The “Galaxy W” line of phones from Samsung is truly something. For a while now, the company has been making this line of flagship smartphones specifically targeted at rich Chinese consumers, complete with sky-high prices. There have been phones like Samsung Galaxy W2019, a crazy dual-screen flip phone for $2,700 (with a number keypad). The large-screen foldable tablet phone has served as the basis for the W line with the introduction of the Galaxy Fold line, and this year’s Galaxy W21 is a dressed-up Galaxy Z Fold 2. Somehow, it’s also $1,000 more expensive than the US Galaxy Z Fold 2, so it’s ¥19,999, or about $3,027.
The W21 is somehow larger than the Fold 2 than the hands-on comparison from the IceUniverse phone leaker, but it doesn’t show clearly why. Samsung has not yet posted the full spec sheet, but an official phone box lists a 6.2-inch outer display and a 120Hz, 7.6-inch internal display, as the Galaxy Z Fold 2. A 4390mAh battery is also listed, which is smaller than the Fold 2’s 4500mAh battery. Besides this, you get an exclusive 512 GB bump in storage, double-SIM support, and all of the usual Fold 2 specs: Snapdragon 865 +, 12 GB of RAM, fingerprint reader side-mounted, and all the same cameras.
There is also the unique color scheme that is brilliant, polished gold straight up. Here we work through translated descriptions, but it sounds like there’s still glass in the back. A brief hands-on video and some of Samsung’s phone shots show that the rear surface is flat, so the vertical ribbon appearing in photos is just a design that lives under the top surface. Samsung’s site says the phone has a ‘7-sheet nano-level optical foil attached to the glass rear panel.’
On November 11, the first batch of this stuff is going out.
