Ah, December — the month when we hang stockings, eat questionable quantities of peppermint bark and receive text messages from relatives asking, “Which phone should I buy?”

But this year, the holiday tech spotlight isn’t on AI toasters, self-driving scooters or that $800 “smart mug” that keeps coffee warm. No, the star perched at the top of the holiday gadget tree is the foldable phone.

Not just any foldable phone — Samsung has now introduced a tri-fold, because apparently the industry looked at bifold phones and said, “Clever, but what if we gave users two creases to worry about instead of one?” If this trend keeps going, by 2030 we’ll be carrying phones that unfold like a Rand McNally road map.

Of course, all of this is the natural evolution of the world’s first foldable device: the flip phone.

Back in the day, the flip phone was the pinnacle of nerd chic — a chunky little clamshell that required both hands to operate and absolutely refused to fit in any jean pocket made after 2004. It was basically a plastic taco with buttons.

The modern foldable, meanwhile, is a glorified, much more expensive version of that same plastic taco, except now it has a hinge engineered by NASA, a flexible OLED screen that costs more to replace than my entire first car and enough antennas to make a small radar array blush. Progress!

A Holiday Wonder … Powered Quietly by RF Engineering

Behind all this seasonal gadget sorcery lies something even more magical: the RF engineers who make these things actually work. Because let’s be honest — anyone can fold a piece of glass. But getting that device to maintain robust 5G performance while halfway contorted like an elf doing yoga? That’s when the Qorvo elves get involved.

Foldables are RF playgrounds:

• Multiple radios tucked into panels that keep changing shape
• Beamforming antennas that must adapt to every bend, angle, and pocket placement
• Power management that prevents your phone from doubling as a festive hand warmer

And now that tri-folds are here, you’re essentially looking at a miniaturized, multi-panel RF Rubik’s Cube. Under the hood, it’s a symphony of filters, switches, LNAs, PAs and clever antenna tuning — the kind of engineering that makes you whisper, “Bless you, Qorvo,” every time your signal bars don’t disappear behind a hinge.

Foldables Are Basically the December of Smartphones

Think about it:

• They bend under pressure (just like our schedules).
• They expand dramatically (just like our waist bands and credit card statements).
• They require careful alignment to function properly (just like family gatherings).
• And they often need time to cool down (just like all of us after the family gathering).

In short, foldables are the emotional support smartphone for the holiday season.

A Toast to the Season of Unfolding

So as you wrap gifts, untangle that 60-foot strand of lights that absolutely was not in a knot last year and attempt to assemble toys with instructions written entirely in Swedish, take a moment to appreciate the modern foldable — a device that proves even the most complex things can still open up beautifully.

Here’s to a holiday season that unfolds, refolds and maybe even tri-folds smoothly … with only minor hinge friction.

This article first appeared in Brent's Musings in Microwave Journal