Samsung's TriFold sells out in Korea, but low margins create profitability concerns

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Samsung's TriFold sells out in Korea, but low margins create profitability concerns

Published: 15 Dec. 2025, 13:48 Updated: 15 Dec. 2025, 15:11

Audio report: written by reporters, read by AI

Customers line up to buy Samsung's Galaxy Z TriFold smartphone at the Samsung Gangnam store in Seocho District, southern Seoul on Dec. 12. [SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS]

Samsung Electronics' breakthrough trifold smartphone is selling like crazy, but a high production cost that leaves almost no room for profit margin has kept the company from popping champagne bottles just yet.

In fact, consumers have been lining up outside Samsung Electronics stores around the country to get their hands on Samsung's latest technological achievement, the Galaxy Z TriFold, during its launch. Even at temperatures of minus 3 degrees Celsius (26.6 degrees Fahrenheit), 80 customers were already in line at the Samsung Electronics store in Seocho District, southern Seoul, waiting for the store to open on Friday at 8 a.m.

One of them was an office worker surnamed Jeong who took the morning off to get in line for the device. Jeong and fellow fans in the queue even tried purchasing from Samsung's online store when it opened at 9:30 a.m. because of the obvious bottleneck at the offline store.

“There wasn’t going to be a lot of stock, so I tried both online and in-store,” said Jeong. “Thankfully, I managed to buy one at the store at around 11:20 a.m.”

Samsung sold out of the Galaxy Z TriFold's initial domestic stock on Friday, the same day it launched, according to the IT industry on Sunday. Early reviews of the device have also been favorable.

However, despite the strong reception, the mood inside Samsung Electronics is not completely upbeat. The company has definitely shown its engineering capabilities with the TriFold, but it is struggling to make much money on each sale.

A customer holds a Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold smartphone [SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS]

However, Samsung's primary goal with the TriFold was to demonstrate its technological prowess, not make a profit.

Although Samsung was the first in the world to release a foldable smartphone in 2019, Chinese rival Huawei beat them to the punch in the tri-fold race. Huawei released its first tri-fold phone, the Mate XT, in September last year, followed by the second-generation Mate XTs in September this year. With its TriFold this week, Samsung wanted to make it clear that it, too, was capable.

Roh Tae-moon, co-CEO and head of Samsung Electronics’ device division, first officially confirmed the TriFold’s 2025 release at the Galaxy Unpacked event in July, saying at the time that the company was preparing to launch the phone within the year.

Reactions to the phone’s performance have been largely positive.

A visitor at the Samsung Gangnam store in Seocho District, southern Seoul holds a Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold smartphone duirng a media day event on Dec. 2. [YONHAP]

Samsung’s TriFold adopts an inward-folding G-shaped design, which improves durability compared to Huawei’s Z-shaped in-and-out folding design. It is also equipped with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, which is seen as outperforming Huawei’s in-house Kirin 9020 chip used in its Mate XTs. The Trifold also achieves an ultra-slim folded thickness of 3.9 millimeters (0.15 inches), quite similar to Huawei’s 3.6 millimeters.

The TriFold’s price came in lower than expected, with an official retail price of 3.59 million won ($2,430). This is roughly 600,000 won cheaper than the Huawei Mate XTs 512GB model, which sells for 19,999 yuan ($2,830).

Lim Sung-taek, vice president of Samsung Electronics’ Korea division, alluded to the pricing strategy during a media briefing on Dec. 2, saying it was “a price made difficultly, by cutting everything possible.”

Lim Sung-taek, vice president of Samsung Electronics’ Korea division, holds a Samsung Galaxy Z TriFold smartphone duirng a media day event held at the Samsung Gangnam store in Seocho District, southern Seoul on Dec. 2. [YONHAP]

The challenge, however, lies in profit margins. The TriFold requires an organic light-emitting diode panel and a high-end processor. Rising memory prices are also increasing production costs.

“Contract prices for DRAM in the fourth quarter will rise more than 75 percent year-on-year,” said market research firm TrendForce in a forecast report. “Considering that memory accounts for 10 to 15 percent of total smartphone component costs, smartphone prices are expected to increase by about 8 to 10 percent this year.”

“There’s pressure from costs, but pricing it too high would make consumers shy away, so Samsung had to make a tough call,” said Lee Jong-hwan, a professor of system semiconductor engineering at Sangmyung University. “It’s a structure where it’s hard to make a significant profit.”

Samsung is reportedly still deliberating whether to increase domestic supply despite strong sales. Expanding production could help boost market share and maintain a technological lead over Chinese competitors — but the company cannot ignore the issue of profitability forever.

The domestic supply of Galaxy Z Trifold units is estimated at between 2,000 and 3,000 units, while the global supply is around 20,000 units.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
BY YI WOO-LIM [[email protected]]