For years, people have decried the monotony of smartphone design. With each annual release, companies tend to recycle the same features -- when they're not borrowing from each other -- with minimal upgrades and hardly any aesthetic changes, resulting in an uninspiring sea of sameness and predictability.
That's why at every tech event I've attended over the last several years, the most eager crowds cluster around phones that defy hardware limitations. This year's Mobile World Congress was no exception. I wiggled my way through hordes of people pushing to get their hands on foldable, flippable and ultraslim devices.
Some of these phones are already available to purchase, like Samsung's Galaxy Z Trifold and Huawei's Mate XTs. Others are still concepts, like Tecno's superthin Phantom Ultimate G Fold and its modular phone. A handful of others I saw are on the way to store shelves, like Honor's Robot Phone and Motorola's book-style Razr Fold.
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As our smartphone options have expanded, our collective tastes have remained largely the same. Global foldable phone shipments hit a record 14% year-over-year growth in the third quarter of 2025, according to Counterpoint Research. But their share of the overall smartphone market was just 2.5% that quarter, keeping foldables firmly in the niche sector. Thin handsets like Apple's iPhone Air and Samsung's Galaxy S25 Edge have reportedly been underwhelming, with marketing buzz not matching up to real-world adoption. Even at a tech conference like MWC, I rarely saw attendees toting anything other than a standard slab phone.
"Just because something looks great, doesn't mean you want it at the end of the day," IDC Senior Research Director Nabila Popal told me in December.
Novelty and adoption remain two separate spheres in the world of mobile design. It's refreshing to see phone manufacturers branch into more ambitious form factors, but those configurations have yet to graduate from spectacle to staple. And perhaps that's by design; something can only be buzz-worthy if not everyone owns it. But the argument that there's a lack of interesting phones loses merit with each passing year of hardware innovation -- even if flagship devices continue to feel like copy-paste versions of their predecessors.
Much of the gap between niche phone hype and adoption boils down to their needing to be more practical. Foldables, for instance, have come a long way with improving camera quality and battery life, but they still lag behind what you'll get on high-end flat phones. The same goes for thin phones like the Galaxy S25 Edge and iPhone Air, which have scaled back specs in exchange for lighter builds. Until sleekness can fully coexist with function, most people will keep choosing the latter.
Prices for unique phones are also prohibitive. Book-style foldables cost around $2,000, and a trifold will set you back around $3,000. Even with their more limited capabilities, slimmer and lighter phones tend to linger at the $1,000 mark.
Perhaps we're creatures of habit. I'm guilty of this myself. After testing some of the most cutting-edge phones on the market, I always flock back to my plain old slab phones. They have everything I need -- namely, great cameras and long battery life -- without any frills. For most of us, one screen is more than enough for everyday tasks.
Sure, the phone in your pocket may look strikingly like the one you used 10 years ago. But does that really matter if it's still serving you well?
It's great that mobile companies are looking for ways to stand apart -- not only from one another, but also from their existing products. And I hope they continue to push those limits and break away from more predictable designs, if only to give consumers more choices.
But until more people actually choose to branch out beyond the familiar, fresh mobile designs will remain firmly in the realm of feverish trade show fanfare and the occasional pocket.
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