Samsung Display has taken to Mobile World Congress 2025 with a handful of new display innovations, one of which is a flexible gaming handheld the company is calling the Flex Gaming. Samsung is one of the industry’s leading brands in foldable displays, although most of its tech revolves around folding screens on smartphones like the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Flip 6.
The Flex Gaming handheld is a new direction for the company, envisioning a future where it’s not just phones that could incorporate folding screens. The idea is that you get a handheld gaming device that offers a bigger display when playing games. When it’s time to store the device, it folds up to be more compact.
It’s a novel idea, given the size of current handheld gaming devices like the ROG Ally X. According to Samsung, the handheld comes with a 7.2-inch screen when unfolded. So it’s about the same size as the display on most other handheld PCs. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen the design for something like this either. A patent for this device popped up in November of last year.
Samsung’s Flex Gaming handheld is just a concept
While this device is neat, it’s worth mentioning that it isn’t something you can actually buy. Samsung confirms it’s just a concept to showcase the possibilities of something like this. That means it may not ever come to market. However, there’s always a chance that someone could come up with a handheld like this. Samsung’s proof of concept shows that it’s possible. All that needs to happen is for some company to see Samsung’s vision and decide the device is worth making. Samsung did also patent it. So perhaps it does have plans to make it a reality.
Of course, there are bound to be some potential complications. The Flex Gaming handheld appears to be running on a mobile OS, likely Android. It may not necessarily be possible to build a folding handheld gaming PC due to all the components needed to produce the kind of performance we currently get from what’s available. We’re merely speculating, though.
That being said, this could be one of the complications a company might run into. The challenge of designing and engineering a handheld gaming PC like the Steam Deck that can fold in half.
Samsung came up with a rather ingenious design
If you think about it, Samsung already came up with an idea to tackle one issue. The joysticks. How might one create a handheld with a folding screen when the joysticks would just get in the way? The Flex Gaming handheld has the solution. It has holes that are adjacent to the joysticks on the opposite side of the handheld. So when you fold it in half, the joysticks neatly fit right into those holes.
It’s also worth mentioning that the handheld doesn’t have any action buttons or a d-pad. With those in place, the device might not sit flush when folding in half. That presents an extra challenge. If Samsung or any other company decided to make a device like this, they would need to come up with a way to incorporate those other standard controls. Again, though, this is just a proof of concept. So it’s just Samsung Display showcasing that a device like this could exist if companies wanted to make it.
2025-03-04 15:07:56