Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 3 may indeed be the best folding phone. But the next frontier in Samsung's foldable phone and display technology may be the sliding screen.

This is suggested by a new OLED Era microsite from Samsung Display, Samsung's screen manufacturing arm. The newly launched subsite shows some of Samsung Display's thin, flexible OLED panels.

While the square foldable displays found in current Galaxy Fold phones will see the light of day, the site also suggests that what Samsung calls "Flex OLED" may one day appear in phones with sliding displays.

Using ultra-thin glass (UTG), Samsung could make a phone or tablet with a virtually sliding display, expanding a compact device into a handheld with a larger screen. [We have seen this concept before with the Oppo X 2021 concept phone, which extends outward and pulls the ends of the foldable display flat on both sides, effectively sliding behind the phone to create a larger screen. Samsung's "Slideable Flex" concept appears to follow this method.

Doing this could result in a chunky phone when the display wraps around the back. However, if the folded display can be made to have a 1.4R curvature, as seen in the Galaxy Z Fold 2, Samsung's sliding display can be wrapped more tightly around the phone's casing, making the device slimmer.

"Crisper, cleaner folds and less space. The Samsung Flex OLED's extremely small curvature of 1.4R creates a sharper fold, resulting in a more compact and precise smartphone design," explains Samsung.

"Stress during folding is minimized by the staggered structure of the display layers, which allows for such a small curvature."

Of course, Samsung makes no mention of any sliding screen devices it is working on. However, Samsung has long innovated in display technology and device form factors, so it is not a big leap to try to make a phone that combines a folding and sliding display.

Flex OLED innovations could also lead to sharper curvature in the next generation of Fold phones, which in turn could lead to a flatter fold, addressing one of our criticisms about the Galaxy Z Fold 3, that it is quite chunky when folded.

We will likely have to wait until at least 2022 to see what Samsung is working on next. The company will likely announce the Samsung Galaxy S22 line next. But we feel we are on the cusp of a true era of devices with innovative, flexible displays.