Android & Chill
One of the oldest technological columns on the web, Android & Chill is your Saturday discussion on Android, Google and All Things Tech.
Google has finally shown Android 16 for people who do not try a beta version of the next operating system, filled with changes in the user interface and new animations.
There are reasons why this is intelligent and reasons why it might not be: it is polarizing, with many people already commenting on the way they hate changes. But it is also visual. You can’t See the underlying change which allows better network connections or guarantees against bad applications. You can See new colors, user interface elements and animations. In addition, many people love them too.
This year strikes differently. There was a lot of work on the “morphing” of the user interface in a dynamic way; Move things, run your phone or open more than one application to the screen all has a little special flair. You might like it or you might hate it, but that’s it for everyone to see it.
One thing that we did not speak much (still) was a tablet. After Android, Google Bohn’s dietetics took a few minutes to show fresh Android phones, but no tablets. Perhaps Google has much more to say about them, but nothing is worth putting in the forefront before the great conference of developers starts.
I think we will hear about the tablets more during the E / S, but I am almost positive, we will know much more about the foldable. Something tells me that Google thinks that foldables have a real (finally) shooting of the general public device that will change the mobile technological landscape. And let’s be honest – hear Nothing That’s not all about AI would be good.
It is difficult for any business that makes Android devices compete with Apple’s iPad. It is by design; Apple made sure that there was a device to reach all prices, and they are available in sizes to suit everyone. If you have already used one, you know that the iPad is a solid device.
Something like the Galaxy tab is also a solid device, but it does not have the traction of the iPad. No flagship Android tablet clashes with an iPad. I don’t know why, but that’s what it is. People buy Android tablets because they need something cheap for children or because they are rooted in the Samsung products ecosystem.
You cannot buy a foldable phone that does not work Android. Dead stop. Some models of societies like Huawei are not “official” but even if the name says something else, it is based on Android. This is because anyone can download the code and do what they want with it. Apple will soon get on board and will make a foldable, but for the moment, anyone interested in a phone who turns or opens on Android.
Google must take advantage of it. I know that we see and hear things each year on “large-fit” or multi-ecrans devices, but I think that Android 16 will be different, and more than speak.
Foldables also have a chance to change everything. Currently, there are two problems with the category: price and sustainability. You can like them (I think the Razr motorcycle is one of the best phones I have ever had), but you cannot deny that they are more expensive and they are more fragile.
What I like to call the fragile factor improves every year. You must still have a plastic coating protecting a surprisingly thin layer of glass, and any deep scratch will do everything in hell, but it is the nature of the beast. The conceptions are now incorporating protections for display surfaces, the hinges are stronger and have fewer sleeves, and even the ugly fold becomes less important to each new version. A foldable will never be a difficult phone that you can use on a construction site, but they will resist normal abuses much better than before.
The cost also becomes less a factor, but not as quickly as sustainability. Foldables, in particular book style devices like the Galaxy Z fold or the pixel fold, are expensive to design, lots of expensive parts and a flat cost. It will not change.
But consider this: you can buy a Galaxy S25 Ultra, a Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and a Samsung Galaxy Chromebook, or you can buy a future version of the Galaxy Z Fold which replaces almost the three. Yes, you read that correctly: Jerry says that there are foldables to replace not only phones and tablets, but also laptops and chromebooks. Call me crazy.
Will it really happen? I don’t know. You don’t know it either, and Google or Samsung either. But could If technology is built with this future in mind and the software makes something foldable that “works just”. Part of this is to make it pleasant to use, to see elements of the screening screen when you open a display or to be able to adjust several applications to size them appropriately on a single screen. You know, just like a laptop.
I am not ready to call the death of the tablet and I will never say that the laptop can be replaced by a phone. But I do not build consumer electronics or software writing for them. I just use what works best for me. If one day, a foldable is what works best because Google finally took the category more seriously, I would save a lot of money and buy this magic device.
