Samsung's New Phones Show How Far Ahead China Is on Innovation

 Earlier this week, Samsung announced the latest generation of its high-end foldable phones at its Summer Galaxy Unpacked event. The Galaxy Z Fold7 and the Galaxy Z Flip7 are variously lighter, thinner, and less crease-prone than before. They are more expensive too. Some call them the “foldables to beat.”

It’s Samsung messaging and a commentator response that sounds an awful lot like what we heard last year. And the year before that, for that matter, in a hall of echoes typical of the iterative progress loop much of consumer tech hardware has fallen into. It's not that we think they'll be bad—we liked their predecessors just fine. It's just that when you compare them to the progress being made by Chinese competitors, they feel a bit dull and already a step behind in an area they are widely thought to lead.

Déjà Vu

It’s a situation we are already watching unfold with EVs, something that was most stark at this year’s Shanghai Auto show. WIRED writer Alistair Charlton called the show a “warning to the West,” as Chinese brands showed off innovation and scale that far surpasses what Western brands have managed in the same time.

Samsung Galaxy Unpacked July 2025

Chinese carmakers push harder on features, design, charging speeds, and simply getting their cars out there—and they’re now ready to start the push outside of their own (already huge) market. China’s biggest EV-maker BYD has launched in the UK and Europe, and the same would likely be true for US streets were it not for tariffs and the dangerous political spotlight this would put on the giant carmaker.

The old idea that Chinese-designed tech is trash, that Japan, South Korea, and the West do the innovating while China provides the factory floor, is out of date. And China’s innovations are not (entirely) from IP theft either. Its early investment in EVs proves it, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

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