If there’s one thing that annoys me about the Galaxy Z Flip series, it’s that the cover screen has been left just a notch or two above useless for years now, and for no good reason. The Galaxy Z Flip 8 is finally embracing apps on the cover screen, but still not to the degree that it should.
Samsung’s Galaxy Z Flip 5 introduced a full-size cover display and, with that, support for using full apps on that display. But the list was incredibly limited, only supporting a tiny handful of apps, and the list hasn’t really expanded. While there’s always been an official workaround, apps were clearly not the focus of Samsung’s flip phone cover display.
The Galaxy Z Flip 8 takes a step towards changing that, but a hesitant one.
“FlexWindow” on the Galaxy Z Flip 8 – likely as a part of One UI 9 – gets a redesigned homescreen that supports customizable panels with widgets, but also a central panel that includes a single widget similar to Google Pixel’s “At a Glance,” with calendar appointments and “Now Nudge” actions that appear based on context.
That same panel includes a proper app drawer, which now opens up to a host of supported Samsung apps.
