Samsung has made some decent improvements to its new foldable phones with the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Galaxy Z Flip 5, but one thing that is still missing is things like dust protection.

Both new phones are IPX8 rated. This means that they can be immersed in up to 1.5 meters of fresh water for 30 minutes without being affected.

However, while this is a fairly comprehensive protection against water, Samsung offers no such guarantee against small solid particles entering the interior, which could cause problems for dusty homes.

However, Samsung is considering this. TM Roh, head of the mobile division, told Korean site BizWatch that fans will have to "wait a little longer."

"We are well aware of consumer demand for dustproofing, and we are making various efforts to achieve this, but the nature of the folding nature of the device makes dustproofing difficult due to its many moving parts," he said.

It should be noted that this is not an insurmountable problem, as one of Samsung's rivals has proven. Motorola's Razr and Razr+ have an IP52 rating for dust resistance, but only two points for water resistance, which is clearly a trade-off.

The "a little more" comment suggests that Samsung is not that far off from cracking this particular nut. One gets the impression that the company wouldn't even be talking about it if it wasn't so close to coming up with a solution, hoping that the 2024 fallible will be protected from both water and dust.

In April, leaker Revegnus claimed that the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 would feature "major form factor changes". However, since then the same leaker has suggested that this could simply be a change in the aspect ratio of the external display, so perhaps not.

In any case, being distracted by what may be just around the corner should not prevent you from enjoying Samsung's current batch of fall-doubles. The improved teardrop hinge makes both models thinner than ever, and the larger cover screen on the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 makes it much easier to use when closed.