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We encountered a lot of weird and wonderful technology at Mobile World Congress, which is currently winding down in Barcelona, but in terms of concept smartphones, Motorola had perhaps one of the most striking offerings on the show floor, with its first rollable concept.
Revealed alongside a roll-up laptop concept from parent company Lenovo – which enables better multitasking by effectively doubling the height of the screen – Motorola’s roll-up concept arrives as an impressively compact little Android smartphone, but with a double press of a button on the right side grows that 15:9, 5-inch screen into a much larger 22:9, 6.5-inch panel.
You may be wondering why Motorola thinks this is a concept worth investing research and development dollars into, but it’s really the company’s way of showing that while foldable devices – like its own Razr 2022 – delivering on the promise of a more compact, full-screen smartphone. , perhaps there is more than one way to meet this challenge.
One of the most elegant aspects of the rollable tablet, based on the time we’ve spent with it, was that unlike perhaps any foldable (aside from Huawei’s Mate Xs 2), it doesn’t require a smaller secondary screen to display information about to bring to the user when closed.
Unlike the rollable concept of the Oppo X 2021 from a few years ago, Motorola’s interpretation not only expands vertically rather than horizontally, but it also doesn’t hide the portion of the screen that isn’t visible when you look at the looking at the front of the phone. .
Instead, the bottom part of the screen is sent to the back of the phone where it can still be seen. It now acts as a secondary rear display, without the need for an additional panel like on the Razr and many of the other best foldable devices out there.
In this mode, with the phone facing down, that display on the back can be used to show notifications, incoming calls or a clock. When using the camera, it can double as a rear viewfinder or display animated faces to grab a subject’s (read: child’s) attention and make sure they’re looking in the right direction.
Another genius idea: the front camera and earpiece are completely hidden in normal use, with the screen rolling down rather than up very slightly to reveal both if needed. This works whether you’re taking a selfie or taking a call, unlike Honor’s Magic 2 and Xiaomi’s Mi Mix 3 from late 2018.
While a double-press of the side button forces the phone’s screen to expand and contract, we also got to see some use cases where Motorola’s rollable can automatically adjust itself.
If you watch a landscape video in portrait mode and then tilt the phone sideways, the screen will expand to provide a larger viewing experience. Likewise, while you can scroll through emails or messages in the contracted 5-inch display mode, if you tap to bring up the on-screen keyboard, the screen will immediately pop up to provide more room for both the keyboard and content together. Smart.
While this phone will never make it to stores in its current form, no Motorola would be complete without Moto Actions, which means you can also quickly launch the camera with a double twist of the wrist, while a karate blow fires the flashlight.
Is there really a future for rollable phones?
Of course, for all the conveniences that come with this phone’s unique form factor and Motorola’s user experience, there are obvious caveats to the concept as it stands.
In profile, the rollable’s body is thick by modern smartphone standards, while the extra screen that protrudes beyond the top of the body is incredibly thin and looks fragile.
Then there is the motorized mechanism at work in that thick body, driving the expanding and contracting screen. To function as a true consumer-ready smartphone, this system would have to withstand hundreds, perhaps thousands, of iterations over its lifetime.
While MWC 2023 played host to many new foldable products, from the Tecno Phantom V Fold to the Honor Magic Vs, to OnePlus’ confirmation that a premium foldable device is on the way in the near future, it’s at least nice to know that other form factors are in the works, even if they have yet to prove themselves to the market.