What you need to know
- Samsung announced a new Retro edition of the Galaxy Z Flip 5 for select regions.
- The latest foldable phone is a homage to the company's older E700 clamshell phone.
- It comes in E700's inspired design and features 512GB of storage.
Samsung has announced a new edition of its popular foldable smartphone in select regions. Dubbed the Galaxy Z Flip 5 Retro, it actually a homage given to Samsung's SGH-E700 — the company's popular clamshell phone from 2003.
The special edition Galaxy Z Flip 5 is heavily inspired by the E700 phone in terms of design and with some retro features. The clamshell featured a mix of indigo and silver colorways on the exterior, which is carried forward to the Galaxy Z Flip 5 phone as well.
Additionally, Samsung is also offering a screen theme to emulate pixel graphics widely used in the 2000's era. Further, the company says there is an exclusive animation for Flex Windows on the device again with a retro sensibility.
Since it's a special edition device, Samsung provides additional items in the retail packaging, which includes three flip suit cards showcasing the company's logo from previous years. There is a flip suitcase coupled with a collector card engraved with a serial number to give buyers a sense of having an exclusive collector edition.
Per the announcement blog post, Samsung mentions that its E700 phone had played a crucial role in increasing the company's mobile phone business as it had hit record sales of over ten million units. Thus, it makes sense Samsung would want to pay homage with its most popular foldable phone lineup.
Aside from the design aesthetics and retro features, the Galaxy Z Flip 5 Retro edition remains essentially the same phone as the regular Z Flip 5. The device will be sold in a single storage option featuring 512GB, and for the Korean market, it is priced at 1,599,400 won (~$1183).
That said, don't expect the special edition to boost the sales of the already popular phone too much. Samsung plans to sell these in limited quantities in other markets, including Korea, the U.K., France, Germany, Spain, and Australia.
The device will be available in the said markets starting November 1. As of now, there is no word of its availability in the U.S. region.
The Galaxy Z Flip 5 is one of the best calmshell phone that Samsung has ever made. This year, it is particulary special since it has a large cover screen and improved hinge mechanism.
