to be honest. |
| |
| ▲ | 0x457 5 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Sure, but I wouldn't buy one even if it was in the same price range as phones I usually buy. For me, it will be useful rarely and cumbersome to use the rest of the time. | |
| ▲ | dbg31415 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I picked up a folding phone a while back just to test it out, and honestly they're still pretty underwhelming. The screen isn't really big enough or the right shape to feel like a real upgrade for movies, and a lot of apps just aren't built with foldables in mind. Most of the time it just feels like a weirdly shaped, less powerful, less durable tablet. On top of that you're dealing with a visible crease across the screen, higher prices for something that's actually more fragile, and bulkier hardware with smaller or split batteries. The tech is cool in theory, but in practice it's a lot of compromises without a clear killer use case. | | |
| ▲ | baby 6 days ago | parent [-] | | which phone was that? I bought the pixel folding 9 last year and it has basically replaced my ipad pro. I watch movies, shows, youtube videos, read PDFs on it, it's really good | | |
| ▲ | dbg31415 6 days ago | parent [-] | | Samsung Galaxy Z Fold. | | |
| ▲ | ulfw 5 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Things have evolved a ton. I've got an Oppo Find N5. Thinner than iPhone Air when unfolded. Same size as iPhone 16 Pro Max when folded. 16GB Ram, fastest Snapdragon, okay cameras, the screen is magnificent, crease basically invisible in day to day use. Battery larger than any iPhone battery (thanks to Silicon Carbon) | |
| ▲ | baby 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | The tech has got really good really quickly! |
|
|
| |
| ▲ | arcticbull 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | I have a folding android and it’s very meh. Wouldn’t get one again. It was also free with a prepaid phone plan so I doubt cost is really the factor. | | |
| ▲ | swores 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Free with a plan just means you paid for it in installments without them breaking down how much of your monthly payment is going towards the device vs towards the network use. Had you opted for a cheaper device you could have got the same plan for less money. The phone is never actually free, just cleverly marketed to seem free. | |
| ▲ | epolanski 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Good foldables are way above the $ 1000 mark. | | |
| ▲ | TeMPOraL 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | I recently got one of these (Galaxy Z7 Fold) and I can't imagine ever going back to a regular phone. The big screen is what makes the phone finally begin to resemble actual productivity tool. | |
| ▲ | arcticbull 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | What makes a good foldable better than say a $700 RAZR? | | |
| ▲ | Miraste 6 days ago | parent [-] | | They're tablet sized screens folding to phone size, instead of phone size folding to half phone size. | | |
| ▲ | Nevermark 6 days ago | parent [-] | | Apple should create 1.5x1.5 and 2x2 inch variations of a wrist "Panel Watch Ultra". Be great for diving - and everything else. That would be the half sized phone I would buy. |
|
|
| |
| ▲ | nicoburns 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | > It was also free with a prepaid phone plan It's not really free. It's just built in to the cost of your plan. Your plan would be half the price if you weren't paying for the phone. | | |
| ▲ | johnisgood 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Yeah, why do people call it free? You do pay for the phone, just not the full amount upfront. | | |
| ▲ | arcticbull 5 days ago | parent [-] | | It was a prepaid plan that was the same price whether I got the phone or not. I guess you could say everyone who didn’t get the phone was subsidizing those who did, but there’s no way to opt for lower pricing if you BYOD. So no, in this case that’s not really true. If it were Verizon where you can pay less if you BYOD then sure but that’s not what I did. | | |
| ▲ | johnisgood 4 days ago | parent [-] | | > It was a prepaid plan that was the same price whether I got the phone or not. Fair enough, then it makes sense to get the phone. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| ▲ | catach 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > It’s not a big enough slice for them to want to chase. Typical strat for them is not to be first with an innovation, but to wait and work out the kinks enough that they can convince people that the tradeoffs are well worth making. Apple wouldn't be chasing that existing slice, they'd be trying to entice a larger share of their customers to upgrade faster. |
|
| ▲ | baby 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Folding phones are also double the price. If the price comes down I would expect them to dominate the market. |
|
| ▲ | amelius 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Yes, in some way everybody is in the 1.5% of something. Apple users will therefore never be 100% happy. Apple is a compromise. But they're also opinionated and very good at telling their users what they should like. |
|
| ▲ | cyberax 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Folding phones are extremely popular in China, where nobody cares about Apple anymore. They are now seen as a status symbol because they are significantly more expensive. |
