At a summer gathering in London, Samsung unveiled its latest generation of foldable phones and smartwatches — devices that represent genuine refinement but also a quiet admission that the frontier of mobile innovation has grown more contested. The Z Fold8's passport-style form factor and the Z Fold8 Ultra's expanded display speak to a company still shaping the category it helped create, even as rivals in China push harder on battery, camera, and durability. These are well-crafted tools arriving at a moment when being good is no longer the same as being first.
Samsung's Galaxy Z8 Series Debuts Passport-Style Fold, But Trails Chinese Rivals
Samsung is not leading in every category, but it's not losing either.
Mark
Why does the passport-style form factor matter so much? It's just a different shape.
Mimi
It's not just shape—it's how you hold and use the device. The 4:3 ratio when open is closer to a tablet, less stretched. When closed, it's more pocket-friendly than the ultra-wide clamshells. Google proved people liked it with the Pixel Fold. Samsung's betting that enough people will prefer this over the 21:9 design that's been standard.
Mark
But you said the Z Fold8 Ultra still trails Chinese phones. In what ways does it actually matter to someone buying it?
Mimi
Battery life, mainly. A 5,000-milliamp-hour battery in a $2,099 phone feels small when competitors are shipping 6,000-plus. You'll notice it in real use. And the telephoto—a 10-megapixel lens versus 50-megapixel 3x zoom on the competition. If you want to zoom, you're cropping a photo, not capturing detail.
Mark
Samsung dropped the S-Pen. Why would they do that if competitors have it?
Mimi
Cost, probably. Or they decided the market didn't demand it enough to justify the engineering. But it's a feature that justified the premium price before. Losing it while charging more is a hard sell.
Mark
The Z Flip8 costs $100 more than last year's model. What did you get for that?
Mimi
A thinner, lighter phone with a faster processor. The processor is genuinely better. But the battery is the same size, and the ultrawide camera didn't improve. For a hundred dollars more, that's thin gruel.
Mark
What about the watches? Are they actually useful or just nice to have?
Mimi
The sleep apnea detection is FDA-backed, so that's real. The vitals monitoring could catch something early. Whether you'll actually use those features or just glance at them once is the question. They're solid watches with good software. Whether they're worth $379 to $699 depends on how much you care about health data.
Mark
So Samsung's not winning here?
Mimi
Samsung's not losing, either. They're shipping good devices with strong software and a massive ecosystem. But they're not leading in the specs that matter most at these price points. That's the story.
El Pulso
- Samsung's foldable lineup lands with real improvements — larger displays, better cameras, stronger batteries — but the gap with Chinese competitors in telephoto, charging speed, and water resistance remains stubbornly visible.
- The Z Fold8's passport-style 4:3 form factor is a genuine departure, bringing a more compact, square design to the US market for the first time since Google's original Pixel Fold, and setting up a direct confrontation with Apple's rumored iPhone Ultra.
- The Z Fold8 Ultra carries an 'Ultra' badge but trails Honor, Oppo, and Motorola on key specs — a 10-megapixel telephoto against rivals' 50-megapixel periscopes, and a 5,000 mAh battery against competitors pushing past 6,000 mAh.
- Samsung quietly dropped S-Pen support again, raised the Z Flip8's price by $100, and left charging speeds well below what the competition offers — small decisions that accumulate into a larger question about ambition.
- The Watch Ultra2 and Watch9 lean into AI-driven health monitoring — sleep apnea detection, cardiovascular scoring, sweat-based hydration alerts — signaling that the wrist is becoming less about time and more about the body's interior life.
- Pre-orders open July 22 and sales begin August 7, with Samsung's vast retail and software ecosystem doing much of the heavy lifting in a market where specs alone no longer close the argument.
At a summer gathering in London, Samsung unveiled its latest generation of foldable phones and smartwatches — devices that represent genuine refinement but also a quiet admission that the frontier of mobile innovation has grown more contested. The Z Fold8's passport-style form factor and the Z Fold8 Ultra's expanded display speak to a company still shaping the category it helped create, even as rivals in China push harder on battery, camera, and durability. These are well-crafted tools arriving at a moment when being good is no longer the same as being first.
Samsung held its Unpacked 2026 event in London to introduce three new foldable phones and two smartwatches — a lineup that shows meaningful progress while quietly revealing where the company is still catching up.
The Z Fold8 is the most structurally interesting of the three. Its passport-style 4:3 aspect ratio makes it more compact and square than the stretched designs that have defined the category, and it's the first phone of this shape to reach the US market since Google's original Pixel Fold. With a 7.6-inch inner display, Flex Titanium crease-reduction technology, a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 processor, and a 50-megapixel main camera, it arrives at $1,899 as a direct answer to Apple's rumored iPhone Ultra.
The Z Fold8 Ultra, at $2,099, steps up with an 8-inch inner display, a 5,000 mAh battery, a 50-megapixel ultrawide camera, and faster 45-watt wired charging. But the improvements don't fully close the distance from Chinese rivals. Honor, Oppo, and Motorola are shipping foldables with 50-megapixel periscope telephoto lenses, 6,000-plus mAh batteries, 80-watt charging, and higher IP dust and water ratings. Samsung's telephoto remains at 10 megapixels, and S-Pen support — dropped in a previous generation — has not returned.
The Z Flip8 clamshell comes in thinner and lighter at $1,199, with a 6.9-inch inner display and expanded cover screen app support. The $100 price increase over last year's model and a 4,300 mAh battery draw some scrutiny at that tier.
