Samsung reportedly set to announce bone-conducting earphones at Galaxy Z Fold 7 launch

Samsung is rumored to launch the Galaxy Fold 7 sometime in July, and it appears as though the phone won’t be the only thing Samsung is bringing along to the party. Rumors suggest that they’ll also be debuting a pair of bone conduction headphones.

The rumor comes from noted leaker Ice Universe on Weibo, the Chinese social media site. Per the post (translated by Google Translate), Ice Universe says that “Samsung Electronics MX division will release bone conductive headphones at the Samsung Fold conference in July.” 

Details are limited, but Ice Universe says the codename of the headset is “Able” and it’ll use open wireless stereo (OWS) that “can transmit sound from around the ear instead of cramming the headphones into the ear.”

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Other details like availability, design, color, and pricing were not mentioned. 

This may be a language barrier issue, but OWS and bone conduction are two different technologies. OWS — also known as air conduction — are basically earbuds that sit close to the ear without being inside of it, and sound transmits into the user’s ear canal. Bone conduction attaches to the side of the user’s head and bypasses the ear by transmitting sound through the skull. 

So, as TechRadar notes, Samsung is certainly making something, but we’re not entirely certain if the new headset will use air conduction, bone conduction, or some mixture of the two. However, the most logical conclusion is that OWS refers to the open earbud design, similar to the Bose Ultra Open Earbuds, that sits on the outside of your ear. We may have to wait until July to know for sure. 

It would be a big step for Samsung as the bone conduction market is a little thin and could use a big player. For now, Shokz, Philips, and H2O top the market, so there is certainly room for the bone conduction space to grow. Consequently, if they are open wireless earbuds, Samsung would be joining Bose in tackling that newer market.