• A photo has been taken of what appears to be the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8
• This is the rumored new wider foldable Samsung might be working on
• We've also seen a comparison image showing it alongside the more conventional Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra

The long-rumored Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Wide — which, confusingly, will reportedly launch simply as the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 — might be Samsung’s worst-kept secret, and now we’ve seemingly seen the phone in the flesh for the first time.

A photo shared on DCInside’s forum (via @UniverseIce) shows what appears to be the phone being used in a restaurant, presumably by a Samsung employee.

It’s housed in an anti-leak case, designed to hide the details, but you can see that it has a wider screen than a typical phone, and that there’s a dual-lens camera on the back.

Short and squat

If you’re wondering just how much wider than the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7’s successor — now reportedly called the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra — this device will be, @UniverseIce has also shared comparison images, as you can see below.

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra appears tall and narrow, and has a triple-lens camera, much like its predecessor, while the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 (Wide) has a shorter, wider appearance.

That should make the latter phone good for viewing wide-screen content like movies when unfolded, but it leaves it with a rather unusual form factor when folded and used like a conventional smartphone.

So, it will be interesting to see whether it’s successful, but given that the taller model apparently has the ‘Ultra’ suffix, it’s likely that this new wide version will be cheaper, and it’s also expected to be closer to Apple’s foldable iPhone Ultra’s form factor. Odd or not, then, it’s a form factor that Apple might be about to make popular.

In any case, we probably won’t be waiting too much longer for the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 and Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra, as both of these phones — along with the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 8 — will likely launch in July.

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James is a freelance phones, tablets and wearables writer and sub-editor at TechRadar. He has a love for everything ‘smart’, from watches to lights, and can often be found arguing with AI assistants or drowning in the latest apps. James also contributes to 3G.co.uk, 4G.co.uk and 5G.co.uk and has written for T3, Digital Camera World, Clarity Media and others, with work on the web, in print and on TV.