2026 needs to be the year Samsung fixes the Galaxy Z Flip’s cover screen

It sounds like Samsung has some pretty big plans for 2026 — that’s great. I’m excited by the idea of new cameras, a custom chipset, and renewed innovation in its foldable lineup. However, this all sounds like stuff we’ve heard before. We’ve seen Samsung adopt a 200MP primary sensor, tack the For Galaxy badge onto Qualcomm’s latest chipset, and expand the Galaxy Z Flip’s cover screen beyond its weird, folder-shaped limits.

So, for any of these new promises to actually make an impact in 2026, I need just one thing out of Samsung: I need it to fix the Galaxy Z Flip 8’s cover screen. I know I’ve been asking for it for years, but here’s what needs to happen now.

Since you and I both know where my usual Galaxy Z Flip complaint lies, let’s start there. Please, for the love of all things with USB-C ports, can you please just make one cohesive app drawer, Samsung? At this point, I don’t even mind if you keep Good Lock for some things; I just don’t want to need it for such a basic feature. Motorola has done this correctly for years, and I’m surprised Samsung hasn’t copied it yet.

If you’re out of the loop, Samsung currently offers one of the most limited, locked-down app drawers on the cover screen of its Galaxy Z Flip. You can only access a limited number of optimized apps, including Google Maps and YouTube. There are a few more, but for the bulk of your apps, you’ll need to install Good Lock from the Galaxy Store and then add plugins to get a full-sized app drawer. Annoyingly, once you’ve done all that, you now have two app drawers instead of one — and one of them is clearly better than the other.

So, all I’m really asking is for Samsung to get its act together and unite the app drawers. It would make life so much easier when I’m trying to pull my Galaxy Z Flip out of my pocket and quickly jump to an app, and I remain at least somewhat surprised that Samsung hasn’t done this already. After all, it controls Good Lock, so we know it has the technology… just make things easier for all of us.

Alright, now that my entire Good Lock argument is out of the way, let’s move on to something a little less obvious: I want to be able to multitask on the Galaxy Z Flip’s cover screen. I know it sounds tricky, especially with just a 4.1-inch panel, but if Samsung is going to give me the real estate, I want to use it.

Besides, Google recently overhauled the way that multitasking works in Android 16, and I think it’s become much friendlier to foldables. Instead of having to split your apps perfectly in half, you can now drag one or the other to command as much as 90% of your display, which would give me most of the now-square panel for whatever I need to get into. It would probably eliminate half of my need for the internal 6.9-inch display, which is kind of my dream.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think multitasking on the Galaxy Z Flip’s cover screen needs to work the same way it does on something like the Galaxy S25. I know that the small form factor would make it more difficult to split a screen horizontally, but I think it’s at least fair to ask Samsung to make things easier. Even if that means creating a special interface where one app occupies 80% of the display and you have to tap on a tiny square in the corner to switch to the other app — almost like flipping playing cards — I think it would be worth it.

Heck, just let me see my recent apps instead of forcing me to swipe back to the home screen each time I want to do something new, and I’ll be happy enough.

The last thing I really need Samsung to fix on its Galaxy Z Flip cover screen is to give it just a little more control over itself. At the moment, it’s almost impossible to do anything without opening your phone, from arranging widgets to picking new clocks, tweaking your quick settings, or downloading third-party keyboards. And remember, this is a $1,100 phone that’s built around the usefulness of its cover screen.

I don’t think it’s especially unreasonable to expect Samsung’s cover screen to be customizable. I really feel like we’ve come far enough that I should be able to drag and drop widgets on a display that’s half the size of a Galaxy S25 Ultra without having to go through the motion of opening that phone. Besides, if Samsung wants to make widgets its go-to instead of full-sized apps, it should be just as willing to make those widgets easy to control.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing about asking for better out of Samsung is that I don’t have to do the same for its rivals. Motorola’s Razr Ultra doesn’t have any of these problems, allowing users to rearrange their widgets, add apps to the app drawer, and set up a new clock and wallpaper combination directly on the 4-inch panel. It’s such a simple but meaningful difference that makes me wonder how anyone picks the Galaxy Z Flip over the Razr — and Samsung didn’t even take a few years off from the US market.

So, if Samsung’s foldable goals for 2026 are really as big as it says they are, I think it needs to make changes. I think if it really wants people to care about its next Galaxy Z Flip, it needs to start with its smallest display and work its way out.