The two new smartwatches — the Watch Ultra2 at $699 and the Watch9 starting at $379 — run on Qualcomm's new 3-nanometer Snapdragon Wear Elite chip and center their identity on AI health monitoring. Sleep apnea detection, cardiovascular scoring, daily cardio load optimization, and sweat-based hydration alerts reflect an industry-wide turn toward the wrist as a preventive health instrument. The Watch Ultra2 adds trail running metrics and a diving app built with Mares.
All five devices open for pre-order July 22, with general availability August 7. Samsung's ecosystem and retail presence remain formidable advantages, but the company is navigating a market where its lead is no longer assumed.
Samsung gathered the tech press in London on a summer afternoon to show off its latest folding phones and smartwatches—three new foldables and two new watches, all arriving with meaningful upgrades but also with a nagging sense that the company is playing catch-up to rivals in China.
The headline device is the Galaxy Z Fold8, a passport-style folding phone with a 4:3 aspect ratio when opened. It's the first phone of this shape to land in the US market since Google's original Pixel Fold three years ago. The form factor itself is genuinely appealing—more square, less stretched—and it positions Samsung directly against Apple's rumored iPhone Ultra, expected in September. At 123.9 by 81.9 millimeters closed, it's noticeably more compact than the Z Fold8 Ultra, though slightly thicker and a touch wider. The Z Fold8 carries a 5.5-inch outer display in a 16:10 ratio and a 7.6-inch inner screen with Samsung's new Flex Titanium technology, which reduces the crease and improves impact resistance. The processor is a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy, the battery is 4,800 milliamp-hours, and the main camera is a 50-megapixel f/1.8 shooter with optical image stabilization. The price is $1,899.
The Z Fold8 Ultra, at $2,099, is the premium variant. It's nearly identical to last year's Z Fold7 in thickness and weight—4.1 millimeters and 215 grams—but it gains a larger 8-inch inner display with higher resolution (2504 by 2256 pixels versus 2184 by 1968), brighter at 3,000 nits instead of 2,600. The battery jumps from 4,400 to 5,000 milliamp-hours. The ultrawide camera improves from 12 megapixels to 50 megapixels. Charging speeds increase to 45 watts wired and 20 watts wireless. Yet even with these improvements, the Z Fold8 Ultra lags behind what Honor, Oppo, and Motorola are shipping in China and the US. Those rivals pack 50-megapixel or better telephoto lenses with 3x periscope zoom; Samsung's telephoto remains a modest 10 megapixels. Chinese foldables boast 6,000-plus milliamp-hour batteries and charging speeds of 80 watts or more. The Z Fold8 Ultra's dust and water resistance is rated IP48, while competitors achieve IP49, IP59, or IP69. Even Google's Pixel 10 Pro Fold, which reviewers found middling, earned an IP68 rating. Samsung also dropped S-Pen support—the stylus that worked on the inner and outer displays of earlier models—and hasn't brought it back, despite the competition offering it.
The Galaxy Z Flip8 is the clamshell option, priced at $1,199. It's thinner than the Z Flip7 at 6.1 millimeters open and 13.1 millimeters closed, and lighter at 180 grams. The processor is the same Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. The outer display is 4.1 inches, the inner is 6.9 inches. The battery is 4,300 milliamp-hours, charging at 25 watts wired and 15 watts wireless. The main camera is a 50-megapixel f/1.8 with OIS, inherited from the previous generation. The price increase from last year's $1,099 model to $1,199 is notable, and the battery capacity feels modest for the cost. Samsung did make it easier to run a wider range of Android apps on the cover screen, a feature Motorola pioneered years ago on its Razr phones.
Alongside the foldables, Samsung unveiled two smartwatches. The Galaxy Watch Ultra2, at $699, is thinner than its predecessor at 10.7 millimeters, with a 1.52-inch display that peaks at 5,000 nits and an 800-milliamp-hour battery. The Galaxy Watch9 comes in 40 and 44-millimeter sizes, priced at $379 for Bluetooth and $429 for LTE. Both watches run Qualcomm's new 3-nanometer Snapdragon Wear Elite processor, offer WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 6.0, and include dual-band GPS. The watches are built around AI-powered health monitoring: sleep apnea detection using an FDA-backed algorithm, a vitals feature that watches for significant deviations during sleep, a heart health score, daily cardio load optimization, a fitness index, and hearing protection alerts. The Watch Ultra2 adds trail running metrics, nutrition and hydration alerts based on sweat loss, and a diving app developed with equipment maker Mares.
All of these devices—the Z Fold8 Ultra, Z Fold8, Z Flip8, Watch Ultra2, and Watch9—are available for pre-order starting July 22, with general sales beginning August 7. Samsung's ecosystem, software features, and retail reach are formidable, and these devices are well-built and attractive. But the company is not leading in every category. The Z Fold8's passport-style form factor is genuinely interesting and may appeal to users tired of the stretched 21:9 clamshell design. Yet without a proper telephoto lens and with a battery that feels undersized for a device at this price, it's hard to call it a clear winner. The Z Fold8 Ultra, despite its "Ultra" badge, doesn't push hard enough against Chinese competitors in battery capacity, charging speed, dust resistance, or camera capability. Samsung is still playing a strong hand, but it's not the hand that's winning every round.
Citas Notables
Samsung's Flex Titanium technology is a meaningful upgrade, but doesn't fully eliminate the crease.— Reviewer assessment
I was hoping the Z Fold8 Ultra would offer a better 50MP 3x periscope telephoto and restore S-Pen support to match Chinese rivals.— Reviewer expectation
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