Samsung’s New Foldables Give the Keys to Google AI and Say, ‘Here, You Drive.’

Samsung’s newest generation of Fold and Flip folding phones is here, and this year, it has quite a bit to parade around. The Galaxy Fold 7, for example, is hella thin and almost as slim as a Galaxy S25 Ultra when it’s folded up, while the Galaxy Z Flip 7 has a bigger front-facing screen that spans 4.1 inches. However much the foldables have going on in the hardware department, there’s even more going on inside with AI. The only difference is that Samsung has almost nothing to do with those AI developments.

See Galaxy Z Fold 7 at Samsung.com

See Galaxy Z Flip 7 at Samsung.com

This year, the inside part—in particular AI—is all about Google and its many, many, Gemini features. In fact, during Samsung’s keynote for the foldables, Senior Vice President of Devices and Services at Google, Rick Osterloh, even took the stage to announce just how deep its Gemini integration is. First, everyone’s favorite AI feature (or at least the most useful), Circle to Search, is getting a dose of Google’s AI Mode. This will help Circle to Search’s multimodal capabilities, paving the way for more nuanced answers to questions about images and products. I’ve had a little time with Google’s AI Mode, and I think that whether it’s actually better at searching is up for debate, but more nuance is certainly what Google is aiming at here, and it’s definitely moving the amount of AI in the Z Fold 7 forward.

Google also announced that, starting with Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 7, you’ll be able to long-press the power button and have Gemini take a gander at your screen while you’re scrolling. With live access to what you’re looking at, you can ask Gemini for help on stuff like product comparisons. Per Google:

“Say you’re deciding which suitcase to buy for your upcoming trip: Open Gemini Live, share your screen, scroll through the different products you’re considering, and ask, ‘which one should I choose based on material quality?’”

And the applications don’t stop there. Google says you can also wield Gemini Live on your camera to do stuff like coach you through cutting your bangs or styling a pair of glasses. Whether you want AI to do that type of thing for you is entirely up to you, but again, it’s certainly a much deeper integration of Gemini into Samsung’s foldable experience—one that’s extending to native Samsung apps. Gemini Live is also being unleashed on Calendar, Reminder, and Notes, according to Google, which feels like a very deep partnership. In fact, partnership may not even be the word, actually. At this point Samsung’s foldables feel like they’re just as much Google phones as they are Samsung ones.

I’m less sure about what that means for Samsung, but for Google, the prospect of being able to put Gemini features in front of that many eyeballs must be very enticing. Google, as you may have noticed this past I/O has been pouring resources into expanding Gemini with several new models and even AI subscriptions that group Google’s latest AI tools into one monthly fee. Google is offering Galaxy Z Fold 7 users that subscription for free, by the way—at least for the first six months. After that it’ll cost $20 per month, unfortunately.

But even if Google’s AI features are more advanced than the competition, and even if they are actually useful, Google still needs to find an audience, and that’s exactly what Samsung can offer it. The biggest hurdle for AI features in phones is still getting people to actually adopt them, and to do that, you need to get them in front of people, which Pixel phones aren’t really doing. To actually take off, those features also have to be useful, and that remains to be seen. We have our Galaxy Fold 7 in hand, so we’ll have more to say on that soon, but until then, Samsung’s newest foldables feel like a big win for Google.

See Galaxy Z Fold 7 at Samsung.com

See Galaxy Z Flip 7 at Samsung.com