Samsung is prepping to launch its 2024 foldable lineup in the coming months, including the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and the Z Flip 6.
This is not all, however, since rumors also hint at the presence of a Galaxy Z Fold 6 Ultra, potentially exclusive to the company’s home market of South Korea, and we had also heard about the existence of the Z Fold FE and Z Flip FE for the longest time now.
However, Samsung fans are disappointed as the purported Galaxy Z Fold 6 FE has been canceled and will not be released this year.
This news comes via a report by the Korean publication The Elec, which explicitly mentions the change in Samsung’s plans to launch an affordable book-style foldable phone and states that this is due to the lack of any differentiation factors for the product and the uncertainty about the potential market response.
It has been stated that Samsung was actively pursuing the idea of an affordable Galaxy Z Fold 6 FE to take the fight to the Chinese foldable competition. Chinese foldables like Huawei’s Mate X5 and Vivo’s X Fold 3 have very thin chassis but compromise on durability.
On the other hand, Samsung apparently wanted its new affordable foldable to show that the company could make a very thin and durable foldable at the same time.
To this extent, they removed the digitizer for the S Pen from the inner display of the Z Fold 6 to make it thinner but later decided to add IP ratings for water and dust resistance to it, which only nullified the gains in thinness.
So, the company faced two choices: achieve a thin foldable or make it thicker and more durable. As you can imagine, this completely destroyed the purpose of the “thin yet durable” aim of the Z Fold 6 FE.
Moreover, the company decided to reallocate resources to ensure that the Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6 are better refined and more complete products instead of actively pursuing the development of the Z Fold 6 FE, as the market response uncertainty to affordable foldables was another major barrier.
However, there is still hope, as the company is allegedly still pursuing the affordable book-style foldable to debut alongside the Z Fold 7 and Flip 7 in 2025. However, it is still too early to speculate if this second attempt is the lucky charm for the company.
