We went hands-on with the Galaxy Z TriFold. Here’s the good (and the bad)

Ever since Samsung announced the Galaxy Z TriFold last week, we’ve had a lot of questions about the phone. What does it feel like to use Samsung’s first tri-fold foldable? Are the hinges sturdy? How heavy/bulky is the phone? Is this folding design better or worse than the Huawei Mate XT?

Well, we now have answers to all of those. My colleague Paul Jones recently went hands-on with the Galaxy Z TriFold at the Dubai Mall — one of the only places in the world where Samsung is demoing the phone — and he came away with a lot of thoughts about Samsung’s futuristic foldable.

What it’s like using Samsung’s first tri-fold

It’s one thing to read about the Galaxy Z TriFold and see pictures online, but what is it like to hold the phone in your hands? As it turns out, it’s pretty great.

One of our biggest concerns about the TriFold was its weight. At 309 grams, the phone is significantly heavier than “normal” foldables like the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and Pixel 10 Pro Fold. But as it turns out, the TriFold feels shockingly lightweight in person. Paul noted that the TriFold actually feels lighter than the Huawei Mate XT, even though the Mate XT is technically 11 grams lighter.

Even more important than the weight, the TriFold’s hinges feel excellent. They’re very snappy and feel just as durable as on any other Galaxy Z Fold handset — which is important. And for the TriFold specifically, Samsung has added some clever safety features to ensure you don’t fold it the wrong way. If you try to close the wrong end of the TriFold while it’s fully open, you see a notification on the screen and feel haptic feedback to warn you that you’re folding it incorrectly. It’s pretty neat.

And, of course, there’s that display. When the TriFold is open, the 10-inch panel looks outstanding. The 4:3 aspect ratio is friendly for both productivity apps and watching videos. Samsung’s AMOLED 2X panel looks just as impressive as you’d expect, and the 120Hz refresh rate — paired with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite chip — lets everything feel smooth and snappy.

The ability to run three apps in full-screen split windows is a huge convenience, and when running a single app, it has much more room to expand than on the Z Fold 7. The overall software experience here is largely identical to Samsung’s other foldables, just with more screen to work with.

That’s the biggest takeaway from our hands-on time with the Galaxy Z TriFold. Samsung is building on the foundation it has with the Galaxy Z Fold series, so if you’ve used a Samsung foldable before, you’ll probably feel right at home with the TriFold. The difference, of course, is that the TriFold supercharges that experience with much more screen real estate, and being able to fold up a 10-inch display into a pocketable phone is damn impressive.

The biggest problem with the TriFold’s design

That said, the Galaxy Z TriFold isn’t perfect. Even after a limited hands-on session with the phone, we’ve already noticed an issue with its design.

The way Samsung designed the TriFold, it can only be set in two positions: Folded shut with the 6.5-inch cover screen or fully opened to the 10-inch inner display. This is different from the Huawei Mate XT, which can be used in three modes: using 1/3 of its display as a 6.4-inch slab phone, opening one portion to use a larger 7.9-inch screen size, and then opening it all the way to use the full 10.2-inch display.

Samsung’s dedicated cover screen is safer than Huawei’s design, as the inner display remains fully enclosed when the phone is folded shut. However, the trade-off in how you can use that main foldable display is a bummer. It’s far from a deal-breaker, but it does inherently limit how you can use the Galaxy Z TriFold compared to the Huawei Mate XT. Then again, the Mate XT isn’t available in the US, whereas the TriFold will be, so beggars can’t be choosers.

Samsung’s next foldable is off to a promising start

Overall, our hands-on time with the Galaxy Z TriFold was a great look at what’s to come. We still need to test important specs like the battery, cameras, and performance, but the core idea of the TriFold seems to be solid. Samsung’s hardware expertise is on full display with the TriFold, and even if the folding design is more limiting than the competition, what Samsung has achieved with the TriFold is still crazy impressive.

The Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold is expected to be released in the US and other parts of the world sometime in early 2026, presumably with a very high price tag.