Introduction

Mystery, promises, waves upon waves of hype, a couple of releases, revisions, disappointment and success, the Samsung Galaxy Fold is a story which pretty much reads like a novel at this point. And after all that, this unique roller coaster ride is still going on full steam. Only now, Samsung is letting people ride. For an arm and a leg, as the saying goes, but even so, if you are persistent and affluent enough, you can get your very own to have and use.

But just because you can, should you board the still very-much experimental foldable panel train and Samsung's initial prototype in particular? To find out, we acquired a shiny new Galaxy Fold and geared it up for actual, real-world use as the daily driver for one of the reviewers here at GSMArena - Victor!
A long time Galaxy Note fan, Victor is very passionate about hardware and has always had a "more is better" mentality towards features. After he was disappointed by the Galaxy Note10 lineup where modern design trends take precedence over the Swiss-army-knife load of features the Note was known for, he was sticking to his trusty Galaxy Note 9 when he was tasked with this review making him jump ship at least for a while.
This long-term review is thus his account of what it is to live with the Galaxy Fold daily. As such, it is a bit more different and personal, for lack of a better term, than our usual in-depth review process. Which, by the way, the Fold has already gone through, in case you want to give that a read. All the points made in our first review still stand true, but they don't necessarily offer the full picture. If you are interested in the user experience after the excitement and buzz is gone, do read on.
Since this whole endeavor took some time, we came up with a new way to keep you in the loop of how it's going. While the prolonged real-life testing was still going on, Victor shared his impressions as they came to him in a diary fashion. For the sake of completeness, this log can still be found on the final page of the review now that the full text is published. Enjoy!

Revolutionary new form factor

This might be kind of an obvious point to make, given the collective year-long hype surrounding flexible panels and their potential. Still, even with all the overstatement, you can't really appreciate how much of a paradigm-shifting thing the new form factor is until you incorporate it in your daily life. Tonestly, the last time I experienced a digital habit-altering experience at quite this scale as with the Galaxy Fold was when I got my first laptop as a kid.
Without a doubt, being young and impressionable played a big role in the latter. Yet, even my skeptical and often bitter adult self found the Galaxy Fold refreshing, even meaningful without even trying really hard.

Even with its plethora of small issues and growing pains, the Fold feels more like a piece of history unfoldin in front of our very eyes. A milestone device, rather than a gimmick. It's bold, and it's different. So much so, that it forced me to re-think quite a few smartphone habits, long-standing routines and even battle with muscle memory.


Starting with the elephant in the room - handling, especially with one hand. It's definitely possible, if you are willing to confine yourself to the tall and skinny 4.6-inch external display. Odd scaling issues aside, it is a pretty okay screen. If you don't plan on typing or any other very precise touch-screen manipulation, that is. Those get annoying really fast. Everything is quite crammed, especially horizontally.
The small viewport is still quite okay for navigating the UI for things like notifications and for making calls. That's where the secondary display comes into its own and works perfectly with one hand.
Once I get both hands on the outside panel, mostly due to force of habit, things get really crammed really fast. Plus, the asymmetry on both ends of the device due to the hinge design, is surprisingly annoying. This might be a personal pet peeve, but it turns out that the varying surface thickness really messes with my ability to thumb-type. Honestly, on more than a few occasions I caught myself subconsciously wanting to "squish" the hinge down and make the Fold "perfectly balanced, as all things should be".

Avengers references and OCD aside, that hinge can easily be the subject of a lengthy pro and con debate in itself. It is an amazingly intricate and impressive piece of engineering. One meticulously crafted in just the right way to accommodate curvature requirements for cutting-edge, futuristic display technology. Samsung is definitely in uncharted waters here and all things considered, their solution is nothing short of impressive.
That's why I really can't fault anybody when it comes to some of my hinge concerns. Things like the massive air-gap it leaves out of necessity for all my pocket lint and various other bits to sip right onto the soft surface of the internal display. Or the fact that, as with every friction-based, moving mechanism, even one with cogs and supports as sophisticated as those inside the Galaxy Fold, there will always be a gradual process of degradation. During my time with the Fold, the hinge objectively got progressively looser in its motion. To Samsung's credit, it never came near to worrying levels of free motion or "flappiness."
Another issue, in part related to the hinge, I found quite annoying is the odd place the side-mounted fingerprint reader ends up in. While the phone is open, it works pretty well. But in its closed state, it ends up kind of tucked in-between the two folding halves which makes it really hard to reach. With Samsung's protective case on, I really had to jam my thumb in there to get a positive read. Perhaps Samsung can find a better place for it on future folding phones or at least figure out a way to offset it more conveniently. Again, this is a brand new form factor and it brings along a whole new set of ergonomic challenges that will take time to get properly addressed.