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Potential color options
Color options are always a big focus ahead of major phones, and that’s especially the case with the Galaxy Z Fold and Galaxy Z Flip, since having an eye-catching design is part of the phone’s appeal. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Flip 6 color rumors have been pretty consistent from the get-go.
Based on rumors and a series of leaked renders that look pretty official to us, it looks like the Galaxy Z Fold 6 will come in pink, dark navy, and silver. Look for brighter options with the Galaxy Z Flip 6, which is expected to feature silver, green, light blue, and yellow. If none of those options suit you, Samsung occasionally offers exclusive colors on its website, so stay tuned.
Eat my dust
One of the most commonly raised concerns about foldable phones is their durability: People are reluctant to pay $999 to $1,799 for one of Samsung’s foldable models if there’s a risk that the device might… well… stop folding. And one of the things that can bring devices to their knees faster than you might think is dust.
This is a problem for Samsung’s current foldables, which have a water-resistance rating but not a dust-resistance rating. That makes potential Galaxy Z Fold and Galaxy Z Flip buyers wary of dust getting into their potential phones and wreaking havoc on the moving parts that cause the phone to open and close.
In this context, you can understand why my colleague Richard Pirday is excited about a feature announced for the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Flip 6. The new phones are expected to have an IP48 rating. This means the phones will be able to resist dust and survive being submerged in water. If true, it’s an improvement that could make people much more confident about buying a foldable phone.
Discover the Galaxy Watch’s bioactive sensor
The Galaxy Watch 7 is also expected to be on the agenda at Galaxy Unpacked, although Samsung has already given us a glimpse of one of the watch’s new features. Samsung previewed the BioActive health sensor that will be part of its upcoming watches.
Fitness editor James Frew has details on the BioActive health sensor, but basically it’s built into Samsung smartwatches, and this upgraded version benefits from optimized sensor placement that should lead to more accurate measurements for things like heart rate monitoring. There’s also more real estate on that chip, as well as improvements to the LEDs used to measure your heart rate.
An Olympic setting
The timing and setting of this Unpacked are a little more interesting than a typical Samsung event. While Samsung tends to hold its product launches in New York or San Francisco, this year’s Unpacked is taking place in Paris. And it’s happening just a few weeks before the Paris Olympics begin.
In fact, Samsung moved up the date of Unpacked, which is usually in late July/early August, so that the product launch could happen in Paris before the Summer Olympics. Part of the reason for that is that Samsung is a sponsor of the event. But I suspect the types of products Samsung will be showing off today are also driving the company’s choice of metrics. As I wrote over the weekend, health and fitness tracking will be a big focus at Unpacked, to the point that foldable phones will likely be overshadowed.
By the way, my colleague Kate Kozuch is in Paris attending Unpacked, so expect reports from her later today.
Oura Prepares for the Galaxy Ring
If today is the day the Galaxy Ring launches — and everything suggests it is — the main rival to Samsung’s smart ring is not letting itself be pushed around. Just before Galaxy Unpacked, Oura announced its intention to integrate artificial intelligence features into its Oura Ring.
The all-new Oura Advisor is a suite of AI-powered tools that will analyze data to offer actionable advice to improve your sleep and well-being. Or as Oura puts it, the Advisor feature available to Oura Ring Gen 3 owners will leverage “AI to help you reach your health goals with personalized insights, recommendations, and encouragement.”
Your move, Samsung.
Unless Samsung has a surprise up its sleeve, no product will won’t Today, we’re introducing the Galaxy Z Fold 6 FE at Galaxy Unpacked. This is the cheaper version of the Galaxy Z Fold that reportedly does away with some features (like missing S Pen support) in exchange for a lower price.
For a while, rumors have swirled about a possible low-cost foldable from Samsung that would be unveiled at this summer’s Unpacked event. But in May, rumors surfaced that Samsung was considering working on this particular device. The problem was reportedly that Samsung was concerned about the lack of differentiation from the feature-packed Galaxy Z Fold 6.
The FE version of the Fold may not be completely dead. There’s talk of a possible appearance early next year alongside the Galaxy S25. But that’s an Unpacked event for another time.
Galaxy AI, Part 2
Samsung’s current foldables, the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Galaxy Z Flip 5, already come with some Galaxy AI features, as Samsung has brought the capabilities introduced with the launch of the Galaxy S24 to recent flagships, including the latest Fold and Flip. That means features like Circle to Search and Chat Assist are already part of Samsung’s foldable experience.
Samsung plans to expand the Galaxy’s AI capabilities at today’s Unpacked event. We know this because Samsung told us in a blog post last month from Won-Joon Choi, who leads the company’s mobile R&D office in its Mobile Experience division. “Our foldables are Samsung Galaxy’s most versatile and flexible form factor, and when combined with Galaxy AI, these two complementary technologies will together unlock all new possibilities,” Choi wrote at the time.
It’s unclear exactly what form the Galaxy AI features designed for the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Galaxy Z Flip 6 will take, but at least one rumor suggests a Fold-specific capability that will leverage generative image editing. Rumor has it that you’ll be able to take any drawings you make on the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and have AI tools beautify them to make them look more stylized.
This is probably just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Galaxy AI features coming to Samsung phones, as I think AI has to be a feature that sets Samsung’s foldables apart from the crowd.
Close-up of the Galaxy Ring
It’s still too early to name the best Unpacked MVP, given that we’re still a few hours away from the start of the event. But it’s very clear that there’s a lot of attention surrounding the Galaxy Ring, the smart ring that will mark Samsung’s first entry into this new health tracker market.
Samsung briefly showed off the ring at its Unpacked event in January, then gave us a sneak peek at the different colors at Mobile World Congress in February. What Samsung hasn’t revealed to us yet is the ring’s price or features.
Leaks have shed some light on the latter issue. According to the leaks, the ring is supposed to measure both heart rate and stress levels, and it is widely expected that it will also be able to monitor sleep patterns, with snore detection features to potentially diagnose sleep apnea. Other potential features include the ability to measure skin temperature and predict menstrual cycles.
Some reports even claim that the Galaxy Ring could include an ECG sensor as well as an additional sensor to measure blood flow. These supposed capabilities, however, seem more outlandish to us.