Samsung says dust resistance on foldables isn’t easy, but it’s working on it

Samsung announced the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Galaxy Z Fold 5 this week, and it turns out that the devices maintain an IPX8 rating for water resistance. This rating means you’re not getting dust resistance, though.

Now, Samsung mobile chief TM Roh has revealed at a press conference that the company is indeed working on bringing dust resistance to its foldables.

“We are well aware of consumer demand for dust proofing, and we are making various efforts to achieve this, but due to the nature of foldables, there are many moving parts, so dust proofing is difficult,” Roh said, according to a machine-translated post by the BizWatch outlet.

The executive added that consumers need to “wait a little longer” for this feature to come to foldables, noting that early foldable phones didn’t have water resistance at first, either.

The 2023 Motorola Razr phones are the only foldables to offer dust resistance right now, albeit with an IP52 rating. That means you’re only getting splash resistance rather than full-fledged water resistance. Nevertheless, we’re keen to see foldables with IP67 or IP68 ratings in the future.

The mobile chief also claimed that the Galaxy Z Flip line could account for an even greater proportion of Galaxy foldables sold than the Fold series.

“We have set the proportion of Flip and Fold sales on a global basis at 60% and 40%, respectively, but this year, we are cautiously predicting 65% and 35% as the proportion of Flip will increase,” Roh said, according to the Maeil business daily.

Oddly enough, Samsung previously noted that Flip models accounted for 70% of all Galaxy foldables shipped in 2021 compared to Fold models. So Samsung’s latest goal of 65%/35% doesn’t quite represent a new high for Flip devices in this regard. But it still suggests that the Galaxy Z Flip 5 is seeing more love from the company. This wouldn’t be a surprise as the Flip 5 is a bigger upgrade over the Flip 4 than the Fold 5 is over the Fold 4.