Foldables opened the door to a whole new world of smartphones just a few years ago, but somehow the entire Android market has settled into just two form factors – clamshell flip phones and book-style devices that just open up to double the width of a normal smartphone screen. As the inevitable “iPhone Fold” approaches, though, it seems Apple is looking to revive a form factor that Android brands, including Google Pixel, once tried, but failed to keep around, and there’s a clear reason why that happened.
Pixel Fold, Oppo Find N, and the form factor we lost
In the early days of foldables, there were a few key form factors floating around. Samsung’s Galaxy Fold had a tall outer display that opened to a vertically-oriented inner display. Huawei and others playing around with foldables that opened from the outside and were wider when folded, similar to a standard smartphone.
But Oppo took a different route with its original Find N foldable.
That device was a short and stubby little booklet. It was thick, but it delivered a pretty tremendous hardware experience. The phone’s outer display was wider and shorter than most smartphones, leaving the inner display to be much wider and more tablet-like. It wasn’t necessarily a perfect 16:10 for media consumption, but the wider aspect ratio left the door open to some fun experiences. Oppo stuck with this for the Find N2 a year later in 2022, which was a truly awesome piece of hardware.
