Oppo's folding phone may have dodged the Galaxy Fold’s biggest flaws

Oppo vice president Brian Shen shown off the company’s folding smartphone in a series of photos on Weibo (via Engadget). The handset, which features an outward-folding display, shares much in common with the recently announced HUAWEI Mate X.

We didn’t learn much about the device — OPPO chose not to show this off at MWC, so we only have some machine-translated details from Weibo to go on — but it already has our attention. When closed, the display wraps around the device, with a camera-wielding sidebar sitting at the left-hand side of the phone’s rear — just like the Mate X. When unfolded, the unit resembles a conventional tablet.

Where this improves upon the Samsung Galaxy Fold, launched last week (pictured below), is in the display area when the device is folded. The Galaxy Fold’s 4.6-inch screen looks tiny with the large bezels surrounding it: OPPO’s phone appears to have a much better screen-to-body ratio.

The Galaxy Fold also doesn’t fold cleanly — there’s a gap at its hinge that OPPO’s device might have avoided. We can’t tell if this is the case from the photos, but the extra development time OPPO may have had compared to Samsung with its folding device (confirmed to arrive in the next couple of months) may have helped it side-step that unfortunate caveat.

We’re still to learn what OPPO’s folding phone will be called, when it will be officially unveiled, and how much it will cost, though its price will likely be upwards of $1,500. We’ll hopefully learn more on this in the coming weeks.