Finally, a large display for your wrist wearable.
While the world’s wondering when Apple will launch their folding iPhone, someone went ahead and made a Watch with a folding display… because why not. Titled the Apple Watch Series X, this quirky concept gives you a smartwatch with a larger folding screen, allowing you to use it as a de-facto iPhone. After all, your watch can make phone calls, right? The Apple Watch Series X is your regular foldable, in the sense that it comes with a primary screen on the front, and opens like a book to reveal a ‘larger’ secondary screen on the inside. Obviously, I use the word ‘larger’ rather loosely, considering how small the Apple Watch’s form factor is, to begin with.
Designed to sit on your wrist, this foldable concept turns the square-shaped WatchOS interface into a more traditional landscape one, unlocking the possibility for a lot of regular apps to make their way onto the wristwatch, including better Netflix and YouTube watching experiences.
Designer: Liquid Silicone
The Series X watch concept has a unique design with a flat-edge that we had expected Apple to debut in 2021. The screen size remains the same, although a bridge on the left edge (with Apple’s branding) hides the folding mechanism (sort of like in Samsung’s Galaxy Fold). You can use the watch as-is, although when you open it, you’re greeted with a widescreen that gives you a better layout of elements – especially for the fitness app, displayed below.
Sure the idea for a foldable watch seems absurd at first, although if you think about it – this format isn’t new. The Galaxy Z-Flip does the exact same thing, with a square-shaped device that opens into a vertical phone – the Series X simply flips this template onto its side.
Does it then make sense for Apple to launch a folding smartwatch? HELL NO! Sure, a larger display on your wrist makes things better, but the scaling of the display, in this case, isn’t absolute, i.e., the larger display still has the same height as the smaller one. If Apple WERE to launch a foldable, it would make much more sense to do so with a display that actually needs folding – take this iPhone iPad hybrid for starters. Or I wouldn’t mind a folding MacBook too, in the format of this FlexBook concept!
