I just got myself a like-new Galaxy Fold for the cost of the new iPhone 16e (!), and I’m realising it’s what I always wanted from the iPad Mini - a premium device with a nice, 120Hz screen, which you can actually pocket and carry about as a phone too.
I’ve been all-in Apple for 20 years or so, and have been getting a bit frustrated with them recently and wanting to try something new, if only to prove to myself it’s better than the alternative. I don’t anticipate being able to switch fully, I’m in too deep and love Apple’s stock apps too much for that. Apple just feels stagnant. Most laptops have touchscreens now, and many also work as tablets. Foldables are a refined market. I’ve tried the Vision Pro, but I’ve used VR headsets with passthrough before, so I was mostly blown away by the small size compared to older headsets. The price will come down, but Apple’s pitch of wearing a headset for 8 hours a hypothetical workday is really not that compelling a sell for me in the first place - for sure, it’s a powerful work environment, but it’s also an ergonomic nightmare.
The Fold, meanwhile, just feels so fun and personal, to have this little sketchpad that folds up! It’s a tablet that fits in your pocket! I’ve not felt this excited about a new computing device from Apple for years. It’s not trying to change the world, or reinvent the industry. It’s just trying making a pocket device that’s a little more human, and year by year figuring out the techniques to do so.
While tablet apps aren’t quite as good on Android, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the support built into stock apps from Samsung and Google. It’s also worth noting web-apps actually run native-level smooth, and you have a backdoor out of phone-size app letterboxing, so Android has it’s tablet perks too.
But Android also has an ugly side - apps aren’t even apologetic about trying to make you sign your life away in their consent pages, it’s kind of scary. Popular nerdy apps that would be someone’s passion project on iOS, will demand tangental permissions just to launch and then happily sell you out to their ad providers.
If Apple releases a fold-up iPad Mini / iPhone running proper iPad apps, it’ll be an instant buy for me. But I also see so many sharp corners coming, like apps needing a recompile to run without letterboxing, or no ability to use landscape on the outer screen / partially folded mode for propping up on a table… Could you imagine if it ships with Stage Manager! That’d make it the dream device for me, a true all-in-one.
Apple lately seems to be dead set on creating the best products in their category, that redefine industries. Vision Pro. Airpods Max. The best cameras ever in an iPhone. The best displays ever in an iPad. Would it kill them to just have some fun once in a while, and put something out using existing tech in new ways, just to see if it catches on?