Unfolding Potential: How Foldable Screen Technology Is Better Suited for Laptops than Mobile Devices

Key Takeaways

• Folding laptops address the need for extra screen real-estate in a compact form factor.
• Modern phones are already optimized so doubling their size isn’t more useful.
• The traditional clamshell design of laptops already “folds,” making foldable laptops a natural evolution.

I’ve never really been convinced that folding screen technology is truly the future of mobile phones, but when I think about laptops it all starts to make much more sense. While folding laptops are still in their infancy, this is one idea that seems to have legs.

Unlike Phones, Laptops Are Actually Too Big

Folding phones are meant to solve two opposite problems—phones being too big and also phones not being big enough.

However, modern phones are largely optimal when it comes to being thin and light, but also offering a screen size that’s usable for the needs of most people. Doubling the screen size of a typical phone doesn’t make it much more useful. You need to upgrade to tablet-sized screens for it to make any sense, if you ask me.

Smaller phones haven’t really set the world on fire, and I don’t think Apple will attempt an iPhone Mini again any time soon. It seems the market has spoken, and thin phone’s with seven-ish inch screen are the happy medium. Folding such a phone in half doesn’t do much to make it more pocketable or mobile.

Laptops, on the other hand, are a different kettle of ergonomics. Even the thinnest and lightest laptops are still sizable device. It’s something that you need to plan to bring along. Imagine a device the size of an iPad Mini that could fold out to be a 15-inch laptop. Alternatively, would you benefit from your current laptop folding down Transformers style into something a quarter the size? This is a possibility of emerging technology that actually gets me excited, compared to a phone that gets slightly smaller when you fold it in half.

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Laptop Workloads Can Never Have Too Much Screen Real-Estate

Whenever I have to work on my 13-inch MacBook Air, I constantly wish for more screen real estate. It’s why I have to combine my MacBook and iPad to be productive.

Sydney Louw Butler / How-To Geek

One of the best things about the first generation of foldable laptops is that you can have a huge screen with the same footprint as a regular laptop.

Image credit: HP UK

One minute you could have the traditional clamshell design, but when you’ve got the space for it, you can quickly set up something with similar screen real estate as a desktop system.

People Are Doing Awkward Things to Get More Screens on the Go

Using my iPad as an extended screen for my MacBook is just one example of the lengths people will go to for extra screen space with their mobile computing setups. You also have the option of adding a portable monitor to the mix, or getting something like a SideTrak to attach a second screen to your current laptop monitor.

I can definitely see a laptop with a screen that folds out to an ultrawide aspect ratio when open as something desirable, if some people are willing to literally carry an extra screen around. Dual-screen laptops are also an emerging niche that could overlap with folding screen technology.

Hinges Are Part of Laptop Design Anyway

The classic clamshell design already “folds” down the middle anyway. It’s just that we achieve that using a hinge. While flip phones were popular for a time, the monolithic phone slab has always been the dominant design, so folding phones do feel like an unnecessary deviation.

A laptop that is one big folding screen does feel like a more natural evolution, especially since we don’t have to give up good keyboard and touchpad integration, which is not true for tablets that end up being like laptops anyway when you add accessories to help you get actual work done. So, in the end, to me folding laptops feel more like a natural progression of the form factor than a hard fork into new territory.

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